I’m a senior who wants to major in CS. My stats: Female, California. SAT: CR:800, M:700, W:740 (2240). GPA: around 4.5-4.8. A lot of APs (10+ by the time I graduate), almost all 5s, ECs: Girls Who Code, internship, work experience, but not that strong. Colleges I want to apply to are CMU, CalPolySLO, UCBerkeley, UCLA, Harvey Mudd so far. I know that a lot of those are reach schools for me and I’m not even sure what a match school for CS would be. I know people who got into Stanford but rejected from CalPoly so I can’t really tell. I’d like to apply to more UCs but I don’t know which ones other than Berkeley and LA have good/ decent CS programs. I’m looking for UCs and also other out of state schools that are match or safety in admissions but also schools where I can get significant financial aid based off of merit because my family is middle class and owns a house that on paper makes it look like we have more money than we do. My household makes 90k so I don’t apply for a lot of aid but can’t really afford a lot.
You should be able to find good CS at all UCs and most CSUs.
UCSD has an excellent CS program (on par with LA & Berkeley), UCI is quite good too for CS, as is UCSB, and even UCSC. CMU and Harvey Mudd are tops but bear in mind that the competition/work load is crushing, and their CS programs are as difficult to get into as Stanford and MIT (in other words, a reach for everyone). Considering the financials I’d recommend you shoot for a UCSD, UCI and UCSB, which you have a good chance of getting into with those stats. Honestly for CS which college you get the degree from won’t matter as much as your real life chops, so if you can get into a UC, don’t go into debt for a private college unless they give you a scholarship.
In addition to UCs (as backup options), look at OOS schools that might offer scholarships in the form of in-state tuition to girls studying CS, as well as private STEM-focused colleges with a large male/female imbalance as they will want to attract more girls for STEM majors, and where you have a good chance of a scholarship. For example, U of Alabama is giving out a lot of scholarships to attract OOS students. On the private side, my daughter recently got a scholarship for engineering at RPI (which has a 70/30 male/female ratio) which made it cheaper than in-state school; RPI is also excellent in CS, so one worth looking into.
However, UCSD should not be considered anything close to a safety for getting into the CS major, due to the major’s huge popularity there. Applicants may be admitted to UCSD but not in the CS major; if they enroll, getting into the CS major later will be very difficult (recent cutoff college GPAs of 4.0 and 3.9): http://cse.ucsd.edu/CappedMajor
For a safety, I would recomend schools that will offer you top scholarship money. That way it becomes a valid choice by itself, rather than just a place you go if you cant get in elsewhere.
You should qualify for several of these
http://automaticfulltuition.yolasite.com/
CS degress are offered almost everywhere.
I would imagine that San Diego State, San Jose State both qualify as safeties for you.
Have you considered [WUE schools](http://wue.wiche.edu/search_results.jsp?searchType=all) at all? Colorado State, Montana State University, University of Utah might be worth considering.
My son had slightly lower stats than yours, but had extensive CS work experience and several coding trophies. He didn’t get into CS at either Cal Poly or UCSB (which he thought of as in-state safeties), but he did get into CMU and some other top programs and got generous merit aid from several excellent schools. We are still shaking our head at the strange outcomes of his application season. So it’s really good to make plans outside of CA for safeties. It also depends on your high school peers, as his public high school was ridiculously competitive. His result: RPI with nice merit aid.
@belmom — fascinating outcome (accepted at CMU for CS but rejected at the California schools). Congrats to your son.
Have you asked your parents how much they’ll pay each year? none of the UCs or CSUs may be safeties if your parents won’t pay for them.
How much will they pay each year…ask them.
Being female, I believe that both WPI and RPI may be matches/safeties. Check their NPC to see what kind of financial aid they provide.
@belmom - My D had almost identical experience as your son, with similar stats to OP, didn’t get into UCSB (her safety), but accepted at CMU and enrolled at RPI (her other safety) with merit.
I can vouch for @ucbalumnus response. I got into UCSD, but as an undeclared major instead of CS. Chose UCI over it, attending in just a few weeks 
CS at UCSD is very, very impacted
https://cs.pitt.edu/undergrads/coop
University of Pittsburgh has a good program, and co-op opportunities.
^and with your stats you have a chance at merit
@chagall : (cool name) Apply to UCSC, SDSU, and SJSU for CS safeties. WPI, RPI, Case Western are good matches if the NPC shows they’re affordable - as a girl applying to CS, they’d likely provide preferential packaging anyway. What about Olin?
90K is not that much at top “meet need” colleges and you should get decent financial aid if your parents’ assets (especially, real estate) are in synch with that.
That income level may qualify you for over $50K in need-based grant aid at those “meet need” colleges.
http://www.usnews.com/education/best-colleges/paying-for-college/articles/2015/09/14/colleges-that-report-meeting-full-financial-need
At Harvey Mudd for example, for a family earning $90K with $90K in home equity and 2 children (one in college), the estimate I get is $55,900 in need-based grant aid, for a net price of $14,755 (according to the College Board NPC). That’s before applying “self help” (student loans, work study).
According to Cal Berkeley’s NPC, for the same income level but no assets (it doesn’t ask about home equity), I get an estimated net cost (after grant aid but before “self help”) of $20,377.
A realistic amount of “self help” might be about $8K/year.
Your Mileage May Vary. Of course, both Berkeley and Mudd are very selective. Less selective match/safety schools may not be as generous with n-b aid. However, some of them may be more likely to kick in significant amounts of merit aid.
Olin is a safety for nobody.
Santa Clara should offer you good merit, and location in Silicon Valley wonderful for internships and employment.
Good luck!
OP as I remember home equity/market value is not asked for by FAFSA. And since you asked about SAFETY schools, it’s unlikely that any of your safety schools will use CSS Profile (where they do ask for it, but it’s impact is capped). So I don’t think this will impact your aid at safety schools.
As others have said, it is really important for you to sit down and discuss how much your family can contribute.
If you were looking at the east coast, I would tell you some decent match/safety schools would be WPI/RIT and probably RPI, U Rochester, UMass (CS program is very good with decent career prospects), U Maryland, SUNY Stonybrook.
Of these, I think you’d get pretty good aid at the first 4. The others would probably be about the same net cost but could even be higher because you are out of state.
But since you are in CA, I think your best bet for a match/safety would be one of the UCs mentioned earlier.
Definitely run cost of attendance calculators, they will give you a pretty accurate view of what you are going to have to spend. IIRC Rochester et al have merit aid calculators as well.
What about U Washington? Not sure how CS admissions works there though.
RPI is not a safety school. Match yes but probably not safety.
Your Math SAT score is below average for that school, based on past stats,
and they are getting more selective. Your other scores are above avg,
but Math would be most important for a CS major.
Engineering schools in general are getting more and more competitive each year recently.
Yes a female applicant has a huge advantage but must have the grades. Maybe more
of a safety for you than a boy, but I don’t think RPI a safety for too many kids.
They just enrolled their record largest freshman class ever, will likely be even more selective this year
since the school has become so popular. We went to info sessions and it was standing room only
filled with really bright kids, and apparently many more of them accepted/enrolled than prior years.
WPI is a bit less selective than RPI, and at least a match, maybe a safety for a female engineer.
They are test optional, which means their avg SAT stats are slightly inflated but it has become a very very
popular school recently.
For east coast, another match/safety is Stevens Institute of Technology.
They also give large merit awards and are in a nice location if you want a view of Manhattan from campus !
We visited all 3 and my son got into all 3 with merit awards, having higher math scores
but lower reading/writing scores than you. Just saying, they are all getting tougher each year,
for popular majors like CS and ENG.
Would have been happy at any of them but he ended up at RPI and loves it so far.
PS
I agree with the Stony Brook comment also. SUNY is cheap for out of state students compared
to other states, and it has a good CS department. Buffalo is a safety, Stony Brook a match/safety.