Is it true that I can apply for a major such as Anthropology and then easily switch my major to mechanical engineering at schools like UC Berkeley. Will this increase the chance of my admission? (I am a high school student)
Easily? NO. Whether it is possible at all is something that you might not know until you are a year of two into university – and if you discover that you can’t switch to your desired major after a year of two of university that would be quite unfortunate.
Generally speaking universities are aware of this trick. They would prefer that students apply for whatever major the student actually intends to major in. It is understood that students will often choose to change their major, but changing your mind is not the same thing as intentionally applying for one major when you intend to have another major.
Different universities handle this in different ways. Some, such as MIT (where I went), ignore your major when deciding whether to accept you, and then allow you to pick whatever major you want. The issue with MIT is that picking a less popular major will not help you get accepted. Some other universities, such as UC Berkeley, consider your major when deciding whether to accept you, but put restrictions on whether you will be allowed to change into some specific majors. Computer science and various types of engineering are examples of majors where changing into these majors is very likely to be restricted.
In the case of mechanical engineering as the true desired major, there is another issue. There are classes that you take as an ME major that are prerequisites for other classes, which are prerequisites for still other classes, and so on. This means that you are relatively restricted in terms of which classes you take when. You pretty much need to start off as an ME major in order be allowed to take the correct freshman year classes to be on track to graduate in time.
Putting this all together, if you want to major in Mechanical Engineering, then you need to apply as a Mechanical Engineering major. It is way too risky that if you apply for some other major, you might not be permitted to switch to your desired major.
Also, there are a lot of universities that are very good for ME. You will want to attend a university that is ABET accredited for mechanical engineering. It really does not need to be UC Berkeley. UC Berkeley is excellent for ME, but so are many other universities.
I am having a similar problem to OP, and it’s really confusing because I am hearing a lot of mixed opinions,
especially about this. To give some context, I am an out-of-state student who REALLY wants to attend a UC like Davis, San Diego, Irvine or LA. My desired major is Electrical engineering but I was told that it would increase my chances if I declared for Psychology and then tried to switch to EE in my first year. This advice was given to me since I’m out of state and I don’t have a lot of EC’s that correspond to electrical engineering but do have strong ones that are related to Psychology. (I liked psychology a lot but I don’t think it’s economically viable and I have become really interested in electrical engineering during this past summer). I thought this made sense because my cousin applied to UC Berkeley as an Architecture major and was able to switch to Civil Engineering(this was 3 years ago). Is it easier to switch if you are in the same college as your desired major? Do some people just get lucky?
At schools like the UCs or CSUs it is difficult to switch majors especially when impacted.
Completely!
At some universities, with impacted engineering departments, a non-major who tries to schedule and take any prerequisite courses for engineering, will be blocked by the computer system.
There are a number of prerequisite math courses that target the direction of the course based upon the major (i.e. Math for Bio, Humanities, Engineering have specific focus areas.)
If you major in Anthropology, you had better like it for 4 years because there are no guarantees that you’ll be able to switch into MEng.
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This is just disingenuous, because you are the original poster using an alias account. Sockpuppertry, aside from violating Terms of Service, just confuses users genuinely trying to help.
I’m closing the thread. You have received valid and correct responses from very experienced users. Your question really needs to be filed under "if it were that easy, everyone would do it.
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