Could someone here provide advice about the UC schools, especially UCB? These are probably my top targets right now.
Do I have any shot in hell of getting into EECS at this point? If not, I guess I’ll take the L&S route.
In order to succeed in the college process, you need to be far more humble. Don’t assume anything - it’s easy to believe that you’ll get this or that but that’s often not the case.
I get it - 35 is a good score - I scored that as well. However, with significantly better GPA, national awards in numerous ECs, and leadership on a state level, I still was nowhere as confident as you are. I’m in the same exact demographic as you, and countless top schools turned me down, even the ones that preached high standardized test scores.
Just be yourself and realize that there are many institutions which you will succeed at.
And are there any admissions profiles for people like me (high stats, average ec’s)? I want to see how they fared.
Go though specific college admissions threads. For example, if you are interested in UCB, browse all the pages of the threads regarding Class of 2022 Discussion/Results and see how people with similar profiles as you did.
You are seriously underestimating the difficulty of admittance for CS in California–Cal Poly Slo will not be a safety (more match/reach - their admit rate is around 10% and you are below avg. on stats). Your choice of major requires you to downgrade your expectations and apply broadly (consider out of state).
@Huangmaster, why/how would USC and Michigan be matches, while UCB and UCLA are reaches?
You’re stuck and insistent that UCB will be an easy admit for you.
They want students who cause change.
I’m going to be direct: UCB will be a non-admit.
CA is overwhelmed by applications for CS. To put it in perspective, CSU Long Beach is getting 100k+ apps a yr, top ten in country. You are trying to apply to an extremely popular major and CA schools do not have enough professors. Of course, if you are full pay USC and Michigan love that (I think you will have better luck at OOS or privates, if you can afford it–and consider more mid-tier CA schools).
Those harsh ones voice a reasonable and sound response to the OP’s question. Sometimes, hard pill is difficult to swallow but a good medicine to cure. I hate the parents tell their kids “don’t worry about life, we will take care of you”, but end up spoil their offspring and leave nothing behind when they die. I don’t know whoever here not giving the OP a realist view will come back a year later to take some responsibility if the OP were rejected every where. Funny though, there are still two treads going on for a month: one is like “why some kids are rejected everywhere” and the other is like “California parents are disappointed their kids did not accepted by UC schools”. I hope someone would direct the OP to read these two treads.
Estimates:
UCB EECS = reach.
UCLA CS = reach.
UCSD, UCSB, UCD, UCI = low reach or reach for CS, but may be high match for the campus. However, if you enroll at the campus not in the CS major, you would face another admission process to get into the CS major (at UCSD and UCSB, it may be very difficult).
USC = not sure, but you may actually have a better chance here, because USC emphasizes test scores more and GPA less than the UCs do, and your profile is test-score-heavy.
http://talk.qa.collegeconfidential.com/discussion/comment/21182988/#Comment_21182988 shows 2017 UC frosh admit rates by GPA range (but these are for the campuses as a whole; CS will be more difficult).
You may want to add UCSC, UCR, and UCM to your UC application for more likely admissions.
These are all reach for everyone schools. You need top end academic credentials and usually some other high level achievement in something to stand out from the numerous other applicants with similar top end academic credentials.
If you apply to this list as is, your default safety is to start at a community college. However, this may not be as optimal for majoring in CS as for some other majors with more common lower division courses, since community colleges may not cover lower division CS courses as well due to each UC having different lower division CS courses.
@1andonly, on what basis would USC “love” an applicant that is full-day? You are, of course, aware USC has been a need-blind school for a very long time (?).
Btw, the vast majority of kids I know who were rejected to USC over the past several years were…wait for it…FULL PAY (and high stats).
What about for UCB and UCLA L&S?
@auntbea what do you mean by “cause change?” I can definitely accomplish something tangible in the time I have. I looked at the threads and most admits don’t have major awards and I thought those would be a huge plus for UCB. Plus aren’t AIME and USNCO a big deal?
Those would still be reaches, though less reachy than UCB EECS and UCLA CS.
If you enter in UCB L&S, you need a 3.3 GPA in the prerequisite CS courses to get into the L&S CS major. About half of the students in those courses earn B+ or higher grades.
If you enter in UCLA L&S, you will find that there is no L&S CS major at UCLA. Getting into the CS major in the engineering division at UCLA is very difficult.
My bad, just assumed due to poster’s response that USC and MI were more welcoming to his grades, while CA publics were not…But, I have no evidence that USC and MI like full pay.
Here are some fairly detailed stats for my kid who got into UCB as a L&S CS intent. In some respects the stats are similar, at least from a grades perspective. This might give you some context on where you stand. I have no idea if he was the last guy in, or somewhere in the middle. He knew going in that there wasn’t going to be much chance for EECS because of his mediocre unweighted GPA so he took the L&S route, which was fine by him as he wanted to keep his options open for a double major anyways.
Using only his a-g grades from 10th and 11th grade:
unweighted 3.73, UC capped weighted 4.05, uncapped weighted 4.62.
20 A’s, 5 B’s, 1C.
25 of the 26 were weighted semester classes - 10 AP semesters, 6 Honors semesters, 6 dual enrollment, and 3 additional Community College classes. The only “regular” class was marching band as a sophomore.
If you include all classes since start of HS, using the same UC formula to calculate weighted uncapped GPA:
unweighted 3.74, uncapped weighted 4.56;
33 As, 9 Bs, 1C; 10AP, 12 Honors, 10 DE, 3 CC.
1540 SAT, 800 Math 740 EBRW (took 3 tries - 1500, 1520, then 1540)
800 Math II, 780 Chem
35 ACT (35.25 actually, 2 tries, first try 33)
AP Bio 5, AP Eng Comp 5, AP Calc BC 5, AP Chem 5, AP USH 4
5.5 AP classes as a senior
Applied for CS except where noted:
Accepted: UCD (L&S), UCSB (Engineering), UCB (L&S)
Waitlisted: Carnegie-Mellon (Information Systems), UCI, UCSD, Northeastern (Cybersecurity, cleared waitlist)
Rejected: Stanford, USC, Vanderbilt, UCLA, Northwestern
No, you can’t. The colleges will know that you have suddenly discovered that you need viable EC’s.
Students who “cause change” already know what I am talking about. If you have to ask, you really are in the dark and need some reality checks. Students who cause change have been active, visible and proactive in creating long term positive changes in charities and volunteer networks.
Think Malala, Emma Gonzales, Denis Estimon, etc.
@ProfessorPlum168 did he have any ec’s?
And in regards to my GPA, 3 out of 5 of my B’s have been in history (the others were in honors Chem and Calc bc). I’m predicting two more B’s in English and history this semester. Not sure if this changes anything though. I also think my gpa goes up a tiny bit if you throw in the dual enrollment classes.
@“aunt bea” wait, so Berkeley wants people who are politically active and service-oriented? I don’t have much interest in any type of activism or service. If I was an eecs major, I’d probably be spending all of my time studying any ways and I’ve demonstrated that I’m capable of doing the work and am very interested in engineering. I’m extremely passionate about EE/CS and should be able to show that and write about it pretty naturally.
Duh, its Berkeley. Do you have any reasoning for your choices other than prestige?