What should colleges do regarding frosh admission to oversubscribed majors?

Parent Cafe
1

What should colleges do regarding frosh admission to oversubscribed majors?

I.e. in the short term, since increasing capacity can be a long term project, if possible (sometimes requires more than just hiring more instructors when facilities like labs and such are required).

Note: some schools reserve capacity for incoming transfers. Assume for this discussion that such capacity is not available to those who enter as frosh.

The ways colleges handle the situation now:

A. Admit frosh directly to the major to fill it to capacity, meaning that the major has higher standards than the school overall. However, this means that changing major can be quite difficult, since the only remaining space is due to attrition from the major. Example: engineering majors at UCB, UCLA.

B. Admit frosh as undeclared or to a pre-major status, but require them to compete by GPA (and perhaps other things like essays) to get into their desired majors after taking the frosh(/soph) level prerequisites. However, this method can create a competitive “weed out” environment, and some students will be denied the major of their choice even though they may have done well enough academically other wise (e.g. a 3.3 GPA in college is generally seen as respectable, but may be denied if the major requires a 3.7 GPA). Example: engineering majors at Purdue, Texas A&M, Virginia Tech, Minnesota.

C. Admit frosh directly to the major in numbers greater than the capacity, but require them to meet progression requirements that are higher than the requirements to remain in good academic standing. This method can create a “weed out” environment. Example: engineering majors at Wisconsin.

D. Admit some frosh directly to the major but admit most as undeclared or to a pre-major status to compete for admission to the major later (i.e. combination of A and B above). This method can create a “weed out” environment for those not directly admitted to the major. Example: computer science at Washington.

There are other majors that can have these issues, such as business, nursing, and popular liberal arts majors like psychology and economics.

2

What is best changes based on your point of view.

If I was a college administrator, I may prefer “A”, as it’s the easiest to put in place and to manage (I screen students during the freshman screening process), while simplifying capacity management (by major).

If I was a student, I would prefer “C”, as it ensures I get the major I want, can easily switch majors (up until my junior year), and all I need to do is perform well in class.

3

From a student’s point of view, (C) is not that much different from (B). In either case, missing the GPA threshold means not being able to do the desired major (in (C), it means being forced out of the major, rather than being denied entry into the major as in (B)). For example, if the progression requirement is a 3.5 GPA, but you only get a 3.3 GPA, you are forced out of the major.

Here are the progression requirements for engineering majors at Wisconsin: https://www.engr.wisc.edu/academics/student-services/academic-advising/first-year-undergraduate-students/progression-requirements/

It would not be surprising that the high attrition rate out of engineering is at least partly due to schools using methods (B) and (C), since they have a larger-than-capacity frosh class of (pre-)engineering majors, some of whom must be “weeded out” (denied entry to major in (B) or forced out of their majors in (C)) for the programs to stay within their capacities.

4

I’d like to see A. Then you know from the start: in or out.

5

@ucbalumnus
Doesn’t UCB do “B” currently? Let’s take a major like psychology, which is a capped or impacted major. You are admitted to L&S but have to meet a 3.2 gpa requirement and knock out 6 or 7 prerequisites before applying. Is that “B”? Am I understanding that correctly? I assume anyone applying to psych is only admitted to L&S undeclared, correct?

6

Re: #4

UCB does (A) for engineering majors, but (B) for L&S majors which are capped/impacted/oversubscribed (e.g. psychology, economics, L&S computer science, statistics, art practice) as well as business (students need to apply to the business division in their second year; admission includes other criteria in addition to courses/grades/GPA). Yes, students entering UCB L&S enter as undeclared.

7

Thank you @ucbalumnus, I have a D that applied to psych (L&S) but it also interested in Linguistics which seems like an open major. Your post was truly helpful, to confirm I understood their site correctly. Also, the UCB Guide to majors is incredibly well done.

Interesting question you pose, because we have a D engineer that didn’t go to UW having been admitted as pre-science rather than direct admit. The AD (real one I spoke to) said it was very competitive to get into later and 3.8 gpa was typical of applicants. Not wanting her to deal with the gladiatorial stress fest (plagiarizing that term) fighting to get in major, or graduate with a degree she really didn’t want, she chose not to attend. I think certainty of major is important to many, personally I would take the major guarantee at entry even with higher standards.

8

I think colleges should decide what works best for them.

But if you asked me for my preference, I would choose option A.

When my children were researching schools for business, of course we realized it would make the transition to college less stressful. That said, not having ‘direct admit’ would not be a deal breaker. << sorry for the double negative. Also, our thinking was direct admit may contribute to a more collaborative, less competitive, environment.

Now that my older child is graduating, I would add one more benefit to option A - flexibility. My children were able to take business classes as freshman. They were able to do a semester abroad. They will be able to graduate with double majors, and in my son’s case also a minor.

On another thread there was a discussion comparing UIUC’s College of Business and Michigan’s BBA. I shared that my son was not a direct admit to Ross. I honestly don’t know how much that factored into his decision to attend UIUC.

But it is interesting to see that Michigan is doing away with regular admission. They’re going to ‘preferred admit’, which sounds like it will now be a 4 yr program as opposed to the 3yr program. I wonder if they’re doing it because they were losing students who wanted guaranteed admission to Ross. It sounds like the new 4 yr plan would allow students to do a semester abroad. I was surprised to learn that undergraduate semester study abroad is new to Michigan…it explains why we got such a vague answer when we visited campus on an admitted student day 2 years ago.

9

With option “C”, you can have a large variation between schemes.

For example, at UF, the progression requirements are not nearly has demanding as UW in engineering or most other majors, with some exceptions (like Biomedical Engineering, Nursing, etc.)

For Chemical Engineering:

Compare that to UW-Madison’s benchmark of a 3.0 overall GPA and a 3.5 Core GPA for Chemical Engineering.

The downside to UF’s much more liberal policy, is the impact on transfer students. They can find it very difficult to gain access to the oversubscribed majors. Very few transfer students can get admitted to the Mechanical, Aerospace, Industrial engineering majors, as well as the BS programs in Business administration, accounting and finance. About a dozen more programs (many healthcare related) are also impacted (for transfer students).

On the other hand, many of the less popular majors are very “transfer” friendly.

10

I like option C.

11

I would like option A the best for a student who doesn’t change her/his mind about the major.

But, some of the students are late bloomers. They “think” they like the major, get admission in their desired major, only to change it later. The attrition rate of the particular major in the particular college will speak a lot to form an admission policy.

I like option D for some other students. Admission to the desired major for some students. If the student is not entirely sure or doesn’t have the required GPA, etc; allow them the general ed courses which will let them explore their options. The Universities should design the courses to allow a lot of flexibility to choose the major in the allied fields, e.g. if the student is not certain about Engineering (or a particular type of Engineering) or if the student wants to be an engineer but missed the necessary cut offs by just a small margin, s/he should get into such general ed courses which will allow her/him to either enter the college of Engineering or some other major in Science. Business, and the other majors will follow a similar model.

My concern is that such majors are mostly in a different colleges (Henry Samueli for engineering, Haas for business etc), and inter-college transfers are difficult. Can the Universities come up with a common pool programs for such students at least for a limited number of students? That way, many students, and parents can save a lot of money, and years if the student needs to change/choose her/his major.

12

My experience with oversubscribed majors is limited to nursing. The state school with a nursing program does D. A handful of direct admits and then competitive for others. My employer does B. I think I’d select one of these options.

After 25 years working with freshman, I can’t say I would be a fan of either A or C because they do not allow students who don’t declare at the get-go to move into the major. First years change their minds… A LOT. And I’m not talking from a statistics standpoint or a parent who knows her own kids and some of their friends (really small samples). I’ve seen a lot of real live freshmen over the years. A and C keep good students out of programs, although there are some administrative advantages.

13

The UCB College of Engineering, which uses (A) (frosh admission to major) does have a CoE undeclared option that frosh can apply to. If admitted, the student can freely choose any CoE major later if s/he is in good academic standing (which includes a GPA minimum of 2.0). However, the number of frosh admitted to CoE undeclared is very small, and it is more selective than most or all of the declared CoE majors, since the CoE majors are already enrolled to capacity or nearly so.
http://engineering.berkeley.edu/academics/undergraduate-programs/undeclared

Note that this is different from schools which use (B), where a frosh entering as undeclared or pre-engineering may need to meet a GPA significantly higher than 2.0 (sometimes higher than 3.5 for some majors at some schools) to get into his/her desired major.

14

@ucbalumnus, I did not mean going undeclared in just CoE. I wish a common pool for Science/Math frosh general ed courses AND the students having flexibility to either go for Engineering or classic Science/Math majors. I personally know some students who are interested in Math but are not completely sure about Engineering. Can they enter as Math major and then transfer to Engineering?
How easy it is to get such transfer, especially from L&S to Engineering for example?

15

At UCB specifically, math is in L&S. Switching from L&S to any CoE major is difficult, but switching from CoE to L&S is not (GPA threshold is currently 2.2 for frosh, 2.5 otherwise), and math is not a capped/impacted major (need only C grades in prerequisites to declare, though the department warns that it the major may be difficult for students who did not get at least a B- in the prerequisites).

So applying to a CoE major of interest (or CoE undeclared) would give more options later to change to math or some other L&S major, compared to applying to L&S, where changing to a CoE major later would be difficult. But it would mean facing a higher admission threshold to get into the school to begin with.

Some CoE majors do have similar L&S majors which are not as hard to get into as the CoE majors, but are still capped/impacted. These are L&S CS (3.3 GPA currently needed) and L&S ORMS (3.2 GPA currently needed), which have some similarities to CoE EECS and CoE IEOR.

http://engineering.berkeley.edu/admissions/undergrad-admissions/change-college
https://ls.berkeley.edu/advising/academic-progress/changing-status/change-college-ls

16

I like option D. Some who already know they want the major and have high (well above the average for the major) can know they will get it. Not everyone knows what they want to major in and there should be room to choose after starting college. There should be limits, done by gpa in certain classes/essays to show interest et al, so that those admitted to the major know they can get the required classes. I know historically some chose U Minnesota over U Wisconsin (reciprocity so costs not an issue) for direct admission to the business school. Those who have the greatest ability should not have to worry about getting in on their college record and choose the school for its program, not as a freshman. It is better to limit students based on resources to teach them effectively and in a timely manner than to graduate students who will not be competitive in the job market. The so-so majors would be better off choosing a different major that they can be competitive in the job market instead of finding out after they have the degree.

17

When I went to school in Canada, universities employed option A, direct admit, but with differing admission requirements depending on program demand. Now that I am starting to research options for DS15 I am starting to see more and more schools that have switched to a form of option B, admit to a specific faculty with pre-major status but with a general first year (sometimes plus required pre-requisities depending on intended major and other times the same general first year for all students admitted to the same faculty) and a required GPA for program admittance in second year, even for non competitive programs. I suspect the move to approach B is not to restrict entry to competitive programs (generally those still remain direct admit) but as a general field leveler as we do not have standardized testing in Canada. By employing option B, universities neutralize any grade inflation and variability in quality between high schools.

I’m wondering however if a student has their heart set on a specific major, are they better off going to a school that employs Option A, direct admit based on high school grades, or risk a school that employs option B, which relies on grades achieved in the first year of university? Is it better to take the risk of not getting into the major of choice at schools employing option B in favour of delaying having to declare a major just in case the student changes their mind? It would seem risky to me to pin your hopes on a specific major and then not get accepted after first year where you would have been accepted had you chosen a different school.