Hello,
I’m a high school senior and I’m looking to get into Cal Poly SLO. My GPA and SAT aren’t the best (3.5 Cumulative GPA & 1020/1600 SAT). I’m wondering, are the admissions solely based on statistics or are exracurriculars a huge part of the admissions process? I have ECs that may interest Cal Poly, and I’m also getting work experience throughout the summer going into my senior year of High School.
You should spend some time reading the comments on the various Cal Poly threads, esp. where they discuss the points assigned for various attributes such as extra English classes taken, your home location, whether your parents attended college, etc. EC’s are a tiny part of the admission process, with no essay to describe what you have done. Work experience that directly relates to your major may help you, but stats (and in my experience, how your high school ranks if in CA) are crucial.
Extracurricular activities are “considered” but are not very important. The most important factors are GPA, courses taken and test scores. What major are you applying for? Some majors, such as engineering, are very competitive and some such as construction management are far easier to enter.
Cal Poly prefers the ACT. Have you taken it? Some people do better on it than on the SAT. In any case, you should try to improve your score.
One thing that may help you would be to apply early decision. A slightly higher percentage of early decision applicants are accepted than the overall acceptance rate (33% vs 31%).
Cal poly SLO discontinued Early decision starting this application cycle. Read this thread about how the MCA score is determined.
http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/cal-poly-san-luis-obispo/1694769-confused-about-mca-score.html
GPA/test scores and HS course rigor are the most important in racking up the MCA points.
As stated above, acceptances are major dependent.
@Yomama12 where did you hear that SLO prefers the ACT? I know they only look at English and math on the ACT but I’ve never heard that they prefer one test over the other. Just wondering.
It says that somewhere on their admissions page, but it makes no difference in your chances.
@lkg4answers It’s in several places. Here is the Cal Poly admissions page at CSU Mentor.
It doesn’t change acceptance chances, but I would encourage the poster to consider taking it as some people do far better on the ACT than the SAT (and some do far better on the SAT than the ACT).
http://admissions.calpoly.edu/prospective/profile.html
That will show you the average GPA and ACT/SAT for each college.
Their formula makes it really hard to overcome a below avg GPA and test score with other considerations.
Based on your stats, I’d encourage to apply but, also apply to CSULB, Chico, Fullerton and (depending on major) Cal Poly Pomona
Good luck.
@Yomama12 Very interesting. I hadn’t noticed that. Thanks!