This is the most important thing you can take away from this thread. If you are applying to all the UC’s, it appears from what others have said, that you have some safeties. Again, I don’t know the UC system well enough to comment. However, please make sure that you are actually willing to attend any of those schools. I don’t want you to be one of the many kids who will post next spring, miserable, because you only got into your safety and you hate it. The best gift you can give to yourself are a couple of safeties that you LIKE and can afford. After you have that locked down, then go ahead and think about the others.
You keep asking how you can make your application stronger. I think you have already been given that advice. Some here think there is not much you can do. I and others think that you can keep working on your ECs and especially find someone to help you present yourself in the best light. Even if that won’t move the needle much on the very top schools, it will help a lot with the next tier down. However, we all agree that no matter what you do, your chances are minuscule at the very top. As @bogeyorpar said, (And I mentioned in an earlier post) as an Asian male CS hopeful, your chances are even less. You are a math kid. You should know what a 98% chance of rejection means.
There is a thread on here somewhere from an Asian male student who made headlines for being one of only 5 students in the nation to get a perfect score on the Chemistry AP. He had a higher GPA then you and excellent scores and he didn’t get into his top choices either. I wish I could find the thread.
No one is trying to denigrate your achievements. Clearly you are intelligent and have a bright future. We just don’t want you to be one of the many students that we have to talk off the ledge next spring.
Your ACT scores show that you are academically qualified for all of these schools but 3.7 GPA makes it unlikely. You need to show an upward trajectory for your GPA. Also, most the colleges you’ve listed have CS admit rates of less than 20%. So they are reaches even with a high GPA.
Sub 10% admit… More like 5%:
Stanford, Harvard, Princeton, MIT, Caltech, Upenn, Cornell, ?Brown?, CMU
Sub 20% admit… More like 10%:
Berkeley, UCLA, UCSD, Umich, USC
GaTech has a 19% admit rate for OOS, CS 10%
UIUC has a 60% rate for the school, CS 18% and you are OOS… So for you CS ~10%.
Higher than 20%:
All the other UC’s Cal Poly SLO
For reaches, I think you have a good chance at UCSD since you are instate. Maybe USC.
There are ways OP can improve his app. I agree there. But it’s a matter of trying to properly parse the advice given and seeing how you can apply it. A mark of the right sorts of drives is that openness- not asking, if I do X, can I get into this reach. And I mean personal willingness to view this in certain ways. Not the passive leaning on others to do it or tell. It starts with the individual.
I’m not sure OP recognizes the sort of competition this is. It’s not, “Yeah, but I’ll knock these one or two things out of the park, will that satisfy adcoms?”
@Huangmaster I applaud your goals but I think you need to adjust your list a bit. I know you have worked very hard in HS and it seems as if you should have a shot at all of the schools on your list. Almost every school on your list except for some of the UC’s are going to be a high reach for almost everyone as they are all very selective. Admissions is a crazy thing and it is hard to explain who gets in and why. When looking at CS programs see if the CS department is in engineering or not? Engineering programs are usually much tougher to get into. I heard USC’s Viterbi acceptance was under 10%. Look at University of Maryland they have an excellent CS program as well as Northeastern in Boston. Also as @gallentjill mentioned Purdue has an excellent CS programThey both have their own CS school instead of being in engineering. I always say if you aren’t going to reach for the stars when you are 17/18 when are you going to do it? That being said you need some schools that you like that will be more of a match or safety since so many of your schools are so selective. Best of luck!!!
I was going to suggest u Wisconsin, northeastern, and u Maryland for CS. They’d be excellent matches. Penn state would be a safety.
Apply to honors college at all.
Ugh, UCLA, UCSD for CS are basically out of reach but apply since C’s only requirebone app. If you wouldn’t be happy at UCSC for CS apply to more matches.
With UCs, Santa Clara, CPP, Cal polyslo, and USC you’d be covered.
(Add the other ones as very high reaches once you’ve done a good job on all of the above).
Do keep UIUC on your list and add Case Western. Consider U of Colorado Boulder which is now
ranked 40 in CS. While your grades are low for direct admit to CS at UIUC
and admission at all at Case Western, you
may be able to get into UIUC and work your way into your major. Check that carefully.
GaTech, your grades are too low, to get into College of Computing
but you may get into a math program there, maybe, I believe. GaTech is ridiculously
hard for OOS applicants today.
Ditto on all the Ivys and Michigan. Michigan is way way harder than GaTech for CS and OOS.
Aim lower to have success, but also order up your matches, so you do not apply to so many. Its just
a waste of money if you have an in state safety/match, like San Jose State??, or Cal Poly Pomona may
be a match for you in state.
Also many Ivys may not suit you, only chose the ones that have EECS, and forget the rest.
For instance, Dartmouth,its a five year engineering degree, do you want to spend five years in
rural New Hampshire?
Purdue, UIUC, and Case Western should be on your list.
You do seem to have a lot of relevant extracurriculars, and seem very hopeful to win a lot of prizes.
If you do, then your list can shift to the more competitive schools, but you have to focus a bit more
on studying and classroom tests to raise your GPA, to get into many of your desired programs.
Your B in BC calculus is a little troubling. Are you in a very highly ranked Los Angeles high school?
what math will you take in senior year? Can you get a tutor so you ace it?
Cornell offers binding ED that ups the admission %, but you are Asian male, which i the hardest gender/race to
get into any Ivy school, so it may be tough even with ED.
Think about whether you want the fast paced quarter system at Cal Poly, U of Cal or Stanford, will that suit your learning style? You could eliminate quarter calendar schools, if you feel its too rapid paced for you. Think about that. Berkeley is on a semester calendar, but hardly easy going.
https://cs.illinois.edu/admissions/undergraduate/transfer-students indicates that changing into CS after enrolling at UIUC is difficult (3.67 or higher college GPA, A- or higher in two CS courses, competitive application process (possibly two stage)). The partial CS majors are not as difficult to get into, but still not easy.
And the issue with counting on an internal transfer includes coming into that situation with the lower BC grade and STEM AP scores. At any point, once in a college, you could face disappointment. And there you are, in that college, wondering how to get back on track.
OP, being empowered to accomplish often rests on finding the right college for you, not based on prestige, but on your actual strengths- and weaknesses.
However OP may be stuck with getting into a school where a student must work one’s way into engineering and CS. such as Purdue, U of Colorado Oregon State or UIUC. That may be his only option, so he needs to keep that option open. I do not see how he can get into any U of California program, (besides Merced or one of the low ranked CS campuses which he clearly is uninterested in ) given how GPA is so important. He needs to get into a college.
He may well have to work his way into CS, no matter what, or aim much lower.
I know perfect GPA students, in state, who do not get into a CS major at UCSD. UCSD is harder for CS admissions than Berkeley lately, I don’t understand that, but thats the data I have. (about ten students, so not a lot of data )
If he does do well in the contests in CS he mentions, or his U of Southern Cal research, that could be his ticket.
He may qualify for spring admission at U of Southern Cal, but I almost doubt it with his grades. Spring admits
can take community college classes in Los Angeles and transfer everything. Since he is local that may work out as well, if he can do very well in his work at USC. But its just very hard to get in, with a lot of Bs and one C, into competitive schools.
He should look at U of Maryland, which is truly amazing in CS but may have a slightly lower standard for OOS.
Also, Rutgers U in New Jersey. He has an odd record, if you ask me, for very competitive schools, and being Asian American with lower grades is rather odd. Maybe though it makes him look “interesting” for some private programs, I don’t know. I assume his high school is very very competitive, which may help him in state and maybe out of state, if his high school is ranked well.
A student admitted to UIUC, UCI, UCD, Wisconsin, and Maryland without direct admission to CS (and not limited by cost constraints among these schools) may not find choosing UIUC to be a good idea if s/he really wants to do CS, since it is unlikely that s/he would be able to get into the major (and even the partial CS majors at UIUC are hard to get into).
It’s more than essays, as many have been saying, throughout 2 threads. Eyes wide open. We’d like to see OP find the right colleges for his actual record, the pattern of strengths and weaknesses, what he has tended to and what’s missisng. Not pie in the sky.
I don’t remember OP saying he was uninterested in these schools. I believe he said he would apply to all the UCs and did not exempt Merced. At least I hope this is what he means.
Along with Rutgers, what do you think of Stonybrook for this student?
The OP has Cornell, MIT, Brown, Penn on his list of dream schools, all east of the MISSISSIPPI!
I believe SUNY Buffalo is better for engineering and maybe CS, SUNY Stonybrook is very good for physics.
Buffalo is now the crown jewel of the SUNY system with high investments in engineering,
but its in one of the snowiest parts of New York State. Stoney brook is on Long Island
and more pleasant, with a train to NYC.
. However very few CA students or ANY OOS students apply to the fine SUNY system,
and its mostly in state kiddos. I think Maryland has way more OOS students and
more on the map for what the OP wants to study. Also Maryland and Rudgers are urban schools with urban kids,
although certainly some SUNY schools are very urban too.
given OP is from Los Angeles and Asian American he may prefer east coast urban, although he focused
on the very best ranks for CS, in his dream list. . JMO, but OP needs to get a clearer viewpoint of geography
and focus on narrowing his list, as well as upping his grades. Its tough! He is busy with a lot of great ECs
is the wild card for this student. It may pay off, his ECs.
If he wants an OOS safety, UT Dallas may be a good safety or Arizona State. Arizona State offers the Bennett Honors College, but his GPA may be too low to get in. Those are state systems with good CS and engineering, and since he may not have a viable safety in California, aside from Merced, or Riverside, which he may not want to attend, he may want to branch out to state systems with strong CS. If he needs direct admit, then UW Seattle, Oregon State, and maybe Purdue and U of Colorado are probably out, although Purdue does admit a lot of OOS middle of the road kids with strong math test scores. The B in BC Calculus is troubling though. His ECs may overcome it, but its hard to know if he should focus back on the classroom or spend time on programming and research work at USC. He has great options out there in LA for ECs but he is spread thin. I cannot remember if he is considering UC Davis. Davis is very strong as both an agricultural and engineering college. Hewlett packard in Roseville CA has invested and recruits from Davis.
I think to-date the stem ECs are math team and robotics, 15 hours of comm service. The rest is projected, has yet to come into play or barely started, no results to describe. That’s the rub.
IMO, here’s my last bit of advice. You have what you need as far as info, opinions, comparisons. 2nd tier UCs are not a safety anymore. Stay off of CC until you get your college entrance results back. Honestly speaking, if my kid (with the similar 4.0-4.1 UC GPA) had been listening to everyone when he did his Chance Me last year, he would be applying to UC-Riverside or Colorado School of Mines (no knock on them, they’re good schools). He only applied to the schools he liked (visited about 80% of the schools), took a couple out that were totally unrealistic and added a couple at the end. He applied to 6 reach schools and 6 match schools, no safeties, and he got into his #1 school, one of the reach schools. Chances are, if you apply to the first and second tier UCs, you might get shut out, but you might also get 2, 3, 4 of them also. Who knows? You can also improve odds by choosing less-impacted majors as well, if getting into a given school is paramount.
Okay. I have my safeties sorted out and am mostly confident about my matches. I’d like to come up with a strategy to increase my odds of getting into UCB or UCLA. Given my stats, is EECS out of the question? Would I need to go the L&S route to have a shot of getting in?