CSU’s do not require essays and is a fairly easy application to complete. Heavy emphasis on the Capped weighted CSU GPA and priority is given to applicants within the local admission area.
CSU’s are test blind this admission cycle and if not a CA resident, expect to pay full fees with no financial aid.
thank you. huge relief to come across schools that don’t ask for essays 
Yes, very quick and easy to fill out. You can even download all your classes into the application through this website:
Even before the pandemic, it was becoming more and more difficult for CA residents to get into the UCs as well as the top CSUs.
We are in CA and in Fall 2016 my oldest applied to 5 UCs (one application), 3 CSUs (one application) and 3 private schools. He also applied to NAU in July just to get that 1st acceptance out of the way and to boost his confidence. The NAU application is easier than the CSU application. 12 schools/6 applications, pre-pandemic
My second sent in applications in Fall 2019. She was a high stats kid (including NMF). She applied to 5 UCs, one CSU, 3 privates and a NMF early acceptance school with a free application. 9 schools/5 applications for a high stats kid.
Like I said, we are fairly new to California so hearing your experiences with your two kids doesn’t surprise me at all now. When I first started to figure out the intricacies it was very stressful.
Because the 2020 grads had lots of waitlist movement, heavy waitlist movement was also predicted for our class by our counselors (but waitlist wound up being almost non existent). The 2020 grads who got off waitlists to UC’s had lower gpa’s than the 2021’s and the 2019’s …at least this was the case at our high school. That was a hard pill for the kids to swallow.
My S is the same. He has everything on his list from a private in FL with 2k kids to a public in Indiana with 25k kids. All have good business programs. We’ve visited all but 2 of the schools he is applying to and there are things he likes about all of them. I could truly see him happy at any of them. He’s just a regular, normal, somewhat sporty kid who gets along with most people. So he is applying to a lot of schools to see where he gets merit and then will look closer at the details to decide what he wants. Most of his schools only have minor extra essays as they are mid-tier schools so the apps aren’t that bad and we have fee waivers for at least half of them.
My second child was a 2020 grad and there was a ton of waitlist movement.
I should add that my high stats kid had her eyes on a private school. We told her that we had the funds to pay for a UC and that if she wanted to attend a private school, she would have to apply for merit scholarships to cover the difference. She wrote 3-4x more essays and completed more applications than my oldest who applied to more schools.
Even the phrase “full pay” can mean different things, I guess: (1) we’re happy and are able to spend whatever it takes to send the student to the best fit school, or (2) schools have designated us as full pay but our kid will have to chase merit for us to be able to swing things. Families in the second category might need to have more applications.
My kid is not interested in state flagships. She did apply to ASU at our suggestion (for the rolling decision plus their merit aid), but everything else is private. We visited 11 schools so far, but she eliminated 8 of them (including some UC schools), so she’s applying to a bunch that she’s never seen. They are also a mix of sizes, but she really wants a school in a big city, so that seems to be a unifying theme.
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Our S22 is aiming for the best school he can get into with the most merit aid, that has his intended major. So he has to cast a wide net. He has two top 25 state flagship/publics where he has automatic scholarships of at least full tuition as safeties. After that, he is swinging for the fences and going after very competitive, large merit scholarships at 6 top 25 USNWR national universities and 5 more in the top 50. Worst case scenario he gets none of the big competitive scholarships and will turn to the two top 25 publics, but I think he has a decent chance at getting one or two of them. Another quite possible result is one of the top 50 schools gives him just enough merit to make it financially painful for us, but doable.
I thought the top 9% were guaranteed a UC!
From UC Admissions website;
Our Eligibility in the Local Context (ELC) program recognizes your individual accomplishments in light of the opportunities offered by your particular high school.
The ELC program ensures that academically talented and deserving California resident students from all over the state have the opportunity to join us at UC.
ELC status adds value to the application and is one of the factors considered when applications are reviewed. Additionally, ELC students not admitted to any of their campus choices are offered a spot at a UC campus that has space, if minimum UC requirements are met.
Yes and right now that UC is Merced and they did not have my daughter’s major so it was if no use to her.
@Vineyarder That essay sounds fantastic! A relief, indeed. I do think in the current test-optional admissions climate that the essay is highly significant.
@vistajay , hooray for an exceptional test score!! That should open some scholarship doors, certainly. The huge number of essays are intimidating for sure. My last college applicant was up to the task, but my current one…not so much. I agree with you about essay fatigue. I tell people to work on the schools of highest interest first, because they may not make it to the last ones on the list.
@Search2022 I agree with you. The student’s voice in the essay is going to be highly significant in selective schools. It has been for a few years now, but even more so now.
@CMCMLM My daughter is in the 20 school club, as was her older sister. I learned my lesson from my oldest who did not apply to enough schools. We are looking for money, live geographically distant from most places, and don’t have reliable quality in state options. It’s initially expensive, but it paid off later on, at least in my experience with the last one.
@EconPop , yes, agree that high stats/ the ability to be full pay would change the strategy. My last applicant was high stats, but still subject to the uncertainty of necessary competitive scholarships and “reach for everyone” admissions. Current student is good-not-great stats; we can pay more this go-around but definitely not full pay or even close.
@Picklenut6 My oldest graduated from UW. Glad to hear yours is so happy thus far!
D22 notified she is a Cameron Impact Scholarship finalist! (Merit, full-tuition at any US college where accepted)
Anyone have experience or knowledge about this scholarship? Next phase is a Zoom interview.
Any general advice on what to wear and prep for interview? She generally does very well in these situations and will speak with passion and authority on her research and activities, but want her to bring in questions to ask and be otherwise prepared.
I think this saddens me even more. Just listing out that someone might splattergun all 8 ivies plus Stanford, Duke, MIT, JHU etc is a testament to our times. These schools are not always interchangeable for other another and I would say in most cases they are more different than they are alike. We need to get away from promoting a apply to all the T20s mentality. This leads to disappointment not only in possible rejections but also in expectation management when young whippersnapper gets to these schools are realizes they are not the best fit or they are not outstanding in something they intend to major in. Bottom up analysis bounded by cost /location + if these are a factor. Prestige mindset is shallow and as someone else pointed out, makes for low acceptance rates bragging rights and little else. I know this is not necessarily your perspective but it is sadly that of many.
Sorry! This is very disappointing and discouraging.
Out of curiosity, did your daughter have many APs and where did her high school peers go? My family is relying on the USs, so you have me very worried.
Yes she had lots of AP classes and also took community college classes every summer and during senior year. Classmates are now scattered around the US and some are in state (California) but not at their first choice in state schools that they had assumed were targets. Lots of kids were on waitlists but not many people got off waitlists. I’ll be very curious to see how this season shakes out. Best of luck. Apply broadly!
Last year was a record year for applications to the UC’s and a few CSU’s, such as CPSLO. No idea how this year will turn out, but I agree with @Picklenut6, apply broadly to both UC’s and CSU’s.
I’m having a hard of enough time keeping everything straight for the four colleges my daughter has applied to and is considering. I can’t imagine juggling everything for more! Bless you all who are juggling so many applications and admissions processes.
I don’t think I’m sadden by this notion. I just think each school provides an appeal to the students. For instance, Brown is open curriculum (those students could possibly also add Amherst, Smith, etc to the list, too). Nothing beats that, in my opinion. But lets say the student is premed, Yale could end up being kinda open curriculum-ish with their GE reqs. Harvard has its appeals. My son’s friend is there and he’s got research at his fingertips and loves it. I can see how kids can discern something about each school that would resonate with them or let’s say if there was a negative part, they could overlook that since the positives overcompensates for the negative. The only one I think could be an outlier is maybe MIT. Maybe that one isn’t a great appeal for a student who has interests in liberal arts and STEM. The UCs have great appeals because it’s a strong college system. But in CA, it’s not guaranteed. If students can afford the cost, they could ditch the UCs and go to an Ivy. No fighting for space for the GE classes.
Kids have access to a ton of info to do research and the scrappy ones will reach out to students at these colleges to get insights about colleges so that’s why I think kids are much more open to applying to that many types of different colleges.
I think the quality of the essays may go down but if they’re that stellar to position themselves to be considered for the T10 lottery, they would figure it out.