<p>UCSD</a> to End TAG Program in Fall 2012</p>
<p>Just read this article this morning, and it seems like the end of UCSD TAG is official, although i think there was already lots of speculation and rumors of that happening. Just wanted to post it up here for those who were planning to TAG next year and maybe to discuss the future of UC TAG's in general.</p>
<p>Yeah, this is super unsurprising.</p>
<p>UCSD has been complaining about their TAG participation for years. It makes sense, I suppose. Many of their programs are ranked as highly as UCLA’s, who doesn’t offer any sort of TAG (such as their undergrad engineering programs, which are tied with UCLA according to USNWR’s 2012 rankings: <a href=“http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/engineering-majors/1213609-usnwr-2012-best-undergraduate-engineering-programs.html[/url]”>http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/engineering-majors/1213609-usnwr-2012-best-undergraduate-engineering-programs.html</a>).</p>
<p>I think that they’re hoping this will improve their image/keep them from being regarded as just a ‘safety school’ for those hoping to get into Cal/UCLA.</p>
<p>They’re probably right, but I feel bad for those who had hoped to TAG for 2013.</p>
<p>3.9 avg gpa for admitted non taggers? That’s BS lol SD really wants to boost their level of prestige</p>
<p>3.9? I talked to someone in admissions and they said 3.5-3.6 was avg</p>
<p>At the end of the article it said 3.9</p>
<p>its more of popularity than prestige. I found an article from a newspaper in San Diego. I could try to search for it again…</p>
<p>When they first started the tag program, maybe 800 transfer students applied to UCSD… 3 years ago say 4,000…then last year about 11,000. UCSD has gained recognition and students have responded by wanting to go to the school. Application numbers have exploded. UCSD cannot afford to guarantee admissions anymore since so many want to come to UCSD. I think this cycle had 14,000 applicants.</p>
<p>I’m very curious to see what this year’s admissions numbers will look like.</p>
<p>It should be about equal. Last year they admitted 45% of applicants. I would think this year around the same percentage, so more students getting admitted than last year (since the number of applications dropped this year).</p>
<p>here is a good read: </p>
<p>[UCSD</a> policy limits community college students | UTSanDiego.com](<a href=“http://www.utsandiego.com/news/2011/mar/18/ucsds-new-transfer-standard-roils-community/]UCSD”>http://www.utsandiego.com/news/2011/mar/18/ucsds-new-transfer-standard-roils-community/)</p>
<p>I expect that their non-tag admit GPAs will be substantially lower this year than they were last year (fewer applicants, higher GPA required to TAG, etc…) which kind of nullifies the claim that non-tag admit GPAs are absurdly high (3.9!?).</p>
<p>Also, only a percentage of those admitted will enroll, and I’m willing to bet that the average GPA of enrollees is far lower than a 3.9 - those with GPAs that high probably end up at LA or Cal.</p>
<p>All in all, I’m not sure that discontinuing the TAG program will have the effect that UCSD is hoping for.</p>
<p>The average GPA of the 2011 cohort was 3.39, only 6% had a GPA of 3.9+. It seems to me that if you would have an average of 3.9 you would need a good chunk of people above 3.9, unless the accepted and attending non-tag population was quite small. </p>
<p><a href=“Undergraduate Statistics”>Undergraduate Statistics;
<p>Well, I imagine that those who are admitted to SD with 3.9s would more likely end up enrolling elsewhere (Cal or LA), but even taking that into consideration, the 3.9 number seems way too high.</p>
<p>I think that SD rep they quote in OP’s article is full of it.</p>
<p>This is a “small” surprised for me or maybe I’m bias toward UCSD. Its great to see another prestigious school rise within California. Hopefully in the future, ucsd will create a business school “not econ”. Back to bias, yes I dislike UCSD because they dont have an actual business program. Their econ program somewhat average, not that great of a deal. On the other hand, I hope UCSD will become one of the top science + medical school for the health of this society.</p>
<p>According to the article, they received 4900 tag application for Fall 2011, and their cut off for non-tags was 3.8, yet with less tag application this year, their cut off raised to 3.9? That is kinda questionable to me.</p>
<p>^^^Maybe they set a smaller enrollment goal in 2012 to compensate for the crazy TAG overload in 2011?</p>
<p>It seems feasible if the non-TAG GPA were 3.8 last year, which it was. Either way, UCSD has quickly risen to become one of the pre-eminment UCs with departments like Biology and Engineering rivaling even schools like UCLA and Berkeley. I think this was pretty much inevitable, TAG at UCSD actually degraded the quality of their admitted pool because they ended up having to reject so many qualified non-TAG applicants. It was really just a matter of time before they had to stop rejecting applicants with 3.7+ GPAs simply because spots were filled by TAG applicants with lower GPAs.</p>
<p>I TAGed this year…still waiting for notifications. <em>sigh</em>
I suppose a TAP or other such equivalent will be rolled out within time for UCSD as well.</p>
<p>why would they want to enroll less people? that doesn’t make sense. more students=more money. I think that article is bs there’s no way the cutoff is 3.9</p>
<p>I’m glad I TAGed UCSD and I had a feeling they would discontinue TAG for UCSD.</p>
<p>@uchappytrain
Each UC has only so many resources they can devote to a maximum number of students. There’s only a limited number of facilities, faculty, housing, general space, etc. It’s not as simple as just admitting more students to get more money, as you risk reducing the quality of education offered at the university. With the perception of a lowered quality of education means a reduced endowment, less public funding, and it makes the school less attractive for students and prestigious faculty that do research at the university. In statistics every population has a set carrying capacity (k), universities included.</p>
<p>um I understand that but im not saying they’re going to accept more than they should, I’m saying I doubt they set a smaller enrollment goal. it’s probablly going to be the same, not significantly smaller bc that would not make sense. unless they intentionally want to make less money.</p>