@bookert1: as I understand each colleges has their own criteria for selection and they put different priority on ECs on an application. It’s not necessary that if someone got in CMU CS will definitely be selected in Berkeley or UIUC CS. As such I know of such cases.
In any case though I agree with you that it does not really matter that much and if someone likes a program then they should apply.
@bookert1:“I believe there are over 200 seats for CS Engineering (not the 160 you mention - not sure what that DMI data link represents, but something is off).”
I do not think the total CS engineering enrollment given at site: https://cs.illinois.edu/about-us/statistics really contradicts with the link I gave earlier (http://www.dmi.illinois.edu/stuenr/class/enrfa17.htm).
See that the total number of CS UG enrollment on DMI link is given as 1045 and on the UIUC admission site is given as 1123 (which could be an estimate and difference between these two numbers is anyway small). Please note students enrolled through transfer as well as during Spring are also likely to be included in the total given in the admission site. However, the DMI site is only for Fall 2017 and this may explain the difference.
It seems UIUC is decreasing enrollments for CS in Engineering in last two years. Based on the same DMI site, the enrollment was around 180 students 4 years back. I would trust the data in the DMI link from UIUC as it is used for reporting to the Provost and looks to be very thorough. In the About DMI section it says - “The Division of Management Information (DMI) is a service unit reporting to the Provost. Our goal is to assist administrators, faculty, and staff in obtaining timely, accurate, and appropriate information from the university’s administrative databases.”