Is acceptance and merit based on major?

Wondering about your experience as to whether a student’s particular major affected admissions and merit - particularly for LACs. My daughter was initially interested in a Biology or STEM major but has recently been considering a double major in psychology and journalism. Is there usually a difference in acceptance rates and merit awarded for say, College of Health Sciences vs. College of Art or Communication. Thanks.

As many admissions cycles as we have been through- and I still learn new things on CC all the time!

I am not aware of any LACs that have a “College of Health Sciences” or a “College of Art or Communication”- ime that is university territory- but obviously you have some in mind. Some LACs do have a “College of Engineering” (Bucknell comes to mimd), but admissions is still through the central admissions system. In all of the LACs of which I have direct knowledge students are admitted to the college as a whole, and generally don’t formally declare a major until at least second semester of the first year (more usually first semester of the second year)- the point is for them to have some time to explore possible courses of study before committing to one. There are some LACs that I am aware of that have a scholarship award for specific subjects, but they are the exception, and are rarely for game-changing amounts.

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Here is an example:

Susquehanna has a Sigmund Weis School of Business, College of Arts and Sciences, etc. My daughter is applying there and will need significant merit. Wondering when you declare your major whether they look at that when deciding merit.

So, imo those “colleges” are like vanity license plates! it’s a jumped up name for “Department” :grin: There is one application for everybody, no matter what subject or “College” you are applying to.

SU lists all the possible merit packages here:

The COA is $67K; the biggest award is $38K, and no, the particular major is not likely to be a big factor for that one- stats & major achievements will be what matters.

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Out of the 6 places (1 LAC) that my DS received merit awards last cycle, I would say that 1 was based upon his major. The one made specific reference to a subject area (Humanities) in the award letter. I believe that the others would have been the same regardless of his stated major.

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It is possible, and fairly common, but not necessarily the case everywhere.

Here is an example of differing admission selectivity by major:

The point index is calculated as described here:

The HS GPA is recalculated from 10th-11th grade academic courses with standardized limited honors/AP weighting.

For majors not marked with a *, an index of 2000 is like a HS GPA of 2.5 for applicants without bonus points. The most selective of these majors had an index of 3400, equivalent to a HS GPA of 4.25 for applicants without bonus points (the recalculation of GPA with limited weighting effectively has a maximum of about 4.4).

…but @ucbalumnus SJSU is a state uni, not a LAC, and @eeyore123 was the school that had a specific subject area a LAC, and was the money substantial (more than a few thousand)?