<p>So, my situation is a little specific but please bear with me. In the fall, I will be a 2nd year Electrical Engineering student at the University of Texas at Austin. However, since I am trying to switch from ECE to ChemE, I've been taking classes relevant to the latter's degree, such as BIO311C and the O-chem sequence instead of ECE classes since I don't really plan on staying in my current major.</p>
<p>I am applying for the internal transfer in December of this year, for Spring 2015 admission. The only trouble is that they have changed up some of their internal transfer policies and this makes the process a little complicated. I finished off my first year with solid 3.5 cumulative and technical GPAs (if you are unfamiliar with the term 'technical', it refers to the cumulative GPA of only your hard-science credits such as math, chemistry, biology, physics and engineering courses). After next semester, after signing up for a generally easier but heavily weighted course-load, I am expecting somewhere around a 3.7 cumulative/technical when it comes time to apply, give or take like .03. With the old policies, since spring transfer historically had a stable cut-off of about 3.6, I could easily pass that and i'd be pretty much in the clear for transferring.</p>
<p>Thing is, they've changed some rules and nobody, not even the engineering advisers, know how it will affect the cutoff. The first change, which is definitely in my favor, is that only engineering students can apply for admission in the semester that I am. That cuts the applicant pool in half right away because more than half of the applicants for ChemE in particular are usually from the College of Natural Sciences/School of Undergraduate Studies. The other big change is that they have finally let Cockrell freshmen apply to change majors within the school after their first semester. Here is the source: <a href="http://www.engr.utexas.edu/undergraduate/admissions/changeofmajor">http://www.engr.utexas.edu/undergraduate/admissions/changeofmajor</a></p>
<p>Looking at the new requirements for both first-year and continuing engineering students, the first-year requirements are obviously a lot easier. M408C is a breeze and much tougher classes like M408D and PHY303K are not needed. As a result, it is much much easier to maintain a higher GPA for that one semester and rather do-able to hit a 4.0. I don't mean to sound like obsessively competitive, but how is it fair for continuing students like me to compete, GPA-wise, against someone that did not have to undertake the same rigor that I did? You could argue that a lot of freshmen do poorly their first semester (my performance certainly was not stellar), but I am a little panicked because I have also met plenty of people that have earned 4.0s their very first semester in college. </p>
<p>There is one wild card though. The advisers have not really directly acknowledged this, but some have hinted at its benefits. When it it comes time to apply, I will have about 70-75 hours of credit going towards the Chemical Engineering degree plan; raw admission in the past has been SOLELY based on GPA, but that much credit and being that close to finishing the degree plan without even being in the major has to count for something...right? </p>
<p>I honestly can't tell if i'm genuinely in a tight spot now or if i'm just freaking myself out. Does anybody have any knowledge/experience with anything I have said in this post? What are my chances and how do you think the new Spring admission policies will affect the cut-off? Feedback would be greatly appreciated. I have been working extremely hard at this school in hopes of admission to ChemE and I would hate to see it all go down the drain because I missed some kind of "window of opportunity" that the incoming freshmen now have because these new policies were not in place during my freshman year.</p>