@mmadness@MelloG@choroidal, thank you for all your thoughts as I am a first-time mom through the process and trying to make some sense for my son who is on the waitlist for mechanical engineering with stats that fall right in the middle of the accepted range: CSU GPA 4.3 and SAT 1460, MCA ~4700. I am confident the application was completed correctly because a Cal Poly admissions officer walked us through and told us where to put 8th grade/ community college math classes, etc. Not sure if the MCA calculator I used is up-to-date though.
I agree the yield protection theory doesn’t hold up, but that a self-reported score of 5000+ also doesn’t make sense if there is a hard MCA cutoff for admission. What I am beginning to accept is that there are many highly qualified students who had scores above my son’s who may have applied to Cal Poly as their “backup school”. I have reliable information from a colleague that she knows 2 such students (4.0 GPA, 1600 SAT) who have also been admitted to Ivy league schools who will likely decline their spots at Cal Poly.
This blog has been a great resource for me, but can also be misleading since it is self-reported. I imagine many of these high-stat, admitted students may not be posting to this thread if Cal Poly is not their first choice, so we are not seeing a good representation.
What would have helped me and my son when choosing colleges is a better breakdown of the “average” SAT/ACT/GPAs. An “average SAT of 1460” could be reached by 10 students each with 1460; or 8 students with 1550 and 2 students with 1100 each which is a big difference. I believe the “median” would tell us what was the most frequent SAT score which is a better reflection of actual scores. It would also help for those accepted/rejected to include the status of the other schools to which they apply.
@BayAreaMom15 for engineering there is a useful tool from ASEE that I used for my son’s schools that breaks down 25% - 75%ile scores for SAT and other data. It is http://profiles.asee.org/
I actually put a little spreadsheet that showed admit rate, yield, % that were in the top quarter of their graduating class, SAT scores, and # of Civ Eng. degrees granted each year so that he could get a better picture of the schools and their likely student body.
For example, SLO’s college of engineering 2017 admits had a SAT math range of 730-630 and a English range of 680-570, 95% of the admits were in the top quarter of their class, and the overall admit rate was 27.6%.
Even though my son had competitive scores based on this (and decent ECs – 4 years of 2 sports, a job, etc.) Davis rejected him. SLO was his first choice so he didn’t care about Davis, but I was a little offended!
@BayAreaMom15, Cal Poly admits competitively, by major, not by school or by college. The stats you posted are for the whole college of engineering, including several non-competitive majors, like manufacturing engineering where almost everyone who applies gets in. ME is one of the most competitive. I’m guessing the mean is a bit higher.
@BayAreaMom15, Cal Poly admits competitively, by major, not by school or by college. The stats you posted are for the whole college of engineering, including several non-competitive majors, like manufacturing engineering where almost everyone who applies gets in. ME is one of the most competitive. I’m guessing the mean is a bit higher.
Hey @eyemgh, no need to hate on the shmucks who got in for MfgE. Save your wrath for those sour grapes parents who insist the system is rigged because their kids weren’t accepted.
Hey guys! I got some good news for those who still have no determination. A Cal Poly admissions officer came to my school today to talk to admitted students and he was very helpful. He told us to tell any friends still without decisions that they have not yet completed reviewing all freshman applications and expect decisions to be finalized by April 1st, but he said they will be done much faster, hopefully closer to the 23rd. He said there is no date set but they hope to release all decisions within 2 weeks. He also said that no transfer applications have been reviewed but they are planning to review those soon. Regarding in-state merit scholarships, those are yet to be given out and will be released with financial aid packages in the coming weeks, which will be released on a rolling basis. According to the AO, expect a final decision and financial aid package within the next 2-3 weeks!
@JakefromStateFarm - @eyemgh was just stating a fact. No need to be defensive. Sounds like your own issues. There are stats that show how many apply and how many accepted. Apparently mfg engineering does not have a lot of applicants, therefore making it not as competitive. It was far from a wrath.
@ugradbiz: I do to want burst your bubble but if SLO has not finished reviewing Freshman applications, how could they possibly start waitlisting so many students?? It does not make sense…
@didhegetin I felt so awful that waitlisted students need to make decision today when many UCs have not yet released their acceptance decisions. I don’t understand this concept. My DD is still on decision pending status, I hope we are not waiting for waitlisted students to confirm.
@ugradbiz it is the same canned response they give every year. They told my daughters class the same thing last year yet I never saw another response of an acceptance except for an international student. Let’s just say, I wouldn’t put money on it.
@Goolia66: I agree since I have followed SLO’s decision threads for the last 5 years and the pattern is pretty much the same other than the release date of the decisions seems to be pushed back later each year.
@didhegetin@jjkmom That’s not how it works. First off, if a waitlisted student is still waiting to hear from other schools, then they should take their spot on the waitlist. There is no harm for them to do that. Freshman acceptances and freshman waitlist offers have already gone out. If you did not get one of these, the only other decision left is denials. There is a delay on the transfer student’s decisions because of a computer glitch that wiped out some of their supplemental apps. The transfers have been emailed about this problem and their decisions are expected to go out by the end of this week. After that all the denials will go out. The admissions office will tell you what u want to hear. Unless there is something drastically different from the way it has been done for the past multiple years, this is the sequence of events.
Has anyone heard back yet for Biological Sciences, in or out-of-state? I’ve only seen a couple of people post on here about getting in, so I wanted to make sure that I wasn’t the only one waiting for an acceptance/rejection.
Any details on in-state admissions too for biological sciences?
@Gumbymom and @CentralCoaster so you are saying if there is no determination on the portal at this point the answer is no? Why not just reject these students then and allow them to move on?
@volunteeringteen: Here are some of the posts for Biological Sciences: Yes there have been several in-state acceptances and many waitlisted applicants.
March 8
Waitlisted
In state biological sciences
4.2 capped gpa
1460 SAT (Superscored)
4815 MCA
March 7
I was waitlisted for Biological Sciences with a CSU GPA of 4.2 and ACT of 33. Have already gotten into a bunch of safeties and U Mich and Boston College… pretty surprised but oh well.
March 2
Accepted
Biological Sciences
In-State
MCA: 4400
March 2
My son was accepted.
Bio Sci
In state
4.13 cp
Never calculated MCA
Feb 28
DS accepted Biological sciences
In state
4.1 Cal Poly GPA
1480 SAT
MCA? Didn’t calculate
@marlinmom yes that is the most likely outcome based on how they do it every year. I agree 100% that it is not very kind. UCD is able to release notifications to all applicants (70k) in one afternoon on the portal for yes, no, waitlist as well as regents or honors. So can UCSD, UCLA, UCB. The schools that don’t are stringing along many anxious kids and parents. Cal Poly is a great school and can offer a great education but this approach to admissions notifications does not impress me at all. My son was accepted in 2016 in an early wave and is now attending UCLA and my daughter was waitlisted last week and was accepted to UC Davis and UW and others and waiting to hear from rest of UCs. So I can view it from both sides and either way I am disappointed in Cal Poly in this regard. When my son was accepted, I had close friends who were waiting to hear for the longest time only to get a no weeks later. UCI did something similar.