Applied to Cal Poly SLO in 2022? Decisions are expected sometime before April 1st. Last year, decisions were released on February 23rd. This is a space to connect with other applicants and share stats, news or admissions updates. Good luck everyone!
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Thanks for creating this thread. My daughter is anxiously waiting and hoping to be able to agonize between UCSB and SLO.
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Hi!
SLO is my son’s first choice. He applied to 12 other schools, but he’s not really considering any but SLO and CPP. He’s going for CS, so we recognize it’s tough to get in.
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Good luck to your son. I hope your son will get into SLO. My son was rejected by SLO, but got accepted to CPP last year. I think CPP’s CS is under the Math department whereas SLO’s CS is under the Engineering department. I remember that there were many students with lower GPA than my son got accepted to SLO CS, so they must have looked at something else more than GPA.
Yeah, CPP’s CS is in the science dept while SLO’s is in the engineering. I suppose it doesn’t matter that much which college it’s in, but to me it seems like it fits in engineering better.
And yeah, SLO has a long list of criteria that they look at in addition to GPA (number of certain A-G courses above the minimum, EC hours, work hours, leadership, major-related, and more). DS is strong in those areas, but with a 10% acceptance rate in CS, perfect candidates still get rejected. I’ve prepared DS for that fact. Now we just cross our fingers.
Where did you find SLO’s CS acceptance rate? Actually my son is now attending UCSD CSE, but they never disclose the acceptance rate. I kept researching, but no success. I only know that UCLA and UCB have disclosed this info, but no other UC or CSU schools.
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SLO posts Target projections for each major. The issue is that they do not post yield and how many applicants are accepted by major. So using a default yield of 33%, last year that expected 5838 Freshman applicants for CS with 205 spots available. If the yield is 33%, they would admit 3X as many spots which is 615. 615/5838 gives a 10.5% acceptance rate.
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UCSD is awesome. One of my son’s older friends is there for CS. DS applied there too, but we don’t think it’s the best fit for him. He’s looking for smaller class sizes and the opportunity to really get to know his teachers. That pretty much rules out the larger UCs and CSUs. He was accepted to SDSU, but again… large impersonal classes for most GE classes. Honors college could address that, but his Engineering teacher really likes CPP and SLO and recommended both to him.
S2 applied for CompE OOS. It’s an outlier for him, and the admissions process seemed kind of odd, and discounted some of his strong points, but the practical nature of the courses appealed to him.
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Yeah, the application does feel very impersonal. There are parts of it that benefit my son greatly (extra credit for additional classes like math and science; number of hours of EC and work, leadership/major-related), but other areas that they ignore that could have be fitted him (the nature of his ECs and work.)
I’m personally relieved they’re test blind. We had 3 SATs cancelled on DS at the last minute (very stressful and frustrating for him) and I was becoming pretty SAT-hostile by the end. I’m trying to figure out how kids at our school managed to qualify for NMS (I’m guessing some of the test dates probably happened after I gave up and told DS he didn’t have to test.)
At this point I just have my fingers crossed.
I found SLO’s admission criteria was very random. Last year both my son and his friend applied to SLO. His friend had lower GPA and less ECs than my son. They both applied for CS. My son had only two B’s in his HS career. He was a president of robotic team. He tutored for four years, and dual enrollment to local community colleges. He completed 7 APs. While his friend was waitlisted, my son did not hear anything from school for long time, but in the end he was rejected. Not even waitlisted.
If you read last year’s thread, you will find so many kids with amazing GPA and ECs were rejected, while kids with lower GPA got accepted. It’s very random.
I just found it odd that they didn’t want to know about test scores, or essays, and the details of many of his achievements, yet was asked if his speech, movement, and appearance was “gender conforming”.
How did we get to a place where that is of more importance to a school than his test scores, essays, etc ?
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Cal states have always used a limited # of application criteria for admission. Up until going test blind, most of the CSU’s mainly used the CSU GPA and test scores to determine an eligibility index where students were ranked based on this index and major. Since going test blind, they have changed some of their admission criteria.
Here is a handy chart to show what each campus will consider:
https://www.calstate.edu/attend/counselor-resources/Documents/2021%20-%202022%20CSU%20Campus%20Admission%20Factors%20Summary.pdf
Cal Poly SLO has always been the outlier using other criteria beyond just stats (although still the most important) which included EC hours, major related job hours etc… under their MCA process.
The Cal states mission has been to advance and extend knowledge, learning, and culture, especially throughout California so they target in-state and local applicants.
There are many colleges in the US that are stat based just like the CSU’s.
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At this point, SLO needs to move to holistic review with essays. Its too competitive a school to be bogged down by CSU rules that limit the # of variables used in selection. Without SAT, essays, or even a detailed description of the ECs I can’t imagine how the admissions office can even pick among applicants.
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Do you know what “QR” and “Crs” mean from that chart?
Crs = Courses so they are looking at the type of Math, English, LOTE courses taken
QR Crs= I believe it stands for Quantitative Reasoning courses
Here is some new information regarding CSU a-g course requirements which are being considered:
The CSU is investigating a proposal to add one year of quantitative reasoning coursework to the “a-g” subject admission requirements, raising the requirements from 15 years of comprehensive college preparatory coursework to 16 years for the entering first-time freshman class of 2027.
To satisfy the requirement, students would have many options, including:
- an additional “c" – mathematics course (with Algebra II as a prerequisite)
- an additional “d"- science course (beyond the two required),
- or a “g"-elective course that has quantitative reasoning foundation (subjects could include computer science, coding, engineering, statistics, personal finance, etc.).
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Well, that will be up to SLO on deciding how to proceed with their admission review. It has been suggested many times that they should use similar UC criteria for their application so we will see if the whole CSU system will initiate an overhaul since I believe they will follow the UC lead and become permanently test blind.
Ya, I don’t know if SLO can ignore CSU’s rules.
For example, the CSU’s are pressuring SLO to switch from quarters to semesters, again. Thankfully, it’s planned for the 2025-2026 school year, and with any luck, my D21 will be out of there by then.
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They have been talking about switching to semesters since my son’s S13 and S14 went through the application process. CPP finally relented so it should be interesting to see if this will happen.