Chance me plz! I need some honest opinions (UCs, USC, Brown, CMU, UMich, Boston U etc) [CA resident, 3.93 GPA, 3.95/4.16/4.26 for UC, psychology]

Chance Me / Match Me!
, , , , ,
21

Not all UC campuses admit by major.

For UCB, Psychology is a High Demand Major so you need to list Psychology as your first choice major for the best chance to pursue that major.

https://ls.berkeley.edu/ls-high-demand-majors-first-year-students

For UCLA, UCSB and UCD, Psychology is in the College of Letters and Sciences which does not admit by major so you can still select Psychology as your major. No advantage if you select Undeclared.

For UCSD and UCI they admit by major and will consider an alternate major so you can be admitted into your Primary major, alternate major and sometimes Undeclared

UCSC admits into a ā€œ proposedā€ major which is similar to Undeclared since you need to take pre-req courses before you can declare.

UCR and UCM admit by major, will consider an alternate major and changing majors later is not too difficult. This is very dependent upon which major you may switch into especially CS or Engineering.

My advice is to apply to the major you want to study.

3 Likes
22

That depends on the college (specially the CA colleges) - and you can look that up for the colleges you consider applying to.

For very many colleges, you wouldnā€™t need to submit/report your AP scores until AFTER you have been admitted. They wouldnā€™t be used for acceptance decision, but will be used to give your course credits, or possibly allow you to skip an entry-level class.

But, for yourself, if your ā€œstandard testingā€ scores generally are not reflecting the high grades your school is handing out - then either you just donā€™t ā€œtest wellā€, or they donā€™t do a good job at exam preparation - or, maybe their grades are too generous to please the parents?

23

If there is a real possibility that you might apply to medical school in the future, then you should budget for a full 8 years of university where the last 4 years will be expensive. Even doctors do not make enough money to make it easy to pay off medical school debt.

Also, it is relatively common for people with a bachelorā€™s degree in psychology to want to pursue some form of graduate school. While a PhD is usually funded, a masterā€™s degree usually is not.

And if you are ā€œeligible for some aidā€ then it sounds like paying $350,000 for a bachelorā€™s degree plus another $450,000 for an MD might involve debt, and might involve a lot of debt.

What this means to me is that cost matters. You should run the NPCs, and see what each of the schools that you are considering is likely to cost. Saving money for medical school or for some other form of graduate school is a good plan.

However, there is also good news. There are a LOT of universities that are very good for psychology and that also are very good for premed. This includes most and more likely all of the Universities of California, and the CSUā€™s, and you are in-state.

With regard to applying to Brown ED, the main thing that occurs to me is that you first need to figure out what it would cost (run the NPC). If it is going to be significantly more expensive than the UCā€™s then I would be reluctant to apply ED. You might want to avoid ED, and get to compare offers from quite a few schools before you decide where to go.

Wherever you attend, your premed classes will be full of very strong students and will be very challenging. Exams will be tough. This will be true at Brown or WUSTL or Duke, but will also be true at UC Riverside or UC Merced or at one of the CSUs.

If you look at the students at pretty much any medical school, you will find that they got their bachelorā€™s degrees at a very wide range of universities. A couple of years ago I got to listen in to the welcome reception for a highly ranked DVM program (veterinary medicine) and got to hear where each incoming student got their bachelorā€™s degree. It was rare to hear the same school named twice.

Also, to me it does sound like you are doing very well. I do like your ECs. Make sure that you apply to at least two safeties, keep the budget in mind, and I think that you will continue to do well.

1 Like
24

uc gpa:
3.95 (uw)
4.26 (w)
4.16 (capped)

25

Here are some admit rates for the UCā€™s. The UC Capped weighted GPA listed is the overall 25-75% percentile for the campus and not specific for the Psychology major. Some campuses do have major specific admit rates and some do not.

2022 Psychology admit rates if available

Campus Psychology
UC Berkeley 4.4% UC Capped GPA 4.15-4.29
UC Davis 37.9% for College of L&S UC Capped GPA 4.03-4.27
UC Irvine 28.6% UC Capped GPA 4.07-4.28
UCLA 10% for College of L&S UC Capped GPA 4.20-4.31
UC Merced 89% UC Capped GPA 3.48-4.08
UC Riverside 48% UC Capped GPA 3.76-4.18
UC San Diego No data but estimated 20-25% UC Capped GPA 4.11-4.29
UC Santa Barbara 27% For College of L&S UC Capped GPA 4.13-4.29
UC Santa Cruz 42% UC Capped GPA 3.86-4.22

I would say UCM, UCR and UCSC are Very Likely/Likely schools
UC Davis would be a Target school
UCSB, UCI and UCSD are High Target/Low Reach schools
UCB and UCLA are Reach schools.

Best of luck and hope you get into Brown ED.

1 Like
26

my schoolā€™s ap teachers like to say that they donā€™t ā€œteach for the testā€ and would rather teach so the students ā€œunderstand something to apply to lifeā€ so oftentimes we donā€™t go over the full course thoroughly. However, my ap scores are usually 4ā€™s or 5ā€™s with the occasional 3 (in calc ab) just got my sat as a 1400 so Iā€™m going to try to retake

27

This topic was automatically closed 90 days after the last reply. If youā€™d like to reply, please flag the thread for moderator attention.