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<li>When you apply in College of Letters and Science, no matter what major you chose, everyone comes in undeclared. The first day you start a UC as a freshman, your major will be Undeclared-YourMajorHere. Then you will get to choose the real major in your soph year…</li>
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<p>Is this true? Then undecided is a good choice within college of L&S</p>
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<li>Undeclared is supposedly a good idea for UCLA, although not the best idea for Irvine…</li>
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<p>Someone posted this. Is this true? Why?</p>
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<li>Someone said…As freshman, switching your “declared” major is no problem, I had a friend switch from women’s studies to engineering at UCI, before he even started there, he called two weeks after he got his acceptance letter and they let him…</li>
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<p>Isn’t engineering is more competitive and more difficult to get in? Why did the university let a student switch from an easier major to an impacted major right away? Is this true? Wouldn’t this hurt other applicants who pick engineering as their first choice in the applications?</p>
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<li>If I go undeclared when apply, how hard it is to go from undeclared (or other majors in L&S) to engineering? In soph year. How big is the chance? I heard that it’s possible.</li>
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<p>I heard that they allow a very small number of OOS. But perhaps next year they will open more space for the OOS because the OOS people have to pay more tuition and the universities are desperately hungry. They need money because the state keeps cutting the budget.</p>
<p>Irvine lets their students change their major the day after they get accepted. So yeah, it’s unfair for those who picked a hard major when applying. BUT Irvine is one of the only schools that doesn’t look at the major selected when choosing students.
That’s why they allow students to change majors so easily.</p>
<p>I also have a question. I won’t have completed the fine arts requirement for the a-g thing since I’m out-of-state and it’s not required at my school… can I still apply to UCs and if so, how?</p>
<p>As long as I know it’s required, I guess your counselor can submit a letter of explanation… But you better check out the website and email one of those people. They can answer your question better.</p>
<p>It depends on the UC campus and the major. For the most part it’s true, but not always.</p>
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<p>Most of the “regular” majors at UCLA are in the College of Letters & Science and admission evaluation is blind to the major. UCI doesn’t look at major for freshman admission, so I don’t know why the person said that.</p>
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<p>Typically engineering is very competitive, but that is not always the case at every UC campus. Depending on how competitive the major is, students may or may not have to jump through hoops to switch.</p>
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<p>If you want to apply to engineering, pick a major. Admission to engineering is major specific (you are only competing against other applicants who are also applying to that engineering major). Engineering Undeclared has a larger than usual applicant pool at most UC campuses, so it’s more difficult to get in through that major.</p>
<p>@sesamesesame, OOS is also subject to the a-g requirement, so you need to complete the VPA requirement to be eligible for admission consideration. Aside from taking a high school course, you may also satisfy the requirement using one of the following:</p>
<p>AP or IB Examination</p>
<p>Score of 3, 4 or 5 on the AP History of Art, Studio Art or Music Theory Exam;
score of 5, 6 or 7 on any one IB HL exam in Dance, Film, Music, Theatre Arts or Visual Arts</p>
<p>College courses</p>
<p>Grade of C or better in any transferable course of 3 semester (4 quarter) units that clearly falls within one of four visual/performing arts disciplines: dance, drama/theater, music or visual art</p>
<p>4 years ago, my son got into UCLA, UCB and UCSD without any of the A-G requirements (homeschooling, so none of his classes were accredited, though in reality he had everything but the fine arts class) He did it using Entrance by Exam. You can google it.</p>
<p>He did get turned down by UCSC, go figure.</p>
<p>BTW, he was also asked to apply for regents at UCLA and (ironically) UCSC, so the system worked - except maybe at UCSC :-)</p>
<p>For number 4, I was in your position and I was able to switch from Poli-sci to Chem engineering. I took a poli sci course and some GE and a calculus math course in the fall quarter and I just wasn’t interested at all, except for my math course. I then decided to start the gen chem and physics series next quarter, and continue with the math. I decided to major in chemistry along the way, but after meeting alot of chem-e friends, I decided to major in Chem-E. Luckily the 1st year chemistry pre-reqs were almost the same pre-reqs for 1st year chem-e majors, so I was able to switch with relative ease since I completed all of the pre-reqs for the 1st year (thank god there was summer school >.<). My GPA was baller as **** though, 3.95. I know for a fact that is what got me in the major. Some of my other friends who applied got in while other didn’t, the others who didn’t didn’t get in simply because of their GPA, even though they took the right courses. The ones who got in I know had a GPA of 3.6 and above.</p>
<p>The engineering curriculum is VERY structured, so if you don’t take the right pre-reqs early enough, you’ll have to be doing summer school, like me. If your ultimate goal is to get into the college of engineering in some generic UC without having to apply to the actual engineering college, then you must start the pre-reqs AS EARLY as you can, and maintain a BALLER GPA. Trust me, if you have taken most of the courses they want you to take, and your GPA is super awesome, they will take you in. The GPA is the best thing they have to gauge you. Give them a good GPA and they will know you’re up for the challenge, no matter how impacted the major is.</p>
<p>Ask Mr Sun - I thought it was pretty straightforward. You have enough points (and you need the 2 SATIIs, which I guess for current applicants, you do not normally need?) Then your application will be looked at. It does seem that the more selective schools, with the more sophisticated admission process are better at dealing with them.</p>
<p>It is a great way for highly qualified alternatively educated kids to get into the UCs - like kids who are homeschooled. I would also like to mention that he got into Caltech and MIT, early action. He was a very attractive candidate. :-)</p>
<p>@anotherparent - my best wishes to your son! Quite frankly I find it alarming that the UCs have not yet adjusted the formula to exclude the SAT Subject Tests. Another reason why OOS applicants who have access to courses that are similar to a-g should follow that path. Plenty of applicants fall through the cracks as it is, I do my best to persuade students to follow the strictest standard available to protect their own interest.</p>
<p>I do fall short on the a-g requirements by one course, but, I do qualify for “Admission by Exam” based on my SAT reasoning and subject test scores. That is, my UC score based on SAT tests comes out to be more than the required 425. Is there a place anywhere on the application to indicate that I should be considered via the “Admission by Exam” path? I did not find it. In the “Completeness Check” step of the “Submit” stage, I get a warning about not meeting the a-g requirements. What have other people in similar situation done to indicate that they should be considered via the “Admission by Exam” path?
Thanks.</p>
<p>This was the case when my son applied 4 years ago. There was no place to specify Admission by Exam. So, finally, we just hit the send button, and I guess they figure it out, though you may want to follow up with an email to the schools.</p>
<p>@GandalfTheGreat, you should put an explanation in Additional Comments as to why you could not complete the a-g requirement. This will trigger a separate review of your application (exception/exam).</p>
<p>AskMsSun,
Can you help answering my question? My son already sent out his UC app; when reporting a-g courses taken at high school, he didn’t put two accredited language course (take at an accredited language school outside his high school but shown on his HS transcript) under his high school, instead he reported them in the additional comment area. At that time, he and I didn’t see any problem and didn’t think more about the missing required language courses. As I mentioned above, my son actually did meet the requirements, just didn’t report them under his high school because of a simple straight thinking-he didn’t take them at his high school. Now when I review his app, I kind of worry about the “missing requirement” message. Do you think it’s a good idea to send out a correction letter (or an explanation in detail letter) to the admission office?</p>
<p>@younglookingmom, your son should submit a change to his Academic History section to the UC Undergraduate Application Processing Service. Contact the office to find out how: call (800) 523-2048 (in California) or (925) 808-2181 (outside California), or e-mail <a href="mailto:ucinfo@ucapplication.net">ucinfo@ucapplication.net</a></p>