<p>Lets just cut to the chase....Colleges and our current education system is in my opinion the worst! I absolutely HATE our so called education system! Its disgusting! All college are a business and their consumers are the people they admit. Well guess what, many of these admitted students are cheating the system and that is the only reason they are getting in.
Let me introduce myself before those reading this thread think that I'm crazy (chances are you'll still think i'm crazy after reading my post though). I am currently a high school senior and I applied to six universities as a Political Science major...all in California. Those colleges are: UCSD, USD, SDSU, UCSB, UCI, and UC Davis. My stats are: 4.06 GPA, 1680 SAT score, 580 SAT II (us history) and 560 SAT II (literature). My EC: Girls Basketball for 2 years, Leader of multiple in school clubs, President of my schools AVID program for 3 years, Sunday School teacher for 4 years, Tutor for middle school students, Volunteer at a nursing home, and I've volunteered at my local hospital.
I was denied by 5 of the 6 universities listed above and I was wait listed at the other one: SDSU. All of my other schools were kinda considered reach school so getting denied by them, although it hurt, wasn't that bad. It was SDSU, a school I applied to as a so called safety school that really hurt. And please don't misunderstand, I wasn't hurt because I was wait listed, I was hurt because people with lower GPAs and lower SAT score than me got in. And honestly as horrible as this sounds, I feel robbed! You're going to think that I am lying about this and honestly I wish I were but many of the students that got in are people that I personally know and one girl got in with a 3.88 GPA and a 980 SAT score. 980. And no that score is not just math and critical reading alone, its all three. Other people that got in, got in with 3.2- 3.5 GPAs and applied under very popular majors at state such as business or bio-chem or even nursing. And I'm sitting here scratching my head wondering how a poly sci major, a major not as impacted as the three I just mentioned couldn't get in. I felt as though I let myself down, my family down, and my teachers down. Four years of rigorous AP classes and so many sleepless nights just to study for tests that would later mean nothing anymore. With all of that going on, I got even more annoyed to find out that people who want to go to school as bio chem majors and other very very populated majors are applying to SDSU and other schools under fake majors. Yeah, for a few months these students are agriculture majors, or mining majors, or even biblical studies majors. Then, once they get into a school they switch their majors! By the way, whoever told you that switching majors is hard is a liar, don't believe them! Its soooo easy!!! Why else would SOOOO many people be doing it!? At least I know I can get my kids into a good school without having them have to kill themselves over stupid high school grades that mean virtually nothing. They just have to lie and they're in. This is our education system today. I guess I have no one to blame but myself, I was naive and didn't even consider applying under a fake major. But after hearing multiple people with crazy low GPAs and SAT scores, (like the girl with a 980 SAT score) get in by lying about their major... I wish I had done the same thing. I really do. Its one thing to try hard at something and not succeed but when someone else succeeds at the same thing after not trying hard, its definitely a big slap in the face. I know that I sound pretty harsh and I do apologize about that in advanced but I'm just venting and I cant vent to a family member for so many reasons so i figured maybe others are going through the same thing and we can vent together. Needless to say, I'm not through with these so called higher education universities, I will not sit back and settle for Community College while a phony is enjoying their admission into SDSU. Again, I don't mean to be rude, I have nothing against CC, its just that Ive gone through school always having college in my mind and I'd just really like to leave high school and start my life in the real world at a real college.
To end, just in case some people don't believe that colleges are blind and are admitting liars listen to this...after my denial/wait list by SDSU, two other friends in the same situation with similar stats but are bio majors did a letter of appeal to state. After talking to a guy in person at SDSU we were told multiple times to not mention wanting to switch majors in our appeal. He said it would actually hurt our appeal rather than help it. So we listened to him. Another friend of mine with lower overall stats than us and got straight up denied by SDSU and she did an appeal too, only she did hers alone and turned it in a week earlier than us. She didn't get the memo of not asking to switch majors on your appeal (this was also emphasized on their website but she didnt know that) and she wrote in her appeal of wanting to go from a nursing major to a general health studies major, having it in mind that she'd switch back to nursing if she got in. Well after we told her that she made a big mistake by asking to switch majors she had lost hope in her appeal. Well two weeks ago she heard back from State and apparently her appeal worked. They admitted her under a new major: General Health Studies...
Message to SDSU: thank you for your fine work and may the graduating class of 2018 be super successful! Man, God bless our education system. </p>
<p>is that a UC gpa or a school gpa? Because school gpa is completely different and can vary per school, depending on the grading structure/environment.</p>
<p>Maybe your personality wasn’t what the UCs wanted</p>
<p>Service area is huge for San Diego State. If you’re from outside of commuting distance, it’s much harder to get in. </p>
<p>Have you talked to your college counselor about your plans? NACAC will be releasing the “space available” list this week, listing colleges that still have spots available in their freshman class.</p>
<p>Now lets not jump to assumptions, its obvious she is just frustrated and needs to vent. Not the first time i’ve heard the, “Should’ve applied for woman studies as a backdoor”. </p>
<p>Although I have heard of people doing that and it working out. I’d rather go to a school doing what i want to do instead of trying some wacky attempt to decieve the admissions office.</p>
<p>Also didn’t you apply to 6 other schools? If you had 12 schools on your list, wouldn’t you have atleast one backup plan in the event this would occur?</p>
<p>Not sure why you would think you can “switch” a major after a few weeks or months. It’s not that way at all. You can state a preference at admission that’s it. You can’t switch to a whole diffrent school (business, nursing, etc). Sorry but I think your listening to too many stories. </p>
<p>Well, a lot here, but I think you have a very unique situation. While there are plenty of criticisms to go around for the american education system, I don’t see many here but rather frustration from people who game’d one detail of the system. Understandable frustration, but you should try to keep your opinions more objective.</p>
<p>Now, to the two main issues at hand.</p>
<ol>
<li>Admissions not fully based on stats</li>
</ol>
<p>A lot of people have argued the reverse of your argument for some time now, that stats should not be everything in your application. For the girl with lower stats, maybe she had something in her app that got their attention. With a 980 on all 3 sections, perhaps she had a learning disability she doesn’t like to share with people, and the colleges took that into account with a decent GPA to counter it. I hope that speculation doesn’t offend anyone, I am just trying to think of situations that could explain this. She could have shown passion in a very specific area beyond academics. On the other side, you could have gotten a big no no on your application by accident. It could have been a bad rec, an essay that rubbed everyone the wrong way, who knows. I understand the frustration though. You should have realized that you would probably need a little something extra with your low SAT. One safety with that score is NOT enough, obviously now in hindsight.</p>
<ol>
<li>Switching Majors</li>
</ol>
<p>Switching majors and the difficulty of switching majors depends on the school and department. Your impression is probably gained from selective programs at already selective schools. I do not have data to back this up, but it seems to be a lot easier to switch as you get out of those “Most selective” schools category.</p>
<p>While switching with intent to switch back is not fully ethical, you’re going to find people at every stage of life who game systems. Keep in mind, it is not guaranteed that they will get to switch, though likely due. They are taking a risk.</p>
<p>Obviously school representatives will not encourage this action, and the ethics of it can be debated very well, but in the end it’s a way to game the system that people use without much way of changing it. They do take the risk of inability to switch back.</p>
<p>Sorry about your situation, I wish you the best of luck. Have you tried finding schools who still have admissions open? If you are set on going to college, you still may be able to. Other posters have more knowledge on this than I do.</p>
<p>While I am still in the venting stage, what I stated are facts. People really are getting in through fake majors and are later changing them to their preferred major. This is an issue that needs to be addressed because its so unfair! </p>
<p>Pengs: I took all of that into account and when I called SDSU they told me to “not compare myself to other people because the admissions team clearly saw something in them that they didn’t see in you.” Well what different or unique thing could the admissions team had seem? Not to seem like a complete jerk but remember that this is a CSU application. No essays. Just stats.
And to those who truly do believe that switching majors is harder than you’d think. I have so many family members who go or went to schools like Cal Poly, ASU USD, UCSD and even SDSU…they all vow that switching majors is a hassle but it isn’t by any means impossible to do. </p>
<p>I think that your SAT score might have been the issue…a 1680 is a little low, even for your so-called safeties. People I know who are attending places like USD and SDSU had scores in the mid-1800’s if not higher. And a school with a 30% acceptance rate should never be anyone’s backup school! As for majors, I believe that impacted ones are difficult to internally transfer to, so if somebody applied under a “false” major, they probably wouldn’t be able to switch into their actual top choice and would be hurting themselves in the process. </p>
<p>Hopefully you have some other good options. Best of luck!</p>
<p>I’m sorry all of this happened to you. Yes, there are times that one is told something that isn’t true when the consequences are severe. I will tell you that these are all selective schools, every single one of them. I want to also tell you that though change of some majors, or choice of some majors do make a difference in some situations, your major probably did not. Schools with subschools of Business, Engineering, Nursing, Performing Arts may have whole other criterion for acceptance and less flexibility in seats. When the number of nursing spots or engineering spots are full, that 's it. To change from there to the school of liberal arts could improve your chances. But once in the school of arts and sciences as you are with your major, it really does not usually change anything to change your major. Most of the time arts and sciences are flexible in terms of major changes and it’s easier to transfer into those schools from a specialty school (done all of the time) than out into one of those specialty schools within the school. And they don’t care if you change within that Arts and Sciences framework. So, you may well not have been told anything wrong. </p>
<p>Again, sorry and hugs. It’s stressful, I know and it doesn’t help when those who are supposed to be in the know are not helpful and give incomplete, incorrect or confusing info. It’s also not always a fair result. </p>
<p>
</p>
<p>Are u sure the 980 wasn’t on the 1600 point scale? Is it even possible to score a 980 on the 2400 point scale and not be clinically dead? </p>
<p>@EllieR0: I understand you frustration with the whole college admissions. Having gone through the process with my 2 sons these past 2 years has been frustrating, exasperating and at times dumbfounding. I agree with you that many times the admission decisions seem arbitrary. Why does someone get in with an SAT 980 vs 1680? What are the adcoms thinking??? Unfortunately we will never know. Regarding the issue of the changing majors by using the back door method, I believe it is many times hearsay more than fact. I am sure admissions is aware of this problem and the people stating that you can change easily is probably not telling you the whole story. I would assume you would have a maintain an excellent GPA to even have chance to change to an impacted major such as nursing. Having said that, I would like to point out a few mistakes I think you made in regards to your college list.<br>
- SDSU could never to counted as a Safety. Safeties in my opinion would have been schools with at least at 75% chance of acceptance.
- All of the rest of the schools you listed would have been reaches and you should have had a least 2 safeties and 2 matches on your list.
It is unfortunate as California residents and tax payers,our kids are unable to get into California Colleges. If you look at the preliminary STATS for the UC’s this year, there is an overall increase in OOS and Internationals which are being admitted at all of the campuses. $$$$ means more than our kids education.</p>
<p>I wish you GOOD LUCK and you will rise above this and come out a winner.</p>
<p>Thank you to @Gumbymom and @cptofthehouse your kind words mean a lot. While I agree that it was foolish of my to consider SDSU a safety school, at the time I honestly though I was a shoe in to getting in. Never in my wildest dream did I think id be in a position where I am complaining about colleges and Universities behind a keyboard. I just wish I knew what more I could have done to have been considered an acceptable applicant to these schools. Applying to colleges is a tough thing and this whole process has brought me to the lowest point ive ever been in a while. I do truly care about my education and so when this whole process fell out of my hands, I began feeling helpless. I am a person of faith and I do believe that there are better things in store for me and those in my situation. To end, best of luck to those better than me who where able to get into these Universities. </p>
<p>Where are you thinking of going to school now? You write very well, and tell your viewpoint well. I know you are hurting, but CA does have excellent schools from CC level on up. NY has tried to emulate the system and have done no where near the job. I think if you focus on the academics and work on the next steps, you are going to do well. Believe me, I don’t say that to a lot of the posters. I’ve been chastized for being mean or cruel just stating the facts. </p>
<p>Again, hugs to you and I wish it had not been such a harsh experience for you. I think you will do well where ever you go.</p>
<p>@cptofthehouse thank you once again. You truly are very kind! My friend and I applied to Point Loma Nazarene University after being denied everywhere else and wait listed at SDSU, just as a back up school. Ironically enough just hours before getting an email from state this morning informing us that we didn’t make it off the wait list, PLNU emailed us letting us know that we got in. I am very thankful to have had the chance to have been admitted somewhere but it is hard to commit to PL because I applied there just out of the spur of feeling rejected and they have a pretty strict religious code that every student must follow. And because I am of a different religion, that may be the deal breaker. And on top of that PLNU is fairly pricey. But I am currently scoping around looking for any University/College in my area that is still accepting applicants. My journey isn’t over yet:) </p>
<p>And worst case scenario, I end up at a CC. It’ll take some time to getting used too but it’ll be a humbling experience nonetheless.</p>
<p>Last year, both Arizona State and the University of Arizona still accepted applications at this point in the year…have you thought about those options?</p>
<p>The students who applied under different majors will face another admission process to change major, so they are not getting a “free lunch”.</p>
<p>Just go to CC and use <a href=“http://www.assist.org”>http://www.assist.org</a> to plan your course selection to transfer to the UC and CSU campuses of your choice.</p>