3.83 GPA acceptable for California colleges?

Archive State Forums
1

Hi, I am currently a junior in highschool and I just finished my first semester last week. I’m interested in going to Cal Poly, UCLA, and UCSD for computer science, but it’s a very competitive major. I moved to Oregon for high school and currently attend the #1 ranked public school in the state. It’s a MAGNET school and the AP courses far more rigorous than any other public school which has unfortunately affected my GPA. I haven’t taken the SATs or ACTs yet, which I know is a huge factor in being accepted into any college. However, I want to know if my current GPA will have a chance when applying to the colleges mentioned above (or any colleges similar). I have just finished finals for semester 1 of junior year.

Unweighted GPA: 3.83
Weighted GPA: 3.97

Freshman GPA: 4.0
Sophomore GPA: 4.0
Junior unweight GPA (only one semester): 3.29
Junior weighted GPA (only one semester: 3.86

The only AP courses I have ever taken are in junior year:
AP Calc BC
AP Physics
AP Stats
AP Lit

I’m wondering if colleges will be more accepting of my GPA due to my difficult junior year schedule along with the status of my school, but I am also worried since colleges generally have higher expectations for out-of-state students. My science and tech based school has a much higher quality education than my home high school. I want to know if colleges value students from these types of schools with a slightly lower GPA over a student who aces all their courses at a “normal” high school.

Thanks in advance!

2

The UC’s and all CSU’s use the same GPA calculation (exception Cal Poly SLO) which includes only 10-11th grades for the a-g course requirements and 8 semesters for honors points for AP/IB or DE courses taken 10-11th grades (OOS applicants do not qualify for the extra honors points in HS designated Honors classes) which is your capped weighted UC GPA. UCLA/UCB will also consider you uncapped weighted UC GPA (unlimited semesters taken 10-11th grades).

Here is the calculator: https://rogerhub.com/gpa-calculator-uc/

For Cal Poly SLO, you use the same calculator but include grades from 9-11th grades with the 8 semester honors cap.

Your GPA will be considered within the context of your HS but since you are OOS, the top schools (UCLA/UCB/UCSD) will set a higher bar in their academic expectations.

CS admission rates for the top UC’s and SLO are below 10% so you will need at least a 4.0+ UC Capped weighted GPA to be competitive.

Here is the SLO Freshman profile for the College of Engineering 2017.

Average CP GPA: 4.16 Average ACT: 32 Average: 1467

For the UC’s below are some UC GPA capped weighted admit stats for 2017 and these are not major specific, so expect CS admission rates be lower and test scores higher.

Freshman admit rates for UC GPA of 3.80-4.19:

UCB: 12.6%
UCLA: 11.7%
UCSD: 38.7%
UCSB: 53.6%
UCD: 56.5%
UCI: 52.1%
UCSC: 75.7%
UCR: 90.1%
UCM: 96.1%

Freshman admit rates for UC GPA of 4.20 or above:

UCB: 42.7%
UCLA: 47.2%
UCSD: 84.2%
UCSB: 82.0%
UCD: 90.3%
UCI: 94.1%
UCSC: 92.7%
UCR: 97.5
UCM: 98.1%

25th - 75th percentiles for SAT:

UCB: 1280-1490

UCLA: 1280-1500
UCSD: 1250-1470
UCSB: 1210- 1450
UCD: 1190-1430
UCI: 1190-1420
UCSC: 1170-1380
UCR: 1090-1310
UCM: 1020-1230

25th - 75th percentiles for ACT:
UCB: 30-34
UCLA: 30-34
UCSD: 29-34
UCSB: 28-33
UCD: 26-32
UCI: 26-32
UCSC: 26-31
UCR: 23-30
UCM: 20-27

One more thing you should consider is costs. As an OOS applicant, the UC’s and CSU’s will offer little to no financial aid, so make sure your parents are willing to pay $60K+/year for a UC and $36-40K/year for a CSU like Cal Poly SLO.

3

What is your home state? If you are from the West, you may qualifiy for WUE, which discounts tuition at some of the CA publics. Here is a list of all the participating schools.
http://wue.wiche.edu/search_results.jsp?searchType=all

This is a guessing game without an SAT/ACT but, assuming a 1250 and a UCGPA around 3.9, your best UC shots are UCSC, UCR and UCM.

CPSLO is pretty unlikely but, the rest of the CSUs should be no problem, as long as you have met the a-g course matrix. I’d also look at some privates like USD and LMU which may offer you enough aid to make them compelling options.

4

$15,355 Average net price, U of Oregon, in-state (from College Navigator, 2015-16)
$19,484 Average net price, Oregon State, in-state (from College Navigator, 2015-16)
$36,000 - 40,000 Cost of attendance, any Cal State University, out-of-state, no aid (approximate)
$60,000 Cost of attendance, UC Santa Cruz / Riverside / Merced, out-of-state, no aid (approximate)

Two points here: (1) as an out-of-stater, attending a CSU or UC would cost you far more than the in-state cost to attend Oregon or Oregon State, and (2) your most likely options in the CSU or UC systems do not necessarily have stronger academic reputations than Oregon or Oregon State.

If you really want to go to school in California, your most cost-effective options would likely be the private schools, because (1) they don’t mark up the tuition for out-of-staters, and (2) they don’t discriminate against out-of-staters in terms of admissions or financial aid.

Consider Santa Clara University, for example. SCU is located in the heart of Silicon Valley, has a highly regarded computer science program, and outranks Cal Poly in the “Regional Universities (West)” USNews ranking. In-state residents would typically prefer Cal Poly, because of the low in-state tuition. But for an out-of-stater, the net cost to attend SCU (after financial aid) would probably be lower than the net cost to attend Cal Poly (assuming out-of-state tuition and no financial aid).

In other words, the private school – which has higher test scores, smaller classes, a lower student-faculty ratio, and a higher 4-year graduation rate than the public school – would probably cost less.

5

UC Merced is the only UC campus that participates in the WUE program. An Oregon resident should qualify for discounted tuition at UCM, which would bring the cost down to maybe a CSU level.

But even then, UCM may not be a attractive alternative to Oregon or Oregon State. In fact, there are a lot of Californians that apply to the Oregon schools, because they perceive Eugene and Corvallis as more attractive college destinations than, say, Riverside or Merced.