$30k is huge!
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Common App completed. He hit submit to a few schools. Progress.
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Love the āchoose your own adventureā theme. Kids have so many different interests so thatās a great way for the school to personalize the visit so they can focus on whatās important for them. My son is hoping to sit in on classes once he chooses his top schools so hopefully that will be part of accepted student events or an option he can set up.
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Time to show some love to Thing 1 lolā¦heās out of Engineering Review at Texas A&M and officially accepted to the College of Engineering! He was auto admit to the school but had to be holistically reviewed for Engineering.
Now to make the decision: does he want to go through the ETAM (entry to a major) process for A&M? Everyone is General Engineering for the first year than you have to apply to get your desired major. You need a 3.75 gpa at ETAM to get your first choiceā¦and he wants Comp Sci, the hardest to get in to.
Heās already directly accepted to Comp Sci at every other school he applied to, however the Aggie Network and A&M Engineering is topsā¦what to do!!!
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Yes, my son caught that right away when he checked the portal, thank goodness. I had them saved separately but it said they had to be submitted in one document so my husband had to rescan them. What a pain! Itās weird because Northeastern needed a bunch of documents but it was all listed on the CSS page once we submitted. I figured all requests for financial docs would be listed there but apparently not. Itās all so confusing and these kids really have to stay on top of it all!
My son wants to submit a music supplement to Case Western (they offer a chance to compete for extra merit even if you are a non-major.) Just finding the due date for that was a task. Majors had to submit by 11/15 but apparently he has some breathing room and they just need by Feb. 1st for non-majors. He really had to dig for the answer though!
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We thought it was 11/15 for non-majors too, but I have to admit that I am thankful that we didnāt know! My son submitted his music supplement earlier this week, Iām glad it is all done now and he didnāt leave it until 2/1 
Congrats, thatās great news!
It will be hard to maintain a 3.75.
A thought exercise: if your son was not able to do CS at A&M, would he still want to go there, or would he choose one of the other schools?
My kid is thinking he doesnāt want to attend the one school on his list that has a GPA requirement for secondary entrance to engineering major, even knowing that his GPA will almost certainly be fine, and knowing that he isnāt likely to be in an impacted major. He just doesnāt want that hanging over his head.
He would definitely not be interested in attending a school where he would be at risk of being locked out of his major of choice.
As for alumni connections, your kid will be fantastically employable with his CS/engineering degree regardless of where he earns it.
But obviously your son will have to decide for himself if the 3.75 requirement is worth it to him.
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I think thatās a good way of looking at it. A lot of these kids have had to be super competitive in HS and really just want college to be about learning and having fun and not wanting to still be at the top of the class (even if, as you said, heās not worried about having a 3.0 or 3.2 GPA or whatever). If having an additional hoop to jump through doesnāt sound appealing and thereās someplace else a student wonāt have to hoop jump, thenā¦ itās great to have those options and know what you want.
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Yes, definitely better to get them in early if you can. My son is giving himself a Jan. 1st deadline.
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3.75 is a very, very high bar for transitioning to major. Iād ask TAMU engineering the percentage of freshman getting their first choice major.
Direct admit to CS would be hard to pass up.
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My son applied to a test optional school, Barry University, but chose to submit his 1450 SAT score. He was able to self-report for the first part of the application process but they are asking him to submit official scores as per his invitation to the honors program and qualification to compete for the STAMPS scholarship. When I went to submit his official score from College Board (in which I tried to only select the 1450 score) it said āthis school requires that all SAT tests be submitted.ā My son took the test a second time but went down a little on each part so he was hoping to only send the 1450. Any idea why a school would require all scores be sent, other than to āsuperscoreā them? He is afraid it will look bad that he went down on his second attempt (he was not feeling well the day of the second test.) Maybe this is a Florida college thing? Thanks for any insight.
They apparently care about all the times a student has taken the test for whatever reasons and I wouldnāt over think it and just send it if you have any interest in Honors and the Stamps Scholarship. The choice is the possibility itāll ding him for those things or not to be considered at all.
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UC Berkeley only requires a 3.3 overall GPA in 3 prerequisite CS courses, 3.75 seems really high.
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Thank you! That makes me feel better.
FYI: For Fall 2023, UC Berkeley has classified CS in the College of L&S a high demand major so they are requiring applicants to select CS as a first choice major (direct admit) and cannot guarantee students will be able to declare the major later.
- Admission into L&S: Those who already know
as high school students that they want a high- demand major should select that major on their UC Berkeley admissions application. If admitted to Berkeley L&S, they will be guaranteed a spot in the major they selected, subject to completing the prerequisites, maintaining good academic standing in L&S, and filing a declaration form.- Changing to a high-demand major after arriving at L&S: For students who did not select a high-demand major on their UC Berkeley admissions application, the process for declaring a high-demand major will be through a review, rather than a minimum GPA requirement only. Students will have one opportunity to apply for a high-demand major, and will be required to have an alternate plan to declare a non-high-demand major as a back-up.
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Hi, My son is a CS major at the University of KS. I also have a senior in aerospace engineering. I would look at what classes he would have to take for that first year at A&M and ask around if there are a couple that are particularly hard to excel in. One of my boys would have made that 3.75 cutoff and the other would not have.
Wow, did not know this. I wonder what they will base the selection on rather than GPA.
General Chemistry + Gen Chem for Engineering Students Lab
Engr 102- Engineering Lab 1- Computation
Math 151- Engineering Mathematics
Engr 216/Phys 216- Experimental Physics + Eng Lab II- Mechanics
Phys 206- Newtonian Mechanics for Engineering & Science
^ these are the main classes listed on the first year Gen Engineering course sheet (along with the the typical English and other University Core Curriculum requirements)
Those seem like basic engineering 1st year courses. I guess it just depends on which if any are the weed out classes. I would definitely do what someone else suggested and ask TAM how many get in etc. Good Luck!
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