Thank you! I think both are academically about the same. I don’t know about the Tech and Info Management major, but I think it has to do with engineering consulting? In that case if your goals are a major consulting firm like Deloitte or Bain, I believe SJSU might have slightly better job opportunities since it’s well known in Silicon Valley. It’ll come down to what you want out of your college experience: an urban experience in downtown that’s recreationally similar to what you’ll get out of a community college? Or a sprawling campus in the middle of forests with a nearby beach and active party scene?
Thanks for your question! For pre-med, saving as much as possible is a priority.
You also want to keep in mind how easy it is to get a high GPA, since that really matters for med school. Case’s average GPA is a 3.38, and UA’s is 3.63. Take into account that UA attracts a good amount of non-academically oriented students who typically get lower GPAs, and UA is clearly the easier school.
I think the biggest difference between UA and Case is the size of the school (Case is almost 1/10 the size of UA), so if you really really prefer a small-school setting, Case would be a better fit. My personal recommendation due to cost and readiness for med school is UA, though. Good luck wherever you go!
Hey so I am a sophomore right now attending a Georgia high school. In my freshman year I got a 3.2 GPA 
In my sophomore year I ended with a 3.8 GPA. I plan to go University of Georgia which requires a 3.8-4.0 GPA. Does the GPA requirement for UGA mean that I had to get a 3.8-4.0 for all years in high school or does it only pertain to Junior year or a combination of years like Sophomore, Junior and senior? Thanks.
Thanks for your question! UGA operates under a different system than many other colleges, they ask you to submit how many letter grades you had per year and don’t ask at all about GPA. So if in freshman year you got a 3.2 and no Cs, you’d report 4 Bs and 1 A. You’d do the same for sophomore and junior year, and make a note of if you took any AP classes that year. UGA doesn’t factor honors in anywhere. Also, I can’t see where you got the 3.8-4.0 req from, I went through their website and there’s no mention of that, so you should be fine. Good luck!
Congrats Neha! I will be starting high school and passionate about CS. What advise would you give me on what to prioritize over next 4 years? Also with the extra time now and summer trying to figure out how to get started with independent research. I have knowledge of python so any tips and pointers you can give on how to get started with using it for research or many projects will be appreciated since you mentioned there are free public data sets available. Also I have heard folks talk about passion projects and for me have been working on STEM outreach already for few years and really want to continue so is that a good idea to build on? Thanks
Congrats on ucb! I read some of your replies and they were very thorough and super helpful.
I wanted to ask you about applying to UCB or some of the colleges mentioned above with a 3.75 uw, very competitive course load, most b’s from freshman year, 3.85 without freshman year for uc’s
I want to major in cs (would EECS be realistic?), but is there any specific suggestions you have regarding ucb, or uc’s in general when selecting majors?
Hi Neha! So I am a sophomore in high school and my dream has always been to attend UCLA. I have some questions regarding AP classes.
- What is your opinion on AP classes? Did you take any?
-Are there other ways to be accepted into certain colleges?
I often hear that AP classes are important in being accepted to harder colleges but if I am going to be honest, I do not want my schedules to be filled with AP classes.
What should I do?
Congratulations Neha on your brilliant performance! Just wondered what you would advise in terms of a maker portfolio which schools like MIT like.
Congratulations!! Good choices and good decision. Were you reject from any schools other than Stanford?
Congrats on everything! I’m interested in a STEM/medical pathway, do you have any suggestions for interships, clubs or things I could look into that would show leadership?
Thank you! Wow, you’ve definitely done your research on college admissions, kudos for starting so early! The advice on passion projects is real, you should continue doing that STEM outreach in your community. For independent research, I would recommend starting with the UCI database and see if anything interests you there. You can run machine learning models using Python on those to find any new trends. If you want to get into the more hardcore side of science research, as in working with professors and getting published, I would recommend first doing a summer research program between 9th and 10th grade. For about $5K, there are very good programs at UCSC, Florida, and Iowa that will give you the credentials to get you off the ground. Once you have that experience and a referral from your PI there, you can start looking for free research internships and work with professors. Hope this helped!
Thank you! I’m glad my advice is helpful. With a 3.85, you would be better off applying L&S CS, the GPA requirement for EECS is ridiculously high. If you’re taking a very competitive course load, that will work in your favor. Colleges accept based on school, so if your school’s average GPA is a 3.5 and most people never take APs, then you’d be at an advantage. For major selection at UCs, especially for CS, I do have one bit of advice. There are two available CS majors at every UC, one pure CS and one with engineering. Berkeley, as you know, has CS and EECS. UCLA has CS and CSE (CS and Engineering), UCSD has CE and CS, UCSB has CS and EECS, and so on. Generally, the one without engineering is easier to get into, so I would encourage applying there.
Good luck with UCLA! It’s a really great school. I took 16 AP classes: 1 freshman year, 4 sophomore, 6 junior, and 5 senior. I know this is a lot, and I don’t recommend this to everyone. To get the checkmark on “rigorous courseload” for colleges, you just have to take 10 APs. The easier APs (some of this differs student to student) are AP Psych, AP Gov, AP Human Geo, the AP Econs, AP Environmental Science, and AP Statistics. If you don’t want to take APs at all, there are definitely other ways to help you stand out to colleges. You can do a community service passion project, you can publish a book or research, or you can do Olympiads! APs are definitely not the end-all be-all for college admissions.
Thank you! I submitted a research poster because I did research in high school. You should submit your most “flashy” work, meaning the one that’ll most grab the attention of whoever’s reading it. I did tons of research projects, from natural language processing to pesticides, and I submitted a very technical one on HIV and machine learning. If you don’t have research, you can submit a visual arts supplement as well. If I was any good at art (I’m not) I’d have submitted an arts supplement along with the research supplement to MIT, because it would show off a less STEM side of me.
Thank you! Haha yes, I was rejected/waitlisted at Harvard, Princeton, Stanford, Caltech, UT Austin, and UC Davis. The Stanford rejection hurt, given that I spent my weekends doing research there and I loved it since middle school.
Thank you! As you know, medical-related internships and clubs are harder to come by than CS ones. I would start with volunteering at a hospital to get some experience for later internship applications. Don’t limit yourself to spending all your time there, though. I saw so many of my friends who spent all their waking hours volunteering at hospitals get rejected because that was their only extracurricular. On top of that, I would encourage starting a Red Cross or Medical club at your school to show initiative and leadership. For internships, you would have to enter the science research side of things. There are good science research summer programs at U Florida, U Iowa, and UCSC that’ll get you credibility in the field. After that, you can start publishing and working with professors. Hope this helps!
Congratulations Neha. Awesome achievement. Can you please elaborate on the following:
- What kind of CS related research you were involved with? Was this independent research or with an institution? How did you get started with it?
- What kind of volunteering activities you did in High School?
Thanks alot for guiding current high schoolers.
Their loss. Honestly, college admission process is far from fair and flawless. Don’t sweat over it. You got bigger and better things to do.
Haha thank you! That made me smile. At Cal/Stanford games I have extra motivation to cheer for Cal too! ?
Thank you! I’m happy to give back to the CC community in any way I can.
- I did loads of separate types of research, including independent research, summer programs, with international friends, and with professors. The nice thing with pure CS research is that it’s easy to get a project up off the ground in a month and you can just keep refining it and making it more accurate if you have the time. This way I was able to do six full scale projects on my own, as well as one that I coordinated with high schoolers from across the country, Canada, and the UK. Out of those seven, I published 3 in journals. Anyone can do this type of research if they find an interesting database and learn data analysis with a Coursera course. I did the UCSC SIP program as a rising junior and SSP as a rising senior. Both are paid, but they paid off (get my pun?) because they helped establish my credibility when I contacted professors to work with them. I did research with professors from SJSU and Stanford once I turned 16, since that’s the minimum age.
- I won’t be going into too much detail on these for privacy. I volunteered as a camp counselor, which racked up 400+ hours and got me the Presidential Gold Award twice. I was also part of the youth advisory board of my county and the regional director of an international nonprofit.