My son was recently accepted to Cal Poly SLO for General Engineering major because he is not yet certain what emphasis he would like to focus on. We see that he can change his major at the end of his Freshman year. Can anyone comment on how easily this transfer of majors is and any drawbacks. The General Engineering degree is not ABET accredited so he definitely will not stay with that major. Thanks!
This page is a good resource for information on changing majors WITHIN the College of Engineering (CENG): Changing Majors Within the College of Engineering - Engineering Student Services - Cal Poly, San Luis Obispo
The above linked page says to “Please review Cal Poly’s Change of Major policy in full.”
That page says that “In determining standards for major changes, a department representative may consider the following criteria when considering students’ requests: a. Eligibility for the proposed major at the time of admission.”
In other words, your student wants to find out whether his admission / MCA score based on recalculated HS GPA, courses taken beyond the minimum, etc. would have gotten him admitted to any of the other majors he is interested in.
I am not sure about that. The page seems to say that the admission / MCA score is not used for changing majors WITHIN engineering. The page states,
If you are changing your major within the College of Engineering, you do NOT complete the university inquiry portlet through the My Cal Poly Portal. You are eligible to change if you meet the guidelines and requirements outlined below.
The portlet is basically an MCA lookup tool, which determines whether you would have been admitted to the target major as a first year student. If CENG students don’t need to complete the portlet, it suggests to me that the MCA is not used in changing from one CENG major to another.
The mention of “guidelines and requirements outlined below” seems to refer to the Cal Poly GPAs listed under each engineering major on the page.
A significant number of GEs change majors. The barrier to move is lowered for a few majors, because they know many enter as undecided. For example, to change into ME, you need a 2.75 cumulative Cal Poly GPA. GEs only need a 2.0 though. No matter the destination major, keeping grades as high as possible will be important.
I wonder why it is that the GEs need to meet a lower threshold? (I don’t expect anyone to know the answer to this - I’m just pondering out loud! 
)
@eyemgh can you confirm that the statement on the web site (“If you are changing your major within the College of Engineering, you do NOT complete the university inquiry portlet through the My Cal Poly Portal”) means that your stats at the time of freshman admission (MCA) are not considered when considering eligibility for change of major within CENG? Is it true that only the admitted CENG major and Cal Poly grades are considered?
I don’t know the answer to that question. The posted information seems conflicting, as @ucbalumnus pointed out. If my student was in that boat, I’d just have them call the CENG and ask.
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