UCs and CSUs are rejecting near-perfect stat kids in larger than expected numbers, apparently.
That’s just mind-boggling.
The article mentions different admission standards for different majors at the end. That is probably one of the more important factors at UCs and CSUs. SJSU is transparent about that (link in the article), but most others are not, so applicants relying on overall admission stats may be disappointed if they apply for more competitive (popular relative to capacity) majors like CS.
Another factor is that California publics weight GPA heavier and test score lighter among the academic criteria. So test score heavy applicants may get into more selective colleges that weight test scores more, while having disappointing results at UCs.
I know many brush off yield protection, but I wonder if that comes into play here at all? Where a Cal State Long Beach might look at an applicant and believe there is no way that student will matriculate here so let’s reject them? Truly crazy times…
@Dolemite, not really. The UC’s don’t weigh applicant characteristics the same way elite privates do. Many/most also admit by major and many competitive majors are about as tough to get in to as an Ivy/equivalent.
If you don’t have a very high UC GPA, your chances to the upper half of UC’s just won’t be very good these days.
CSULB, like other CSUs, calculates an eligibility index = GPA * 800 + SATR + SATM. Then applicants are ranked within majors applied to and a cutoff set. Unfortunately, most CSUs are not as transparent about publishing the cutoffs as SJSU.
What would be helpful to reduce the panic over “mysterious” results would be:
a. CSUs publish their frosh and transfer thresholds like SJSU does at http://www.sjsu.edu/admissions/impaction/ . CPSLO should publish their MCA add-on point system and the MCA thresholds by major.
b. UCs publish a table for frosh by division (when major does not affect selectivity, such as in UCB L&S) or major (where major does affect selectivity, such as in UCB CoE) similar to the table it publishes for transfers at https://www.universityofcalifornia.edu/infocenter/transfers-major . For frosh, it may have to be a grid of GPA and test scores for each division or major.
I think most of us who grew up in CA are stunned at how things have changed and for some schools how quickly. We are definitely ignorant of the cutoffs. I, for one, will be telling as many of my friends as possible they exist and to be mindful of where your child might land.
It would make sense to publish the previous year’s cut offs to help students realize whether they’re even remotely competitive and understand the difference between, say, sociology and social work, or sociology and computer science. And it’d be fair to provide some financial aid dedicated to room&board for lower and middle income families whose children are admitted to an out of local district CSU.
i think it’s hype… i mean who is this counselor who told a student to consider CPSLO or UCD a safety??? I mean, even a 4.4/1600 is a ‘probably’ at both and has been for several years. As with all the UCs, both do a pretty good job telling applicants what it takes to get in by posting the stats of last year’s admitted class and populating tools like this:
https://www.universityofcalifornia.edu/infocenter/admissions-source-school
Other CSUs like LB make you dig a but more but, you can get the EI numbers if you work at it. And, now that Naviance seems to be everywhere, there shouldn’t be nearly the mystery.
Do you have links to where you found the admission thresholds for other CSUs besides SJSU?
Naviance at high schools may not reveal a sharp cutoff if there are differences in admission thresholds by major, as can be seen at SJSU.
The stratification amongst the most highly selective schools and all the rest will only widen.
@Dolemite I think UC San Diego is a much better school than Cornell. Surveys have indicated that many the kids at
Cornell are miserable
There are also non-standard students (homeschool, charter school, etc.) who don’t have access to Naviance, whose school isn’t on that list that NCalRent posted, and who are perhaps viewed in a different light than students from well known publics and privates. The admissions process is more opaque for some applicants.
UCLA publishes its engineering admissions stats by major as does UCI, I believe, but some UCs such as UCSD say they don’t admit to/by major. Not sure I believe them. I’m glad that SJSU is more transparent. Thanks for sharing that link, @ucbalumnus- very informative.
It seems to me that there are many schools which are being pulled up by the general trend of the highly selective schools becoming unattainable.
USC is the perfect example of this trend.
It used to be a back up for the rich kids who didn’t get into their top school-even 5 years ago.
Now…it’s a much different story.
Ca kids are applying to and attending many out of state publics and privates that they never considered before and it seems like schools like USC and the Claremonts as well as Northwestern, Northeastern, Boston College and even some lesser known schools like Carlton, Colby and U Richmond are rising as well.
As the “elites” become out of reach, others will fill with exceptional applicants and those colleges will rise in desirability and the outcomes of their graduates will be outstanding as well.
For some, that may be true for admission to the school, but an admit may be offered direct admission to the desired major or to undeclared. For highly competitive majors like CS at UCSD, undeclared admission is almost like rejection for an applicant who really wants that major.
@lalalander111 agreed, and I’d add Tulane, SMU and NYU to that list as well. All 3 are suddenly very popular with CA kids.
UCSD engineering is tough to get into. I counted all UCs other than UCLA/Berkeley (matches) as safeties for my kid because he was not a STEM kid, and he was accepted to all UCs. But had his major been CS or engineering, good chance he would have been denied from several UCs. With so many high stats STEM kids in CA applying to CS and engineering programs at UCs, I would not be surprised to see kids who got into Top 10 colleges get denied.
@websensation, do you mind sharing your son’s major? And did he apply to all the UCs?
This article focuses on admission difficulties, but another could be written about middle class families who can’t afford the UCs even if they got in. That’s us. Our son is headed out of state on a full ride (NMF) at University of New Mexico.