Hi, I’ve been admitted to both UCSB and UCSD as an economics major. However, I’m having a tough time deciding between the two schools. I know that for UCSB, you are admitted as a pre-econ major, and have to fulfill a certain GPA in at certain number of courses. While visiting UCSB this weekend, I attended a faculty lecture taught by an econometrics professor there, and he said that some students that are admitted as pre-econ majors do not actually end up fulfilling the requirements for the major, and end up having to switch majors. My question is, is this the same policy at UCSD? I know that at UCSD, it says that I am an economics major, and not a pre-econ major. My problem would be not being able to become an economics major at UCSB if there is not any available space. Also, does anyone know how these majors stack up against the two universities? Thank you.
BUMP! I want to know this too! :))
I am an economics major at UCSB in senior year standing. You are right in your statement that at UCSB there is a weeding process that eliminates students out of the major. In order to matriculate to full major status, you need to get a 2.85 GPA in certain pre major economics classes (the calculus, upper division writing requirement and statistics courses are not included in this 2.85 GPA, you only need a grade of C in these classes). However, the curves for the lower division Econ classes are set so that approximately 40% of the class gets a B- or better, which does weed out a sizeable group of people. The exception to this is Econ 10A, the final (and hardest) lower division Econ class, which has a set grading scale based on your percentage score.
I hoped this helps in terms of UCSB. However, I am unsure about how cutthroat the Econ department at UCSD is, and unfortunately cannot offer any insight on that front.
Econ is challenging at UCSD but I wouldn’t call it cutthroat at all. There are a lot of resources for students, including The Econ Tutor (http://www.sandiegouniontribune.com/uniontrib/20050605/news_1m5tutor.html old article but everyone still goes to his sessions in random hotel ballrooms). It’s a bit more math-heavy than other econ programs, because the department is best known for producing economic research. If you’re up for the challenge, it should be fairly rewarding. The econ department at UCSD is considered the strongest non-STEM department here, and one of the top 15-20 in the nation overall.
UCSD economics major criteria to declare:
http://www.economics.ucsd.edu/ugrad/ugradEntry/index.php