Hi, Need help with CS and CSE college list. My D has a 4.4 GPA, 6 AP (since she is in IB program), 3 awards, Lead Programmer in Robotics team, Science team, and other extracurricular activities/certificates.
What are her chances of getting into UCs?
Which Cal State she should consider?
Need help with Out-of-state college list?
For the UC’s calculate all 3 of her UC GPA’s: GPA Calculator for the University of California – RogerHub
If she has only taken AP/IB courses and no DE or CC courses during HS, then her Capped weighted UC GPA= Cal State Capped weighted GPA. The exception is Cal Poly SLO which uses 9-11th grades vs. the rest of the UC’s and CSU’s which use 10-11th grades. To get her SLO GPA, just include her 9th grades for the a-g courses.
Which AP’s has she taken? Will she get her IB diploma? What is her highest Math level for Senior year?
Does she have preference to location for the CSU’s and UC’s? Will she apply CS to all or a combination of CS and CSE?
What is your budget for OOS schools? Do you qualify for need-based aid? EFC?
Are you looking for merit aid? Will she be taking the SAT or ACT?
Answer these question will help CC posters with some suggestions.
Her UC GPA is 4.08.
AP subjects - AP Computer Science Principles, AP Physics 1, AP World History, Calculus BC, Computer Science A, and Physics 2.
She will get her IB diploma in 2022.
No location preference for CSU or UC.
She can apply to either CS or CSE or both.
We don’t qualify for EFC and we are ready to pay tuition which is same as UCs.
Her ACT is 32. Thx.
I will list some statistical UC admission data for 2020 since most of the data is not yet available for 2021 admits. CS/CSE admission rates will be lower than listed since these are usually impacted and selective majors.
2020 Freshman admit rates for UC GPA of 3.80-4.19 capped weighted and not major specific:
UCB: 14%
UCLA: 8%
UCSD: 39%
UCSB: 40%
UCD: 55%
UCI: 38%
UCSC: 82%
UCR: 90%
UCM: 97%
2020 UC capped weighted GPA averages along with 25th-75th percentile range:
UCB: 4.22 (4.13-4.30)
UCLA: 4.25 (4.18-4.31)
UCSD: 4.16 (4.04-4.28)
UCSB: 4.15 (4.03-4.27)
UCI: 4.11 (3.96-4.26)
UCD: 4.10 (3.95-4.25) Updated for 2021
UCSC: 3.94 (3.71-4.16)
UCR: 3.88 (3.65-4.11)
UCM: 3.68 (3.40-3.96)
Admission Rates for California Applicants:
UCLA: 10.1%
UC Berkeley: 16.8%
UC Irvine: 20.1%
UC Santa Barbara: 28.0%
UC San Diego: 28.5%
UC Davis: 39.0%
UC Santa Cruz: 54.5%
UC Riverside: 64.0%
UC Merced: 99.7%
Recommendations:
What is your local Cal State since this school will be a good safety school unless CS/CSE is an impacted major which may not be a guaranteed admission.
Schools to consider:
Cal States: Cal Poly SLO- Reach, San Jose State- Reach for CS/CSE- Target. San Diego State-Target, CSU East Bay-Safety, Cal Poly Pomona-Target, CSULB- Low Target
UC’s: UC Merced- Safety, UC Riverside and Santa Cruz- Target, UC Davis and Santa Barbara- Target/High Target, UC San Diego- Low Reach and UCLA/UCB- Reach
OOS: Arizona State- Low Target and consider Barrett’s Honor College. University of Utah- Safety, Oregon State- Target
No reason to go out of state unless the Cost of attendance comes under the UC’s and CSU’s.
Although some employers have school preferences, for CS especially, school name matters less than experience for post graduation jobs. A student will have a good outcome as long as they make use of the resources/opportunities available at any of the schools.
My younger son graduated from SDSU 3 years ago and doing very well as a CS major in Cybersecurity.
If she has a specific interest such as Cybersecurity, AI etc… then checking the school catalogs and curriculum might help her better define her list.
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What is unweighted GPA and what is the scale for what I assume is a weighted 4.4 GPA? Or class rank, to put it in perspective.
Standardized test scores?
Out of state preferences in terms of location, size, school type, cost, etc.?
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@collegerashmi: I will add that the Cal states all admit by major and most do not consider alternate majors so she will have to decide on CS or CSE when applying if both are offered. SJSU and Cal Poly Pomona will consider alternate majors.
For the UC’s, Freshman admission varies by campus.
UCM, UCR, UCSC, UCSB, UCLA admit by major for CS and CSE in their College of Engineering.
UCM, UCR and UCSC will consider alternate majors but for UCSC, you have to be admitted into the College of Engineering to study either CS/CSE.
UCLA does not consider alternate majors.
UCSB considers alternate majors only if they are not in the College of Engineering.
UCD admits by major for CSE.
CS is in the College of Letters and Sciences but considered Selective and admits by Academic Division.
UCI admits into the University first and then into the major. In the case that UCI is unable to accommodate all qualified applicants in their first-choice major, those students who indicate a valid alternate major may be offered admission in that major or Undeclared.
UCSD: The campus does not admit students on the basis of academic major or choice of UC San Diego undergraduate college. Alternate majors are considered and capped majors are highly competitive. Also note: Capped majors require additional pre-req courses and specific GPA to be able to qualify if changing majors. Also if applying to a capped major, select an non-capped major as an alternate.
UCB offers CS (EECS) in the College of Engineering which needs a direct admit or CS in the College of Letters and Sciences which requires a secondary admission based on GPA for pre-req courses. UCB does not consider alternate majors.
There is a current CC discussion going on about CS which might be of interest: For Computer Science, at What Point is it Advisable to Consider Cost or Prestige?
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I have linked the impaction point calculation for San Jose State and the admitted thresholds required for admission for CS and CSE so she can see where she stands in comparison to the 2021 admits.
Edited: SJSU is only one a few Cal states that is pretty transparent when it comes to Freshman admissions and you will not find similar data by major for the most of the CSU’s.
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She could also look at some of the other WUE schools besides University of Utah.
Some majors are not available at all campuses so check each school for specifics.
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If you want to save $$, U of Arizona is your best bet - and has a wonderful Honors dorm/dining hall/gym combo. ASU is good, not as cheap, with a top notch Honors College.
But you can beat UC a lot of places - Utah, New Mexico, maybe Colorado School of Mines, Alabama, Ms State. Florida State, Florida, South Carolina (another top Honors), Purdue, etc.
You might also look to privates that have a large male/female disconnect - as you might do better for being a female…an RPI, WPI, Rose Hulman.
These are more “focused” - so don’t give up on the privates.
Good luck.
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I can’t add much to what @Gumbymom said, but will add that Cal Poly requires a capped and weighted GPA that includes 9th grade too. The average capped and weighted GPA of acceptances into the CENG was 4.13 last year. CS, SE and Comp E are all VERY competitive. Admission stats don’t tell the whole story, but based on percentages alone, Comp E is probably the easiest of the three. Good luck!
This is a lot of good information that I am still trying to read through…thank you. How SJSU compares to SLO/SDSU? Is UCSC better with Comp Sc than UCD?
Personally I feel that SJSU CS and SLO CS are probably on par with each other since they the most selective for that major.
CS is a very popular and selective major at both the UC’s and CSU’s. The Cal states also give preference to local in-service area students while the UC’s do not.
SDSU would probably be a notch below but there is a large tech sector in the San Diego area where internships/jobs are readily available. They are one of the most applied Cal states besides Cal State Long Beach which makes them more selective overall.
UCSC and UCD are also very similar with UCD being overall more selective. Proximity to the Bay Area and Silicon Valley make them good options for Internships and post Graduation jobs.
In general, if all the schools are ABET accredited for CS and CSE, they will have similar curriculums. What sets the different schools apart is more location and school fit/vibe.
https://amspub.abet.org/aps/name-search?searchType=institution
As California residents, we are lucky with so many great schools within the state. Much will depend upon on where your student will be accepted and which schools work academically, socially and financially for her.
Having had 2 sons go through the process and graduating college, one at a Cal state and one at a UC, in the end they landed at the best school for them.
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This is hard to compare, because so much of it is subjective. Everyone has an opinion, but much of it isn’t backed up with objective information. That said, you can compare salaries on College Scorecard. It’s the only source of non-self reported salary data that I know of. You have to look at Computer Information Sciences or Computer Science. Different schools classify CS/SE differently.
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I agree with @eyemgh in that which school/s are “better” can be difficult to quantify and everyone has their own opinion which I stated above. What is important is which school is “better” for your particular student and your daughter is the one whom must determine that for herself.
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CSUN and CSUFresno also show the most recent previous frosh admission thresholds.
Thresholds could change year-to-year based on how competitive the applicant pool for each major is.
By default, CSUs which are not campus-impacted and where CS is not major-impacted (e.g. SFSU) will admit CS applicants who meet baseline CSU admission requirements.
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General content may be similar in many respects, but how the courses and curricula are organized can vary considerably (transfer students may have difficulty matching courses at their current college and their transfer target in many cases).
Also, ABET-accreditation for CS does require some non-CS natural science, so it is more likely to be had for engineering-based CS major programs than for liberal-arts-based CS major programs.
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College Scorecard shows the salary range for SLO is very high compared to other schools like Purdue.
I’d expect west coast schools to have higher salaries because of the cost of living.
College Scorecard keeps being brought up. It just doesn’t seem to be all that. But maybe I’m missing something.
Computer Science seems to have lots of opportunities these days, including for kids from schools that aren’t accredited ( not unusual). Everybody and their uncle seems to want to go into CS in the last few years! 
No one can say for sure why that is, but it’s most likely because most Cal Poly grads work on the west coast, where salaries (and the cost of living) are very high and most Purdue grads don’t. My son has multiple friends who are CP CS/SE grads, and two years out, they all make more than the median number reported on College Scoreboard. They all work for CA based companies, but they don’t all live in CA.
I bring it up because as far as I know it’s the only source of non self reported salary data.
It’s pretty obvious thought that, as is the case with most schools, CA grads stay close to their alma maters. CA salaries are higher than the rest of the US for most engineering disciplines. Take it all with a grain of salt, objective or not.