Hi there guys, I’m a cc student looking to apply this Fall to transfer Fall 2019. My question is (because I’ve gotten different answers, some people saying definitely put an alternate major if available and others say it’s a waste of time): What even is the purpose of alternate majors? I’m a physics major right now and was thinking of putting math as my alternate major since I meet those pre-reqs too. Is it that if I’m not “fit enough” for my first major, then perhaps they reconsider for my alternate?
I don’t know. Someone enlighten me please and thank you!
Hopefully someone with UC experience will chime in but our experience in different states is that schools with impacted majors sometimes request a back up preference. We know students who applied to Purdue and UMD for engineering that were denied engineer and offered an alternative major.
You probably want to ask each campus directly how alternate major is used.
Note that for UCB L&S, transfer students are admitted undeclared and are supposed to declare their majors in their first semester. Neither physics nor math at UCB is a capacity-limited major, so declaring should be a formality if you have the prerequisites completed. However, major is presumably considered in admission readings because they presumably want to see that you will be able to declare your major by having as many prerequisites as available at your community college completed.
You’ll want to read this for the answer:
https://ls.berkeley.edu/advising/planning/schedule-planning/choosing-major/high-demand-majors
In your case neither major is in the high-demand category as of today.