<p>I was wondering if it was harder to get into SPECIFIC programs at UIUC. Like I know it's already more competitive to get into UIUC's engineering school, on average, but is it even more competitive to get into UIUC's Materials Science and Engineering program if you applied to that specifically?</p>
<p>I think you will have to check with each major. I think someone earlier said that Bioengineering was really hard to get in because they have a very limited amount of spots. But it’s impossible to know for sure because U of I doesn’t release that information.</p>
<p>Drusba can correct me, but from what admissions and academic deans have told me, getting into the College of Engineering as a whole is independent of major. </p>
<p>Once admissions selects students for the college, students are filed into majors based on credentials. If a major fills, students will then be offered an alternative major still in the College of Engineering. </p>
<p>In other words, getting into a specific major can be more competitive (due to demand/popularity) but not being admitted to a specific major does not mean that you are not accepted into engineering at all.</p>
<p>Yes, there are varying degrees of difficulty for admission per major. The one with a significant difference in engineering is bioengineering, a fairly new program with limited seats and signifcantly lower admission rate than other engineering programs. Beyond that there are differences that can vary from year to year depending on number of applicants per major in comparison to seats available but those are not large differences. Usually if you are looking at the small degrees of differences in difficulty beyond bioengineering, the more to less difficult would usually be CS and electrical and computing engioneering, followed by mechanical and materials and aero and chemical, followed by civil followed by nuclear, industrial and then General Engineering (an actual major) the easiest to get into of the group (but do not assume huge difference in difficulty) Usual process in engineering is to decide first whether you will be admitted to chosen major, then, if not, whether to offer you an alternative engineering major (which for many may be general engineering), and then if not, you are evaluated by another college as an alternative (usually DGS).</p>
<p>The University of Illinois is one of the few schools (U-Mich, Wisc, and Purdue) to admit directly into a selected program, as specified on the application, within the Engineering College. If you’re grades, scores and interests as expressed in your essays support your selected program of choice, you are directly admitted into the program. At other schools your simply admitted into their First Year Engineering programs, and if you later meet the requirements for admittance into a specific program, you apply for a limited number of open slots competing with many others that want to get in too. I actually like the certainty associated with UIUC as opposed to the two tier competition for slots in specific engineering programs at other universities.</p>
<p>If your grades/scores etc don’t get you admitted into your program of choice, they can choose to admit you to an alternate program of their choosing, or General Engineering, or, if your application is strong enough to get you admitted to the university, but not strong enough for engineering, you can get admitted to DGS (Division of General Studies).</p>
<p>Either way, you can take the same courses that program-admitted engineering students take. If you do well, you can transfer into your desired program for your sophomore year.</p>
<p>My conversations with admissions indicated that interest in particular programs within the college of engineering vary from year to year, so it can be more competitive or less so depending on the number of applicants selecting that major in that year. So your chances vary yearly.</p>
<p>As Cool states Drusba is the resident expert here, and can correct any information that may be off target. He may even be able to tell you how competitive to this point, interest in a given program has been…but I don’t think they have the stats yet.</p>
<p>Good luck getting into your program. Hope this helps.</p>
<p>The man checked in while I was typing!..</p>
<p>I realize that I wasn’t clear above. U-Mich, Wisc and Purdue do not admit you directly to your intended major. Only Illinois does as far as I know.</p>