I am currently a student here at UCSD (no I am not a UCLA reject, I selected UCSD over both UCLA and USC). As the decisions are starting to roll in, I believe I must share this information:
Normally when universities accept students, they accept a number higher than the actual amount they want (ex. they want 6000 freshman so they accept 9000). They do this because some applicants get into their “dream schools”, so only a fraction of accepted applicants will actually attend. In this case, people tend to favor UCLA over UCSD.
Last year, we had hundreds of more incoming freshman than anticipated. As a result, we had students who had been selected for specific colleges (Muir in particular) that were forced to live in other colleges on campus in “overflow housing” (Revelle, Marshall, and Sixth).
This year, to prevent this from happening again and to compensate for last year’s influx, UCSD is only admitting people to capacity (ex. 6000 admits for 6000 spots). Since it is highly unlikely all of the spots will be filled, the wait list this year is going to be larger than it has ever been and there will be a great opportunity for those of you who are placed on the wait list to still make it in.
That being said, I wish you all luck! I know this can be a very tough time for many of you, but just know that although people like to throw big names around, college is only what you make of it. I promise you all will find your niche and you will have the time of your life.
Sorry, I kind of find this hard to believe? Universities admit based on average yield calculations and they just happened to overadmit last year. Where you find this information?
Please provide a source because it’s kind of inconsiderate if that isn’t true and this type of info might cause lot of panic …
@ucsdcscholar I know a few people on Muir College Council who informed me of this. They told me to relay the information to people who may find it useful.
I also found the “to capacity” claim to be a bit far-fetched, but the fact is that UCSD is going to under admit this year and the waitlist is going to be huge in comparison to years prior. Many students see being waitlisted as a 95% chance of rejection, but this year that won’t be the case.
If you do end up on a waitlist at UCSD or elsewhere, try to get solid information from the admission office and use historical data to make an informed assessment of your situation. It is definitely true that waitlist situations vary from year-to-year at each UC campus, because all sorts of things can affect the yield in a given year. So one year there might be hundreds of students admitted off of the waitlist, while another year there could be virtually none. If the campus is already over-crowded from last year, it stands to reason that the campus will be very careful not to overadmit this year.
Muir overflow did not mean school overall overflow. But UCD has been using this tactic (use larger WL as buffer) for a few years, as many admitted in the past did not commit. Does not mean UCSD will start to do this. Now UCI last year actually did see more than expected accepted students committed so they might use WL more this year.
Major: Mechanical Engineering
Capped/Weighted GPA: 3.8
SAT: 1400
ECs: Varsity golf, 5 officer positions, won/competed in tournaments, many awards, big projects to help school, hundreds of community service hours
Essays: 8/10
Hooks: none (unless medical disabilities count?)
Out of State
Accepted: CU Boulder, University of Portland, UC Davis
Rejected: UCLA
Waiting to hear from: Santa Barbara, Berkeley (lol)
Can anyone tell me my chances of getting off the waitlist for UCSD
I was also waitlisted at UCLA and Johns Hopkins on the same day.
UC Capped GPA: 4.04
I’m top 6% of my class
SAT: 1410
SAT 2s: 710 for Biology Ecol. and 650 for Math 2
Low-income and Black