<p>Can USC (University of Southern California) and UC Los Angeles be considered low safety schools, or would you say they are at the least a match for everyone? I'm looking into majoring in computer science and these are two of the schools I'm looking at for safeties.</p>
<p>HAHAHAHAHAHA. Unless MIT and Cal Tech are offering full rides, then I guess.</p>
<p>If you are from Cal and have good GPA/scores, they could eventually be safeties. In any other cases, don’t count on it.</p>
<p>I’m not from Cali but I have good scores - 3.9 gpa, 2300 SAT. (But I’m sure many applicants will have this) What my hook is is that I’ve won international competitions in music.</p>
<p>UCLA waitlisted tons of people with your stats from my school this year. It is definitely not a safety for you.</p>
<p>USCs acceptance rate was 18% this year. Safety is a relative term.</p>
<p>Then if not a safety do you think it could be a match? Or is it a reach for anyone?</p>
<p>3.9 is below the avg UCLA GPA for incoming first years. These are not safeties but could be a match, not a reach you have an excellent SAT score. I would advise applying as a music/computer science double major as your hook</p>
<p>When you’re in the range of stats that you are in (2100-2400 SAT and 3.90 UW GPA and above) it’s a complete crapshoot for both schools. Some will get in, some will not. There’s absolutely no way to tell so therefore you can’t call it a safety now, can you?</p>
<p>It is a total crapshoot because those two schools (esp berk) don’t weigh stats as heavily as say, ucsd.</p>
<p>don’t count on it, people with better stats were waitlisted/rejected.</p>
<p>3.9 UW is a below average GPA? I’ve gotten zero Bs and 2 A-s… the rest of my grades are As. My weighted is a 4.6… which is one of the highest the school has seen in the past few years. What is their average GPA then, fliqer?</p>
<p>@fliqer That’s a really good suggestion. I’ll definitely do that!</p>
<p>@muffincakes Then for a safety could I use UCSD? I was interested in their cs program also and was either going to apply to USC or UCSD and ended up choosing USC. However, if UCSD is a better safety then I would rather go for it. I don’t want to end up being one of those “waitlisted/rejected everywhere” people come next spring.</p>
<p>They are likely matches for you; just not a sure thing … for almost anyone.</p>
<p>If you call it a “match” you’re just going to be disappointed when you get that small envelope. Best not to call it anything and don’t think about it.</p>
<p>OK, so if a kid with stats like sesame wanted to major in CS, what California schools are safeties? 2300 is WAY over all CSU’s middle percentile, even Cal Poly. I repeat: what schools are safeties?</p>
<p>some kid from my school considered UCLA a safety but didn’t get in…</p>
<p>@ThousandMiles what were his stats?</p>
<p>UCLA and USC are selective enough that no one should consider them as safeties (though some may be able to consider them matches). Additionally, holistic admissions processes make stats-based predictions of admissions decisions less reliable.</p>
<p>As far as actual admissions safeties for the OP, the most ironclad ones are the non-impacted (for the computer science major) CSUs such as Chico, Dominguez Hills, Los Angeles, Northridge, Pomona, Sacramento, San Bernardino, San Francisco, assuming one meets minimum CSU eligbility.</p>
<p><a href=“http://www.calstate.edu/sas/documents/impactedprogramsmatrix.pdf[/url]”>http://www.calstate.edu/sas/documents/impactedprogramsmatrix.pdf</a>
[CSU</a> Campus Impaction Information | Student Academic Support | CSU](<a href=“http://www.calstate.edu/sas/impaction-campus-info.shtml]CSU”>http://www.calstate.edu/sas/impaction-campus-info.shtml)</p>
<p>Community college would be another assured admissions safety, but then applying to transfer would need to be done later.</p>
<p>Other assured safeties would be out of state schools where one can get automatic merit scholarships for reaching GPA and ACT/SAT thresholds (presuming that the scholarships come with admissions), such as the University of Alabama campuses in Tuscaloosa, Birmingham, and Huntsville.</p>
<p>In practice, such a student may also want to consider less selective schools as almost-safeties for admission even if admission cannot be 100% reliably predicted beforehand. Examples could be UCs like Davis, Santa Barbara, Santa Cruz, Riverside, and all CSUs (e.g. San Jose State) except for San Luis Obispo. Out of state, there are also Minnesota, Virginia Tech, North Carolina State, Massachusetts, and Stony Brook that may be worth checking (these are also somewhat less expensive at list price than many out of state public schools).</p>
<p>Remember that a true safety must be affordable. Check the net price calculators at the school web sites.</p>
<p>Recommendation would be include at least one ironclad safety (non-impacted CSU, community college, or some school like the Alabama ones with guaranteed merit scholarships for stats) in the application list. If some of the almost-safeties are more desirable than the ironclad safety(s), then include one or more of them. Then add any number of other schools to the application list.</p>
<p>@ucbalumnus Thanks! Great advice. I think I’ll just bump up USC and UCLA to the non-safeties list since I already have 2 other safeties which are true, solid safeties that I would likely also receive a scholarship from. I guess I don’t need as many safeties as I originally thought. Thanks again!</p>
<p>You might also want to calculate your UC GPA, since it differs from the one your school provides. I’m sure your counselor has a form where you can do that.</p>
<p>As long as you have schools that you’re sure you’ll get into and that you can pay for (and that you’d be willing to attend), you don’t need more safeties. Also, I’d suggest just applying to most of the UCs, since it’s one application anyway. Just see what happens.</p>