Item — HN Reader

^^^ This. 100% This.

This kind of applicant is now treated as table stakes for programs like UMich, and acceptance rates for impacted majors like CS in top programs have dropped to single digits.

It is ridiculously competitive to get into top programs now. I got into an Ivy in the late 2000s to early 2010s. With my stats from back then (13 APs all 4s and 5s, a 4.5+ GPA, varsity wrestling, JV XCountry, NHS, CSF, USAPHO, USAMO, Policy and LD debate, a 2200+ SAT, 35 ACT, 8 SAT Subject test), I would have been lucky to get into CS@UC Davis today and I absolutely wouldn't have gotten into my alma mater.

3 comments

I'm pretty sure you would get into Berkeley with that profile. Also you can just major in math and get a job as a software engineer anyways. I agree that the system has reached the point of absurdity though. ETH Zurich and KU Leuven have the best solution to this issue in my mind, which is to let everyone in but make the classes ridiculously hard so that 50% leave in the first year.

> I'm pretty sure you would get into Berkeley with that profile

I was rejected from EECS@Cal and CS@CMU at the time (though my alum interviewer for CMU kept in contact with me to this day, and helped open doors for me professionally) yet got into an Ivy and waitlisted at MIT ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

And this was before college admissions got as competitive as it is for you guys today.

Most HNers graduated college in the 1990s and early 2000s and don't realize how competitive admissions have become across the board from 2008-09 onwards.

> Also you can just major in math and get a job as a software engineer anyways

Absolutely! Applied Math is a heavily interdisciplinary major that is very powerful.

Then why is getting into M.S programs much easier? The GRE is barely an exam and it's not like you need to go to an IIT or do any olympiads to get into columbia or a good UC. Yes in principle you have fewer applicants than bachelors, but that would be compensated by the fact that indians and chinese students also apply no?

M.S. Programs, non-thesis options, are cash cows for every university.

Most of them are not ABET accredited. Class sizes are large.

In defense of this practice, how do you handle students that finished undergraduate 5, 10, 15 years ago? If you do much gating, there are not enough students.

> Then why is getting into M.S programs much easier?

Because domestic undergrads applying to a research-oriented grad program are advised to apply directly to a PhD program.

MS/MA programs are expected to remediate deficiencies at the undergrad level, and most undergrads will take 1st year MS/MA classes as part of their senior year doing a bachelors. Alternatively, the MS/MA is awarded if a PhD candidate failed Quals.

Outside the US, the expected path is BA/BSc/BEng/BTech to MS/MA/MTech/MPhil to PhD.

In the US, the expected path is SB/AB to PhD and MS/MA if you fail quals or are looking for a professional program to remediate coursework deficiencies.

Makes sense

Policy/LD debate, especially if you were good, might as well be a minus these days. That just tells everyone you're going to spread "post-modern neo-marxism" / fashionable nonsense wherever you go, and/or be more slimy than the worst memes about lawyers could ever imagine.

Debate is actually dying, and for a reason. Good riddance, don't let the door kick your ass on the way out.