<p>I plan to apply to colleges such as UCLA, Stanford, Berkeley, Caltech, etc.. and I've realized that I have no idea what career path I want. I'm curious to know whether putting "Undecided" for major choice will affect my chances of getting into schools such as those 4. In addition, I've also noticed that a lot of these schools, more specifically the UCs, have colleges dedicated to certain majors (Henry Samueli school of engineering, college of letters & science). Suppose that I put "Undecided" as a major and let's say that I get accepted into Berkeley or UCLA. During the two months vacation I have, I think "Hey, I wanna be an engineer now!," or "Hey, I wanna study neuroscience!" can I still attend their engineering school or science school(duno, if this is letters and science) despite putting "Undecided" as my major choice?</p>
<p>1) There's no problem with putting Undeclared or Undecided. Most colleges know that kids change their minds; some schools actually prefer Undecideds.</p>
<p>2) Not sure about UC, but for most universities with specific schools, you must apply to that school within the university. You can't just apply, for example, to Boston University. You apply to the School of Education, the School of Arts & Sciences, the School of Engineering, etc. How easy it is to switch between those schools differs from university to university - this is a question you need to address to each school.</p>
<p>However, it is usually not difficult to change majors within the same school (e.g. to switch from Biology to Philosophy if both are housed within the College of Arts & Sciences).</p>
<p>Colleges vary. Contact the particular college. At MIT it made no difference and there were no separate applications for different schools (even though there are different schools), but it's different at other places.</p>
<p>For UCs, the undeclared is per college. For example, you have undeclared for CAS and undeclared for College of Engineering. The undeclared of college of engineering is the hardest to apply to especially at UCB, because it can be stipulated that student who applies to this major use it as backdoor to their EE/CS major which is very competitive to get in.
My D originally was undeclared but changed her mind to something that her EC/activities/academic interest can prove that she is genuinely interest in her intended major. It makes it easier for her to write her UC essay #1. It makes it easier for her to get very specific scholarship. Granted all college students are technically undeclared.</p>
<p>^ So if my EC's don't directly tell what I'd be interested in, would it be better to apply undeclared?</p>
<p>I want to apply as a Bio Science major for UC's, but I don't have many EC's related to that.</p>
<p>I don't know what to tell you but my D has strong test scores(Bio SAT subject is near 800) and some ECs related to Bio, but she did not put Bio. If this is the only strong academic interest she has, I would suggest undeclared in CAS. Luckily she has 2 strong academic interests as well as ECs to prove it. However, keep in mind that UCs have a lot of money for biotech/bio research, if you put a biology as your major you might win some merit money. My niece and nephew got in on Regents Scholarships for bio. In D's case, D is not looking at merit aid. It's nice if she gets them but if she gets into her top UC choice that would be better than merit money.</p>
<p>OK, going back to the post. </p>
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During the two months vacation I have, I think "Hey, I wanna be an engineer now!," or "Hey, I wanna study neuroscience!" can I still attend their engineering school or science school(duno, if this is letters and science) despite putting "Undecided" as my major choice?
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<p>So, like let's say I pick undecided for UCLA's college of letters and science, and let's say that I get accepted. Suppose I decide "Hey, I changed my mind, I wanna be a chemical engineer!," can I still get into the School of Engineering during my first year? I really don't know how changing majors work, so let's say I can't do that, what would happen?</p>
<p><em>bump</em> 10 chars. Please, I'm very worried because I'm undecided on what I want.</p>
<p>I read in the UCB thread that it does not matter what major you declare, you may have to reapply to your own major in junior year.
I have a friend whose daughter got accepted in as a transfer student to UCLA with a women studies major but she graduated 3 years later as a CS major. I think it's definitely possible.</p>
<p>If you want to go into the Engineering fields (or even have an inkling for doing so) for the UCs (especially Cal), then I suggest you put down that major as it will be very hard for you to transfer into that major later on. However, for most other majors/universities, it shouldn't matter too much as they understand students change majors around 2 times their time at the school.</p>