And engineering is even higher rated. Every engineering major they offer is ranked in the top five for undergraduate in the country with most being number 1 or 2. My oldest is a civil engineering major, and it was number one when he entered and now number two in the country. My current applicant was admitted for mechanical engineering, which is number two in the country, with MIT number one.
This just emphasizes why it’s so important to look at the major you’re applying to. If you want to be an engineer, most of the top 20 national universities can’t compete with large publics like GT, UIUC, Berkeley, etc. There are of course several exceptions but not many.
My twins applied EA2 OAS to GEORGIA tech for Biomedical Engineering. Georgia Tech was twin B dream school. Twin B got rejected , twin A got deferred. We were initially shocked. However, Twin B had higher SAT and AP test scores. Twin B had a lower unweighted average (3.9) while Twin A had 4.2 weighted average. Twin A was in a biomedical program through school, where as Twin B did not do any activity related to her intended major. Twin A was captain of her school,s track team multiple times and part of NHS. Twin B was part of the track team , in Model UN . Twin B did no volunteering at all but has had a paid job as a math tutor since June 2021. They both got into U Michigan through EA and looks like Twin B is doing okay with the ultimate outcome .
Like others have mentioned, it’s simply VERY competitive. My OOS state freshman turned down Berkeley, UCLA, CMU, Northwestern, USC, Rice, Harvey Mudd and many others… for an out of state scholarship to GT. So i too stand with the others that it wasn’t yield protection and you didn’t do anything wrong either. With CS you have to apply to variety of schools.
Hi! I was admitted to GaTech for fall 2023. This years OOS acceptance rate was and institution low of 10%. Just to clear up some things, GT does ask for intended major, but upon admission you can change it, so GT does want an academically diverse incoming freshman class, but your selected major won’t have that much effect. As someone who applied the strongest part of my application specifically to GT was my answer to “why do you want to study here”. Did your daughter use specific programs and opportunities at GT that she loved or was it generic? And while GT loves to see very focused ECs to their major they are more concerned with impact on community, paid work experience, and other non-traditional EC that won’t be common to all other applicants. I am the treasurer of my high schools art honor society, I manage a pool in the summer, and I also tutor students in math, science and history while speaking spanish. GT looks for an applicant with a diverse interest. I think the biggest thing that could have improved her chances is more diverse extra curriculars. GT has released stats saying that some 40% of admitted students were involved in art extracurriculars, and like 50% had paid work experience. Your daughter seems so smart, but GT and their review was just looking for different things. This is of course in my opinion as an admitted student, who has committed to GT.
Here are my stats for perspective:
GPA: 3.96
WGPA: 4.76
SAT: 1380
ACT: N/A
APs: 11 (lowest score received was a 3)
Dual Enrollment: 4 total classes (for senior year)
Applied Major: Biology
Declared Major: Biology
Demographics: Female, White, Hispanic, High Income
ECs: Quiz Bowl Team Captain, Varsity Field Hockey/volunteered at clinics, Varsity Swim/Club swim for 6 years, Delegate at a national conference, tutored for 150+ hours, licensed pool operator/life guard/managed a pool over the summer, art honor society treasurer, history honor society committee chair, started an annual book drive for a local non profit, and a 3 year contributing writer to my schools newspaper/editor for 2 years
Recommendations: I had a close relationship with my counselor and my Calculus teacher wrote my recommendation (that was a class I struggled in but I kept working hard, participation, and asking questions)
From our experience GT does not yield protect with rejections. I think it has too many good candidates similar to UMich. Both have tendencies to defer good students then waitlist them. I agree that rejection in this case is very strange. Something really went wrong, but OP needs to move on no matter what. On the other hand, I know for a fact that Boston University does yield protection and rejects top candidates. I know several families who were in that boat with BU. It is also strange to me that CWRU deferred such candidate. That can be in fact yield protection. I am not aware that CWRU is ranked very high for CS. But it is very strong school overall.
Gt denied and deferred very high stats kids at our school too- none got accepted in the EA round. Kids are presidential scholar nominees, NmF, strong gpas, strong ECs- but most have moved on and looking at other schools like ivies and private schools now. Being public school they just had limits.
Per the GT website, 20 percent of deferred applicants over the past 2 years have been admitted. So 80 percent of deferred students are denied or waitlisted.
The waitlist offers will be huge in numbers like many schools. Waitlist offers are for a very specific type of student(race,gender,etc)/geographical location/extracurricular involvement/etc. I would expect the waitlist offers to be many more than the expected enrolled number of students
Unfortunately yes. That was the story of my daughter and many friends that I know. The only reason my daughter got accepted from waitlist is because it was Covid year and many kids decided to delay enrollment. She also got a spot only after she reached admissions and pointed that she was admitted to UMich, Carnegie Mellon, and CWRU and UMD, but she wanted to attend GaTech because she is legacy and was dreaming about it from childhood. (That is true and every family member except her dad is GT graduate.) She also mentioned that she will take the spot at any point even after May 1st. She got admitted 2 days later on April 29th . That was a miracle. BTW she was also OOS with stats exactly like OP, but without Math competitions. However she was a graduate of technical magnet with all advanced classes, APs, DE through Differential Equations, did robotics team for several years (including championship) etc. She applied for BME. Also 30 students from her magnet applied to both GaTech and UMich. Initially one was selected for each school and the rest were deferred. I do not know all details but at the end only one girl commited to UMich and 4 students went to GaTech. This is another problem: students from very strong programs have very little chance since they compete against each other. GaTech or UMich cannot take all these kids and pull from one place in the state only. They want diversity.
Which one is her safety ? Which state are you in ? My son also got rejected from Gtech, UIUC and UT Austin for CS and its very disappointing. His stats are very good too. CS Major is highly competitive and these are public IVYs hard to get into. Wouldnt have set the expectations this is what I believe now
Overqualified? I don’t quite understand overqualification idea although people talk about it a lot.
Not sure whether colleges care about math and coding competition anymore - seems in our area early result from those kids is far below expectation. Hope RD will be better. Let see.
Anecdotal but our S was deferred by GT (they asked for another essay). He had 4.0 uw gpa, 2400 SAT (back when 2400 was max score) , 3 subject tests at 800.
He was accepted by 10 colleges including Stanford (he accepted), CMU SCS, and Cal.
Maybe not overqualified but certainly qualified. Not sure how GT decides
I see that scenario, of exemplary candidates being deferred from Ga Tech, a lot. Far more than you would expect for candidates accepted to one or more HYPSM colleges.
Michigan seems to be much more predictable in terms of admissions.
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. That was a miracle. BTW she was also OOS with stats exactly like OP, but without Math competitions. However she was a graduate of technical magnet with all advanced classes, APs, DE through Differential Equations, did robotics team for several years (including championship) etc. She applied for BME. Also 30 students from her magnet applied to both GaTech and UMich. Initially one was selected for each school and the rest were deferred. I do not know all details but at the end only one girl commited to UMich and 4 students went to GaTech. This is another problem: students from very strong programs have very little chance since they compete against each other. GaTech or UMich cannot take all these kids and pull from one place in the state only. They want diversity.
