For UCLA, UCB and UCSB College of L&S, primary major is not a consideration for admission although there is admission data out there for specific major disciplines that I listed so going Undeclared will not have an impact. To declare the Psychology major, she would have to meet each schools requirements in declaring.
UC Davis will ask Undeclared majors to specify a discipline when applying:
UCSD/UCI will admit into the University then review Primary and alternate majors. If the student does not meet the major thresholds for admission, then they can be admitted as Undeclared so no disadvantage to listing Psychology as a major if she fine with Undeclared.
UCSC other than the College of Engineering does not admit by major but into a âproposedâ major and the student needs to meet the requirements for declaring.
In general, applying Undeclared is not an advantage or disadvantage.
The only drawback for some campuses is course registration where students admitted into the major get priority on the major classes over non declared majors.
IOW it means your student may not be able to take foundational courses for the Psychology major during part of her 1st year.
There are no shortcuts. UCs are very aware of these tricks and make them as difficult as possible.
Have you run the NPC on Santa Clara, LMU, Chapman, Whittier, perhaps if her ECs are exceptional colleges like Occidental, Pitzer, and Scripps (smaller, private colleges would have more resources devoted to the application due to having 1/10th of what UCs get, and thus would likely weigh ECs more.)
What about Lewis&Clark, SOU, Whitman, UPuget Sound?
For CSU specially slo and LB, understand the entire college says itâs impacted. So does it still matter which major we select. For example selecting psychology as a major vs something else. For example. Like choosing interdisciplinary arts or child development. Instead of psychology. Would the chances of admission be different ?
It is important to understand that though all majors are impacted, the admission threshold for each major varies, depending on the capacity of the major to take new students, and the number of students applying for that major in that term.
We encourage you to apply for the major in which you intend to earn a degree. Change of major is prohibited after the application change deadline. After you are admitted, we canât guarantee that you will be able to change your major.
There is a chart that was useful to us years ago that showed the number of applicants for each major at SLO and the projected number of spaces available - maybe another poster can help you find it. This was a helpful way of understanding which majors were more impacted than others.
I also wanted to mention that you have alluded to her excellent ECâs - this would potentially give her a boost with her UC applications in a way that will not matter for the CSUâs - which generally consider academic performance over anything else. Good luck to her!
Cal Poly takes activities such as work experience, internships, volunteer programs and extracurricular activities into consideration. We are also interested in any leadership roles you may have held in these activities. Selection Criteria | Cal Poly
But this is quantitative rather than qualitative, you simply get points based on how many hours per week and did you have a leadership position (yes/no). It doesnât matter if they are âexcellentâ or not.
The previous poster had implied ECs were irrelevant for CSUs, I was pointing out thatâs not the case for SLO (and maybe some other CSUs, I havenât really looked at many of these)
Not to go too off topic, but that is why I used the word âgenerally.â No implication, just reality.
As @Twoin18 rightly points out, it is quantitative. I have kids that applied to both CSUâs and UCâs. They have 20 spaces and 4 PIQâs to detail their ECâs on the UC app to their heartâs content, not so for the CSUâs. That SLO asks a few extra questions is really no comparison. My oldest was accepted into Cal and waitlisted at SLO, which I believe to be indicative of the difference between holistic and non-holistic admissions.
Simply put, the opportunity to go into detail on the UC app about your excellent ECâs is of great advantage to the OPâs student, particularly when her (unweighted) GPA is on the lower end of the range for the CSUâs she is looking at (at least SLO).
Note that the target projections are not admit rates. Just the projected number of applicants for each major and the projected number of students that SLO would want to enroll.
My general advice to students applying to large universities with 100 majors is to actually dig into the offerings rather than apply to âBiologyâ or âManagementâ - it usually pays to find a major similar enough to what a HS student may be interested in yet not as well-known. Otherwise why not apply to a university with 40 majors?
But the difference between some of these is surprising.
The most surprising ratios app/target for me would be Food Science and IT&Packaging (both with superb professional outcomes yet neglected), or how some majors differ despite my assumption they could be interesting to similar student profiles, such as EEES v.Environmental Engineering, and why is Industrial Engineering so different in COE, not hardcore enough for ârealâ future engineers and too hardcore for management types? (Iâd have thought itâd attract the Tech/Business kids but I guess not).
Anyway, Psychology looks like the most selective major in the CLA. 3,600+ apps, target 75 freshmen (v. graphic communication, ~450 apps for 73 freshmen).
SLO also has a smaller undergraduate population than Cal State Long Beach and San Diego state so this makes them very competitive for the available spots for each major.
SDSU for example had 5191 applicants for Psychology with 311 enrolled and CSULB had 5258 applicants and 432 enrolled.
The missing piece for SLO is that actual number of applicants they admit which is also dependent upon the yield for that major.
Psychology is usually in the top 5 of popular/applied majors for all CSU and UC campuses.
but I guess not).