Chance a Junior [US citizen] from overseas interested in Math [and computer science]

[AustenNut]

@clockila

Are mid-tier UC’s that competitive for CS? I see Irvine/San Diego have 40% admit rates from my school and UC Davis had a 90% admit rate according to Admissions by source school | University of California. They may not have applied direct CS though (a few did CS at Berkeley but through Arts & Sciences not EECS).

As I said, I am not an expert in the California publics (or an expert, period). I do know that admissions are very major dependent at the UCs and that the admissions process for CS has gotten much more competitive even in the last year or two. Below are a few quotes from our resident UC experts from various threads that might illustrate your chances more knowledgably than I can.

@Gumbymom

I would put all the UC’s into the Reach Category since CS is impacted at all the UC’s and the selectivity rate is below 10% for all these campuses. UCI for example has a 7.1% admit rate for CS, while UCLA was 5.4% last year. Also the UC’s are test blind permanently so your excellent SAT score will not be considered.

The CS majors in L&S has been having lots of issues lately due to overcrowding and they’re anticipating that the requirements related to that major will soon change (a recent thread). If you want to be guaranteed access to CS, the CoE path is the better route to go at Berkeley. The entire College of Engineering rate is likely much higher than the CS rate as well.

@ucbalumnus

From OPA – University of California Berkeley , choose the Academic Indicators tab. “Last updated on October 22, 2021” for the “last 3 complete application cycles”.

GPA appears to be weighted, not capped. Calculate using GPA Calculator for the University of California – RogerHub

Admission rates only:

GPA	L&S	CoE	CoC	CNR	CED
3.800-4.000	6.3%	2.7%	4.5%	11.5%	8.7%
4.001-4.199	10.6%	3.9%	8.2%	23.7%	14.7%
4.200-4.399	21.8%	8.8%	17.5%	38.9%	29.1%
4.400-4.599	34.8%	16.4%	33.3%	53.0%	39.5%
4.600-4.799	40.9%	21.4%	39.6%	52.4%	49.4%
4.800-5.000	41.5%	20.7%	36.2%	46.1%	43.0%

This post shows how a CS GPA might be nearly 2 points higher than the rest of the school’s GPA if it’s a popular CS program.

@ucbalumnus

For SJSU CS, the frosh admission threshold was equivalent to a 4.35 GPA, although some students effectively got +0.25 add-ons for being in the local area.

However, most majors at most CSUs are not so competitive that the student taking that many additional courses (presumably a strong student with a high GPA) would have to worry about it (e.g. many majors at SJSU had frosh admission thresholds equivalent to a 2.60 GPA).

This post was written recently to a student with a 4.0UW GPA/4.56W GPA and a 35 ACT

@Gumbymom

For UCB and UCLA, CS will be a Reach. You are looking a 3-5% acceptance rates for CS at the top UC’s. Since CS is impacted at all the UC’s, many 4.0+ students have been waitlisted or denied at many of the UC’s, the past few years.

Target schools for CS in California where you would have a solid chance for acceptance are UC Santa Cruz, UC Riverside, Santa Clara, San Diego State, CSU Long Beach, Chapman University to name a few. UC’s like UC Davis, Irvine, Santa Barbara are no longer target schools for CS due to popularity and impaction.