My son got the offer with General Engineering (Computer CS Track). Does it mean he needs to keep his first year gpa 3.5 above to enter his major? Is there any direct admit to the CS track?
How hard it is to get the this gpa? Where to find the data about the percentages for the students get into their preference majors by the end of the first year, especially for the CS track?
@AmberZhu123 There is no direct admit to his desired major.
To be guaranteed his first choice of major, yes, he must maintain a 3.5 GPA. Have students received their first choice with less than 3.5 cumlative? Yes.
They will actually use two GPA’s. A student’s overall GPA and their engineering required class GPA.
Here is the analysis for class 2021 (Fall 2017) for Computer Science
https://engineering.tamu.edu/academics/entry-to-a-major/resources/analysis-spring-2017-admission-cycle/cpsc.html
Here is the link for all majors https://engineering.tamu.edu/academics/entry-to-a-major/resources/analysis-spring-2017-admission-cycle/index.html
@Thelma2 Thank you for the info. wow, it looks hard to get a 3.5+ gpa. The max is 3.65.
I think the chart you are looking at for computer science is a profile for holistic review students. Everyone who gets a 3.5 GPA and above is automatically admitted. Kids who have a GPA below 3.5 go into holistic review. The holistic review students admitted to CS in spring 2017 had cumulative GPAs ranging from 2.59 - 3.48. The kids who had GPAs of 3.5 to 4.0 are not included in that profile.
@chercheur Thank you for clarifying. But the chart I read with max 3.65 does include the students with gpa 3.5+. Do you mean their preference major is not CS track initially and they try to transfer from other majors to CS?
Can you post a link to the chart you’re looking at?
@chercheur This is the one I checked:
https://engineering.tamu.edu/academics/entry-to-a-major/resources/analysis-spring-2017-admission-cycle/cecn.html
That chart is for a computer engineering major (with a cs focus) and not for a computer science major. It is also for holistic review students who had below a 3.5 cumulative GPA. See Thelma2’s post #1 for the CS link if your son is a CS major.
There are 2 different GPAs shown on your link. The top is the cumulative GPA. The bottom is the GPA for only the math, science, and engineering classes.
A student could have a cumulative GPA below 3.5 (due to lower grades in English or history classes, for example) but have above a 3.5 GPA in only their math, science, and engineering classes.
It makes sense that kids who gravitate toward engineering would have higher math and science scores but possibly lower language arts scores. I’m sure that’s one thing they evaluate during the holistic review process.
Here are the ETAM requirements for the class of 2022. The cumulative GPA must be 2.0 or above, with a 3.5 qualifying for automatic entry to your major https://engineering.tamu.edu/academics/entry-to-a-major/general-engineering-program/index.html
I hope that makes sense. One of the more experienced members may be able to explain it better!
@chercheur Thank you for the link. It makes more sense to me now about the requirements for the courses and the gpa. I called the admission office today and got the same answer basically. I would like to know more info about the percentage of the first year students getting into their first choice major, especially the CE CS track.
You did a great job @chercheur
On the links I supplied, if you go through every major in the 2017 admission analysis, all of the cumulative GPA’s are below 3.5 while the Math,Science,Engineering GPA can be higher than 3.5.
So you are correct, this analysis is the qualifying GPA’s for all of those who did not automatically qualify for their first choice major due to their cumulative GPA being 4.9 and under.
It is possible that the auto to major admits had 3.5 and higher cumulative and M,S,E GPA.
@AmberZhu123 so if your student didn’t make the 3.5 cumulative GPA for auto to his first choice major, a 2.59 cumulative gained entry to the major during the spring 2017 cycle (this is for class 2020, my son’s class).
I wish I had copied down the analysis for the class of 2018 and 2019 classes but didn’t and now the info isn’t on the site
Are you planning to visit the campus? If so, I would suggest setting up a meeting with a professor from the Computer Science & Engineering department. They should be able to you the percentage of students who were auto admits (3.5 cumulative GPA or higher). Their contact info is here https://engineering.tamu.edu/cse/contact.html
Then report back with the numbers 
@AmberZhu123 Yes, I agree with @chercheur This is your assignment and report back your findings! 
@chercheur I call their office and was told they don’t have the percentage information.
You could email the department head with your question
OMG I literally laughed out loud at Bruce Gooch’s profile photo and wonder what decade Dylan Shell he had his pic taken.
Texas A&M has grade distributions by course (see http://web-as.tamu.edu/gradereport/ ), so you can look up what percentage of students in the general engineering courses (listed at https://engineering.tamu.edu/academics/entry-to-a-major/general-engineering-program/class-of-2021.html ) earn A grades.
One other point is that there are requirements to do ETAM and even if you have a GPA over 3.5 but you do not have for example both Math classes at TAMU yet, they will not let you apply for ETAM. So at the next opportunity for ETAM, the GPA in this case will be over 3.5 but the student has to go through the holistic process for review because auto admit is only for the first opportunity of ETAM.
The chart at Thelma2’s link above reflects the kids who went through the holistic ETAM process last Spring 2017, which is the class that entered in the Fall 2016. TAMU has not publicized the results of ETAM this past Spring 2018 for the class of Fall 2017 as of yet. From what I understand from TAMU advisors the stats do not paint a pretty picture for some of the majors and they made some changes to the ETAM process because of it. Apparently, some of the most popular majors including Computer Science and Mechanical Engineering were completely filled up with auto admits and could not admit anyone else holistically.
That’s a good point.
Entry to a Major - Course Requirements
**Two of the following math courses: **
• MATH 151, 152, 251, 253, 304, 308; CSCE 222 (Discrete Math)
**Two of the following science courses: **
• CHEM 107/117 or CHEM 101/111, CHEM 102/112, PHYS 206, PHYS 207, PHYS 222
• Students interested in Biomedical, Chemical, and Materials Science and Engineering are expected to take
- CHEM 107/117 or CHEM 101/111 and 2) CHEM 102/112 during their first and second semester respectively
**Two of the following engineering courses: **
• ENGR 102, ENGR/PHYS 216, ENGR/PHYS 217
Ah, yes, I totally neglected to mention, that the guarantee with 3.5 was for first timers through the ETAM process. So THANKFUL to @chercheur and @pbleigh for their knowledge and paying it forward helping others since they went through this whole process.