I know this is a popular topic given the number of students who are admitted to UCSD as undeclared despite having applied to a capped engineering major, but even after reading countless other threads, I have questions about how hard it really is to transfer into an engineering major. It would be great if anyone has any personal experience (even if you know students) who have seriously tried to declare an engineering major.
“Difficult” and “really hard” are incredibly subjective terms, and I hear about the “competition” more than I do about the difficulty of the classes. I’ve looked into the courses required to transfer into majors (specifically looked at bioengineering and mechanical engineering) and the don’t seem particularly intimidating aside from MAE 8 (only because I don’t have any experience with programming, so I can’t be sure as to how well I would do).
My question is: of the hundreds of continuing students applying to declare these capped majors, how is the competition among them? Would it be difficult for a student like me to compete with these other students?
To give a general idea of my work ethic, my hs course load: ignoring my honors courses, I’ve taken 2 APs 10th grade, 4 APs 11th grade, and 5 APs (counting gov/econ as one) 12th grade and have only ever gotten a B+ (89.44) in a single semester of notoriously the hardest class in my entire school (the rest of my grades are As). And out of the AP exams I’ve taken, I’ve gotten 5 5s and one 4. I’ve been able to handle a heavy load while also maintaining club activities and other extracurriculars as well (ex I tutor AP Calc AB students weekly). I could use some of these credits to satisfy some of the reqs for the major transfer too, and since I’m generally well rounded, I wouldn’t have to worry about non-STEM courses negatively impacting my GPA
I hear that a competitive GPA varies according to year (depending on how many students drop out), and the type of kids trying to declare that major. I absolutely love the UCSD vibe and campus, but I am passionate about engineering, so should I risk attending and possibly not being able to declare my major of choice? Honest feedback is appreciated.
Yesterday for Triton Day I was talking to a student who graduated recently from mechanical engineering. He told me he personally started as an undeclared major and then switched into mechanical. He said it basically was determined by your GPA and if it was over (I think) a 3.5 then it was enough to switch in. Keep in mind they are college level courses and I am an incoming freshman too so I wouldn’t know much on their difficulty.
I do find it curious that you didn’t make it into engineering however. You have taken far more AP classes than I have (I’ve taken 6 total, 2 junior year and 4 senior year) and seem to have excelled in all of them. Yet I was admitted as an SE so it’s funny how it works. I’m sure you should be fine though. From one incoming freshman to another you seem to be a smart kid, and changing to engineering for you shouldn’t be a problem. @marsie
Thank you for your response 3ngineertalk. I wasn’t able to attend Triton Day because my school had its prom yesterday (early, I know lol). But when I did go to a tour last Thursday, all they did was tell me how difficult it is without actually giving any personalized attention (the staff wouldn’t really let me even describe what kind of student I am).
I can speculate as to why I wasn’t admitted for bioengineering (probably because my SAT score wasn’t competitive enough).
My other option is UCI (good rising school, but major lack of diversity) and maybe Harvey Mudd if a miracle occurs and I can get off of their waitlist lol.
I attended Triton Day and attended the Undeclared Engineering session they had. They presented a presentation on all the alternatives one can take if they were not admitted into engineering such as taking physics as an alternative to Mechanical or Electrical engineering. When several people asked if they could get into engineering we were told that we must apply after the first year and admission is based on the performance on prerequisite courses such as Calculus Physics and chemistry. However they told us not to rely on this and choose an alternative plan because of the varying limited space of openings.