Building a college list that’s manageable and realistic is critical to decreasing the stress of submitting your college applications. Taking on loans is one of the most consequential decisions you will ever make, which is especially difficult since you will be only 17 or 18 years old.

If you are a Texas resident applying exclusively to a handful of Texas public and private universities and would be okay attending and can afford some or all on your list, then this post may not apply to you. This post is for applicants applying to many reaches nationwide or to more than ten universities.

It’s almost universally true that students and parents underestimate the time required to complete their essays and fulfill the other requirements. UT-Austin and Apply Texas will take a minimum of four weeks to complete if you take the drafting and editing process seriously, and for Texas residents applying to a selection of nationwide universities, you can expect to spend six weeks or more even with working every day to complete everything.

Clients working with me every day finish occasionally finish the Common Application within three weeks. If you’re applying nationwide, you can expect to spend upwards of at least 100 hours on your applications. My approach to professional services focuses on the time and stress that I save clients.

In the past, I’ve been agnostic about the college list with few strong opinions or recommendations.

My philosophy had always been: if you want to apply, go for it. Better to apply in the fall and sort out your decisions in the spring rather than regretting not trying at all. It is the case that you truly can’t know whether you can afford a university until you receive your financial/scholarship package, but most universities also publish the average net costs students pay relative to the sticker price.

Going into my twelfth cycle serving students and families through Tex Admissions, I want to share a few missteps I see applicants make and offer a few rules of thumb for building a reasonable college list. The opening concerns why most students shouldn’t bother applying to top 20s.

Occasionally, I make Reddit posts soliciting best application practices, and I’ve shared some of their recent contributions in this post.

I also share my thoughts on how and whether UT-Austin and other universities going test-optional will affect your admissions chances or how you should approach your college list in another post.

I provide an overview of sub-optimal and best college-list-building biases. I question whether you should visit universities before applying. I offer advice for Texas residents before concluding with my approach to affordability and student debt. My post applies mostly to Texas residents, so non-Texans can modify my recommendations to account for their local public options.

My post doesn’t even consider honors options or possible scholarships at Texas public universities because I argue that regular admission is still likely a better return on investment than more expensive OOS or private alternatives. Honors and scholarships can make a good education value even more favorable.

College List Summary: for almost all Texas residents, you shoudn’t apply out of state/private or to top 20s. You will probably end up enrolling at a Texas university, so it may not be worth the time to apply for universities nationwide where you’re unlikely to gain admission or afford. Keep your list realistic and consider carefully before adding many schools.

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Should you bother applying to a top 20 university? Almost certainly not.

Almost everyone asks me about this nowadays, so I want to provide a reality check. If you have to ask whether you’re competitive for a top 20, you’re not. Genuinely competitive applicants don’t even bother asking the question. The competition landscape for top 20 admissions is beyond what most families can visualize, and no admissions calculator, AI tool, or Reddit thread will give you an honest picture of it.

I expand the scope of the top 20s beyond the most prestigious private schools (Ivies+) to include applying for flagship public institutions as an out-of-state applicant. OOS admissions rates for non-residents applying to UT is 5%. The OOS admissions rates are similar at the most in-demand public schools, such as Michigan, Georgia Tech, UC-Berkeley/Los Angeles, Virginia, and UNC. Elite programs like Michigan Ross, UW-Seattle CS, UIUC CS, and Berkeley EECS are similarly selective as the most competitive private universities, like Stanford or Harvard. These schools and programs appear on almost every prospective student who emails me, yet almost none of them will gain admission to any of them. The apps are also very time-consuming, so it’s an exercise in futility. Even then, if they somehow manage to get into Berkeley or Michigan, I’m not at all confident the $400,000 four-year degree cost is worth it.

I wrote a chapter about this landscape in my 2021 Surviving the College Admissions Madness, and the competition has only steepened since then. Here is the actual math. There are roughly 3.8 million American high school seniors each year. About 300,000 to 350,000 of them will apply to at least one top 20 university, submitting somewhere between 800,000 and one million individual applications across the group. At the end of that process, approximately 35,000 US students will actually enroll at a top 20 school. That means if you are not, roughly speaking, in the top 1% of all American high school seniors by academics and resume, your chances approach zero.

The picture gets steeper for STEM and business applicants. A meaningful share of those 35,000 enrolling students will be in humanities and social sciences, so the pipeline for technical and pre-professional fields is considerably narrower. At many schools, Regular Decision admission rates for STEM and business programs have fallen to somewhere between 1% and 4%, well below the published overall rates you will find on any school's website.

A common response to these numbers is to treat the top 20 admissions as a lottery: the odds are terrible, but someone has to win, so why not enter? This framing is seductive but wrong, and it has a name. Nassim Taleb calls it the ludic fallacy, an error in reasoning that applies probabilistic reasoning as in a casino game but to situations with incomplete and unknowable information. The mistake of using clean, well-defined probability models to reason about complex real-world situations where the underlying variables are not random at all. A lottery is genuinely random with all ticket holders having an equal chance of winning. Top 20 admissions is not.

The students who enroll are not 35,000 lucky ticket holders drawn from a pool of 300,000. They are a highly non-random subset with specific, extreme characteristics that most applicants simply do not share. Treating admission as probabilistic, as in "I have a 10% shot, so I might as well try,” misrepresents the problem entirely. You do not have a 10% shot. You either have a realistic shot, or you do not, and the honest work is figuring out which category you are in rather than taking comfort in aggregate statistics that do not describe your individual candidacy.

What does it actually take to be competitive?

That is genuinely unanswerable, and I say that as a counselor who has worked with dozens of the highest achieving students, almost all of whom routinely get denied to top 20s. The more useful question is: do you have flawless academics and a resume with national or international level accomplishments? If the honest answer is anything short of yes, applying to top 20 schools is unlikely to be a productive use of your time, energy, or emotional bandwidth during one of the more consequential years of your life.

The students I see harmed most by the top 20 applications are not the ones who apply knowing it is a long shot. They are the ones who apply, genuinely convinced they have a chance, receive universal denials in the spring of senior year, and then have to process that outcome while simultaneously navigating enrollment decisions. The psychological toll is real, and so is the practical cost: top 20 applications require serious essays, and the time spent on applications with near-zero probability is time not spent strengthening applications that actually matter.

There is also a demographic component. If you’re not super elite, you’re cooked.

My blog audience and client base are primarily upper-middle-class suburban families in senior-level professional roles, rather than the elite and super-elite top 1% and .1% families. I argued in my 2021 Admissions Madness blog posts that “Your ZIP Code is the Most Important Admissions Factor.” That’s even truer today.

The Harvard economist Raj Chetty, who I’ve cited for the past decade, released a study with co-authors from the Opportunity Insights project in 2023 and updated for 2025 that “Children from families in the top 1% are more than twice as likely to attend an Ivy-Plus college as those from middle-class families with comparable SAT/ACT scores.” (You can also find a college admissions-specific summary here).

A partial explanation is students from super-elite communities have privileges and opportunities that far exceed those in the suburbs. Children are groomed from an early age to attend the same or similar elite universities as their parents. Private schools account for around one-third of students at top 20 universities despite public schools overwhelmingly graduating more seniors each year.

These children often attend super-elite private and boarding schools that serve as pipelines to top 20s, a kind of side-door that the ultra wealthy have that the engineers and doctors living in Frisco or Round Rock do not. Certain super-elite schools like Exeter, Boston Latin, and Andover send more than ten seniors to Harvard each year, or Lawrenceville, next to Princeton’s campus, which sends a disproportionate amount of students there each year. Despite working with many students admitted to top 20s over the years, the same dynamic plays out on the west coast. Stanford remains elusive. One reason might be that elite Bay Area schools are extremely over-represented at Stanford. So, the true admissions rate for upper-middle-class communities for STEM majors is much less than 1%.

The Opportunity Insights admissions data only goes through 2015, despite an update in 2025, and given the widening social inequality and K-shaped economy since COVID, we can expect the admissions gap to widen between upper-class and upper-middle-class families. Consequently, non-legacy, non-super-elite-connected, suburban families at strong but not super-elite schools face so many competition hurdles that admissions statistics can never communicate that it’s like running a 100-meter dash starting two seconds later than the other runners.

The Chetty data also shows that attending an Ivy-Plus college increases a student's chances of reaching the top 1% of earners by 50% and nearly triples their chances of landing at a prestigious firm. But those outcomes are measured against attending a state flagship, not against the children of top 1% families who arrived at the same institution with legacy networks, family social capital, and generational wealth already in place.

In other words, getting in is not the same as competing on equal footing once you're there. The child of a Goldman partner or a third-generation Harvard legacy arrives at college with internship pipelines, alumni networks, and family connections that no admissions office can redistribute. A student from The Woodlands or Sugar Land who earned their seat on academic merit alone enters the same building but a different social ecosystem.

The compounding effects are significant. Elite family networks accelerate access to the most competitive internships, which feed into the most selective graduate programs and employers. Social capital inherited across generations is not neutralized by four years of shared coursework.

Moreover, AI displacement is not hitting all careers equally. The professional roles that upper-middle-class families have historically used as reliable pathways to prosperity, law, medicine, finance, and consulting are precisely the white-collar fields most exposed to automation in the next decade. The hedged bet that a top 20 degree represented for previous generations is becoming a less reliable instrument at exactly the moment when getting there has never been harder or more expensive. That corresponds with my argument in this post that debt-minizimg public educations at flagship institutions are a much less riskier.

A final irony to all of this is that many suburban families point to poor and working-class communities as “taking their spaces,” especially with the top 5% law, when the reality is elite college admissions has so many structural advantages for the top 1% that the bottom 95% would be wise to organize against if it were possible.

What to do?

The healthiest framework, in my experience, is to not set the top 20 admissions as a goal at all. Be genuinely open to UT Austin, Texas A&M, and other strong programs where your candidacy is competitive. If a top-20 outcome occurs, it will be a genuine surprise worth celebrating. If it does not, you will have spent your senior year building toward something real.

One legitimate exception: binding Early Decision at a top 20, for students who are genuinely prepared to enroll at that school, pay full price if necessary, and make that commitment before knowing their UT outcome. ED does meaningfully improve odds at most schools. But ED only makes sense if it is a true first choice, not a hedge, and not a gateway to a cascade of Random Decision applications that carry admission rates in the low single digits.

An overview of common college list missteps

• Submitting many applications to selective private or out-of-state public universities that offer little to no merit scholarships or are far out of reach, the “just to see if you get in” fallacy

• Desiring both a prestigious university and one that offers generous merit scholarships. Those universities are very rare.

• Omitting to apply to any university or program where they are 100% guaranteed admission based on their rank/grades and ACT/SAT schools

• Applying to only one or two “dream schools” where you’re not guaranteed, potentially leaving you with few options spring senior year

• Applying to schools Regular Decision that offer binding Early Decision or Restrictive Early Action options, especially if you’re a STEM applicant. Gaining RD admission to STEM majors at top 50 universities is the most difficult pathway possible. ED admissions rates are often 2-3 times higher than for RD. So, you should limit the amount of RD schools on your list if they offer ED.

• Applying to too many schools that require unique applications and supplements

• A safety isn’t a safety school unless you’d be content enrolling. Reddit user seaelixir shares, “One of the safeties I applied to was a school I wouldn't even consider attending, yet applied for the sake of having an "acceptance," which was not the right mindset and I wish I hadn't applied to it.“

• Only applying to out-of-state or private universities if cost is in any way a factor to affording your studies. Barring exceptional circumstances, leaving your state just for the sake of it is usually not a good reason, the “I can’t stand it here!” fallacy. Texas is a massive place.

• Having unrealistic expectations for exceptionally selective schools that admit less than 8% of their applicants: Harvard, Princeton, Stanford, MIT, Cal Tech, Columbia, UPenn, Yale, and others. These are reaches and high reaches for everyone. The “It doesn’t hurt to try!” fallacy.

• Listing many of the same kinds of universities that offer little substantive difference, especially with Computer Science and Business applicants submitting applications to most US News Top 20 universities without compelling reasons

• Over-weighting pre-med or pre-law as a deciding factor of where to apply. Medical and law school plans are almost totally irrelevant for choosing a university.

• Continuing to add schools rather than substituting or subtracting, especially if your senior year has already started. Your list should shrink, not grow, over time, unless you’ve finished all of your applications and feel motivated to continue submitting apps.

• Placing too much emphasis on US News rankings at the expense of other college search resources

• Falling in love with a dream school and tying your self-worth to that particular admissions outcome. Reddit user mungbeanmimi shares “I applied to fourteen schools, all the UCs, and a few cal states, but my dream school was UC San Diego. I dreamt of UCSD ever since I was little and I collected merch from that school. Rejection hit really hard and I was really depressed for days. I’m still bitter about it.”

• Applying to more than twenty universities, “shotgunning.” Reddit user Qlzto suggests, “18 schools is too many schools. I didn't need that many target/safety schools. (Also, I applied to schools I knew I couldn't afford. Why did I do that?) I'd probably have been better off cutting out some of the target schools on my list to put more time/effort into the reach apps.”

• Adding schools to your list because people pressure you and it isn’t somewhere you’d ever see yourself enrolling under any reasonable circumstances

Check out my new book Surviving the College Admissions Madness and Youtube Channel

College list best practices

• Having a healthy balance between high reaches, reaches, targets, safeties, and at least one school where you’re 100% guaranteed admission based on your grades or rank and ACT/SAT scores

• Very rough classification boundaries: High reaches are those where you have a less than 5% chance of gaining admission; reaches are a less than 25% chance, targets are a wider range of a 25% to a 70% chance of success, safeties are 70-99% probability, and assured/security schools are those where you will 100% gain admission. There can be slight reaches and safer targets.

• Keeping the list to less than 12 schools and no more than 15 total. Reddit user spoon_potato provides a nice summary, “I applied to 9 schools total. 1 safety (state school), 2 targets, and 6 reaches. Honestly, I’m satisfied with what I applied to. My parents had little say where I applied. I only considered schools I could afford and I only applied to 9 because application fees are high.”

• Your academics are within or higher than the middle 50% of applicants on GPA/Rank and test scores range for most or all of your universities. If you scored a 28 on the ACT and make a mix of A’s and B’s with a moderately challenging courseload, Top 20 universities may not be realistic.

• I recommend keeping your high reaches - schools where you fall below the middle 50% academic ranges and/or schools that admit less than 10% of their applicants - to a maximum of three. These are hail mary universities like the Ivies and their equivalents where you might decide it worth paying in full to attend. Lists that include six or more reaches need to be trimmed significantly.

• By definition, applying RD to schools that offer ED or REA are high reaches for virtually every applicant. Consider Rice has an ED admit rate around 15% and an overall admissions rate of 8%. The RD admit rate is much less than 8% when you account for scholarship athletes or other special recruits, probably around 5% for Rice’s True RD rate.

• Substitute reach schools for target or safety schools where you have a greater than 90% chance of admission and a decent shot at scholarships, honors programs, or viable out-of-state tuition waivers

• A maximum of three out-of-state public flagship universities like Michigan, Georgia, UCLA/B, etc.

• Ask yourself: would you ever full-pay for a Berkeley degree relative to UT-Austin, or Indiana/Purdue relative to Texas A&M? Current college student and Reddit user justheretohelpyou_ advises:

  “Focus on target schools. Focus on target schools. Focus on target schools. So many kids on Reddit shotgun/apply to more than 20 schools and either get denied by all of the reaches or they get in a T20 and are stuck with a $75k/year bill. Meanwhile, other kids are weighing a full ride to a target school against the $75k bill. You'd much rather be the second kid in that example.…$40K-$50K in debt total wouldn't be terrible. More than that can snowball quickly.”

• If you’re going to apply to UC-Berkeley and/or Los Angeles, you may as well apply to four or five UC campuses since they’re all on the same application. If you don’t want or can’t afford to pay the additional application fees, you probably shouldn’t be applying to the UCs anyways. The UC application is time-consuming, so my rule of thumb is to apply to none or to four or five. Justheretohelpyou_ agrees, “The UC system should be treated like a T20 school without the aid for an OOS student. They are insanely expensive.”

• Limiting the number of applications to universities that offer few merit scholarships or out-of-state tuition waivers if enrollment would strain family finances or place you in significant debt

• Paying careful attention to universities that require little to no time to apply, limiting the number of “unique” applications or supplements. Applying to UC-Berkeley is not the same as applying to Illinois because the former requires substantially more work than the latter. Applications to Stanford, Columbia, MIT, and Princeton and others require substantially more time and effort to apply than Harvard, Dartmouth, Penn, Johns Hopkins, and those with fewer supplemental essays.

• Keeping an open mind about possibly attending a handful of universities rather than fixating primarily on one “dream school.” This is especially true for Texas Longhorn die-hards.

• If you have multiple interests, selecting different majors or unique programs at your universities rather than putting all of your eggs in the same academics basket

• Consulting a variety of rankings lists beyond US News like the Times Higher Education World University Rankings, Super Money Best Return on Investment, Forbes Best Value Colleges, Colleges That Change Lives, and Niche’s various rankings lists.

• Savvy applicants also pay careful attention to how their prospective majors/program rank against similar programs. Major rankings and overall university standings often differ, particularly for STEM.
  
  
  

  Even though U Penn, for example, ranks number 11 in the world overall by Times Higher Education, they rank number 37 for Engineering, two spots lower than less selective or expensive Purdue. Similarly, Illinois ranks 23 for Engineering despite being just within the top 50 globally. Oklahoma State has an especially strong Aerospace Engineering program comparable to Michigan, Notre Dame, Virginia, and Cal State Poly despite being less rigorous for other engineering majors or overall. Wichita State ranks number 5, higher than UT-Austin. Be wary of prestige and name brands.
  
  
  

• Creating at least one realistic scenario for enrolling at every college on your list

• Utilizing Net Price/Cost calculators if available like this one for Baylor that estimates potential merit/need aid

• Building a spreadsheet with some or all of the following fields: ranking based on interest; high reach/reach/target/safety/security; major; whether unique supplements are required; honors program options; expected cost of attendance; EA/ED/Priority deadlines; which application to use; acceptance rate to your major if available; application fee; allow for superscoring; assigned admissions counselor e-mail; whether they require or recommend reference/counselor letters, SAT subject tests, a paper resume, interview

• Researching particular resources, courses, research labs, study abroads, student organizations, professors, and other opportunities unique to each university on your list. This also helps to answer “why this university?” prompt because you should already have particular reasons for applying.

• Being mindful of climate, location, school culture, Greek life, religion, size, political orientation, diversity, etc. Don’t want to attend a smaller university in a cold climate? Dartmouth may not be your best fit regardless of anything else, for example.

  Reddit user thinker111111 agrees:

  “I wish I had thought more about what I actually wanted out of my college experience early in the process. It's so easy to get caught up in rankings/prestige, size, study abroad programs, research opportunities, weather, food, dorms, or whatever quirky clubs they're advertising on the college tour without truly considering what you want your college experience as a whole to look like. You can probably do without the fancy dorms or Squirrel Watchers Club. What do you want four years from now, other than a piece of paper with your name on it? How do you want to grow as an individual during this time and what environments would best support that growth? I came to this realization on January 1st, when writing my CMU supplement on "What do you want out of your college experience?" I really wish I had written that one first, rather than last since it would have helped me to frame my college search so much better.”

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Should you apply binding Early Decision?

Perhaps the most typical and consequential college list question families ask is whether and where to apply binding Early Decision (ED).

An applicant can apply to a single ED 1 school. The University of Texas at Austin and most public universities do not offer Early Decision (ED), only non-binding Early Action or priority deadlines. ED offers a 2 to 3 times higher admissions rate at the trade-off of locking in that as an option while precluding most other admissions offers. However, ED provides less of an admissions benefit than the slightly less-competitive pre-COVID times. You can view the ED admissions statistics here.

You should only apply ED if:

1. You have a far and away top choice, ideally a campus that you've visited or spent time on for a summer program.

2. Cost is in no way a factor, and your family can afford the full cost of attendance. 99% of the time, you will not get merit aid or scholarships from the top 50 universities that offer ED.

3. UT-Austin is not your top choice, far and away, since your ED 1 decision will come out in mid-December, before UT releases their decisions. Consequently, many of my families don't apply ED so as not to preclude a UT offer.

Other reasons Texas families don't apply ED because it isn't worth the cost for 300-350K for a bachelor's. The return on investment isn't there, especially relative to the price of Texas A&M in the event UT doesn't work out.

I argue later in this post that no university is worth 3x the cost of A&M or UT-Dallas with a partial or full scholarship. In fact, despite many of my clients applying to and gaining admission to numerous top 20 and 50 universities, 90% of my clients ultimately enroll at either UT or A&M. One or two each cycle will take a UTD full ride or other generous offer.

Another way to think about this is Michigan as a reference point and a common school my families apply. In-state residents pay like a third of the price, so non-residents are paying 3X the price for the same education. 

In any other consumer arena, this would be highly irrational. It'd be like paying $600 for a hotel room and your neighbor $200, or 1.5m for a house versus 500K for the same house purchased at the same time. I honestly can't think of any other economic choice where individual consumers pay radically different prices, like in versus out of state tuition or scholarships at private universities, except maybe same-day plane or last-minute event tickets.

Some schools offer Early Decision 2, and it has become more common in recent years than in previous cycles. Some of my clients apply ED 2 because those results come after the UT-Austin decision. That way if YES UT, they can withdraw the ED, and if NO UT, then they can see if ED 2 works out.

Moreover, some schools have "restricted" or "single choice" early action, which is sort of like ED, where a student can only apply to a single school, but it is non-binding. Stanford has REA and not ED, for example.

I argue further down how I'm also very biased towards Texas public universities. Another subtle reason is that most students tend to think they'll remain in Texas, so why go a thousand miles away from home without intent or strong reasons to lay down roots in another part of the country? 

I have two or three families who get into UT and choose to go out of state or private at full cost, but they're also families usually with only children and/or are mid-seven figures in net worth or higher, such that the total cost is a few percentage points of their net worth. 

Even the act of "applying just to see if I get in" can pose great confusion if a student actually manages to get into a top 20 when it'd be irrational and financially ruinous actually to enroll over UT or a Texas public.

You'd also be better off saving the cost difference and putting a down payment for an apartment or something to get a tangible return on investment or max out his Roth IRA for 30 years for your student's future.

Finally, grad school admissions is way more chill and attainable. Not paying 300-350K for a bachelor's could easily be like A&M + a master's for less of the price, and the student would get a lot more out of it, professionally, academically, and location-wise. 

Should you visit universities before gaining admission? Probably not

You can find hundreds of articles and blog posts offering tips for making the most of your college visits, but few ask the fundamental question: should you visit at all? College Board suggests, “It’s best to visit colleges before your applications are due. That way, you can be confident you'd be happy at any of the colleges you’re applying to.”

I hold the contrarian view that college visits before gaining admission almost always provide more stress and less clarity than if families didn’t visit at all. Post-acceptance visits are always more productive. Applying somewhere allows for a much lower threshold than enrolling. Consequently, the best practice remains to apply broadly to schools where you have a reasonable expectation of potentially enrolling.

The “summer after junior year” family college visit circuit has become the zeitgeist for America’s top 1%. Families spend thousands or sometimes tens of thousands of dollars for a whirlwind trip of northeast small liberal arts colleges, west coast STEM schools, and tours of the SEC. I argue these rites of passage are almost always a waste of time and resources. I hold the cynical suspicion that many wealthy families take summer college tours to Keep Up with the Joneses rather than fearing missing out and risking alienation within their elite family friend networks.

I found a single New York Times article, “Skipping the College Tour,” by Erica Reischer from 2017, calling into question the effectiveness of pre-admission visits. Searching “college tours” on the NYT database yields dozens of conventional articles about best practices, so it seems Reischer is alone in her views.

She summarizes findings from behavioral economics about how humans of all ages and education levels struggle to forecast what our future selves want. She argues that our imagination about the future skews too far in either optimistic or pessimistic directions, so a cloudy day and an uncharismatic tour guide might knock a school off the list that otherwise would be a good financial and academic fit.

A more significant hazard that Reischer doesn’t address is the more common occurrence of a student falling in love with an unattainable or unaffordable school for oft-arbitrary reasons. Perhaps a tasty vegan poke bowl in the student cafeteria elevates a school to your top choice. She also doesn’t address how mom, dad, and son might all have incompatible perspectives of a college following a visit that creates tangible tension around the dinner table.

A typical exchange with dozens of families goes like this: they visited eleven schools in two weeks, and their daughter falls in love with Yale, Princeton, Tufts, or whatever, yet they have a 3.5 GPA and a 1350 SAT. There are zero universes where that student has a greater than 1% chance of gaining admission. Or they make a college list, visit many colleges, and the list doesn’t change, calling into question visits’ utility. Premature visits also force families to discuss finances when the total cost of attendance might be unknown, which isn’t necessarily bad since financial transparency within families remains a best practice.

Visiting schools too early inflates expectations, complicates family conversations around finance and affordability, and leads to the irrational behavior outlined in Reischer’s piece. A former client visited Carnegie Mellon, fell in love with it, gained admission to UT Austin engineering, and made the difficult, if sound, decision to enroll at UT when they couldn't justify spending $300,000+ for a bachelor’s degree.

Many articles endorsing college tours suggest it provides a “family bonding experience.” So do vacations at all-inclusive beach resorts, ski trips, Carnival cruises, or other holidays where fun and bonding provide the central motivation rather than an indirect consequence of sitting through rock climbing wall showcases, hard-sales PowerPoints, and student tour guides walking backward. Whatever happened to fun for its own sake? With college applications talk encroaching earlier and deeper into family dynamics, having a no-admissions talk holiday may improve family well-being and decrease stress.

Some articles liken college visits to test driving a car, but the analogy fails. Test driving a car permits you to buy it that day if you wish, whereas a college visit provides an equally hard sell yet the real prospect of rejection months down the road. Universities are incentivized to maximize their application numbers to decrease their overall admissions rate and thus increase their rankings. However, unlike a car salesman who wants to sell as many vehicles as possible, universities restrict their offers through artificial scarcity.

Other justifications include “demonstrating interest,” but most universities have moved away from this factor as a consideration on equity grounds since it privileges families with the resources to visit campuses. You can attend virtual information sessions for schools that still consider demonstrated interest.

Pre-admission college visits might be fruitful if you intend to visit extended family in another part of the country and visiting nearby universities isn’t a burden, or hanging out with a sibling college student. Formal summer internships or research programs are a great way to explore campus resources and get more of a feel for the campus and city than an afternoon sales pitch. Pre-admission visits might also help if you’re determining whether to apply binding Early Decision (ED), especially if it’s a school you’re unfamiliar with. I caution against applying ED to a school you’ve never visited or lightly researched.

Some demographics benefit from pre-admission college visits, including rural or urban students who may not come from college-going communities. Developing college literacy and exploring opportunities may encourage some students to apply to or enroll at four-year universities who wouldn’t otherwise. That’s one reason almost every university has all-expenses-paid fly- or bus-in experiences to outreach with marginalized communities.

First-generation college students, recent immigrants, or families who did not receive undergraduate degrees in the United States may also benefit from getting a general feel for American college life. I was a first-generation college student who only applied to UT, hadn’t visited Austin, and would have significantly benefitted from visiting campus or Liberal Arts Honors for a formal tour. I applied to UT almost solely because my dad is a Longhorn football fan.

Nevertheless, pre-admission college visits provide a binary choice: either you apply or you don’t. They aren’t as informative for creating a hierarchy of preferences for the systemic errors in reasoning that Reischer outlines. If you’ve already resolved to apply to UT-Austin, and since UT doesn’t consider demonstrated interest, reconsider a formal visit and instead attend a football or basketball game or a concert in Austin or something fun.

Some instances where visiting helps is if you’re considering a niche program like Plan II Honors or Ole Miss’s Lott Scholars that provide personalized concierge and actual classroom visits beyond the standard student-guided tour or canned PowerPoint presentation. Or, if you’re truly torn between Moody Communications or McCombs Business, attending major-specific information sessions can help resolve the dilemma.

Still, I recommend saving money on pre-admission tours by going on vacation or putting those resources toward application fees or eventual tuition. Apply to a reasonable list of schools, receive your admissions offers, assess the costs, and then determine your top three or four choices if there isn’t a clear frontrunner (like UT). Even for a university that’s your clear frontrunner, visiting can help address logistical questions or even make new friends or a future roommate.

Notice that I caveat “tours” with “pre-admission.” Post-acceptance visits can be incredibly fruitful because hypothetical variables around your major/honors or cost become concrete. There are zero instances where a pre-admission visit could be more productive than a post-admission visit, except that it may require visiting over spring break during senior year or missing a few school days.

Post-acceptance visits permit an academic advisor to explore potential first-year courses; check out your future residence hall; figure out parking or public transport; consult with the Financial Aid office; discuss major changes or other on-campus programs; attend future classes; ask about sports tickets; nail down summer orientation; and other “soon-to-enroll” student questions. Visiting when there are fewer unknowns will help make a more informed decision about where to enroll.

Recommendations for Texas Residents

Before suggesting how to build your list, let me preface my thoughts on Texas public university options.

We’re fortunate to have an excellent public university system with many more affordable options than other states. Many students dream of enrolling at UT-Austin or Texas A&M and can’t imagine their lives without being a student. Still, we’ve got many high-quality opportunities as a state relative to others.

Throwing some shade at Oklahoma University. Consider that it’s their state’s best public university overall. Yet, it consistently ranks much lower than UT-Austin, Texas A&M, UT-Dallas, and even Texas Tech and the University of Houston, depending on the metrics.

Born in more rural states like South Dakota, Wyoming, and Idaho, or even more populated ones like Arizona, New Mexico, Oregon, Massachusettes, and Connecticut? Your options are significantly more limited than if you’re a resident of Texas, California, New York, Illinois, Colorado, North Carolina, and others that have more extensive and affordable public options.

Texas has a solid distribution of research and teaching universities throughout the state that produce a more accessible environment than neighboring states like Louisiana or Arkansas, which have fewer options generally but especially for students in rural environments. We have multiple university systems with various campuses in the University of Texas, Texas A&M, Texas State, and the University of Houston networks, among others.

Every year, I have high-achieving Texas resident clients who apply to and gain admission at universities nationwide, especially for Business and Computer Science. They gain admission to prestigious universities and programs, which I cover in my client’s results post: the UCs, Michigan, Illinois, Georgia Tech, North Carolina, Rice, USC, and so on.

Overwhelmingly, almost all of them enroll at UT-Austin, and those who don’t get into UT, choose Texas A&M, scholarships at UT-Dallas, or generous aid packages from private universities like SMU, TCU, or Baylor. Occasionally, my clients enroll at universities like Arkansas, Indiana, Alabama, Arizona, and a few other middle-tier public flagship universities that offer generous merit scholarships and/or resident tuition waivers.

I understand the tendency to apply and “see where you will get in” and that you “only get one shot at your college applications,” but it ends up being a ton of work, often causing more stress and anxiety than necessary, and for what? To end up enrolling at UT or A&M, where you were almost certain to anyways? Of my approximately 25 Texas resident clients for Fall 2020 who gained admission to UT, only one chose to enroll elsewhere, Vanderbilt.

A reasonable college list for Texas residents should likely include UT-Austin, Texas A&M, UT-Dallas, and perhaps two or three other universities, including one where you’re “assured admission” based on your grades and ACT/SAT with likely merit scholarships or honors programs. There is no need to apply to private universities unless there are realistic scenarios where you might enroll. There is definitely no need to apply out of state if you’re okay enrolling at a Texas public university, and you’re also likely or assured admission.

I interviewed a former client and incoming UT CS freshman who crunched the numbers after gaining admission to several prestigious CS programs and determined that UT-Austin is a better value. He even crunched the numbers for places like MIT and Stanford and determined that, had he gotten in, he would have still ended up at UT-Austin. He reported after our interview concluded that a friend of his enrolled at UTD on a full-ride rather than pay full price at MIT and subsequently graduated with debt in the middle six figures. A Redditor in April 2024 also did the math. They came to a similar conclusion that, taking the extreme edge case, full paying for even a Penn Wharton degree for an investment banking career isn’t worth it given the opportunity cost. The same applies for CS degrees at top schools.

This is a controversial perspective, but consider your options extremely carefully if you’re considering a debt load more than the five-year average of your expected starting salary, even for the Ivies and their equivalent. Visit the Student Loan’s subreddit to see what your future may hold.

Let’s talk about debt and student loans. Saving money and graduating with minimal debt is critically important

Student borrowers hold over $1.6 trillion with an average load of around $35,000. Around 15% of American adults carry student loans with two in ten borrowers late on payments. Over 50% of current college students take out loans to afford their education. Approximately 14% of all borrowers hold more than $60,000 and account for 52% of the total debt held. While undergraduate students estimate it will take six years to pay off their loans, “the Department of Education reports that the typical repayment period for borrowers with between $20,000 and $40,000 in federal student loans is 20 years” (CNBC).

Nobody ever anticipates failing to finish their Bachelor’s, but only about half of all Texas college students finish their degree in six years, and students who take out college loans but don’t graduate are three times more likely to default than borrowers who complete. Not all loans are created equally with private student loans offering particularly high interest rates or fewer repayment/consolidation options. Most borrowers will need to take out at least some private loans to cover costs.

Given the high degrees of economic uncertainty due to Covid-19, it’s tougher to forecast employment prospects and macroeconomic strength five years into the future, i.e. you may not have a job in your field when you graduate or your skills may be less applicable or irrelevant.

Consider that in-state tuition for California residents at the Univesity of California Berkeley averages $14,200 per year compared with $11,700 annually for Texas residents at UT-Austin and $11,900 per year at Texas Tech. California residents may spend upwards of $20,000 more to receive their degrees of the U California system relative to Texas public options, not even including the higher costs of living in Califronia metros and their state income tax.

Still, most residential Bachelor’s degrees will set students and families back at least $100,000 before any aid or scholarship considerations at Texas public options. Attending an out-of-state or private university can exceed $250,000 for a four-year degree. A recent study suggests that “young adult from middle-income families have a higher risk for debt than do those from low- and high-income families.”

Unlike credit cards, student loan debt CANNOT be discharged except in very rare circumstances. Your opportunities will be significantly limited following graduation and years to come if you choose a university where you know you’ll be saddled with debt exceeding your expected starting salary. Especially in the Covid-19 climate, frugality should play a heavier weight in building your college list.

One issue with the Financial Aid packages themselves is they almost always obscure what your actual package entails. Bundling together subsidized and unsubsidized loans alongside Work Study or renewable scholarships with strings attached makes it difficult for even the most financially savvy families to assess what a repayment plan might look like following graduation.

Moreover, universities have incentives to inflate or tweak their Median Salaries without regard for salaries ranges or distributions of who makes what. One family crunched the numbers and found that if you have a slightly below average salary for your first five years, and take on slightly more debt than initially intended, it could take many years longer to repay the balance and the interest. That money could go to down payments on houses or future studies, but unexpected changes in 5 and 10 year plans starting from high school add high degrees of uncertainty.

Debt accumulation is expensive - it’s expensive to be poor.

Potential opportunity costs of taking on significant student debt:

• Forgoing or delaying graduate/medical/law school

• Forced to live at home following graduation

• Inability to afford or qualify for a home mortgage or car loan

• Working a less-than-ideal job to pay the bills sometimes at the expense of pursuing work in your field

• A lower net worth and fewer resources to invest in retirement funds or save for rainy days

• Exacerbation of mental illness, pathological stress, general anxiety, and even suicide

• Delaying or deferring dream jobs

• Not visiting doctors offices or seeking healthcare resources from fear of accumulating more debt

• Sacrificing hobbies and interests

• Delaying marriage and raising a family/kids

• Monthly loan repayments that exceed your rent or even food costs

• Working multiple jobs and/or 60+ hour weeks to afford repayments

• Less access to federal loan forgiveness programs than previously

• Lower credit score/failing to pay credit card or medical bills

• Disqualification from jobs if failing background checks that show delinquency on loans

• Federal government garnishing your wages

• Parents being on the hook for loans if students take out Federal Parent PLUS Loans or private loans that require an adult to co-sign

• Pursuing higher risks occupations or professional opportunities like joining a startup or launching your own business

The above realities increasingly call into question the value of a college degree at all, let alone paying for most or all of the costs of an out-of-state or private university. Now more than ever are discussions necessary about possibly delaying college enrollment by taking a gap year and working, or beginning students at inexpensive community colleges that guarantee credit transfer.

One reason the Texas Legislature put the “automatic transfer admission” clause into the top 10% automatic admission bill is to allow students pathways to enrolling at Texas public universities if they prefer to save money by enrolling at community college first.

Applying to universities where you’re either highly unlikely to gain admission or have few opportunities to afford it, there may be a tendency to apply “just to see if you get in.”

Check out my new book Surviving the College Admissions Madness and Youtube Channel

Committing this fallacy costs application time and money. If you’re stressing over application fees, you probably shouldn’t apply to selecive out of state universities. By even applying, either consciously or subtly, you create unrealistic sets of expectations. Either you don’t get in and feel disappointed, or you gain admission and receive an expectedly thin financial aid package that makes the university unaffordable.

Rice is the most common example that comes to mind because, unless your family makes less than $130,000 a year, you should expect to pay the full cost of attendance. Even though Rice provides an excellent education and one of the best in the world, unless your family net worth is in the multiple millions of dollars, there are few universes where paying upwards of $280,000 for a four-year Bachelors, including Rice, provides a sound return on investment. Do not apply to Rice for Early Decision if you cannot afford it.

Affording universities also requires a family to project their income stability years into the future. Working in volatile markets that depend on commodities like oil and gas or real estate prices? Maybe reconsider enrolling at a costly university. Likewise for full or almost full-pay at less prestigious private universities like SMU, TCU, Baylor, and others, it’s rare that they will provide a return on investment to offset the costs of attending almost any Texas public university.

The counter-argument to filtering your college list by cost is to simply apply to your universities regardless of the sticker price because you may receive unexpected merit scholarships that bring the expected cost of attendance closer to or even lower than comparable public options. It’s sometimes preferable to apply, see what your options look like during senior year spring, and then say no rather than regret not trying at all. Still, you should have maybe two or maximum three reach schools based on selectivity or ability to pay.

Interested in working together?

Introduction

I address why STEM programs are so competitive, especially relative to non-STEM programs. Second, I highlight trends before providing advice for UT Computer Science, The Cockrell School of Engineering, and the College of Natural Sciences.

If you skip straight to the bottom without reading the first half, you will have a very incomplete understanding of the STEM admissions landscape. Knowing “how to” apply without understanding “why” won’t adequately inform you.

Nevertheless, I published more recent posts about UT STEM Honors programs, alternatives to CS, applying for Business/CBHP, for external transfer into STEM/Business majors, and the difficulties of changing majors into STEM/Business for current UT students.

This post focuses exclusively on regular admission and not honors. Everything that applies to being competitive is the same for honors, only that the degree of Honors competition and selection is even more extreme. There are no secret honors admissions insights other than to have low expectations for getting in.

— Kevin Martin | kevin@texadmissions.com

An Overview of STEM College Admissions Nationwide

College admissions across the nation have become substantially more competitive nationwide since COVID, particularly for STEM majors. UT is no exception.

To get one FAQ out of the way first: top 5% admissions DOES NOT guarantee UT STEM majors. These spaces are competitive for everyone, and there doesn’t need to be a 75/25 ratio of top 5% like for the university overall. The top 5% only guarantees Liberal Arts, Communications, Education, and Social Work. Years ago, Natural Sciences was guaranteed and, to a certain extent, McCombs, but that hasn’t been the case for a long time.

A consequence of our society’s fascination and push toward STEM degrees means there is WAY more consumer demand than classroom spaces that universities can supply, particularly for top 50 programs. UT received around 3,000 computer science applications in 2016, and they likely receive 10,000+ nowadays for an admissions rate of around 5-10%. That means many highly qualified applicants will be left out. Even Texas A&M and UT-Dallas reject many STEM students they would have admitted in admissions cycles before COVID. Texas A&M also seems to be rejecting top 10% applicants in engineering for the first time ever.

Since Fall 2022, I have had clients scoring 1550/35+ ranking in the top 5% rejected to varied UT STEM majors, including biomedical engineering, computer science, and even less-known majors like neuroscience and environmental science. I’ve even had students in the top 10% scoring 1500+ rejected from majors with many spaces, like biology and math, who would have almost certainly gotten in before COVID.

It isn’t enough to be a top 2% student with a 1580 who is a varsity athlete or band member, and not much else, if you want computer science or a selective engineering major. You must have a deep and varied commitment to STEM activities, ideally from freshman year or earlier. I had a student ranked 5 out of 1000 and a 36 ACT rejected to UT Biomedical Engineering (yet admitted to Rice Early Decision after a deferral). I had multiple clients rank in the top 2% and 1550+ rejected to CS, some with decent STEM-related extracurriculars and skills.

These academically perfect students would be a shoo-in for regular admission in prior cycles, and our work focused on UT Honors and the top 20 nationwide universities. I used to be able to assess a STEM applicant based on their academics alone, but nowadays I need to see their resume to gauge whether they have a chance.

The primary takeaway for applicants: if you want a STEM major, it is absolutely essential to have relevant extracurricular experiences.

Families nowadays mostly accept that if your student has a 3.8 and a 31, you’re not getting into Stanford. They fail to realize that Carnegie Mellon University (CMU) Computer Science admits an average SAT Math score of 800, meaning that every competitive applicant must have a stellar resume in an already competitive applicant pool.

For anyone less than exceptional, you’re better off saving your money on app fees and buying literal lottery tickets, where your odds of a return on investment may be more favorable than the astronomically low chances of getting into top STEM programs with anything less than an exceptional application.

Great essays are essential for getting in, but they’re no guarantees. They might not compensate for anything less than stellar academics and a resume. Poor essays will sink even the most accomplished applicants. That’s one reason I have relatively high academic minimums for taking on clients. One of the most frustrating aspects of American college admissions is that students don’t know what it takes to get in. In practice, a Holistic Review means you must be outstanding in everything.

An OOS-admitted UT-Austin Turing Honors client with a perfect GPA and ACT scores and a strong STEM resume gained admission to three other top-20 CS universities, along with a few excellent scholarships. CMU, Illinois, various Ivy League schools, and the UCs, including San Diego, also rejected them. Another Turing-admitted student had similar outcomes despite various nationwide STEM high-level achievements and flawless academics. I’m certain both applicants would have been admitted to the top 10 CS programs before the pandemic. Because competition is so intense, even the best applicants rarely gain admission to the programs they apply to.

You’re lucky to get into a single-reach school, even when you apply to ten or more. Applicants have incentives to apply to twelve or more CS programs because there are few assurances of having success, which feeds into the increased competition. For example, UT-Austin occasionally denies applicants admitted to the Ivy League or its equivalent. Gaining admission to one high-reach doesn’t imply favorable chances at another – outcomes are inconsistent, variable, and, in practice, mostly inexplicably random at top 50 universities.

My recommendation moving forward is not to apply to Stanford, Harvard, Princeton, MIT, Caltech, Carnegie Mellon, or similarly ranked CS programs unless you can afford the full cost of attendance. To be competitive, you must have otherworldly credentials, as if you’re the greatest applicant your community has produced in living memory or a national and international champion in something STEM-related. These are the most time-consuming applications, and you’re wasting your time and money if you’re not a top student on the planet.

What was true of Ivy League and equivalent universities a generation ago - that they were tough but not unattainable - is increasingly the case for STEM programs at flagship public and STEM-oriented universities in states like Texas, California, Michigan, Washington, North Carolina, Georgia, and Virginia. Gaining admission as an out-of-state applicant is especially challenging. UT’s out-of-state admissions rate in Fall 2025 was 5%.

Many of these programs today, particularly for Honors, are more selective than Stanford or Princeton were thirty years ago. When exasperated parents tell me they can’t believe how much college admissions has changed since they applied, they're right.

One irony is that it’s almost certain late-career admissions professionals wouldn’t have gained admission to their alma mater if they were applying today. I’m confident that most extremely high-achieving applicants are more talented than the counselors reviewing their files. College admissions officers are generally well-meaning if painfully unremarkable. As a reference point, I was UT Admissions’ first and only Honors graduate to work in the office.

Given the highly competitive STEM landscape, “chancing” and assessing chances at most selective programs is largely a waste of time and an exercise in futility, as I argue in this Admissions Madness blog post.

No STEM applicant to prestigious programs is safe.

Below, I make my best-educated guess about which colleges/schools/majors are more or less competitive than the other. You’ll note that most STEM majors trend toward being more competitive than non-STEM majors, less so. I estimate the McCombs Business somewhere between Natural Sciences and Cockrell Engineering.

One reflection of this trend toward engineering and the sciences is a substantial increase in Medical School applicants. Before COVID, the rate of change may fluctuate two or three percentage points, but in the last med school app cycle, the number of applicants increased 18%. Similarly, despite record burnout and early retirements, Nursing school applications have risen by 15% since before COVID.

I lament that Holistic Review and “fit for major” incentivize students to specialize so early on. Students understandably feel pressure to commit themselves to interests and activities that may not appeal to them in order to pass through the admissions gatekeepers. Well-meaning parents and teachers reinforce this urgency, often toward a few narrow career pathways, such as medicine and engineering. It isn’t enough to simply be a decent student and citizen anymore.

The Resume and Transcript arms race is where we are, though, so if you have any inkling toward STEM, you need to begin exploring those interests as early as possible. If you decide during your junior or senior year that you want STEM but don’t have the corresponding math and science profile, I suggest carefully assessing your expectations. You’re not going to get into UT CS even with perfect academics, although you may have a shot at Texas A&M or UTD.

This is not at all the kind of advice I would give pre-COVID - I don't think students and families need to surrender their interests and values entirely to the admissions gods - but the extreme competition for STEM spaces requires playing the game starting in middle school.

I loathe how college admissions incentives corrupt families, communities, schools, and value systems across our state and country, the focus of my recent book, Surviving the College Admissions Madness. There is much I would change if I could wave a Magic College Admissions Wand.

Since COVID, more students are applying to more universities than ever. Common Application submissions increased by 11% during the first COVID year, when in previous years they may have grown by a few percentage points. Googling admissions rate increases for any university in the top 100, and you’ll see increases anywhere from approximately 20% at UCLA to 60% at Harvard or even 100% at otherwise obscure Colgate. UT’s overall application numbers increased from 73,000 for Fall 2024 to 100,000 in Fall 2025 and 2026. Most of those increases came from STEM and business major applicants.

I wrote the first version of this post in March 2022, and the 2023 admissions cycle suggests a substantial increase in STEM/CS applicants. A May 2023 Washington Post article covers the dramatic rise in Computer Science students at the University of Maryland, reflective of broader nationwide trends. Significantly more students are applying for STEM majors than non-STEM programs.

Historically less selective, Auburn admitted 85% of its Early Action applicants. Since COVID, that number has dropped to 25%. It shocked me when a few of my clients were rejected. The Admissions Madness was largely confined to elite top-50 universities, but it seems the insecurities of rejection at highly selective universities trickle down to second- and third-tier schools. Families need to re-evaluate their conceptions of which schools are a match and safe.

UT STEM programs are not a safety school for anyone.

Universities are to blame

One issue among many is a lack of transparency at most universities. We have no idea exactly how competitive a given program is because most Offices of Admissions do not release their data. That means the public cannot assess how competitive biomedical engineering is compared to biology or the relative competition between Electrical/Computer Engineering and CS. That requires observers like me to make their best educated guesses, which I visualized in the introductory line chart.

Another layer of uncertainty, particularly for UT College of Natural Sciences (CNS) applicants, is which majors are “impacted” and which are not. For most colleges and schools, UT makes decisions at the “college level,” meaning it doesn’t matter whether you apply for biology or nutrition in CNS. For most majors, but not all, enrollment managers generally allocate spaces among CNS applicants.

However, there are exceptions. UT computer science is certainly separated, with CS applicants evaluated against one another. It is unclear whether other in-demand majors, like neuroscience and environmental science, are also evaluated at the major level. It could be that all CNS applicants are compared with others in the same first-choice major, as with Engineering majors at the major level, but we have no way to know.

Similarly, in the College of Liberal Arts, I have reason to believe that the most in-demand majors, Psychology and Economics, are evaluated at the major level, so it might matter which major you choose, and it might not. There may be other small programs, such as Urban Studies and Environmental Science, that are also separated, particularly in transfer admissions. Moody Communications might also separate out the most popular majors, Radio-Television-Film and PR/Advertising, but it’s unknowable.

Students with varied interests have a stake in accessing this data because they may want to hedge their bets by applying to a comparatively less risky major if they’re outside of the top 5%, and the main priority is UT enrollment, irrespective of their major.

Moreover, your second choice selection on Apply Texas is highly unlikely to be offered - it’s an anachronism from a decade ago. Nowadays, it primarily allows students to apply to multiple honors programs, resulting in confusion for thousands of families. Lack of transparency around UT’s first- and second-choice major system perplexes thousands of families each cycle.

Since many universities, like UT, pigeonhole students into a first-choice major and make it difficult for them to change their major once they arrive on campus, it isn’t enough for most families to merely gain admission. They also need their desired major.

Check out this post: “Internal transfers seem really unfair for unsure new students.” Many current UT students on Reddit lament the difficulty of changing majors. The takeaway is that if you want a STEM major yet are not offered it as a high school senior, you should strongly reconsider enrolling at UT.

This raises a more significant point about a lack of accountability to the public. I’ve heard directly from admissions counselors that they feel the general public can’t handle the information, unlike the mixed messaging by US entities and institutions throughout the pandemic. When I worked for UT, I was trained to tell families the numbers don’t matter. They even stressed that we must deceive ourselves into believing that all majors are “equally competitive.”

Infantilizing of the public by university bureaucracies and their public relations/communications teams will be a common theme throughout your admissions process. Official social media channels like YouTube, Instagram, Twitter, and Facebook are finely manicured, mostly unhelpful university promotional pieces.

Get used to being in the dark during the most consequential application of your life. University bureaucracies hold all of the power, and you’re at their mercy. They’re not interested in informing, only persuading you to apply and probably get rejected for the privilege of paying six figures for their higher education services, of which they have an accreditation monopoly.

Can you imagine a car dealership that rejects three in every four buyers willing to finance a luxury car?

I’ve worked with and observed over ten UT admissions cycles, and not a single one has proceeded smoothly. They’re all littered with miscues, errors, and unnecessary obfuscations. Admissions gatekeepers are not infallible, omniscient gods.

I argue in an Admissions Madness blog post that elite universities are unlikely to change their ways.

The information the public most wants isn't accessible, so unaffiliated and unauthorized blogs like mine are so popular. The more than $2 billion college consulting industry responds to the inefficiencies and incentives that universities themselves create. Understand that Offices of Admissions and Enrollment Management are glorified sales teams, not the tax-subsidized institutions that are supposed to be accountable to the public. They artificially keep their program spaces small to maintain or elevate their prestige.

Rolexes are unremarkable if they cost $100, and everyone has one. Likewise, Harvard maintains its hold on our collective consciousness by graduating fewer than 2,000 students each year since the 1920s. UT has expanded its incoming class size by around 1,400 since 2007, from ~7,200 to 8,600. Rice has committed to increasing their enrollment by 20% over the coming years, but it isn’t enough to keep up with the demand for STEM degrees while balancing concerns about diluting educational quality.

However, in many cases, rapidly increasing demand outstrips a university’s theoretical capacity to supply spaces, particularly for computer science and engineering. Universities struggle to hire and retain enough qualified computer science instructors who are offered lucrative compensation packages in the private sector. Decreased state and federal funding and institutional support also stretches thin a university’s resources.

Consider the perspective of a long-time computer science lecturer, Nicholas Weaver at California-Berkeley, who warns that “their CS department is on the verge of collapse.” Berkeley struggles to accommodate their CS students with enough class spaces, let alone the many hundreds who attempt an internal transfer after arriving on campus.

The New York Times published an investigative piece about struggling to find spaces in CS classes required to graduate, featuring UT-Austin CS in particular. Getting in is only the start of many computer science students’ woes. Some intro CS classes, even at prestigious universities like Carnegie Mellon, might top over 500 students. This was happening before COVID and has since amplified due to staff shortages and record numbers of university applications. Imagine paying $70,000 in annual tuition and not getting the classes you need to continue the degree sequence. There are few options to remedy the situation, and none of them are student-friendly.

Nevertheless, as I argue in my 2021 book, Surviving the College Admissions Madness, elite universities do not care about you.

Should you bother applying to a top 20 university? Almost certainly not.

Almost everyone asks me about this nowadays, so I want to provide a reality check. If you have to ask whether you’re competitive for a top 20, you’re not. Genuinely competitive applicants don’t even bother asking the question. The competition landscape for top 20 admissions is beyond what most families can visualize, and no admissions calculator, AI tool, or Reddit thread will give you an honest picture of it.

I expand the scope of the top 20s beyond the most prestigious private schools (Ivies+) to include applying for flagship public institutions as an out-of-state applicant. OOS admissions rates for non-residents applying to UT is 5%. The OOS admissions rates are similar at the most in-demand public schools, such as Michigan, Georgia Tech, UC-Berkeley/Los Angeles, Virginia, and UNC. Elite programs like Michigan Ross, UW-Seattle CS, UIUC CS, and Berkeley EECS are similarly selective as the most competitive private universities, like Stanford or Harvard. These schools and programs appear on almost every prospective student who emails me, yet almost none of them will gain admission to any of them. The apps are also very time-consuming, so it’s an exercise in futility. Even then, if they somehow manage to get into Berkeley or Michigan, I’m not at all confident the $400,000 four-year degree cost is worth it.

I wrote a chapter about this landscape in my 2021 Surviving the College Admissions Madness, and the competition has only steepened since then. Here is the actual math. There are roughly 3.8 million American high school seniors each year. About 300,000 to 350,000 of them will apply to at least one top 20 university, submitting somewhere between 800,000 and one million individual applications across the group. At the end of that process, approximately 35,000 US students will actually enroll at a top 20 school. That means if you are not, roughly speaking, in the top 1% of all American high school seniors by academics and resume, your chances approach zero.

The picture gets steeper for STEM and business applicants. A meaningful share of those 35,000 enrolling students will be in humanities and social sciences, so the pipeline for technical and pre-professional fields is considerably narrower. At many schools, Regular Decision admission rates for STEM and business programs have fallen to somewhere between 1% and 4%, well below the published overall rates you will find on any school's website.

A common response to these numbers is to treat the top 20 admissions as a lottery: the odds are terrible, but someone has to win, so why not enter? This framing is seductive but wrong, and it has a name. Nassim Taleb calls it the ludic fallacy, an error in reasoning that applies probabilistic reasoning as in a casino game but to situations with incomplete and unknowable information. The mistake of using clean, well-defined probability models to reason about complex real-world situations where the underlying variables are not random at all. A lottery is genuinely random with all ticket holders having an equal chance of winning. Top 20 admissions is not.

The students who enroll are not 35,000 lucky ticket holders drawn from a pool of 300,000. They are a highly non-random subset with specific, extreme characteristics that most applicants simply do not share. Treating admission as probabilistic, as in "I have a 10% shot, so I might as well try,” misrepresents the problem entirely. You do not have a 10% shot. You either have a realistic shot, or you do not, and the honest work is figuring out which category you are in rather than taking comfort in aggregate statistics that do not describe your individual candidacy.

What does it actually take to be competitive?

That is genuinely unanswerable, and I say that as a counselor who has worked with dozens of the highest achieving students, almost all of whom routinely get denied to top 20s. The more useful question is: do you have flawless academics and a resume with national or international level accomplishments? If the honest answer is anything short of yes, applying to top 20 schools is unlikely to be a productive use of your time, energy, or emotional bandwidth during one of the more consequential years of your life.

The students I see harmed most by the top 20 applications are not the ones who apply knowing it is a long shot. They are the ones who apply, genuinely convinced they have a chance, receive universal denials in the spring of senior year, and then have to process that outcome while simultaneously navigating enrollment decisions. The psychological toll is real, and so is the practical cost: top 20 applications require serious essays, and the time spent on applications with near-zero probability is time not spent strengthening applications that actually matter.

There is also a demographic component. If you’re not super elite, you’re cooked.

My blog audience and client base are primarily upper-middle-class suburban families in senior-level professional roles, rather than the elite and super-elite top 1% and .1% families. I argued in my 2021 Admissions Madness blog posts that “Your ZIP Code is the Most Important Admissions Factor.” That’s even truer today.

The Harvard economist Raj Chetty, who I’ve cited for the past decade, released a study with co-authors from the Opportunity Insights project in 2023 and updated for 2025 that “Children from families in the top 1% are more than twice as likely to attend an Ivy-Plus college as those from middle-class families with comparable SAT/ACT scores.”

A partial explanation is students from super-elite communities have privileges and opportunities that far exceed those in the suburbs. Children are groomed from an early age to attend the same or similar elite universities as their parents. Private schools account for around one-third of students at top 20 universities despite public schools overwhelmingly graduating more seniors each year.

These children often attend super-elite private and boarding schools that serve as pipelines to top 20s, a kind of side-door that the ultra wealthy have that the engineers and doctors living in Frisco or Round Rock do not. Certain super-elite schools like Exeter, Boston Latin, and Andover send more than ten seniors to Harvard each year, or Lawrenceville, next to Princeton’s campus, which sends a disproportionate amount of students there each year. Despite working with many students admitted to top 20s over the years, the same dynamic plays out on the west coast. Stanford remains elusive. One reason might be that elite Bay Area schools are extremely over-represented at Stanford. So, the true admissions rate for upper-middle-class communities for STEM majors is much less than 1%.

The Opportunity Insights admissions data only goes through 2015, despite an update in 2025, and given the widening social inequality and K-shaped economy since COVID, we can expect the admissions gap to widen between upper-class and upper-middle-class families. Consequently, non-legacy, non-super-elite-connected, suburban families at strong but not super-elite schools face so many competition hurdles that admissions statistics can never communicate that it’s like running a 100-meter dash starting two seconds later than the other runners.

The Chetty data also shows that attending an Ivy-Plus college increases a student's chances of reaching the top 1% of earners by 50% and nearly triples their chances of landing at a prestigious firm. But those outcomes are measured against attending a state flagship, not against the children of top 1% families who arrived at the same institution with legacy networks, family social capital, and generational wealth already in place.

In other words, getting in is not the same as competing on equal footing once you're there. The child of a Goldman partner or a third-generation Harvard legacy arrives at college with internship pipelines, alumni networks, and family connections that no admissions office can redistribute. A student from The Woodlands or Sugar Land who earned their seat on academic merit alone enters the same building but a different social ecosystem.

The compounding effects are significant. Elite family networks accelerate access to the most competitive internships, which feed into the most selective graduate programs and employers. Social capital inherited across generations is not neutralized by four years of shared coursework.

Moreover, AI displacement is not hitting all careers equally. The professional roles that upper-middle-class families have historically used as reliable pathways to prosperity, law, medicine, finance, and consulting are precisely the white-collar fields most exposed to automation in the next decade. The hedged bet that a top 20 degree represented for previous generations is becoming a less reliable instrument at exactly the moment when getting there has never been harder or more expensive. That corresponds with my argument in this post that debt-minizimg public educations at flagship institutions are a much less riskier.

A final irony to all of this is that many suburban families point to poor and working-class communities as “taking their spaces,” especially with the top 5% law, when the reality is elite college admissions has so many structural advantages for the top 1% that the bottom 95% would be wise to organize against if it were possible.

What to do?

The healthiest framework, in my experience, is to not set the top 20 admissions as a goal at all. Be genuinely open to UT Austin, Texas A&M, and other strong programs where your candidacy is competitive. If a top-20 outcome occurs, it will be a genuine surprise worth celebrating. If it does not, you will have spent your senior year building toward something real.

One legitimate exception: binding Early Decision at a top 20, for students who are genuinely prepared to enroll at that school, pay full price if necessary, and make that commitment before knowing their UT outcome. ED does meaningfully improve odds at most schools. But ED only makes sense if it is a true first choice, not a hedge, and not a gateway to a cascade of Random Decision applications that carry admission rates in the low single digits.

The STEM/Non-STEM Bifurcation

With this rising tide of applicants, admissions rates for STEM programs are decreasing significantly compared to those for non-STEM programs. The STEM/non-STEM bifurcation is a division within universities between their most in-demand majors and less popular ones.

Most universities, including UT, do not provide this data beyond the federally mandated “Common Data Sets,” it is impossible to know the true selectivity for your desired program. As a STEM applicant, you can safely assume your admissions experience is more challenging than that of most non-STEM students.

One complicating factor in discussing Admissions Rates is that most universities have many parallel enrollment management processes running simultaneously. At UT, it is evident that non-STEM majors like Communications, Liberal Arts, Education, and Social Work are substantially less competitive than the university median. When UT admits 17,000 or so students, it must forecast within a small margin of error which admitted students from what majors are likely to enroll.

Applicants who rank in the top quarter, scoring 1300, routinely get into these programs. In contrast, almost nobody with those stats is gaining admission to the natural sciences or most engineering majors, barring extreme luck or special circumstances.

The first question I encourage you to ask when your friend got in with a lower rank and SAT is to ask what major they applied to. More often than not, family gossip compares STEM apples with non-STEM oranges.

When you’re applying to a university, you’re actually submitting an application to one of many of these parallel, shadow admissions systems that need a certain amount of athletes, majors, diversity, band, legacy, professor’s/donor’s kids, etc. Scrutinizing Naviance Scatterplots or other data is mostly a waste of time because they don’t disaggregate the data, often only plotting GPA and test scores without regard to major, resumes, or essays.

Even for a school like Rice or Stanford that considers your proposed major but doesn’t explicitly admit a quota of computer scientists or engineers, it is certain that applying for a STEM major is much more competitive than if you wanted anthropology or communications. Non-STEM applicants find it comparatively easier to apply to the top 50 universities than their STEM counterparts.

This bifurcation looks different at every university, and there may be multiple forks (like within CMU’s Fine Arts programs that admit less than 5% of their applicants) depending on their offerings and program prestige. When universities that don’t lock you into a major say they don’t weigh or consider your proposed major, they’re bullshitting you.

Stanford and Rice will never admit four-fifths of their incoming class as computer scientists and engineers because that would crowd out non-STEM students whom their universities also accommodate, even if the overwhelming majority of their applicants want STEM majors. Gaining admission to English Literature at any university will always be less selective, no matter what their official sources tell you.

For STEM-predominant universities like Caltech and MIT, average SAT/GPA stats are essentially meaningless. Unless you know one of their admitted students personally, you won’t have much of an idea of just how exceptionally, phenomenally, ridiculously accomplished the average MIT admit is. Unless you have national and international level accomplishments alongside perfect academics, don’t even bother applying to STEM programs at the top 10 universities. You would be floored to see the portfolios and credentials of their denied applicants, let alone the admits.

Families with STEM applicants often drastically underestimate the competition landscape. Even for top applicants, it is very hard to get in, especially for CS and CS-adjacent majors like computer engineering at top 20 universities.

When I caution parents that their top 10% student with a 1480 and a thin STEM resume has virtually no chance of gaining admission to UT CS, they’re appalled. They argue with me. I don’t understand that their child is special, they assert. Then, unsurprisingly, I didn’t hear back from them in January when their child was almost certainly denied.

I love when people surprise me with unexpected admitted student reports with below-average portfolios, but they’re one out of a hundred for those I’m pretty sure won’t get in. College admissions is as much about luck as anything you do as an applicant. I’m more cautious and careful than ever not to inflate expectations with my STEM admissions assessments.

What families fail to realize is that there are tens of thousands of highly qualified applicants, most of whom will be denied their top choices. UT often admits students who were denied admission to CMU, MIT, Princeton, Stanford, and so on.

Being the best CS kid in a mediocre school doesn’t mean much when you’re competing against a worldwide talent pool and against top high schools with resources and endowments that rival regional universities. Houston’s prestigious Kinkaid College Preparatory School’s endowment is $68,000 per pupil, more than six times the spending per pupil for nearby urban school districts.

Fifteen years ago, below-average students at these prestigious schools routinely gained admission to their preferred universities when UT admitted two-thirds of its applicants, but not anymore. Rejections from Princeton or the top 20s end up at UT. UT rejections cascade down to Texas A&M; TAMU rejections end up at UTD; denials from UTD enroll at Texas State, and so on down the selectivity ladder.

Now that even students from Kinkaid and Strake Jesuit, or high-resource suburban schools in Katy and the Woodlands, are routinely rejected from UT-Austin, Elite America is waking up to the shifting college admissions landscape. Services and blogs like mine become more in demand as competition increases and bureaucratic transparency decreases.

Institutions that claim to value diversity and accessibility stand in stark contrast to the reality that the top 50 universities are largely the domains of wealthy, highly educated families. Not only are there record-low numbers of African American and first-generation enrollment at top 50 universities since before the 1960s Civil Rights movement, particularly in STEM, but the elite and affluent are also increasingly locked out of admissions spaces. Almost everyone loses, except for ballooning university endowment portfolios.

As NYU Professor Scott Galloway says, many prestigious institutions are hedge funds with universities attached. However, one step in the right direction toward making UT more accessible is their new ATP program for CS, which I discuss further down.

I have a 30,000-foot view of college admissions, while families have, at best, a sample size of a few dozen family friends and classmates in AP and Honors. Although my client data is limited, since most of my clients have top 5% rank and test scores, and I can control the essay variable, it reveals the importance of the resume variable more clearly.

A STEM-oriented resume is a necessary condition for getting into CS and engineering for most applicants nowadays.

It is impossible to know the true admissions rates

Furthermore, even for the rare universities that publish granular admissions data based on early action/decision, legacy, diversity, athlete, donors, etc, even if you know that a university might admit 7% of their CS applicants, you don’t know your chances if you’re an unhooked regular decision applicant.

Put another way. If Rice’s overall admissions rate is 8%, and their early decision admissions rate is around 16%, for unhooked, high-income STEM majors applying regular decision, you should assume your demographic’s admissions rate is substantially lower than the 8% published rate. The odds are probably more like one in 20 or 25. Except for the most exceptional applicants, you’re wasting your time applying for regular decisions at top 20 STEM programs. Buy lottery tickets with your app fees instead.

Furthermore, checking the University of Illinois’s overall admissions rate (45%) masks the fact that its Computer Science admissions rate hovers around 7%. Out-of-state students applying for CS at the University of Washington-Seattle are admitted at a 3% (lower than Stanford’s overall!!) rate despite an overall 48% admissions rate. An out-of-state UT-Austin applicant with college-educated parents has no way of knowing the admissions rate for CS, only that it is more or substantially more competitive than that of a comparable in-state student. Googling Illinois’s, UW’s, or UT-Austin’s admissions rates will unknowingly mislead you.

As an applicant, it is important to research your programs and look for incomplete admissions data to assess whether to apply early decision or opt for Applied Math rather than CS, for example. I suggest applying to a variety of programs at different universities rather than submitting applications to 14 different CS programs.

Here is a list of many unconventional questions to consider asking admissions officials.

I also share best practices and rules of thumb for building a reasonable college list.

But what about Business? Isn’t it as competitive as STEM majors?

To a lesser extent, Business is also competitive at UT and universities nationwide, more so than non-STEM majors generally, but almost always less so than computer science or engineering. However, those applicant numbers and enrollment spaces have remained mostly stable or have increased linearly over the past decade. There hasn’t been a corresponding exponential growth of business applicants as we see with CS and engineering. However, McCombs released their 2024 data in a presentation, where it received 12,500 applicants for around 1,000 admissions spaces. In Fall 2025, McCombs received around 16,000 applications, so the admissions rate is around 5-7%. However, many of these come from out-of-state applicants, so the admissions rate for Texas residents is likely a bit higher.

For example, UT Business Honors has received around 2,000 applicants and admitted ~300 students since I started in admissions in 2011, whereas computer science applications have increased at least 1500% in the same period. I share tips for applying for BHP and McCombs in this post.

Nevertheless, if you want to major in business, it is essential to have relevant experiences like DECA, internships, work experience, business class electives, summer camps, independent study courses, and/or non-business leadership/officer positions.

Using CMU as an example, the Tepper School of Business's admission rate is 23%, a better rate than the university average. Of course, applying to the world’s top-ranked school, Wharton at UPenn, is likely substantially more difficult than the university average. You can safely assume that applying to business at Penn is more competitive than their mediocre engineering programs. Likewise, for universities with highly ranked business programs relative to their overall or STEM prestige, like USC, Northwestern, or Michigan, Business selectively may behave similarly to STEM program admissions.

As an aside, ten years ago, computer science was essentially open enrollment, with Petroleum Engineering as UT’s most selective and demanded major when oil was around $100 a barrel. Applications notably dropped following the BP Gulf Oil catastrophe and the financial crisis that cratered energy prices.

I largely exclude business from this post because it isn’t part of this emerging disequilibrium I’ve identified between the supply and demand of STEM university spaces. Consequently, societal and public discourse trends influence which majors appeal to which students. When Elon Musk and SpaceX launched their first rockets and transferred some operations to Texas, the number of Aerospace Engineering students in that cycle increased substantially before leveling off in recent years.

One reason college admissions is such a mess is that holistic review is bullshit, as I argue in the video below. Nobody knows what it takes to get in, and universities themselves don’t have consistent admissions standards and review procedures.

Applying to UT-Austin Computer Science

UT-Austin Computer Science is extraordinarily competitive. Almost everyone who applies will be rejected.

With the exception of maybe Nursing, Architecture, or Electrical/Computer and Biomedical Engineering, it is UT’s most competitive and in-demand program. You need to be, almost at a minimum, top 5% with a 1500 SAT to have a shot. There may be some students with slightly lower academic profiles admitted if they have national/international/exceptional resume achievements and/or Powerball-levels of luck, but your chances will be very low nonetheless.

If you have to ask whether you’re an exceptional talent compared to a global applicant pool, it’s harsh, but you probably aren’t.

As I mentioned in the intro, we have no way to tell just how selective CS is. Acknowledging how hard it is, a common FAQ families ask is, “Ah ha! Well, if CS is competitive, what if we apply to Computer or Electrical Engineering?” Failing to realize that thousands of families have precisely the same insight. Except for Informatics and to a lesser extent Applied Math, any CS-adjacent major like Stats/Data Science will be extremely competitive, given the demand within society and among employers for these skills. If you rank outside of the top 10%, I would strongly consider applying to something else like Informatics or applied math.

Reviewers are looking for a demonstrated commitment to activities and interests related to computer science. Because so many students apply, they can be selective about who they choose.

The reality is that, with access to a ton of independent study and resource options that are either free or inexpensive, today's teenager has access to way more opportunities than when I was applying to college. Admissions staff regularly sees applicants with a high level of competency, so it's important that you set yourself apart.

Like any other program, reviewers are looking for self-starters, students who can work independently and/or in groups, curiosity and passion about their future studies. Reviewers want to see that you spend your free time tinkering and exploring just because it will help your admissions chances but because you can't imagine doing anything else.

There is a huge range of successful kinds of Computer Science applicants, and most of them won't have a typical resume of leadership experience, volunteer hours, or your standard list of extracurricular activities. All things equal, independent study will almost always look more impressive than joining an organization or contributing to an already established project. Especially since COVID with ECs and competitions canceled, the relative lack of formal activities normalizes independent and self-study in the admissions review process.

Possible activities and information to include in your Apply Texas Essay A, UT Short Answers, and your expanded resume

This is not an exhaustive list, but it should give you an idea of some things to consider in your own portfolio based on what I've seen other successful applicants submit. You need to be as explicit as possible about:

• Which programming languages and software you know

• What resources you've used to learn and your level of competency (elementary, intermediate, proficient, expert)

• Any independent projects, applications, or games you've developed

• Leadership positions in niche or underrepresented communities like women in STEM or a Hispanic robotics team

• Advanced mathematics beyond high school calculus like linear algebra or differential equations

• STEM extracurricular activities like robotics, Technology Student Association, Science Olympiad, Intel ISEF, etc.

• Consider including your personal site if you want to give reviewers the chance to look at your work (they won't always do so)

• If you've conducted research with a professor, note any publications that may be in progress, the journal, and if you're a sole or co-author

• Unpaid internships or paid employment with technology companies or start-ups

• Certificates, open-source courses, or university credits you have earned and the approximate number of hours it took for completion

• Related community service or volunteer projects (like building a website for a non-profit, creating a record keeping software for an animal shelter, constructing and managing a mailing list, etc)

• Experience and/or demonstrated competency in graphic design, video editing, search engine optimization, online marketing, digital publishing, cryptocurrency, architectural/engineering/statistics software, music production, 3D printing

• Unconventional activities that are important to you but may be unfamiliar to your reviewers yet are important to you

• Special circumstances or obstacles you've overcome, i.e. not having AP Computer Science at your school, no access to mentors with relevant experience, starting your own club, not having internet at home

For activities or interests that are most interesting to you, consider spending at least some parts of your essays providing context why they interest you, how it helps shape your current and future academic/professional goals, and why you would be a good fit for your choice of major.

You should also consider discussing why UT-Austin specifically is a great fit for you. I suggest that you explicitly identify at least a few resources, student organizations, professors, research labs, upper-division coursework, and professional opportunities in Austin and why you are uniquely interested in UT. I share about incorporating “Why UT” statements in this post.

Many applicants competing for spaces at most selective universities nationwide don't do enough to say why they are applying besides just "it's ranked really high" and "it might make me a lot of money in the future." 

My clients have gained admission to UTCS, including 10 Turing Scholars. 37 of 64 CS clients have been admitted (58%) since 2017. Nevertheless, many talented ones are inevitably denied each cycle.

UT-Austin Computer Science Accelerated Transfer Program (ATP)

Note: I am unsure if this program still exists.

Starting in Fall 2021, UT-Austin launched a pilot program for the only direct-admission pathway into Computer Science, ATP. When I first heard of it, I honestly thought it was a weird scam, but it’s 100% legit. For fall 2022, they seem to have expanded the offering to significantly more students. It seems that select Texas residents ranking in the top 6% who were not offered CS have the opportunity to complete three core CS classes in their freshman year with guaranteed admission into CS as a sophomore.

It’s unclear now why some students are offered this program, and others are not. It reminds me of PACE, where a handful of applicants are randomly selected without the university releasing the criteria for who is targeted. I suspect UT has some parameters (academics, diversity, first-gen, and/or low-income) for whom they offer.

Unless UT CS is also significantly expanding the number of students it can accommodate—for a program that already has issues with overfilling classes and some students unable to get the ones they need—then I anticipate the new ATP program will make it more challenging, and perhaps substantially more difficult, to internal or external transfer. It is almost impossible to transfer into UT CS without straight A’s in intensive STEM courses and a substantial STEM resume.

It seems like an awesome deal for students offered ATP, and one seriously worth considering. A client of mine, whose parents do not have high school degrees and who has a tuition guarantee through Texas Advance, yet was in the top 2% of his class, is, I imagine, the sort of student best served by this program. I appreciate that UT is making efforts toward increasing accessibility for its most in-demand majors.

This DOES NOT appear to be a program you can request or appeal into.

Relevant excerpt from the invitation:

UT-Austin Cockrell School of Engineering Tips

The Cockrell School is unique among UT-Austin colleges and schools because they admit all of their applicants based on their first-choice major rather than the overall pool of engineering applicants. When applying, it’s important that you select two engineering disciplines. It’s essentially the only college/school where your second choice major might be offered. In recent cycles, applicants have been given architectural and civil engineering, sometimes when they didn’t even ask for it.

In 2016, Cockrell received a little over 11,000 applicants and admitted approximately 3,000 students. It wouldn’t surprise me for Fall 2022 if application numbers exceeded 17,000 applications for a similar number of students. The overall admissions rate is almost certainly between 10 and 20 percent, but the rates for each major vary drastically.

Here is a table showing the enrollment size of each Cockrell major.

Below is my best and very-imperfect approximation of which majors are more or less competitive relative to the others. We have no way to know the exact numbers, and as I reference in the intro with very high Petroleum Engineering applicants in 2011 and relatively low numbers nowadays, engineering interest tends to shift each year. For example, Aerospace didn’t use to be especially challenging, but in recent years it is in higher demand, but not to the same degree as electrical/computer or even mechanical.

Mechanical engineering has the most students and applicants, so I use it as my competitiveness benchmark. There is also no way to know just how competitive biomedical is over electrical/computer, but my intuition is that, given the tiny enrollment size of biomedical, it is either somewhat or substantially more competitive than electrical/computer.

Here are also my rules of thumb for assessing whether an applicant is competitive for their desired major, which corresponds with how I perceive the relative competitiveness of each program. Parameters updated for Fall 2023 applicants.

It is critical that you do your research before applying. Reviewers have high expectations that you have a clear idea of why you are applying to your desired engineering discipline and how you hope a UT education will help you after graduation.

Unlike other universities, UT requires students to choose an engineering discipline as HS seniors, with the expectation that they remain in it for all four years. Mechanical Engineering is the most popular and in-demand option because it offers the most career flexibility. They also offer flexible curriculum options through the Career Gateway Electives, which may appeal to students with interdisciplinary interests.

Consider discussing your physics and math classes, as well as an influential teacher. Share an anecdote of a particularly memorable project or independent study. If you’ve taken engineering electives, discuss any relevant themes and how they’ve helped shape your future studies and goals. Write about robotics, engineering competitions, research projects, tutoring, and anything else relevant to STEM.

You should research the different curricula and resources for the many Engineering majors to choose the one that’s your best fit. One way to articulate why you want to study something or pursue a path is to, in your essays, acknowledge a few alternatives and why they interest you less.

In your essays, tell your reviewer “why UT” by identifying a few specific professors, research opportunities, student organizations, etc., that interest you. Pinpointing reasons why you’re applying will help separate your application from others. Saying “UT is the best Engineering program in Texas” or “Austin is a wonderful city” is not enough.

Also consider discussing how you bring a unique perspective to campus and classroom discussions and how you see yourself as a leader on UT’s campus.

For your resume, it is important to expand upon and elaborate as much as possible any relevant Engineering-specific or STEM experience, generally, and how they support your first-choice major. I understand not everyone will have relevant experience, but a record of pursuing your interests can be a difference maker.

Possible Alternatives to Studying Computer Science or Cockrell Engineering

Themes related to automation, robotics, data analysis, electronics, game design, and many other broadly related Computer Science fields often live in different UT departments or have interdisciplinary curricula. If you feel that Computer Science is too competitive, or your interests are more narrowly tailored, you might try related majors like:

• McCombs Management Information Systems (MIS)

• College of Fine Arts, BS in Arts and Entertainment Technology

• College of Natural Sciences, BS in Applied Mathematics or Actuarial Sciences

• College of Natural Sciences, BS in Physics or Chemistry on the Computation stream

• College of Natural Sciences, BS in Computational Biology

• College of Natural Sciences, BS in Space Sciences, Physics

• Environmental Science in the College of Natural Sciences, College of Liberal Arts, or the Jackson School of Geosciences

• Geological Sciences or Geosystems Engineering, Jackson School of Geosciences

• Urban Studies, College of Liberal Arts

• Geography, College of Liberal Arts

• Informatics

• Majoring in anything else and pursuing an 18-hour Computer Science Certificates on the following topics: Applied Statistical Modeling, The Elements of Computing, Scientific Computations and Data Sciences.

• Bridging Disciplines Program Certificates in Design Strategies, Digital Arts and Media, Smart Cities, Innovation/Creativity/Entrepreneurship

Getting into UT-Austin’s College of Natural Sciences (CNS)

CNS has the highest enrollment of any UT college/school, and they also receive the most applications. Years ago, CNS majors were included in the top 6% guarantee, but that's no longer the case. Highly qualified top 6% applicants are routinely rejected from the largest majors like biology and chemistry. Only in the previous few cycles have I received significantly more interest in CNS admissions as communities and schools note the increasingly competitive landscape. I had 9 CNS clients in the Fall 2022 cycle, compared with 2 in 2017, excluding computer science.

In the introduction, I alluded to the fact that we don’t know which CNS majors UT separates out. Computer Science applicants are compared with one another, and I also have reason to believe that neuroscience admissions work in the same way. Environmental science and math may also be considered. So when families ask me which majors among biology, chemistry, or physics are the most competitive, we have no way to know. However, outside of CS and neuroscience, your major choice is unlikely to influence your admissions chances relative to other CNS options.

Given the ambiguities around which CNS majors may be more or less competitive, my best advice is to choose the major you feel you’d be content with spending four or five years studying, taking exams, and conducting undergraduate research. Changing majors within Natural Science once you’ve enrolled used to be straightforward, but not anymore. Most majors require an application and are not guaranteed.

Note that anyone from any major can pursue Pre-Med or other Pre-Health Professions. You DO NOT need to be a biology major to attend medical school. Anyone in any college/school can complete the pre-med prerequisites. Selecting a pre-med interest in Apply Texas does not influence your admissions in any way.

My advice about the need for relevant experience and a substantive STEM transcript for CS and Engineering also applies to CNS. It is essential to have a STEM-oriented application. Some top 2% and 1550 students may be able to get into CNS majors without a STEM resume, but it is increasingly difficult. Even students in the top 10% with a 1450 face an uphill climb and should consider CNS a reach.

You will find the official CNS admissions advice very helpful.

Some relevant experiences and ECs to pursue and possibly include in your essays

• Shadowing physicians and clinics

• Volunteering at hospitals, science museums, and public health outreach efforts

• Hosting or participating in medical fundraisers

• Working at the front office in a medical setting

• Taking AP biology/chemistry/physics and related electives like medical terminology, medical rotation, health sciences, etc.

• HOSA competitions and related school health clubs

• Summer programs that explore life, health, and medical sciences

• Research opportunities like UT-Austin’s High School Research Summer Academy

• Competing in various science fair competitions

• Conducting independent research or more formally as part of an AP Research class or other advanced science class

• UIL Math and Science or Science Olympiad competitions

• Completing Coursera or EdX open courseware curriculum or certificates related to your future major(s)

• Honors societies like Mu Alpha Theta or Science National Honors Society

The Freshman Research Initiative (FRI)

FRI is UT-Austin’s flagship undergraduate research program, aiming to ease the transition from high school to campus while connecting students with mentors and research projects immediately. The program offers an Honors-like experience, provides many opportunities, and offers a smaller community than if you didn’t participate. It isn’t the only way to participate in research, but it streamlines the process. Browsing some Reddit posts may help give you an idea of the pros/cons and the student experience.

It started as a UT student pilot project and has since ballooned into a highly desirable opportunity. I include FRI in this post because any incoming CNS freshman who wanted it many years ago could enroll. Nowadays, as with everything else, there are limited spaces and high demand. Most students who apply gain entrance, but it’s not guaranteed. In some years, there has been a lengthy waitlist.

FRI is not something you indicate on your initial application. Consequently, admitted CNS students are invited to apply in the spring of their HS senior year, and they are required to submit additional materials beyond what they submitted on Apply Texas. It is essential to apply as soon as you receive the invitation, as they seem to admit students on a rolling basis. I don’t think FRI has access to your original Apply Texas materials, so you’re probably safe repurposing what you already wrote, perhaps for your Major short answer if applicable.

Interested in working together?

My Fall 2024 freshmen clients had the strongest outcomes of any admissions cycle. Although UT received the most applications and had the lowest admissions rate ever, 24 out of 37 of my clients (65%) gained admission to their first-choice UT major. The trend continued in 2025, with 30 of 43 my clients (70%) gaining admission to their UT first-choice major, with two additional students gaining admission off the waitlist. You can view my nationwide results from all admissions cycles here. Fall 2025 and 2026 saw similar success.

Across the three most recent admissions cycles, four clients received Forty Acres Scholarship Program semifinalist interviews, and one received UT’s flagship full-ride offer, my second Forty Acres Scholars recipient. Five gained admission to Plan II, three for Engineering Honors (with scholarship), three for Business Honors, and onbe each for ECB, CSB, Turing CS Scholars, and Liberal Arts Honors. For STEM majors, sixteen of nineteen gained admission to CS, eighteen of twenty-nine received Cockrell Engineering offers, and fifteen of twenty-one were admitted to McCombs Business.

My Early Decision clients gained admission to Duke, Rice (2), Cornell CS, Washington University in St. Louis, Emory (2), Tulane, and TCU Honors with scholarships. I assisted over half of my clients with their applications nationwide, including admission to forty universities on the US News Top 50 list. Notable Regular Decision outcomes to STEM/Business programs include Penn M&T, Princeton, Brown, Yale, Carnegie Mellon CS, Duke, the UCs (Berkeley, Los Angeles, Davis, San Diego, Santa Barbara, Irvine), Pitzer, Maryland CS, McGill (Canada), Michigan, Notre Dame, Rice, Emory, Northwestern, North Carolina, St. Andrews (UK) Virginia, Washington Seattle, UIUC CS, and Georgia Tech CS.

My clients also received Honors and/or Scholarship offers to Ole Miss Lott, Alabama, Colorado-Boulder, Arizona State, Georgia, Florida, Oklahoma State McKnight, TCU Roach, SMU, Auburn, Tennessee, Miami, Penn State, Rutgers, Indiana, Purdue, OU, Texas A&M, Baylor, UT-Dallas, Texas Tech, Houston, Rose Hulman, and School of Mines.

Nevertheless, almost everyone who gained admission to UT enrolled there, and those not admitted mostly enrolled at Texas A&M, often with Honors, rather than attending an out-of-state university. Some notable out-of-state enrollment decisions include Princeton, Penn M&T, and Michigan Engineering,

Tex Admissions Client Services Process

My clients worked very hard this past cycle. Typically, we process three to five rounds of essay and resume revisions before submitting. On average, we spend six weeks on the UT application. For two-thirds of clients with whom we collaborated on applications in addition to UT, their writing improved substantially with each subsequent draft. Since Fall 2016, 272 out of 433 first-time clients have gained admission (64%) to their first-choice UT major.

Over 120 first-time freshman and transfer clients since Fall 2017 have submitted my end-of-year questionnaire soliciting feedback with 1 as strongly disagree and 5 as strongly agree with the following statements.

• My clients answered 4.9/5 in strong agreement with the statement: Do you feel that you submitted your strongest application? All 23 clients for Fall 2021 answered with 5s.

• How satisfied are you overall with our work? They rated our work 4.8/5

• 4.8/5 feel satisfied with counseling services - communication, guidance, expertise

• They responded with agree 4s and strongly agree 5s, in 96% of responses

Tex Admissions Client Results Summary Fall 2024, 2025, 2026

76 out of 114 my Fall 2024-26 first-time freshman clients (67%) gained admission to their first-choice UT major. There were 37 admitted Texas residents ranked outside the top 5%. Two top 6% clients were denied their first-choice major (CS) and one each for ECE and Business. 2025 saw the highest admissions rate for my clients, I thought were maybe (yellow) or unlikely (red) to gain admission, with 14 gaining admission unexpectedly. 2026 had a similar trend of my clients overperforming where I’d forecasted.

My typical client comes from the top 9% of their class scoring around a 32.5 or 1480 on the ACT/SAT. My average client this year was similar academically to previous cycles. By contrast, I estimate that the average admitted UT student comes from the top 7% of their class, scoring around a 31 or 1390 on the ACT/SAT. On average, they applied to around 12 schools, ranging from a low of 2 to a high of 20. I share my tips and philosophy for building a reasonable college list.

My clients tend to have above-average resumes, with a few exceptions in both directions. Many aim for honors or selective majors like Business, Engineering, or Computer Science. All of them completed their application by the October 15 UT early action deadline. Many gain admission to selective and prestigious programs nationwide.

You can view the academic breakdowns for popular majors like Computer Science, The Cockrell School of Engineering, and the McCombs School of Business in the linked posts.

Those not getting into UT almost always have a UTD Scholarship with Honors and Texas A&M Honors as second and third chances. Others attend SMU, TCU, Baylor, and non-Texas universities on scholarships and honors programs. For the first time ever, one of my clients got denied from Texas A&M Engineering.

A scatterplot below shows admitted and denied students regardless of program—all scores are converted into SAT. As you can see, great rank and test scores are no guarantees of admission, and sometimes, students with slightly lower credentials find success depending on their first-choice major.

Interested in working together?

Update #6 March 7, 2026: Late in February, UT released all ECB and CSB decisions. It seems Engineering Honors (EHP) released their decisions over this first weeked in March. So, for future applicants, you should never assume Honors decisions will come out before March 1 or around the same time as the regular admissions decisions.

Update #5 February 13, 2026: UT has released it’s big batch of admissions offers and rejections/CAP. This was one week later compared to last year. It doesn’t seem many or any UT Honors program decisions have released. Hopefully, they will come out by the end of the month, but in some cycles, some programs released their decisions late into March. Here are my video thoughts.

Update #4 January 22, 2026: It appears some Honors decisions have gone out, including Business Honors and Plan II. It is unclear how many and if this is the entire batch.

Update #3 January 21, 2026: Forty Acres Scholars releases their Semifinalist notifications.

Update #2 January 15, 2026: UT admits around 5,000 applicants and defer the approximately 95,000 others.

Update #1 December 15, 2025: A small batch of STEM/business admissions offers have released. I will update this post later by collapsing all of the updates from previous cycles.

I receive these frequently asked questions around this same time every year. We can only speculate on how UT might release their admissions decisions. Every year is different, and they often implement changes on a whim without communicating anything to the public or even to high school counselors behind the scenes. There is no rhyme or reason why some students hear back early, and others don’t. You will find nothing but frustration, dead ends, and suspicion towards your friends if you try to read the UT admissions tea leaves and divine how it works. Almost all of my clients gain admission in January/February, and few, if any, gain admission early nowadays.

Nobody has a crystal ball and can predict when and who will find out early. Not even UT admissions counselors know.

Don’t listen to the grifters and social media prophets who claim “to know” when UT will release their decisions.

We can only look at past data and use “inductive reasoning” to make imperfect forecasts about what may happen in subsequent years. I wish UT were more transparent about this and many other things, but it is what it is. That means the public can only go off unofficial sources like mine. Nevertheless, you can expect to hear back any time between late November and late January. Refreshing the email or My Status doesn’t make the release come any quicker.

No student is ever denied their major or to UT overall early - those decisions go out all at once, usually at the end of January/beginning of February.

In the past few cycles, everyone has heard back by February 1, regardless of whether they applied by the November 1 priority deadline. With UT declaring that all early applicants for Fall 2025 and 2026 will hear back by January 15, you should not expect to receive your decision early.

International applicants usually hear back on the last day of February or the first day of March. Architecture and Fine Arts students should also expect delays.

For Fall 2025 freshmen, approximately 8,500 students were enrolled out of 19,000 admitted students. UT received around 90,000 freshman apps. Around 11,000 are likely auto-admitted Texas residents, with 29,000 apps from non-auto-admits. Admit rate for non-top 6% will be around 10%, and OOS/international admit rate will be around 5%. The overall admissions rate will be approximately 20%, with substantially lower rates for STEM/business majors.

Here are my posts on appeals, the waitlist, Early Action, internal transfer, and external transfer.

When did previous UT application cycles hear back?

Fall 2025 applicants heard back on these dates:

• December 10, 2024: It seems a small batch of decisions went out for varied majors, including CNS, Business, and Liberal Arts, including non-top-6% Texas residents. The vast majority of admissions offers were released. There is no predicting or identifying why a given applicant hears back early or not. UT received around 90,000 applications this cycle, a 24% increase from Fall 2024, with a 48% increase from out-of-state applicants.

• January 16, 2025: UT admitted around 5,000 freshman, about one-quarter of all offers given. Everyone else was deferred. This was the first year UT had a formal Early Action/Deferral system, and the fact that 95% of offers weren’t given leads to the conclusion that UT was very far behind in their review process. Customer service people told families this as well. No other university had ever deferred almost every applicant on their admissions decision release deadline. I shared my initial thoughts in this video.

• January 26, 2025: Forty Acres Semifinalist interview offers were distributed.

• February 7, 2025, 6pm: UT released their big batch of admissions offers, CAP, and rejections for OOS applicants. It didn’t appear that any Honors program decisions have gone out. Here is my YouTube video of that year’s cycles.

• February 18, 2025: Engineering Honors and ECE/Business (ECB) Honors decisions went out. ECE Honors remains under review.

• March 1, 2025: ECE Honors and Turing CS Honors decisions went out on Friday and over the weekend. All honors decisions had been released by this date.

• April 10, 2025: Some students have been offered a position off the waitlist only if they enroll in the “take the world by the horns” program that requires spending the first semester abroad, presumably in South Korea. Oddly, this process required an additional essay for inexplicable reasons. At least some out-of-state students also received this offer. Otherwise, basically nobody got off the waitlist for Fall 2025.

Fall 2024 applicants heard back on these dates:

• November 30, 2023: A small batch of decisions were released. It also seems like for the first time ever at least a few students were rejected prior to the February 1 release deadline.

• December 11, 2023: Over the weekend, a small batch of decisions went out for most majors and Texas residents outside of the top 6%.

• December 14, 2023: UT released a larger batch this evening for students across many majors. Plan II has released some decisions.

• January 13, 2024: A small batch of decisions have gone out over the past few days. Still, the admissions offers so far are a small fraction of the eventual total. This cycle seems similar to the previous one where most applicants are likely to hear back at the end of January.

• January 20, 2024: Forty Acres Scholars Program released their semifinalist candidates. Two of my clients received invitations.

• Thursday, February 1, 2024, 8pm: Almost all admissions and rejections have been released for all majors (except some in Fine Arts). It’s unclear how many Honors decisions have been released and how many remain. Honors programs do things on their own timeline. I discuss appeals and transferring in the linked posts. Here is my video for that cycle.

• February 12, 2024: BHP continues to interview applicants. On February 19, they released some favorable admissions offers.

• Friday, February 23, 2024: A few students have gained admission on appeal, including McCombs, and others offered CAP have been given PACE. I wondered if PACE still existed, and if it was possible to request appeal into it, and evidently both questions are a yes. This is by far the earliest that UT has offered favorable appeals.

Fall 2023 applicants heard back on these dates:

• December 13, 2022: UT releases a small batch of regular admissions decisions from various majors and a handful for Plan II Honors

• January 10, 2023: UT releases a small batch of regular admissions offers from various majors. BHP continues to request interviews

• Monday, January 30, 2023: UT releases almost all decisions for all majors and residencies. Some Honors programs like BHP and Turing were yet to be released. I share my thoughts in this video

• February 18, 2023: BHP continues interviewing students and doens’t release all of their decisions until the end of the month

Fall 2022 applicants heard back on these dates:

• November 18 released a small batch of liberal arts and natural sciences

• December 15 UT eleased a small batch of decisions, including non-auto admits and out-of-state for selective majors like CS, Engineering, and Business. Plan II also released a few.

• December 22, 2021 a few Plan II and Health Science Scholars Honors decisions trickled out in the past week. BHP continues interviewing applicants. UT did not release any large batches of students in December.

• January 14, 2022, UT released some decisions, mainly auto-admitted Texas residents. It seems some non-auto admits have also received their majors, but most auto-admit decisions have not been released. A handful of my top academic auto-admit clients have gained admission.

• January 21, UT released their first batch of rejections and a small wave of admissions offers

• January 25, UT released a small batch of acceptances, including for Architecture and Fine Arts.

• Friday, January 28 2022, 6:40pm: UT released the main decisions, of which virtually all were CAP/rejections.

  Here are my thoughts on that cycle: https://youtu.be/-W-J4XDlXK4

• Tuesday, February 1: Many honors decisions went out, including for Turing, Liberal Arts Honors, Plan II, and varied Natural Sciences honors.

Fall 2021 applicants heard back on these dates:

• November 20, 2020: UT released a small batch of auto and non-auto Texas residents from a variety of majors. Plan II honors release a handful of honors decisions.

• Spring 2021 Transfer: Most applicants who had more than 24 hours completed heard “yes” on Wednesday, December 9. More decisions continue rolling out each day. The remainder heard back in early January.

• Thursday, December 10, 2020: UT releases the first major “wave” of the Fall Freshman 2021 cycle with non-auto admits gaining admission across most majors. Ten of my clients received good news including an OOS McCombs. 40 Acres Semifinalists were notified over the weekend of January 3. Fifteen of my clients heard back at this time.

• Friday, January 15, 2021: A small batch of admissions decisions went out around 5pm. No students had been rejected.

• January 27, 2021: UT publishes their official (heavily downvoted) video.

• Friday January 29, 2021 730PM (Central): UT released their final batch of acceptances to OOS and non-autos, around a dozen of my clients got in. I share my thoughts about the piecemeal/non-transparent decision release schedule in this hot take video.

• Monday, Februrary 1, 2021 6PM: AllCAP and OOS rejections go out; nobody gains admission. It was a blood bath. I published a video sharing my thoughts.

• Some honors programs released admissions offers after February 1 even for students who applied by the November 1 priority deadline.

For Fall 2020 applicants, decisions were released on the following dates:

• November 22, 2019, was the first release of Major decisions for a very small handful of top 6% Engineering, Business, and other majors.

• Thursday, December 5 saw another small release.

• Friday, December 13 experienced the first “large” wave of favorable admissions decisions

• January 10 to 17 saw smaller batches of releases

• The major final wave of favorable decisions went out Tuesday, January 21, 2020, the first time in recent memory the main acceptance batch didn’t go out on a Friday

Nobody can explain UT-Austin my status/RIS/WIO glitches

Every year, there are also glitches on My Status, RIS, or the Financial Aid pages that may or may not indicate whether a student has been admitted. A new one that appeared for Fall 2025 transfers is that some students’ portals indicated that their transfer credits had been received and granted access to the degree audit before official acceptance offers went out. It’s unclear if all eventually accepted students had the same audit access early, or if some eventually rejected applicants also had access to it. I hear and see these reports every year, including this one, and I still don’t know what to make of them. I saw someone on Reddit call it “Portal Astrology.” That’s a perfect description since there aren’t ways to empirically test claims like “if X appears, it means Y” or “X always means Y” because it might be the case that X means nothing, is coincidental to an outcome, or could mean A or B.

Event invitation marketing blasts

Applicants and families also sometimes read too much into "invite-only" events for honors programs, for example, and misjudge that either being invited to or attending these events will improve their chances. As far as I know, the parameters for event invitations or attending virtual/in-person events do not influence admissions chances or signal anything in particular. They’re used primarily to drive application numbers and share information.

When I worked for UT, we had a flagship invite-only overnight on-campus event that included attending a UT game. The parameters for the program were pretty wide, and although many of those students did gain admission including honors, some didn’t get in at all. UT has a CRM analytics software called Recruiter (unless they’ve moved to a new system) that determines which students are invited to what events, but to my knowledge Recruiter doesn’t play any role in admissions. Recruiter tracks all of your interactions with the university and their messaging flows to you. A few students in Open Records Requests accessed their Recruiter data. So if you're thinking to attend an event primarily because you think it will improve your chances, save yourself the time and don't.

What if I’m in the top 5%? Does that change my decision notification?

No. Top 5% only guarantees a space at the university and not your first choice major, so you’re in the same boat as a non-top 5% student or a non-Texas applicant.

A few days after completing your application, you should receive a notification, “Congratulations! You’re admitted based on your high school rank.”

This DOES NOT mean you receive your major especially if you’re applying for anything outside of Liberal Arts. Moreover, accepting your top 6% notification and submitting your enrollment deposit DOES NOT increase your chances for receiving your desired major.

What about Honors admissions decisions?

Honors programs each release their decisions at their own discretion. Nowadays, they tend to release most or all of their decisions later in the cycle, after the regular admissions offers are released. I discuss Honors admissions in detail here.

Interested in working together?

Update #4 April 21, 2026: Some applicants have gained admission off the waitlist for College of Natural Science majors. I suspect there are perhaps a few hundred who have or will get in from the waitlist (among the 85,000 applicants UT-Austin has rejected).

Update #3 March 28, 2026: Some applicants have gained admission off the waitlist for COLA and Moody majors. I will continue to update this post as the cycle concludes.

Update #2 July 24, 2025: It seems basically nobody gained admission off the waitlist. The boiler-plate rejection letter reads: "Thank you for your continued interest in The University of Texas at Austin. After careful consideration, we regret to inform you we will not be able to remove you from the waitlist. The 2025 freshman class has now been finalized, and there are no additional spaces available. Please know our original decision was the result of a very competitive applicant pool. However, we are confident that you have the tools to succeed wherever you decide to enroll. If you are still interested in pursuing an undergraduate education at UT, you may consider applying for transfer admission, which requires a minimum of 24 hours of transferable credit from another college or university, including dual credit from high school. Learn more about the deadlines and transfer admission process here. We wish you the best of luck in your future educational pursuits and beyond."

Update #1 March 29, 2025: Some CNS applicants who requested Informatics as their major change on the Waitlist have gained admission.

Note and PSA: I do not assist with the UT Waitlist academic update essay or Letter of Continued Interest at other universities for non-clients. Do not pay anyone to assist you with these essays - unscrupulous services prey on people’s grief.

I’m understandably receiving many questions about UT-Austin’s new opt-in waitlist for Fall 2025 first-time freshmen applicants. This is the first time UT has used such a procedure. It also appeals they will allow for Waitlist opt-ins for Fall 2025 external transfer applicants. The Waitlist is for students who did not gain admission or who were offered CAP, or those admitted students who did not gain their first/second choice major or want tor request a major change.

I mentioned in my recent decision release video that I welcome UT using the Waitlist. In previous cycles, UT used its “appeals process” like a lottery, except nobody knows how many winning tickets are given. For years, the appeals lottery was a gigantic mess, so I hope this dysfunction doesn’t occur with the Waitlist.

You can read UT’s official page about the UT-Austin Waitlist here. I will share my thoughts about how I think the Waitlist process might unfold, and I will update this post with the results at the end of the summer.

I begin working with external transfers after they’ve completed at least one semester of college courses post-high school. You can read my comprehensive external transfer guide and this internal transfer guide for UT's current student major changes.

TL;DR: there isn’t much to do but opt-in to the Waitlist and make enrollment decisions for Fall 2025. You should assume you will not be offered a spot at UT-Austin.

How might UT’s Waitlist work? Why do universities use a waitlist?

UT and other universities use wait lists to fill remaining spaces, usually after the May 1 National Enrollment Deadline. Waitlists differ somewhat from deferrals, whereby universities that defer students to the Regular Decision applicant pool will release those decisions no later than April 1.

Thankfully, UT is upfront about this when their page reads: “UT Austin makes final admission decisions about an incoming class only after considering all applicants, the needs of the University and its academic programs, and limitations on class size. Therefore, a reverse in admission decision is unlikely.”

We must go down the rabbit hole to understand how and why waitlists work. Your “academic update” essay is unlikely to make any difference, and there is no action to take besides opting into the Waitlist.

A key phrase is “the needs of the university,” which translates into Enrollment Management practices. Many institutions, including UT, have actually shifted away from the bureaucratic language of “admissions offices” to “offices of enrollment management” or subsumed many departments within that broader umbrella. Google almost any “university + enrollment management,” and you might find some interesting result differences.

If admissions staff review and score applicants, enrollment managers attempt to forecast how many admitted students will enroll called the “admissions yield.” The highest yield rates come from schools like Stanford, Harvard, and MIT, which enroll around 80% of their applicants.

UT-Austin’s overall yield is between 45-50% each year, and in recent years, UT has enrolled around 9,000 first-time freshmen students. Consequently, when admissions staff admits 17,000-18,000 students, enrollment managers expect a little less than half to enroll. Some senior admissions staff are also enrollment managers.

Those yield numbers will differ with each major. Presumably, the most in-demand majors, like CS or ECE, probably have higher yield rates than less in-demand ones, such as social work or communications. Enrollment managers must balance many different needs around in-state, out-of-state, international students, spaces in colleges/schools/majors, scholarship athletes, low-income/rural/first generation, and so on. They have a tricky and challenging job, and these stats and numbers are ultimately unknown and unknowable. Like admissions, enrollment management is an opaque black box.

If UT-Austin or other universities have unexpectedly more students enrolled than their yield forecasts anticipated, there could be housing shortages, issues registering for classes, overcrowded classes, dining hall crowds, etc. Moreover, if they hit their enrollment projects just right, there is no need to fill spaces with a waitlist. Undoubtedly, UT and universities use AI and Big Data processing to forecast their enrollment, although I’m unsure whether or to what degree they use AI on the admissions review side.

If universities under-enroll by a few percentage points, they will know that information only after the May 1 enrollment deadline. Then, they use waitlists to fill those remaining spaces.

This helpful blog post shows how some universities regularly admit many students from the waitlist, with others admitting few and often zero. These trends don’t particularly correlate with public, private, or prestige. Universities report this data to the Common Data Sets initiative.

Another factor is “summer melt,” which is enrollment manager-speak for those admitted students who submitted their enrollment deposit but withdrew after May 1 and before classes start in August. Summer melt happens for logistical/financial reasons, family disruptions or extenuating circumstances, getting off the waitlist of another university, or missing tuition payment deadlines. Ivy League and equivalents might experience a few percentage points of melt. UT and other public flagship universities might expect 5-10% of enrolled students to not complete their twelfth day of class for their first semester, which is the technical cutoff for melt.

So, summer melt explains why UT publicly broadcasts that waitlist offers may come as late as the end of July. They may want to fill those remaining students for students who have withdrawn their enrollment offer.

Do I need to opt-in ASAP? Is the Waitlist first-come, first-served?

No. I highly doubt UT’s Waitlist is first-come, first-served, partly because of their page’s explicit language: “The waitlist is not ranked, and we do not know if any space will become available or how many students will be accepted via the waitlist.”

Since it “isn’t ranked,” that also means they’re unlikely to consider or reconsider the credentials or review scores of the original application. Why some students get admitted off the waitlist and others do not will never be known. If you are lucky enough to get in, be gracious in your reward.

Since they’re unlikely to even release offers before May 1, and they definitely won’t in February, it isn’t important or urgent to send it in. However, there’s also no reason to wait. So, you may as well opt-in sooner than later.

The most important thing is that you make an enrollment decision for Fall 2025 so that you can continue your studies. DO NOT wait for your UT Waitlist offer before making a decision.

If you are offered admission off the UT Waitlist, withdrawing from the institution you have enrolled isn't a big deal. As mentioned above, “summer melt” is fairly common.

What about appealing?

Thankfully, it seems UT has moved on from the Appeals Lottery system of recent cycles. There are only very narrow instances where a student can submit an appeal, and none of them are “I really want to go to UT!”

• Appealing for a late application to be considered on time (for applicants only). 

• Changing your Freshman/Transfer status (for applicants only). 

• Requesting to defer admission to a later semester (for admitted students only). 

• Requesting to reinstate an offer of admission that you previously declined (for admitted students only). 

• Requesting to change a chosen Coordinated Admission Pathway Institution (for CAP students only).

One interesting case is “changing your status from freshman/transfer” because this was a loophole many years ago for early college high school students who earn many college credits and might graduate high school with a community college associate’s degree. I’ll be curious if this bullet point implies UT has re-opened this side-door to admission.

They are also explicit that you should not call, email, or show up on campus to show how you really, really want to enroll at UT. The Waitlist page explicitly states, in bold: “Additional materials, such as letters of recommendation, continued letters of interest or other items, submitted by you or on your behalf will not be accepted or reviewed.”

Should I request a major change?

Sure, may as well. Spaces in high-demand STEM/Business majors are likely more likely to fill up, so requesting a major in a non-STEM program may be a good idea.

However, it is very difficult to change into a STEM/Business major at UT if you did not gain direct admission. I strongly caution against enrolling at UT for a non-STEM major if you desire business or most STEM majors. I discuss UT student internal transferring/major change in this post.

If you were a top 6% applicant who did not gain admission to their first-choice major, you should strongly consider enrolling at a university where you have a predictable pathway to earn your preferred degree.

Is it possible to request PACE or other pathway programs?

No.

Does opting into the UT Waitlist negate or influence pathway programs like CAP?

No.

If you want CAP, especially at Arlington or San Antonio, you and all of your family need to be on phones and devices to refresh the screen like they are buying Beycone concert tickets. Those spaces fill up within five minutes. If you accept your CAP offer, and you eventually get admitted off the UT Waitlist, you will withdraw from CAP and enroll at UT.

How should I approach the UT-Austin Waitlist “academic update” essay submission?

There isn’t really a strategy. It’d honestly be better if UT didn’t give an option at all because it and Letters of Continued Interest, like at Michigan, give applicants the illusion of control.

Waitlists depend entirely on the needs of universities and have little or nothing to do with individual applicants. It’s purely an economics game around the supply of spaces and hitting enrollment management targets. At least UT is transparent about this through the new Waitlist rather than the previous Appeals Lottery process that gave students hope that their essay would make a difference.

I appreciate that UT specifics “academic updates,” which I interpret as concerning only fall semester senior year grades or changes in rank/GPA. I suppose if you want to provide resume, extracurricular, achievement, or special circumstances updates with your 200 allotted words, go for it. Do not send in any supporting documents like a resume or rec letter.

If your rank improved into the top 6% after your fall senior year grades, this will not qualify you for automatic admission. The automatic admissions cutoff is based on the rank given by the December 1 deadline.

So, write a few “stick to the facts” sentences, send in your essay, and move on with your life without an expectation for success.

UT-Austin Waitlist outcomes for Fall 2025

I will update this post at the end of the admissions cycle.

The University of Texas at Austin has released their initial wave of decisions and deferrals for Fall 2026 applicants around 5pm on January 15, 2026. Fall 2026 seems similar to the previous year Fall 2025. That was the first cycle that UT had a formal Early Action deadline of October 15. They deferred almost every applicant in the same way last year. Almost all admissions and CAP decisions went out around February 7, 2025. This year, Fall 2026, UT was a little more proactive with communication.

I estimated that approximately 75% of Fall 2025 applicants were deferred, or around 4,000-5,000 students. Some messaging is circulating online about a “counselor meeting” that coincidentally shared the same data, that around 75% of eventually-admitted students would be deferred. Consequently, if UT admits around 4,000-5,000 applicants on January 15, and there are around 100,000 total applicants, approximately 95% of applicants are deferred. This seems to be irrespective of whether they applied by the October 15 EA deadline or the December 1 regular admissions deadline. You can read about UT’s many missteps over the years here.

Something like three-quarters of my eventually-admitted Fall 2025 clients heard back in February, and not on January 15, including my very top-performing students. Many applicants who were invited to apply to the Forty Acres Scholars Program (FASP) were also deferred.

That means if you’re deferred, you’re not necessarily cooked.

Does applying Early Action make a difference? My hypothesis for Fall 2025 was no, and I’m inclined in Fall 2026 to believe applying Early Action doesn’t make a difference. There were December 1 RD applicants who were admitted on January 15.

UT-Austin’s many Honors Programs handle admissions review and decision release independently. They’re almost always after the Big Batch of decision releases. Some programs do not release their decisions until the end of February and sometimes even in early March.

I’ve excerpted notes at the bottom of this post. I cannot verify the accuracy of that information, but it generally checks out as being plausible.

What can I do if I got deferred?

Nothing. There is nothing “to do” but wait.

I would say “don’t freak out,” but the reality is, the few weeks in Limbo between deferrals and admissions offers isn’t fun. I wish UT didn’t do it like this. Almost no other university has a gigantic batch of deferrals before the normal admissions decision release.

UT’s admissions FAQ page explicitly reads in response to the question, “Can I submit additional information after receiving a deferral? No, after the admissions deadline, additional materials such as letters of recommendation, letters of continued interest, or other items submitted by you or on your behalf will not be reviewed.”

All that you can do is wait.

In Fall 2025, UT gave a few days’ notice that it intended to release almost all its decisions on the first Friday in February. If that happens again for Fall 2026, that means decisions might come out on February 6. Their official messaging is that decisions will go out “on or before February 15.”

Past cycles do not indicate future trends. “Inductive reasoning” isn’t especially helpful in college admissions.

Nobody knows why a given applicant heard back early or not. UT is likely behind on reviewing applications like it was last year. It could be the case that your admissions file is stuck in the inbox of a lazy admissions reviewer. When I worked at UT, something like one-quarter of all diligent admissions readers read three-quarters of the files. The other three-quarters of admissions reviewers were chronically behind in reading their files and often had their files re-assigned to the diligent reviewers.

I expect social media spaces will continue to be a dead-end speculative void and an engine for anxiety and misinformation. I suggest avoiding online communities for “information.” They’re mostly spaces where misery loves company. I get their appeal, but you and your parents are only making this process more stressful by refreshing and doomscrolling. See this post, “The truth about Reddit’s Applying to College.”

It makes me feel hopeless about the state of the world and algorithmic spaces when Redditors treat “Portal Astrology” as literal. This was 100% sarcasm and a joke a few years back. Y’all need to stop.

What if I eventually don’t gain UT admission?

It may be that UT’s admissions rate falls below 20% for the first time in history. The admissions rate was 70% when I enrolled in 2007, when UT received 27,000 applications. It wouldn’t surprise me if the out-of-state admissions rate was below 5%. That means almost everyone will get denied in this and in future admissions cycles.

If you were an automatically-admitted Texas resident who ranked in the top 5%, but you did not gain your first-choice major, you should reconsider enrolling at UT. STEM and Business majors are extremely difficult to transfer into after arriving on campus. For example, if you applied for UT Cockrell and didn’t gain admission, you should consider enrolling at an alternative program like Texas A&M. Still, you can read about UT’s “internal transfer process.”

Essentially, every Texas resident who does not gain admission to UT will receive the “Coordinated Admissions Program” (CAP). CAP is UT’s equivalent to a rejection for Texas residents. You can read if CAP is the right fit for you here.

Some of you may eventually decide to attempt an “External Transfer” to UT-Austin after enrolling at a community college or a four-year university following high school. I have many posts about this process, and this Transfer Guide is a good place to start.

If you receive CAP, or if you’re a non-resident applicant who is denied, you will have the option to join the Waitlist. Basically, nobody was admitted off the waitlist for Fall 2025, and more generally, waitlists at other universities almost never admit students. If you do gain admission, it almost always comes after May 1, and it often complicates your enrollment picture.

The Waitlist system has (thankfully) replaced the Appeals Lottery of earlier admissions cycles.

Speculation below about initial Fall 2026 data and deferrals

I cannot verify if the below is accurate or from an official source, but the numbers, reasoning, and trend checks out based on last year’s (Fall 2025) process.

Let’s talk about UT-Austin’s Coordinated Admissions Program, or CAP. I will discuss what CAP is, who it’s a good fit for, and who probably shouldn’t consider CAP.

What is the Coordinated Admissions Program (CAP)?

CAP is by far the most popular and common transfer pathway program. It guarantees admission only to Liberal Arts majors if you earn a 3.2 GPA at a UT-Austin system school during your freshman year. CAP is only offered to Texas residents and not out-of-state or international students. CAP does not require you to submit a separate application. Instead, you accept your CAP offer directly on your UT-Austin My Status page. You can only select the CAP schools you were offered, but if you rank in the top half of your senior class, every option should be available.

The most in-demand schools by far are the Arlington and San Antonio Campuses, so if you prefer these, you and your family must all be on your devices logged in and hitting refresh because spots fill up faster than tickets sold for a Beyonce concert. During your spring semester at the UT system school, you can try for any first choice major except Architecture and submit the required essay and resume. If you do so, you cannot select economics or psychology as your backup major, since these are the most in-demand Liberal Arts programs. If you want economics or psychology, select it as your first choice, and it should be guaranteed.

PACE is a very uncommon admissions offer

Another pathway program you may encounter is PACE. However, only a few hundred applicants are offered PACE, which allows for co-enrollment between ACC and UT-Austin. You cannot request PACE, so if it wasn’t offered to you, you cannot pursue it. I also want to emphasize that enrolling at ACC provides no transfer admissions advantage.

The ACC to UT supposed advantage is the most intractable myth among any UT admissions misinformation. Enrolling at ACC does not make any difference, as I outline in this post. You should not enroll at ACC unless you’re from central Texas. UT does not care whether you enroll at a community college or four-year university or UT system school when transferring. They only care about your college GPA at whichever institutions you’ve attended.

Who is CAP a good fit for?

CAP is a good fit if you’re open to completing a liberal arts degree. CAP provides no advantage or benefit for other majors like natural sciences, business, communications, or engineering other than the 3.2 liberal arts guarantee. CAP is also a good fit if you have fewer than 30 hours from AP or dual credit. Since CAP requires its students to complete a relatively rigid set of core curriculum classes, if you’ve already satisfied many of those requirements, you may be better off enrolling at a four-year university to avoid repeating too many classes.

CAP students must complete 30 hours by June 1 to be eligible to transfer to UT. CAP is also a good fit for students content with delaying gratification. It doesn’t matter where you begin your degree but where you complete it. I know it seems like the end of the world to go to San Antonio or Tyler for a year, but five years in the future, it’ll seem like a blip on the radar.

Who is CAP not a good fit for?

If you want any other major that isn’t liberal arts, CAP is not a good fit for you.

Even UT staff will tell students to enroll at a four-year university where they have a guaranteed pathway to earn a degree in the sciences, engineering, or business. Similarly, if you gained admission through top 6% but were not offered your STEM or Business major, you should strongly consider not enrolling at UT. It is difficult to change your major after arriving at UT.

So, some students propose completing CAP and enrolling in liberal arts and then trying to change their major after arriving at UT. This is not a good idea because it might put you in a position of needing to transfer a second time away from UT to earn your desired degree. CAP may also not be a good fit for students who desire a more traditional college experience and have offers from similar top 50 universities with a guaranteed pathway to completing their degree.

I hope you’ve found this post interesting. Reach out at kevin@texadmissions.com with any questions about CAP or working together on your external transfer application.

Interested in maximizing your admissions chances?

The 2024 transfer application cycle has officially wrapped up with almost all decisions going out the third week of June, which was much later than previous cycles and also after UT’s stated release of June 15. I share more in this video.

UT transfer does not practice rolling admission, meaning when you submit your application has no bearing on either your admissions outcomes or the timeline for when you will receive your decision. Applying early provides no advantages when transferring.

If you are intending to apply in future transfer cycles, consult this comprehensive external transfer application and admissions guide to help prepare your materials.

Anyone interested in internal transferring while a UT student should consult this post. Internal transferring is outside of the scope of this post.

In this post, I provide a summary of admissions outcomes with recommendations for the future.

UT-Austin External Transfer Admissions Recommendations

UT reads and scores all transfer applications. Generally, competitive applicants have a GPA of at least 3.5 across all college courses. Spring 2020, however, was less competitive than prior cycles. At least some applicants with a GPA around 3.3 gained admission to Liberal Arts, which hadn’t happened before. It is hard to say whether Spring 2021 and subsequent cycles will be similarly or more selective.

The average transfer admissions GPA at UT is 3.75, but keep in mind this also includes CAP students guaranteed to transfer with a 3.2, so the reality is admissions is much more competitive than the 3.75 average suggests.

Earning outstanding grades is a necessary condition but won’t be enough to get you in. You also need a strong resume and interesting essays that demonstrate your fit for major and supply compelling reasons why UT is where you need to be to continue your studies.

Transfer admissions depend largely on the number of spaces available in a given program, so in some years there are many spaces and in others there aren’t.

Programs that always have limited spaces: McCombs Business, Nursing, Architecture, Computer Science, all Engineering majors except Architectural and Civil

Radio-Television-Film and Advertising also tend to fill up and are more competitive than other Moody programs.

Because CAP transfers are guaranteed admission to Liberal Arts, paradoxically, it’s a more competitive major than others because there are fewer spaces available for non-CAP transfers. Therefore, if your GPA is lower than 3.65, consider applying elsewhere.

Following the Spring/Fall 2024 transfer cycle, I’ve updated and lowered slightly some of my GPA recommendations.

Here are my GPA minimums to be competitive and also take on clients for either Spring or Fall transfer admissions. Under no circumstances will I take on clients with less than a 3.5.

• Education, Social Work, Undergraduate Studies, College of Fine Arts (non-portfolio or audition programs): 3.5 or higher

• Moody Communications (not RTF or Advertising) and Liberal Arts: 3.6 or higher

• College of Natural Sciences and the Jackson School of Geosciences: 3.8 or higher

• Most Cockrell School of Engineering (except the less in-demand civil, architectural, and petroleum engineering): 3.85 or higher

• RTF, Advertising, or McCombs School of Business: 3.9 or higher

• Computer Science, Computer/Electrical Engineering, Architecture, Nursing: 4.0 or don’t bother trying

For STEM programs or majors that have prerequisite courses, you need to earn a perfect 4.0, especially in calculus to be considered competitive.

Need help submitting your best spring or fall transfer application? Complete my questionnaire for a free consultation and discussion of what I can do to help.

Spring and Fall UT Transfer Client Outcomes

Fall 2025 UT Austin TRANSFER Admissions Results

• ADMIT 4.0 | Mechanical Engineering

• ADMIT 4.0 | Electrical/Computer Engineering

• ADMIT 4.0 | Economics (second choice major) - Denied CNS Math first choice

• DENY 4.0 | Mechanical Engineering

• ADMIT 4.0 | Chemical Engineering

• ADMIT 4.0 | Chemical Engineering

• ADMIT 4.0 | College of Natural Sciences - Human Development/Family Sciences

• DENY 4.0 | Computer Science

• DENY 4.0 | McCombs School of Business

• ADMIT 4.0 | College of Liberal Arts - Government

• ADMIT 3.97 | Moody - Communications & Leadership

• DENY 3.94 | McCombs School of Business

• ADMIT 3.9 | College of Natural Sciences - Math

• DENY 3.89 | Mechanical Engineering

• DENY 3.89 | Moody - Journalism (out-of-state)

• ADMIT 3.86 | Moody - Communications & Leadership

• DENY 3.82 | Mechanical Engineering

• ADMIT 3.79 | Moody - Communications Studies (second choice), Denied Advertising/PR

• DENY 3.75 | McCombs School of Business (B’s spring semester)

• ADMIT 3.74 | Moody - Speech, Language, and Hearing Sciences (SLH)

• ADMIT 3.65 | Education - Physical Culture & Sport

• DENY 3.5 | Moody - Communication Studies (B’s spring semester)

Fall & Spring 2024 UT Austin TRANSFER Admissions Results

Note: Computer Science seems almost impossible to gain admission nowadays. Both 4.0s had stellar resumes. Anecdotally, I didn’t see a single verifiable report online of an applicant gaining admission to UT CS. Some students will inevitably gain admission, but it’s very rare.

• DENY 4.0 | Computer Science

• DENY 4.0 | Computer Science

• ADMIT 4.0 | Electrical/Computer Engineering

• ADMIT 4.0 | COLA Economics

• ADMIT SECOND CHOICE 4.0 | Denied Business, admit Economics

• ADMIT 4.0 | Moody Communications and Leadership

• ADMIT 4.0 | Mechanical Engineering

• ADMIT 3.97 | McCombs School of Business

• ADMIT 3.94 | McCombs School of Business

• ADMIT 3.93 | Liberal Arts Government

• DENY 3.9 | Computer Science

• ADMIT 3.88 | Liberal Arts Health and Society

• ADMIT 3.88 | Liberal Arts Rhetoric and Writing

• ADMIT 3.81 | McCombs School of Business

• ADMIT 3.72 | Liberal Arts Government

• ADMIT 3.7 | Liberal Arts Government

• ADMIT 3.66 | Liberal Arts Health and Society

• ADMIT 3.6 | Liberal Arts Human Dimensions of Organizations

• ADMIT 3.5 | Education - Physical Culture and Sport

Fall & Spring 2023 UT Austin TRANSFER Admissions Results

• DENY 4.0 | McCombs School of Business

• ADMIT 4.0 | Education

• DENY 4.0 | Electrical Engineering (Michigan admit)

• ADMIT 4.0 | CNS Biology (spring)

• DENY 4.0 | CNS Biology (fall)

• ADMIT 4.0 | Moody Communications

• ADMIT 3.9 | McCombs School of Business

• ADMIT 3.9 | Liberal Arts Economics (out of state, USC Business admit)

• ADMIT 3.71 | Civil Engineering

• ADMIT 3.66 | Liberal Arts Government

Fall 2022 UT Austin TRANSFER Admissions Results

• ADMIT 4.0 | McCombs School of Business

• ADMIT 4.0 | McCombs School of Business

• ADMIT 4.0 | McCombs School of Business

• DENY 3.9 | McCombs School of Business (admit second choice Economics)

• DENY 3.85 | McCombs School of Business

• DENY 4.0 | Computer Science

• DENY 3.9 | Computer Science

• ADMIT 3.95 | COLA Sociology

• ADMIT 3.91 | Education

• ADMIT 3.77 | Education

• ADMIT 3.67 | Moody Journalism (rejected to RTF first choice)

• ADMIT 3.7 | COLA Government

Spring 2022 UT Austin TRANSFER Admissions Results

• ADMIT 4.0 | College of Natural Sciences Biology

• ADMIT 4.0 | College of Natural Sciences Mathematics

• ADMIT 4.0 | COLA Sociology

• ADMIT 3.75 | Education

• ADMIT 3.7 | COLA Sociology

• DENY 3.6 | COLA Geography

• DENY 3.55 | Education

Spring and Fall 2021 Transfer Client Outcomes

I worked with 8 spring and 15 fall clients for 2021. 13 of 15 fall clients gained admission to UT (87%).

Fall 2021 UT Austin Admissions Results

• ADMIT 4.0 | Computer Science

• ADMIT 4.0 | Computer Science

• DENY 4.0 | Computer Science

• ADMIT 4.0 | Informatics

• ADMIT 4.0 | McCombs School of Business

• ADMIT 4.0 | Moody Communications/Journalism

• ADMIT 4.0 | Moody Communications/Advertising

• ADMIT 3.94 | Moody Corporate Communications

• ADMIT 3.93 | McCombs School of Business

• DENY 3.9 | Economics (OOS)

• ADMIT 3.88 | Economics (appeal)

• ADMIT 3.79 | Education/Kinesiology (OOS)

• ADMIT 3.77 | Natural Sciences/Physics

• ADMIT 3.72 | Natural Sciences/Physics

• ADMIT 3.57 | Moody Communications/Journalism

Spring 2021 UT Austin Admissions Results

5 of 8 Spring 2019 clients gained admission (63%). Spring only allows Natural Sciences, Liberal Arts, Education, and Social Work applicants.

• ADMIT 4.0 | College of Liberal Arts/Economics

• DENY 4.0 | College of Liberal Arts/Economics

• DENY 4.0 | College of Liberal Arts/Urban Studies

• DENY 4.0 | College of Liberal Arts/Psychology

• ADMIT 3.75 | College of Liberal Arts/Health and Society

• ADMIT 3.68 | College of Liberal Arts/Psychology

• ADMIT 3.54 | College of Liberal Arts/Government

• ADMIT 3.53 | College of Natural Sciences/Math

Spring and Fall 2020 Client Outcomes

I worked with 5 spring and 16 fall clients for 2019 with an average GPA of 3.81. 7 clients attend two-year colleges and 9 for four-year universities. 15 of 16 fall clients gained admission to UT (94%).

Fall 2020 UT Austin Admissions Results

• ADMIT 4.0 | Moody/RTF

• ADMIT 4.0 | Moody/RTF

• ADMIT 4.0 | Cockrell/Chemical Engineering

• ADMIT 3.97 | Cockrell/Mechanical Engineering

• ADMIT 3.92 | McCombs School of Business

• DENY 3.92 | Cockrell/Computer Engineering

• ADMIT 3.89 | Liberal Arts/Psychology

• ADMIT 3.87 | Moody/Corporate Communications

• ADMIT 3.86 | McCombs School of Business

• ADMIT 3.76 | Moody/Communications Sciences and Disorders (CSD)

• ADMIT 3.75 | Liberal Arts/Rhetoric and Writing

• ADMIT 3.72 | Education/Elementary Education

• ADMIT 3.71 | Liberal Arts/Government

• ADMIT 3.64 | Liberal Arts/Linguistics

• ADMIT 3.55 | Moody/Communications Sciences and Disorders (CSD)

• ADMIT 3.5 | Fine Arts/Art History

Spring 2020 UT Austin Admissions Results

5 of 5 Spring 2019 clients gained admission (100%). Spring only allows Natural Sciences, Liberal Arts, Education, and Social Work applicants.

• ADMIT 4.0 | College of Liberal Arts/Economics

• ADMIT 3.87 | College of Natural Sciences/Nutrition

• ADMIT 3.65 | College of Liberal Arts/Sociology

• ADMIT 3.65 | College of Liberal Arts/Geography

• ADMIT 3.53 | College of Liberal Arts/Health and Society (significant personal/special circumstances related to major)

Spring and Fall 2019 Client Outcomes

I worked with 9 spring and 20 fall clients for 2019 with an average GPA of 3.8. 13 clients attend two-year colleges and 16 for four-year universities. I worked with one student seeking a second bachelors.

7 of 9 Spring 2019 clients gained admission (77%). Spring only allows Natural Sciences, Liberal Arts, Education, and Social Work applicants.

Spring 2019 UT Austin Admissions Results

Here are the Spring 2019 results and GPA. All students had strong resumes and great to outstanding essays. Spring admissions depends largely on the number of spaces available and can be less predictable than fall admission.

• ADMIT 4.0 GPA | College of Natural Sciences/Public Health (admit on appeal because of more than 24 hours AP but no college grades yet earned)

• ADMIT 4.0 | College of Liberal Arts/History

• ADMIT 3.95 | College of Liberal Arts/IRG

• ADMIT 3.8 | College of Natural Sciences/Mathematics

• ADMIT 3.71 | College of Liberal Arts/HDO

• ADMIT 3.71 | School of Education/Physical Culture and Sport

• ADMIT 3.67 | College of Natural Sciences/Physics

• DENY 3.59 | College of Liberal Arts/Rhetoric and Writing

• DENY 3.58 | School of Education/Exercise Science

Fall 2019 UT Austin Admissions Results

10 of 20 (50%) of my clients gained admission for the fall. Here are the Fall 2019 results and GPA. All students had strong resumes and great to outstanding essays.

• ADMIT 4.0 GPA | College of Liberal Arts/Psychology

• ADMIT 4.0 | College of Liberal Arts/Classics

• DENY 4.0 | College of Natural Sciences/Computer Science (International)

• DENY 3.93 | Cockrell School of Engineering/Environmental Engineering (120+ hours, second bachelors)

• DENY 3.9 | Moody College of Communications/Radio-Television-Film

• ADMIT 3.87 | Moody College of Communications/Corporate Communications

• ADMIT 3.87 | Moody College of Communications/Journalism

• DENY 3.84 | Moody College of Communications/Radio-Television-Film

• DENY 3.83 | College of Liberal Arts/Psychology

• ADMIT 3.83 | College of Natural Sciences/Mathematics

• ADMIT 3.8 | College of Liberal Arts/Psychology

• ADMIT 3.77 | Education/Sports Management

• ADMIT 3.76 | College of Liberal Arts/Sociology (Denied first choice Moody, admit second choice COLA)

• DENY 3.76 | Cockrell School of Engineering/Environmental Engineering

• ADMIT 3.75 | College of Liberal Arts/Government

• DENY 3.68 | Cockrell School of Engineering/Environmental Engineering

• DENY 3.68 | College of Natural Sciences/Biology

• DENY 3.58 | Education/Sports Management

• ADMIT 3.5 | Education/Sports Management

• DENY 3.48 | College of Natural Sciences/Biology

Other Data and Observations

The two most extensive samples of self-reported student data are on College Confidential and reddit.com/r/utaustin admissions. A word of caution: 1) not all students self-report their grades or even admissions decisions truthfully, and 2) there is no way to know the quality of their resume and essays as self-assessments are often wildly off base.

Nevertheless, these reservoirs of information could be useful if you want to dig a little deeper. I won’t summarize any of the data here other than to say these self-reports helped me make my GPA recommendations to consider UT-Austin a match that I posted earlier here.

Fall 2020 transfer outcomes on College Confidential can be found starting on page 8.

The subreddit moderator team allowed students to report their outcomes on this open spreadsheet. You can view the /r/utaustinadmissions statistics and data here.

What stands out the most is that, with one or two notable exceptions, no students who earned less than a 3.5 GPA gained admission to UT for any major. Therefore, if you’re applying with a lower GPA, UT should be considered a high reach. I suggest casting a wide net for your applications in any case as nobody is guaranteed UT external transfer admission.

Need help submitting your best spring or fall transfer application?

Note: this post is for External Transfers who are not UT students. Current UT students wanting to change their major or internally transfer can consult this post.

Public Service Announcement: Enrolling at Austin Community College (ACC) does not improve your UT transfer chances.

Navigating the college admissions process, especially as a transfer, can sometimes feel like crawling around in the dark. I build upon this previous post 9 Tips for Transferring by compiling all relevant questions into this comprehensive post. I provide perspectives and additional resources to help you consider your options while addressing these themes and FAQs:

• Why Students Transfer

• The Coordinated Admissions Program (CAP) and Pathway to Admission through Co-Enrollment (PACE)

• Transfer Eligibility and Prerequisites

• Automatic Transfer Admissions

• Spring versus Fall Transfer

• Admissions Statistics and Trends

• GPA Recommendations by College/School

• Essay and Resume Tips

• Receiving Your Decision

Check out my new book Surviving the College Admissions Madness and Youtube Channel

Why transfer?

There are a few reasons why students might attempt a transfer. Some remain committed to the UT dream and want to get there as soon as possible. Others enroll at a great university, but the major they come to love isn’t offered there, so they must switch campuses to pursue it. Students sometimes want to stick with their major but feel limited by their current environment and believe their growth ceiling is low. They are attracted to UT’s extensive opportunities and resources. Approximately 40% of bachelor's degree earners nationwide graduate from a university where they did not start their studies.

Many transfer students are nontraditional. They are mid-career professionals looking to complete their degree or pursue a second bachelor’s in a different field. There are veterans who want to take advantage of the GI Bill, which covers most costs. International students, especially from China, South Korea, Taiwan, and India, are increasingly enrolling at community colleges before finishing their bachelor’s degrees in the United States. The range of transfer applicants is much more extensive than that of first-time freshmen, who are overwhelmingly high school seniors. There is no “typical” transfer student.

I discuss veterans and non-traditional students in this post.

Coordinated Admissions Program (CAP)

About a third of incoming fall transfers enroll through the Coordinated Admissions Program (CAP). CAP is a requirement for Texas residents during their senior year of high school. It isn’t something one can request. CAP requires students to take 15 hours in the fall and 15 hours in the spring. A 3.2 GPA guarantees admission to Liberal Arts. All other majors are competitive with the rest of the transfer pool.

You can view the HS Rank/Test score requirements for each UT-System campus. Keep in mind that UTSA and UT-Arlington always fill up within an hour or two of the CAP portal opening.

CAP may not be a good option for students with many dual credit or AP courses because it requires a rather rigid curriculum, so having many hours may limit their CAP options. If you’re solely focused on enrolling in a more competitive major like Business, Engineering, or Computer Science, CAP may not be a good fit because it offers no guarantees. Internally transferring into these programs once you’re a UT student is also challenging and would delay your graduation. It may be better to enroll at a four-year university where you have a guaranteed pathway into your major

Transfers arrive roughly equally from community colleges, four-year universities, and the CAP program. In 2013, UT sent 10,539 CAP offers. Of those, 1,981 applicants took their offer and enrolled at a UT system school, and 773 transferred to Austin after their freshman year. Unlike first-time freshman applications, which have steadily increased over the past decade, transfer applications have remained relatively static, if not slightly declining, in recent years.

Interested in maximizing your chances of transfer admissions? Complete my questionnaire for a free e-mail consultation.

Transfer Eligibility and Requirements

Hours: Prospective Spring applicants must have 24 hours of transferable coursework completed by the September 1 spring deadline.

For spring transfers, any fall hours in progress will not count either for the 24-hour minimum or prerequisites.

Fall applicants need only to have 24 hours completed or in progress by the March 1 deadline. If you have less than 24 hours completed by the deadline, admissions will wait for the semester to end and receive your transcript/grades to make a decision.

All transfers must also have graduated HS or earned their GED.

Some recent HS graduates attempt to transfer in the spring immediately after graduation by having more than 24 hours of AP or IB credit. They might also have two or three summer classes and post-HS college grades. However, this pathway is tenuous, as you will compete with older applicants who have substantive post-HS college transcripts. There is no penalty for applying for spring and trying again for the subsequent fall if your spring attempt doesn’t work out. Only recent HS graduates with significant dual-credit college hours and grades should have a viable shot at admission for the spring.

Some older applicants ask whether they can reapply as a freshman rather than with their transfer credentials. However, after graduating from high school, if you take even one college course, you cannot pursue first-time freshman admissions. You must apply as a transfer. Consequently, 99% of high school graduates will apply as transfers, unless they are taking a true gap year.

GPA: UT used to require a 3.0 minimum for your application to be considered, but they quietly removed that requirement last year. Keep in mind that they do not replace grades, so if you failed Calculus and earned a B later on, both are considered in your GPA calculation. UT admits students who earn mostly all A’s. The university's average applicant is a 3.4, and the typical admit has around a 3.75. Some programs, especially for STEM and Business, are substantially more competitive, with competitive applicants having a 3.9+ GPA.

You can use this GPA calculator to help see your overall grades/credits.

Applications: Applicants must complete Apply Texas OR the Common Application and pay a $75 fee or request a fee waiver. You must mail in or upload your college transcripts from all hours earned or attempted from all colleges or study abroad programs.

HS Academics: Admissions reviewers will not consider any high school academics, such as your rank or ACT/SAT scores. They also will not see any previous first-time freshman or transfer applications.

The transfer process only considers your college-level coursework. The Office of Admissions does not evaluate your high school grades, rank, or standardized test scores. I have reassured many adults seeking transfer that they don’t need to take the SAT.

Admissions Review: Decisions are still made using the Academic and Personal Achievement matrix, but the only academic factor is your college GPA. Your college GPA and transcript account for 50% of the admissions criteria while a review score of your essays, resume, and other factors accounts for the other 50%.

More than 90 hours, or already have a Bachelor's?

UT discourages applicants from four-year universities who have exceeded 90 hours from attempting to transfer. You need to spend at least 2 years at UT to earn your degree, and 3 years for some programs, so they prioritize students entering as sophomores and juniors. If you claim AP credit at your current institution and it appears on your transcript, those credits will count toward the twenty-four-hour minimum requirement but not toward your GPA.

What about Honors Programs?

In theory, some first-time freshman honors programs admit transfers, namely Business Honors. However, transferring into a freshman honors program is exceedingly rare and almost impossible. Instead, you should consider on-campus honors and certificate opportunities intended for upper-division students.

Interested in maximizing your transfer admissions chances? Complete my questionnaire for a free e-mail consultation.

Prerequisite Courses and Credit Equivalency

It is necessary to research any prerequisite courses that you need. Business, Engineering, Geosciences, Nursing, Natural Sciences, Environmental Science, and Economics all have a few required courses. You can meet these prerequisites through AP or other credit-by-exam. These courses must appear on your transcript by the deadline; you cannot take them in winter or summer sessions. Other majors “recommend” courses, but they are not prerequisites for eligibility.

• Business requires macroeconomics and microeconomics and Calculus 1 and 2.

• Engineering requires at least four technical courses, including Engineering Physics 1 with lab and Calculus 1 and 2. Competitive applicants will have additional core technical courses in their proposed major (like chemistry for Chemical Engineering or geology for Petroleum)

• Geosciences requires Calculus 1, Chemistry 1 with lab, and Geology 1 with lab

• College of Natural Sciences requires Calculus 1: MATH 408K or 408C or 408N (TCCN: MATH 2413) and six (6) credit hours in first-year math + science coursework.

• Nursing, which is nearly impossible to gain admission to, requires Biology and Chemistry 1 with lab and Calculus 1

• You can view other program prerequisites here

Will my credits transfer?

It is important to reference UT’s “Transfer Guides” and the “Automated Transfer Equivalency” system to see what may be required and how your credits will transfer to UT. All regionally accredited Texas universities have credit equivalency agreements. For out-of-state students, any courses that are part of your college’s core curriculum should transfer without issue. Non-Texas college transcripts are evaluated by hand, and accreditation is granted on a case-by-case basis.

This reference on UT-Austin’s admissions page for “common credit transfer issues” provides a comprehensive summary of which Calculus sequences you need for business, engineering, economics, etc.

Note: If you apply from OOS or International, it isn’t possible to know which credits will for sure transfer. A good rule of thumb is that core curriculum classes or “for science” with lab should be fine.

HS Dual Credit

Credits earned during high school or early college by students who have earned their Associate’s will count towards their overall college GPA. It isn’t possible to replace grades.

Dual credit can be both a blessing and a curse. Some HS students don’t take their classes as seriously and come to regret that their dual credit B’s and C’s are on their permanent record, so to speak. Admissions will, however, evaluate upward grade trends.

In some years, you have been able to appeal for consideration as a transfer student based on your college grades if you are denied as an HS senior. It seems UT may be closing this loophole, though.

You can’t apply as a transfer if you are still enrolled in HS.

Interested in maximizing your transfer admissions chances? Complete my questionnaire for a free e-mail consultation.

Academic Fresh Start

If it has been more than ten years since you began college, you may qualify for the “Academic Fresh Start.” Under Texas law, some students may be eligible to have their prior college records erased. Sometimes, at eighteen or nineteen, you may not have taken your college courses seriously. This law is in effect so that your thirty-five-year-old self isn’t punished by performance in the distant past. If you believe you are eligible for invoking Fresh Start, contact the Office of Admissions to begin the process.

Automatic Transfer Admission (ATA)

There is one less-known pathway called Automatic Transfer Admission (ATA). It has very specific, strict requirements to be invoked. Legislators bundled the ATA pathway into the original 1997 HB 588 bills’ “top 10%” admissions bill. The idea is for students who can’t afford or move too far away from home a four-year university to allow them transfer after the core curriculum at their local community college.

For the longest time, I had a false belief about how this pathway worked. One reason is that I’ve never worked with a single eligible ATA case, either while working for UT or independently with Tex Admissions.

I mistakenly thought that to qualify for automatic transfer to UT-Austin, a student would need to graduate in the top 6% and enroll immediately in a community college to complete the requirements. One of my clients did a deep dive and called the various admissions powers that be and clarified that, as long as you graduate in the top 10% of your high school class, you may be eligible for ATA.

ATA eligibility requires meeting several specific conditions, which is one reason invoking it is so uncommon. You can read it directly on UT’s site. To my knowledge, ATA only guarantees admission into Liberal Arts.

“Some students who graduate from Texas high schools qualify for automatic transfer admission.

To be eligible, you must:

• Have graduated from high school in 2008 or later

• Qualify based on Texas law for automatic freshman admission to a Texas university

• Enroll in a Texas community or junior college after you graduate from high school

• Complete the core curriculum at a Texas public junior college or other Texas public or private lower-division institution of higher education

• Earn a cumulative GPA of at least 2.5 on a four-point scale (or the equivalent)

• Apply for transfer admission to a term no later than four years after the academic year (e.g., 2014-15) in which you graduated from high school

Requesting Automatic Transfer Admission

If you want to be considered for automatic transfer admission, check the box on the ApplyTexas application to indicate that you believe you qualify. In addition to the regular application requirements, you must submit:

• A completed Automatic Transfer Admission Form

• An official high school transcript indicating your class rank at graduation

• An official college transcript indicating your completion of the core curriculum

After you apply, refer to MyStatus for additional details about your automatic transfer admission status.”

Students interested in ATA DO NOT need to enroll at ACC to invoke. They may complete their core curriculum at any two-year college.

Spring versus Fall Transfer

Applicants can apply for either the fall or the spring semester. As of Fall 2026, Around 10,000 applicants apply for fall, while only a few hundred apply for spring transfer. Spring admissions are limited only to majors in Liberal Arts, Natural Sciences, Education, and Social Work. Spring admissions depend more on the university's need to fill spaces than on an applicant's merits.

The deadline for spring admissions is September 1, and you must have earned 24 hours or more. Fall courses in progress do not count.

I discuss Spring transfer further in this post.

External Transfer Fall Admissions Statistics and Trends

Historically, UT had enrolled about 2,500 transfer students each fall. Fall 2018 enrolled 1,581 transfers, a substantial decrease, due to the historically large freshman class. For Fall 2013 to 2017, the number of transfer applicants ranged from 7,741 for Fall 2012 to 8,515 for Fall 2014. Fall 2015 saw a slight dip in transfer applicants, to 8,197, and admissions, to 3,499 students.

Fall 2018 transfer admissions were the most competitive ever. 8,335 applicants applied for 1,993 spaces (24% admissions rate), and 1,581 admitted students chose to enroll, a matriculation rate of 79%, much higher than the first-time freshman enrollment rate, which tends to be between 45-50%. I reflect on the Fall 2018 transfer cycle here, where, for the first time, students with 4.0s across all majors got denied.

Fall 2019 transfer admissions was slightly less competitive than 2018 due to less applicants. 7,496 applicants tried for 1,868 spaces (25% admissions rate) of which 1,398 admitted students chose to enroll, a matriculation rate of 74.8%. I discuss Fall and Spring 2019 transfer admissions results here.

The application numbers trended downward during COVID, but then spiked to the highest level ever in Fall 2024, at nearly 10,000.

Out-of-State Applicants: 95% of admitted transfer applicants are Texas residents. The OOS admissions rate is less than 10%.

UT isn’t always forthcoming with their transfer numbers, but you can view this page for any updates. What these numbers mean for applicants and families is that the number of available spaces AND the number of applicants fluctuate each year, university-wide and within colleges, schools, and majors.

GPA Recommendations by College/School

The average admitted transfer GPA has gradually increased from around 3.6 five years ago to 3.75 nowadays. Since about a third of admitted students come through CAP, the “real” average GPA is actually a little higher, since we can presume that a subset of CAP admits would not have been admitted if they had GPAs between 3.2 and 3.5.

Although a handful of Spring 2020 applicants with less than a 3.5, even some as low as 3.25, reported gaining admission to Liberal Arts, this seems to be an exception and anomaly.

Earning outstanding grades is a necessary condition, but it won’t be enough to get you in. You also need a strong resume and interesting essays that demonstrate your fit for the major and supply compelling reasons why UT is where you need to be to continue your studies.

The days of transfer students regularly getting in with a 3.4 or 3.5 are mostly over. If you have less than a 3.5 and gain admission, and some inevitably will, consider yourself very lucky.

Transfer admissions depend largely on the number of spaces available in a given program, so in some years there are many spaces, and in others there aren’t.

Programs that always have limited spaces: McCombs Business, Nursing, Architecture, Computer Science, all Engineering majors except Architectural.

I have posts dedicated to the Cockrell School of Engineering, the McCombs School of Business, and Computer Science.

Admissions statistics for each college and school are incomplete and hard to find. The average admitted GPA for Natural Sciences is a 3.8 with presumably strong STEM grades. One of the most popular majors, McCombs, has an average admitted GPA of 3.96 and admits less than 12% of its applicants and almost none for out-of-state.

For Fall 2019, Moody’s Radio-Television-Film and Advertising seemed very full for whatever reason. Almost every RTF and Advertising applicant got denied, so if you’re transferring to these programs in the future, and it’s possible they may or may not be full again, if you have less than a 3.9, consider another major. We’ll see what happens for Fall 2020.

Here are my GPA minimums to be competitive, for UT to be a “match,” and to take on clients for either Spring or Fall transfer admissions. Under no circumstances will I take on clients with a GPA below 3.5.

• Education, Social Work, College of Fine Arts (non-portfolio or audition programs): 3.55 or higher

• Moody Communications and non-restricted Liberal Arts: 3.7 or higher

• Restricted Liberal Arts Majors (Psychology, Economics, Environmental Science, Urban Studies, Health and Society, IRG: 3.8 or higher

• College of Natural Sciences and the Jackson School of Geosciences: 3.85 or higher

• Restricted Moody Communications majors (Advertising and Public Relations): 3.9 or higher

• Most Cockrell School of Engineering majors (except civil, architectural, and petroleum engineering): 3.9 or higher

• McCombs School of Business: 3.9 or higher

• Computer Science, Electrical/Computer or Biomedical Engineering, Architecture, Nursing: 4.0 or don’t bother trying

For STEM programs or majors that have prerequisite courses, you need to earn a perfect 4.0, especially in calculus, to be considered competitive.

Interested in maximizing your transfer admissions chances? Complete my questionnaire for a free email consultation.

Required Essay A “Statement of Purpose” Tips

Transfer applicants must submit different essays from first-time freshmen. Submissions can be around 750 words. The required Essay A Statement of Purpose reads:

The statement of purpose will provide an opportunity to explain any extenuating circumstances that you feel could add value to your application. You may also want to explain unique aspects of your academic background or valued experiences you may have had that relate to your academic discipline. The statement of purpose is not meant to be a listing of accomplishments in high school or a record of your participation in school-related activities. Rather, this is your opportunity to address the admission committee directly and to let us know more about you as an individual, in a manner that your transcripts and the other application information cannot convey.

UT wants you to demonstrate why you deserve a space in your desired major. There are, however, a few key differences. Reviewers have higher expectations for transfer students. Since you are at least one year removed from high school, your essays should reflect those additional experiences.

As a transfer applicant, you should have a clearer sense of where you come from, where you are now, and where you want to go. You should ask yourself these questions to help craft your statement of purpose:

• What reasons have you identified that make your current situation less than ideal?

• Is it the cost of attendance, lack of access to needed coursework, have you outgrown your environment, or are there things going on at home?

• What were your expectations before enrolling, and how did those differ once you arrived?

• Does your decision to transfer go back further than the past few years?

• What experiences did you have growing up at home or in high school that help tell the story of where you currently are?

• If you attended a community college immediately after high school, what were the circumstances surrounding that decision?

• Did you want to attend a university closer to home, or do you want to save money?

• Did you not feel quite ready to jump feet first into a four-year degree?

• Was there a particular program or set of courses offered at your college that appealed to you?

UT admissions reviewers expect you to identify resources on campus and in the city of Austin that appeal to your specific goals and ambitions. You can easily find this information online. It is critical to demonstrate that you have done research before applying. Since you have already taken at least some college-level courses, it may be helpful to identify and describe a few that inform your chosen major. You should also discuss what sets UT apart from other universities and why it is the right fit for you.

I suggest avoiding vague statements like “Austin is the Live Music Capitol of the world” or “I want to research and study abroad, and I believe UT is a great place to do this.” Be as specific as possible.

Consider this example:

I am intrigued by the Humanities Honors Program in the College of Liberal Arts because I have a variety of interests: education access, child development, and the political economy of poverty. UT is one of the few Texas universities with a self-designed interdisciplinary curriculum, allowing me to create my own major. I am from the Rio Grande Valley and I am the first in my family to attend college. I am interested in researching educational access in Mexican-American communities and am excited to conduct research at the Benson Latin American Collection.

I want to work with Dr. Robert Crosnoe in the Department of Sociology. He investigates the complex web of poverty, education, and human development. I am also interested in pursuing a Children and Society certificate in Bridging Disciplines. I am fluent in Spanish and interested in spending a summer in Guatemala working with indigenous elementary school students through UT’s School of Social Work Maymester Abroad. Eventually, I want to work as a college adviser at a low-income school in the Valley, sharing my knowledge and story with future college students.

Notice the explicit link between their biography, academic goals, and professional aspirations. This applicant minimizes vagueness by citing concrete examples unique to UT. They have demonstrated at least some prior research and show a level of maturity beyond what one would expect from a high school senior.

You should also highlight characteristics or your personal story that may set you apart from other applicants. Since there are no standardized exams or a class rank to compare you to other applicants quantitatively, it is particularly important to use your personal statement as an opportunity to stand out from the pack.

Consider these five Statement of Purpose Essay A examples of admitted external transfer students.

Required Expanded Resume Strategy and Optional Recommendation Letters

Unlike first-time freshmen, UT requires transfer applicants to submit an expanded resume. It is a good idea to still complete the Apply Texas resume sections as thoroughly as possible, but it also isn’t a big deal if you skip it.

UT recommends including the past five years’ worth of experience on your resume. For recent high school graduates, this means you should include your HS information. For mid-career professionals, veterans, or adults returning to school, you should include your relevant experience since high school.

Especially for non-traditional applicants, don't get so caught up in whether you have enough volunteer or extracurricular activities. If you are working full-time, there is no expectation that you have a profile similar to that of a full-time student. 

In your resume, you should market what separates you from the crowd. Just like a recent HS graduate discussing what sets them apart in their extracurricular activities, talk about how you excel within your workplace. What are your roles and responsibilities? Do you manage anyone? Are you responsible for meeting sales quotas or completing projects under budget?

Regardless of the type of applicant, UT and other more selective universities want to see that you work hard, have at a few interests and curiosities, can write thoughtfully, and are hopefully doing something besides sitting around.

Whatever you are doing outside your courses, be sure to include as much detail as possible. This is not a one-page professional resume. It can be as long as you would like.

Consider these varied resume posts for more tips and resources.

Recommendation letters

You can submit recommendation letters if you want to introduce an outside perspective on your employment history or classroom behavior. Recommendation letters for transfer applicants can be useful, especially if you have worked a full-time job or served in the military. A reference letter from your boss or commanding officer can help provide context to your roles and responsibilities. A letter can be an effective way to set you apart from applicants with similar experiences. Let these questions guide whether you should submit a recommendation letter:

• Is there something specific you want them to discuss or emphasize?

• Is there an accomplishment you are proud of that sounds better coming from someone else rather than you writing it in an essay?

• Can your writer speak on how you would do in your desired major?

Should I submit recommendation letters? If so, how many?

It depends. Very few recommendation letters make a difference, as I argue in this recent post.

First, to “make a difference” in your admissions decision, the letter would have to elevate your score on the 1 to 6 Personal Achievement Index scale. Recommendation letters can certainly tip the scales if you are truly between two scores. An admissions reviewer may bump a 4 to a 5 based on a stellar reference. Letters are the last items that reviewers see. By the time they reach them, they have a good idea which score they will assign.

Second, most recommendation letters are not very good. Perhaps one in fifty letters I read while reviewing applications offers a fresh perspective or new information. Almost always, recommendation letters restate what can be found elsewhere on the application, such as in the transcript or resume.

Recommendation letters should always add new information.

Students choose referrers who don’t know them well or who are chosen only for their credentials. Too often, students procrastinate in reaching out. Their recommenders may be unaccustomed to writing letters, or there isn’t enough collaboration between the student and the referrer to produce a useful recommendation.

You don’t get any bonus points for submitting a recommendation letter. It is also very rare for a letter to hurt an applicant’s chances. In 98 percent of cases, they are unlikely to make a difference. If you are finishing your application at the last minute and haven’t secured a letter, consider not sending one.

Receiving Your Decision

Once you have completed your application by the deadline, the waiting game begins. Since no GPA guarantees admission, all transfer applicants receive a holistic review. If you have applied for spring admission and completed 24 hours by the October 1 deadline, you should find out by mid-November to early December.

Fall transfer applicants should not expect to hear back until mid-June, regardless of the major or number of hours you have completed or in progress. Since 2019, essentially all applicants have received their decision on or around June 15. However, in recent cycles, the decisions came out a little later. For Fall 2025 transfers, most heard back from June 20 onward. I also can’t rule out that isolated cases may hear back early, so if you see reports online, don’t freak out. 99% of applicants will not receive an early decision.

Interested in working together?

In this post, I want to compare and contrast the transfer application process from applying as a high school senior.

The easiest way to reach me is by email kevin@texadmissions.com and to complete this questionnaire for a free email admissions assessment and to discuss pricing and services.

1. Transfer has a less predictable number of spaces available.

Students transfer out of majors, leave UT, or graduate early. Some years certain programs are much more difficult than others, but it isn’t possible to know which ones are in a given year. In 2019, advertising/PR was unexpectedly very competitive. Some like CS, ECE, biomedical Engineering, Nursing, and Architecture are always competitive.

2. Many majors have prerequisites for transfer

Contrast this with first-time freshmen, where almost any high school senior is eligible for almost any major. Epecially for STEM and business check your major to see if there are prerequisites.

3. There is a smaller rate of change in the number of transfer applications from year to year

In most years going back two decades, UT received between 7,000 and 10,000 applications for around 2,500 spaces. Those spaces are split into approximately one-third of community colleges, one-third of four-year universities, and a third for CAP. Whichever college you attend doesn’t matter, only your college GPA. For fall 2024, UT received a record number of 10,000 applications, but consider that the number of first-time freshmen applications has almost quadrupled since 2007, while transfer numbers remain relatively static.

4. Transfer admission does not consider HS rank or SAT, only the college GPA

There is ambiguity on the Common App about how “previous apps” might be considered for admission, but applicants who have spoken with UT receive conflicting answers. “Previous apps” does not appear on UT’s official admissions page. So, unless there is a formal announcement about previous apps somehow factoring in, I will assume HS credentials don’t matter, or that multiple transfer attempts are reviewed within the context of previous applications.

5. The transfer resume is required and can go back five years

If you’re a recent high school graduate, for sure include activities from high school and feel free to discuss them in the essay if they’re relevant to your first choice major. The expanded resume is also required, but the Common App allows for unlimited activities and longer descriptions compared to first time freshmen, so the best practice is to duplicate the expanded resume into the Common App inputs.

6. There is a wider range of potential applicants (two-year, four-year, veterans, mid-year professionals, etc)

Competitive high school senior applicants tend to look the same. They have strong grades in APs, a high SAT, they come from the suburbs or attend private schools, have college-educated parents, and similar resumes. Transfers come from much more diverse populations. Many are recent high school graduates, but many are also military veterans, mid-career professionals, parents, first-generation college students, and even retirees. They also come from more varied educational settings, like two or four-year colleges or public and private universities.

7. Transfers usually have a clearer idea of expectations and reasons for enrolling

Since every transfer has at least a semester of studies after high school, there is a somewhat higher standard for why you want to transfer and what you want from your UT education.

8. Admissions reviewers have a lower expectation for high-flying ECs

Since many transfers are recent HS graduates with little time to pursue university opportunities, don’t stress if you don’t have many university activities. Non-traditional adult students or veterans also don’t need to go complete random volunteering or certificates to try and look like a recent typical high school graduate.

9. Rec letters make even less of a difference for transfers

I argue in my second book, Surviving the College Admissions Madness, that rec letters are a waste of time. They’re poorly written, rarely provide new information, and are impersonal. I estimate that a rec letter makes a difference in perhaps one in fifty applications.

For transfers, rec letters are even less important, partly because they’re challenging to get if you’ve been in college for only a semester or feel awkward asking a professor at your four-year university to help you leave it. Most transfers don’t submit letters; when they do, they tend to be from work or internship supervisors or some other non-academic reference.

10. Transfer requires only one essay rather than many

HS seniors to UT have one common app essay, two regular admissions supplements, and potentially honors program essays, amounting to around 1,500 words. Transfer allows only a single essay. That constraint produces many consequences for the content, style, and approach to the transfer essay, which I discuss in other videos.

11. The transfer essay style requires “sticking to the facts” versus a storytelling essay

Since transfer only allows one essay, and you must answer many specific questions about your reasons for transferring, you must have a literal, analytical approach.

12. Transfer essays rarely benefit from conventional introductions, conclusions, or rhetorical devices

Transfer essays do not benefit from attention-getting introductions or the sorts of creative writing you did in English class.

13. There are also fewer approaches to the transfer essay versus nearly infinite for HS seniors

Transfer essays tend to present the accumulation of many small facts and experiences rather than focusing deeply on one or two themes, like band or robotics.

14. Transfer essays must answer a variety of particular questions

The Common App essay for high school is very open-ended. Transfers need to answer how they ended up at their current institution, pros/cons about their current situation, why their experiences and perspectives make them a good fit for their desired UT major, and how you can benefit UT classrooms and campus communities.

15. It is essential that transfer applicants identify specific UT resources/courses

Research and incorporate into your essay specific UT courses, professors, student orgs, study abroads, minors/certifications, and internship opportunities.

For applicants at four-year universities, it helps, but it isn’t necessary to identify UT opportunities that aren’t present at your current school. For example, one transfer client applying for math wanted to focus on topology, which UT has a lot of professors and resources, and their current institution did not.

16. Transfer applicants have a compressed timeframe to apply and enroll

The high school senior application process spreads out over a year from the end of junior year until the May 1 enrollment deadline. HS applicants have four to five months to apply, another few months to wait for the decision, and many weeks to decide their enrollment. For transfers, they begin and submit their applications in January and February and receive their decisions by the end of June. It’s a very quick turnaround time to unenroll from your current institution, move cities, find accommodation in Austin, register for summer orientation, and enroll in classes.

Interested in maximizing your admissions chances?

In this post, I provide an overview of UT’s transfer statement of purpose along with 15 tips to consider when writing your essay.

The easiest way to reach me is by email kevin@texadmissions.com and to complete this questionnaire for a free email admissions assessment and to discuss pricing and services.

1. Understand the questions that the transfer statement of purpose asks

The UT-Austin transfer statement of purpose prompt is overly wordy and pretty difficult to understand at first glance:

“The statement of purpose will provide an opportunity to explain any extenuating circumstances that you feel could add value to your application. You may also want to explain unique aspects of your academic background or valued experiences you may have had that relate to your academic discipline. The statement of purpose is not meant to be a listing of accomplishments in high school/college or a record of your participation in school-related activities. Rather, this is your opportunity to address the admission committee directly and to let us know more about you as an individual, in a manner that your transcripts and the other application information cannot convey.”

Breaking down the question into sub-questions can help you draft your initial ideas and ensure your essay is headed in the right direction.

Here are the five or six questions that are essential to answer the transfer statement of purpose:

• Address how you ended up at your current university

• Why it isn’t working out

• Why you want to transfer to UT in your particular major

• Any relevant leadership, diversity, or major-specific experiences, and how UT can help you achieve your goals

• You also have the option to share about any special circumstances relevant to your academic journey

2. Show and don’t tell

The transfer statement of purpose is your argument that provides examples and evidence that you’re a great fit for your chosen UT major. You must share about academics, extracurriculars, and life experiences to support your candidacy for your chosen major. Since transfers tend to be at least a year or two older than high school seniors, reviewers expect a greater nuance and clear vision of your short- and long-term goals.

One common mistake both transfer and high school senior applicants make is not supporting their assertions with examples. An applicant might claim that they are a leader or have a passion for business, yet they don’t back up those claims with specific experiences and examples that provide substance to their leadership or passion for business. You need to prove your arguments.

A similar mistake that most applicants make is not discussing any major-relevant experiences in their resumes. The statement of purpose complements and works together with the resume rather than being separate from it. The resume shares what you have done, and the essay is your opportunity to share how and why you’ve pursued your interests.

3. Your transfer essay requires a fundamentally different approach from high school senior applications

The distribution of possible responses to this question is much narrower than the old UT and current Texas A&M topic “tell us your story,” Main Essay, or first-time freshmen Common App questions. There isn’t enough word limit space for rhetorical flairs, attention-getting introductions, or lengthy stories on non-major specific topics, more appropriate for high school seniors. Try not to be cringey when using similes, like comparing your journey from ACC to Texas Tech to a flower blossoming in desert rains.

Instead, approach the transfer essay like a graduate or medical school admissions statement of purpose. Your tone is more neutral, mature, and “stick to the facts.” Some clients feel frustrated that intensive revisions make their essay “sound robotic,” but the approach works since it’s rare for my transfer clients not to gain admission.

4. It's okay to be critical when addressing why things aren’t working out at your current institution

It’s almost impossible to discuss your reasons for transferring to UT without sharing why you wish to leave. This isn’t like a job interview where the conventional wisdom isn’t to criticize former employers. Usually, when a student transfers, things aren’t going super well at their current school.

For example, a transfer client wrote, ‘I feel that my ceiling for growth is limited because there are few courses that match my major and my classmates often skip class. I struggle to find ways to supplement my coursework with active student organizations.’

On the other hand, you should try to balance your critical commentary with the positive aspects of your current school. For example, you could write, ‘I enjoy the small class sizes at my private university that allow me to form connections with my professors. My academic advisor always makes time for me, and its location in a major metropolitan area makes it easy to find internships or collaborate with nearby universities.’

It helps if you lead this section of your essay with the pros rather than starting with the cons.

5. Don’t dwell on your initial UT rejection - avoid overly emotional appeals

Another common mistake that transfer applicants make is spending many sentences detailing their heartbreak at their initial rejection or unsuccessful previous transfer attempts. The first reason is that it wastes valuable word limit space, and the second is that you don’t want to come off as immature. Save your sour feelings for an angry Instagram and Reddit post or a TikTok rant.

Since many applicants will do this, an easy way to stand out is not to spend unnecessary time and hyperbole about how you felt to not gain admission. I understand that the sting of rejection hurts, but it isn’t essential for your transfer essay. Instead, you can share in a single sentence something like, “It disappointed me to receive CAP, but since I don’t want a liberal arts major and have too many AP credits, I enrolled at A&M engineering so I have a pathway to earn my preferred degree.”

6. Transfer essays rarely benefit from conventional introductions and conclusions

One consequence of high school English classes teaching students to write in the five paragraph essay format, other than it’s never used in the real world, is that you don’t need an “let me overview what I’m about to tell you” introduction or “let me sum up everything I’ve just told you” conclusion. A single opening sentence that provides specific information about your reasons for enrolling at your current institution is all you need.

Likewise, you need only a single concluding sentence that also ideally provides some new information, like outlining long-term plans or a potential dream job or PhD program. You do not need to provide an attention-getting introduction that sets the scene like you might have written for your high school senior essays. The transfer statement of purpose is more like an essay you would write for graduate or medical school, rather than something that requires creative writing and storytelling.

7. Focus on more recent experiences and activities

A common mistake transfer applicants make is focusing too much on the distant past when it isn’t directly relevant to supporting their argument for deserving a transfer admissions space. For example, one of my transfer clients applying for business worked at their family’s grocery store in earlier childhood. They dedicated a significant amount of first draft space to the experience, and they said they preferred to keep this content in their essay. I responded that, although this is emotionally significant and central to your personal development, it’s less effective content compared with their impressive recent professional experiences that showed their fit for business. We preserved some of the grocery store content in the subsequent draft and dedicated more time to their recent experiences. For transfers, you’re a little too old to talk about playing with LEGOs or making games in Roblox.

If you are a recent high school graduate and wish to discuss high school experiences, it helps to choose and develop the one or two most meaningful and major-specific things. That way, you can free up space for your more recent experiences after high school and in college. Discussing high school experiences might also help develop a longer trend that connects your distant activities to your more recent ones, which is really effective content. Especially if you are in your third or fourth semester of university, your essay should largely feature your college experiences.

8. Discuss your identity, background, culture, or the environment in which you were raised if you feel it’s relevant

Since the transfer process only allows for a single essay, you have less space to discuss themes outside of your academics and resume. Especially if you’re a recent immigrant, first-generation college student, attended a low-resource high school, come from a single-parent or low-income household, or other indicators of structural adversity, it can be helpful to share about the opportunity or challenges you’ve confronted. That may help frame the discussion around your academics and extracurriculars, or if your personal experiences relate to your desired major. Many transfer applicants come from non-traditional backgrounds, so if you feel it is necessary, dedicate some space in your essay to provide context for your experiences.

9. If you are changing majors in addition to transferring universities, identify transferrable skills and experiences

Some transfer students opt to change their major in addition to leaving their university. Sometimes, a student discovers a new interest, and that major isn’t available at their current institution. One of the very first students I spoke with when I started at UT admissions in 2011 was a student at the University of Virginia. They wanted to transfer to UT after writing for the student-run newspaper, but UVA didn’t have a journalism program. The only way they could pursue their interests was to change environments.

Other students want to change to UT because it has a stronger program for their new major, or they don’t think they can get into competitive UT majors like business and computer science. They have concerns about whether their recent courses or resume experiences apply to their new major. The best practice is to look at the underlying skills acquired or your extracurricular roles and responsibilities and how they could relate to your new major.

For example, a transfer client of mine switched from Psychology to Speech, Language, and Hearing Sciences in Moody Communications. They discussed how their courses on human behavior and perception match well with their new studies and a speech pathology career because this major helps make the world more accessible for the hearing impaired or students with different learning needs. Other examples include detailing how your computer science classes might relate to a major change to applied math or a new interest in climate change and sustainability relates to a new major in civil engineering from mechanical.

10. Contextualize your transcript and identify ways you might have overcome academic challenges

There is often more to your academic story than the letter grades in your courses. One straightforward way to contextualize your transcript is to discuss grades that aren’t A’s, especially if extenuating circumstances contribute to making a B or a C. If you experienced an illness or family and work obligations, share about them. It isn’t about making up excuses but sharing with your reviewer that there’s more to the story.

It could also be the case that you started with a B or a C in a course following the first midterms and finished with an A. You can frame those initial setbacks about how you might have modified your study or time management habits to make better grades on your exams. If you visited office hours or did better in a subsequent course on the same subject, like chemistry or calculus 2, discuss that upward trend within a course or in the sequence.

Another way to frame your transcript is if you’ve done extremely well in a course. Many colleges and universities do not indicate A-plusses, so if you earned a perfect grade, you can share that context, especially if you were one of the top students in the class. High-achieving students also sometimes assist the teacher or tutor their classmates, so if this is relevant, then include that information.

11. Contextualize your transcript by identifying and developing content about your favorite classes or professors

Some of the most powerful essay content is about discussing an influential teacher. Favorite teachers are always unique to you, and they help make concrete specific themes you’ve explored in class or projects you’ve completed. If you’ve conducted research with the same professor you’ve taken a class with, especially if it relates to your first-choice major or long-term goals, then share them by name in a few sentences. Identifying specific aspects of classes you’ve enjoyed can help frame your major interests by identifying particular aspects of your studies that appeal to you beyond the generic course titles like physics or government.

12. Write concisely and economically

Before Fall 2024, UT required two essays, the statement of purpose and one of your choice between an “issue of importance” or “share about special circumstances. The old Apply Texas portal used to permit a lot more words per essay than today’s Common App. That allowed for a lot more flexibility since you could submit around 1,500 words of content between the two essays.

Nowadays, since the transfer application only allows for a single statement of purpose of 700 words, and since you need to address five or six questions, there is no room for fluff, abstraction, or impersonal content. Every sentence must count. Your goal is to write an essay that’s as information-dense as possible. This requires significant rewriting and editing.

13. Transition sentences usually aren’t necessary or helpful

When you conclude a paragraph by summing up what you’ve already said and then introduce the next paragraph with an overview, you’ve wasted two sentences better spent illustrating your experiences or supplying concrete details. It’s not uncommon for transitions to account for more than half of the word limit space on first drafts. Transitions, introductions, and conclusions are the first cuts I make because they are not word economical or information dense. They only help when they play a dual role of providing new information while setting up the following experience or example. Occasionally, transitions play a rhetorical purpose that extends a metaphor or symbol.

In almost all instances, especially in supplements or transfer statements of purpose, you need only a single word or phrase to indicate a shift, change, or continuation to your reader. Words like moreover, nevertheless, however, and finally are typically all you need.

14. Use near-term forecasting where necessary

Near-term forecasting is a technique that allows you to anticipate an achievement, internship, officer position, or some other development that you reasonably believe will happen or will have happened by the time reviewers assess your application. It isn’t strictly necessary for something to have occurred for it to be valid content for you to write about. Both first-time freshmen and transfer applicants can use this technique, but it’s especially helpful for transfers since you’re applying in a condensed timeline.

Since transfers submit their application at the beginning of their semester, and it might only be their second semester of college after high school, it can be helpful in the essay and resume to identify activities you have in progress and potential short-term goals. Some examples include a potential research publication, hosting an event, or receiving an officer position. You can frame this in an essay by writing, “I expect to become the treasurer in March,” or “We have submitted a paper for publication, and we intend to present at the conference in April.”

If an opportunity falls through, you also don’t need to worry about updating your application or telling admissions. Nobody fact checks your inputs, but that also doesn’t mean you should lie or mislead.

15. Cite specific UT resources and opportunities that appeal to you

In the final paragraph or two of your essay, you should cite particular courses, labs, professors, student organizations, student abroad programs, minors, or career resources that match your interests. You can also pair these resources with the content about your current experiences to show how you see yourself on campus.

Many applicants make the mistake of neglecting to share any reasons why UT appeals to them, or they write vaguely about UT being a top-ranked school and great for their future career. Since reviewers expect a somewhat higher level of sophistication and maturity from transfer students, they want to learn how your previous and current experiences could connect with UT on-campus opportunities. That can also help set up a summary of your long-term professional or academic goals after receiving your UT degree.

For some students, you might be able to identify a professor, course, or research opportunity not currently provided by your institution. For instance, UT-Austin has a unique program called Bridging Disciplines that helps connect coursework outside of your major with internships or research. Few universities offer a similar program. UT also has many certificates and specializations that may not be available at your current four-year university, so it can help to identify ways that UT can uniquely help prepare you for the future.

Interested in maximizing your admissions chances?

I cover the three most in-demand UT-Austin majors for transferring: Computer Science, the McCombs School of Business, and the Cockrell School of Engineering. In other posts, I provide essay tips and other transfer information.

The easiest way to reach me is by email kevin@texadmissions.com and to complete this questionnaire for a free email admissions assessment and to discuss pricing and services.

Transfer to UT-Austin Computer Science and CS Admissions Statistics

I need to be upfront that this isn’t going to be an optimistic perspective. It’s going to provide a reality check for many of you. I know that computer science, especially at UT, is one of the most desirable and in-demand programs, especially compared to UT-Dallas or Texas A&M, which is where many UT transfer applicants come from.

My first piece of advice is not to get your hopes up. UT CS is unimaginably competitive to transfer into, so much so that I’ve basically stopped taking on clients for it. I’ve had many 4.0 clients in recent years who have not gained admission. CS has only been this competitive since COVID, because it was as attainable as any other STEM major in the past. 99% of you are not going to get into UT CS as a transfer.

UT admitted only 6 among 1,037 applicants for Fall 2024. The admissions rate was 2% in Fall 2022 and 2023. It wouldn’t surprise me if Fall 2025 had even more applicants for the same number of spaces.

The primary reason UT CS is so competitive to transfer into is that there are few spaces available. Whichever UT students change out of CS or graduate, those spaces tend to go to current UT students who apply for an internal transfer. The internal transfer admissions rate is above 50%.

It’s so rare that you don’t even see verifiable acceptances online anymore, nor do admitted CS transfers message me. The only other majors like this for transferring at UT are Architecture and Nursing, which have always been almost impossible.

So, if your top priority is to get into UT in general, you should strongly consider not selecting computer science as your first choice. Unfortunately, a similar major in Statistics and Data Science doesn’t admit transfer applicants, at least as of filming this in Fall 2025. Although UT technically allows you to select two majors, the second choice is almost never given, especially for STEM majors. On the other hand, graduate admissions for UT CS is relatively normal, so your best option might be to finish your degree at your current school or another university and look at UT for your post-bachelor’s education.

Nevertheless, I know many of you reading this will be determined to try and transfer anyway. I can offer some tips to try and maximize your chances. If you don’t have a 4.0, your odds are basically zero, although it might happen in theory where students with slightly lower grades might get in. You need a 4.0 in your STEM courses at a minimum. Although the College of Natural Sciences doesn’t require any prerequisite courses, you should have substantial coursework in core calculus and lab science classes like physics, chemistry, and biology. You should also have many computer science classes completed as well.

You will need an exceptional STEM-oriented resume with many deep demonstrated experiences in coding, programming, and related computer science themes. This could take many forms like professional jobs, research, internships, extracurriculars, or STEM competitions. Low-level independent projects or the sort of proof-of-concept coding you might do as a beginner won’t cut it. Competitive applicants will be familiar with many programming languages or statistical analysis techniques.

I receive inquiries from maybe five prospective CS transfers each year who have a strong enough resume that I think they’ve got a chance. It’s hard to describe what competitive applicants look like, but I recognize it when I see their profiles. The unfortunate reality is that the dozens of others wanting CS who email me have little to no hope. If you have to ask whether you’re competitive, you’re probably not.

The final advice, of course, is to write your best statement of purpose possible. I dedicate many other posts to essay tips, so I won’t discuss it here. Then it’s a matter of getting extremely lucky. If you end up gaining admission, I’d be interested in hearing from you and seeing your application materials. If UT CS doesn’t work out, I recommend completing your studies elsewhere rather than trying again.

I’m sorry to share a discouraging post, but it’s better to hear about this intense competition from me than to get your hopes high and inevitably be let down. I don’t really take on CS clients anymore, but if you have an exceptional profile, I would be interested in working with you.

Transfer to the McCombs School of Business

McCombs accepts applications only in the fall semester. Everyone applies for Business Undeclared, meaning you cannot declare your intended major, like finance or accounting, on the Common App. You will decide your major after one year at UT.

You must have 24 hours completed or in progress by the March 1 deadline. All applicants must also have credit or grades for microeconomics, macroeconomics, and calculus 1 and 2. You don’t necessarily need grades for these courses, but they must appear on your spring semester transcript.

Taking the prerequisite during the Maymester or summer will not satisfy the prerequisite requirement. It’s essential to double-check with UT’s transfer resources and automated transfer equivalency system that your calculus courses transfer correctly to fulfill the McCombs prerequisites. It can get tricky when taking business calculus rather than the one for science and engineering majors.

Transferring into business is quite competitive but not impossible, like CS, architecture, and nursing.

MCcombs business transfer statistics

The admissions rate for Texas residents is probably around 10%, with the out-of-state admissions rate much lower at around 3%. Competitive applicants will have a 3.9 college GPA or higher. Many 4.0 GPA applicants will get denied, but students with around a 3.8 GPA might occasionally get in. If you’re at a community college, applying to business programs at other universities is essential to give yourself a pathway to continue your studies since nobody is guaranteed transfer admission into McCombs.

Occasionally, the second choice of majors in economics or Moody Communications is given if you are not admitted into McCombs. In theory, Canfield Business Honors (CBHP) allows for transfer admission, but it’s almost impossible to get in. They admit perhaps five external transfers each year. A few of my best McCombs transfer clients who gained regular admission have tried, and none have gained admission.

It's essential to have extensive related business and leadership experience on your resume. It is very difficult to gain admission into McCombs without a strong resume. Note that your expanded resume for transfers and first-time freshmen applicants can and should be longer than a page and as long as necessary. That can include work experience, internships, high school DECA, or college extracurriculars like finance, economics, investing, real estate clubs, etc. All four-year universities, as well as most community colleges, will have these extracurricular opportunities. Developing your contributions, roles, and responsibilities, or events you’ve assisted with can help.

You can also identify how your current experiences might tie into similar UT-Austin opportunities. It’s essential to develop how and why you’ve pursued your varied business and leadership experiences in your statement of purpose while locating specific courses, career advising, case competition, professors, certificates, and other resources that can help you achieve your goals.

Transfer to the Cockrell School of Engineering

Cockrell Engineering accepts applications only in the fall semester. You must have 24 hours completed or in progress by the March 1 deadline. All applicants must also have credit or grades for engineering Physics 1 with lab and the first year of calculus equivalent to UT’s 408 C and D or the three-semester K L and M sequence. Competitive applicants will have more STEM courses with labs beyond the prerequisites. You don’t necessarily need grades for these courses but must appear on your spring semester transcript. Taking the prerequisite during the Maymester or summer will not satisfy the prerequisite requirement.

The first thing to understand about applying to the Cockrell School of Engineering is that it is UT’s only college or school that reviews each applicant based on their specific major. Some majors, like ECE and biomedical engineering, are substantially more competitive than the less in-demand majors like civil, architectural, and petroleum. Mechanical and chemical engineering are moderately competitive, with smaller programs like environmental, computational, and aerospace being more challenging to predict.

Competitive applicants for ECE and biomedical must have a 4.0 to have a shot. Even then, almost everyone will get denied. Most of the transfer spaces are for current UT students. Most other majors require a 3.9 overall and a 4.0 STEM GPA to be considered competitive. For the less competitive majors like civil, architectural, and petroleum, students with 3.5s and lower occasionally gain admission. These three majors are also sometimes given as a second choice major, so the optimal approach is to select one of them for your second choice. It’s also very hard to change your engineering major at UT, so I don’t recommend enrolling at UT unless you gain admission to a major you have a reasonable expectation that you will enjoy and want to earn your degree in.

If you’re at a community college, it’s essential to apply to engineering programs at other universities to give yourself a pathway to continue your studies since nobody is guaranteed transfer admission into Cockrell Engineering, even for the less in-demand majors.

It's essential to have extensive related STEM experience on your resume for the most competitive engineering majors. It is very difficult to gain admission into the most desirable Cockrell programs without a strong STEM resume. Note that your expanded resume for transfers and first-time freshmen applicants can and should be longer than a page and as long as necessary. That can include work experience, internships, deep commitments in high school, or college STEM extracurriculars. All four-year universities, as well as most community colleges, will have these extracurricular opportunities. Developing your contributions, roles, and responsibilities, or events you’ve assisted with can help. You can also discuss substantive independent projects or those outside of school or clubs.

You can also identify how your current experiences might tie into similar UT-Austin opportunities. It’s essential to develop how and why you’ve pursued your varied business and leadership experiences in your statement of purpose while locating specific courses, career advising, research opportunities, upper division electives or pathways, and professors that can help you achieve your goals. Identifying potential dream jobs or ambitions for graduate school in a concluding sentence can also help suggest your long-term goals.

Interested in maximizing your admissions chances?

There are two kinds of transfers: external and internal.

External transfers begin their studies at one university and wish to move to another, like at Texas A&M, and want to move to Austin. They may or may not be changing their major in addition to moving campuses. I discuss external transferring here.

Internal transfers are current students who wish to enroll in another college or school. Internal transfers differ slightly from changing majors because a student in the College of Liberal Arts, for example, may wish to change their major from History to Government. Changing majors within a college is usually pretty easy (although there are exceptions, especially in Engineering).

“Changing majors” and “internal transfers” can be used interchangeably, but when you’re Googling for advice, search for internal transfer rather than major changes.

The university limits internal transfer attempts to a particular college/school at two. Only in rare exceptions are students granted appeals to internally transfer after completing 60 hours or four long semesters, so if you want to change your major/internally transfer, you need to do so during your first or second UT year.

When students email me about internally transferring, they come from a few different backgrounds:

• Current UT students usually wanting to transfer into Business, Engineering, or Computer Science

• First-time freshman applicants who are not admitted to their first-choice major and want to game plan possible pathways and whether to enroll at UT or another university where they’ve received their major. This is different from appealing discussed here.

• Prospective external transfers who are trying to apply for a less selective program with hopes of internally transferring after arriving at UT

Generally speaking, it is easier to transfer internally as a UT student than to transfer externally from another college or university. You’re also more likely to finish your degree sooner if you transfer internally rather than externally, as I discuss further down.

Most UT programs also give preference to students on their second internal transfer attempt, since they want to provide them with a pathway to their desired degree and reduce the chance they will external transfer out of UT. So, some students may choose to delay their internal transfer applications to build stronger GPAs and resumes.

Internally transferring into some majors is relatively straightforward (Liberal Arts, Education, and Social Work) while others are much more difficult (Business, Engineering, Computer Science). A few are nearly impossible (Architecture and Nursing).

I have omitted Jackson Geosciences, Education, and Social Work although the links in this sentence direct you to each portal. For Fine Arts prospective internal transfers, you need to visit the department specific to your major because procedures vary widely.

This post is primarily for prospective UT students who are deciding whether to enroll and possible options after enrolling. I discuss each college or school or particular in-demand majors and provide resources for current UT students to access or prospective UT families to assess their options.

I assist current UT students interested in changing majors or internal transferring. I charge $3,000 for one call and essay/resume revisions. Complete this questionnaire for an initial assessment or email me directly kevin@texadmissions.com

My UT GPA internal transfer recommendations

These are my best-guess rule-of-thumb recommendations to be competitive for the following UT programs:

• McCombs School of Business: 3.9 GPA with significant business/leadership extracurriculars. Many 4.0s will get denied.

• Computer Science and Neuroscience: 3.9 GPA with significant CS/STEM extracurriculars, 4.0 STEM GPA. Some 4.0s will get denied.

• College of Natural Science majors (biology, chemistry, math, nutrition, etc.): 3.8 GPA with moderate STEM extracurriculars, 3.9 STEM GPA

• ECE, Biomedical, and Computational Engineering: 3.9 GPA with significant STEM extracurriculars, 4.0 STEM GPA. Many 4.0s will get denied.

• Mechanical, Aerospace, Chemical, and Environmental Engineering: 3.8 GPA with moderate STEM extracurriculars, 3.9 STEM GPA. Some 4.0s will get denied.

• Architectural, Civil, and Petroleum Engineering: 3.25 GPA with some STEM extracurriculars, 3.5 STEM GPA

• Moody Advertising and Public Relations: 3.9 GPA with significant communications/leadership extracurriculars

• Other Moody Communications majors: 3.5 GPA with moderate communications/leadership extracurriculars

• Economics, Psychology, International Relations, Urban Studies, or other restricted Liberal Arts Majors: 3.8 GPA with moderate related extracurriculars

• Informatics: 3.5 GPA with moderate related extracurriculars

• Nursing and Architecture: Unfortunately, don’t bother trying.

Internal Transfer Essay Writing Tips

Some colleges and schools either require an essay or allow for an optional one. Not all programs will allow for submitting a resume or supplemental materials, so the essay is your opportunity to stand out and provide context to your resume and academic interests.

Your essay should largely or entirely reflect major-specific experiences you’ve had at UT. Minimize or omit experiences from high school. It’s critical that you cite concrete experiences and share anecdotes that are particular to you. Avoid vagueness or generalities. Reference particular lessons, professors, themes, independent studies, projects, and so on that fit for your proposed major.

Share the how you’ve explored your interests in and out of the classroom in addition to the why.

A common mistake transfer applicants make is focusing too much on the distant past when it isn’t directly relevant to supporting their argument for deserving a transfer admissions space. Your essay should largely center on your UT experiences, but if you’ve started something in the past and continued similar experiences at UT, then drawing that broader trend could be helpful. Generally speaking, you should focus mainly or exclusively on your UT experiences and not on early childhood.

The tone and style of the statement of purpose should be “stick-to-the-facts” rather than the storytelling or narrative mode you may have utilized as a first-time freshman applicant. Since you only have 500 words, there isn’t space for “attention-getting introductions,” summary introductions or conclusions, rhetorical devices, or even transition sentences. Your statement of purpose should look like an essay submission to graduate school. It must be information dense and word economical.

Joining engineering or technical clubs if you’re a non-technical student aiming for CNS or engineering can help. If you’re coming from Natural Sciences or another STEM-oriented major, compare and contrast your current studies with how your proposed major can help you expand your skillset or discover new interests. For Business applicants, a track record of leadership and EC involvement will help because they place a heavy emphasis on the resume in addition to your grades.

It will help to discuss your professional goals. Identifying Central Texas firms or those nationwide that fit your interests will help give reviewers an idea of where you see yourself long-term. Citing HOW you came about these opportunities also helps. Did you listen to a podcast, attend a guest speaker presentation, read a book or published article, or have an influential person in your life who helps guide your goals? If you’ve had a related internship, that will help provide context to your goals. Relate your personal experiences and how your future major courses or research opportunities can aid your path.

Since the transfer process only allows for a single essay, you have less space to discuss themes outside of your academics and resume. Especially if you’re a recent immigrant, first-generation college student, attended a low-resource high school, come from a single-parent or low-income household, or other indicators of structural adversity, it can be helpful to share about the opportunity or challenges you’ve confronted. That may help frame the discussion around your academics and extracurriculars, or if your personal experiences relate to your desired major.

I don’t have any polished internal transfer essay examples. External Transfer Apply Texas Essay A Statement of Purpose, however, is similar. These Transfer Essay A examples may help articulate your journey and future goals.

McCombs School of Business Internal Transfer

McCombs Internal transfer information page

Current UT students must have an in-residence GPA of 3.25 or higher to be eligible to apply. However, the average admitted student has a 3.87. Anecdotally, last year, UT students with 3.9+ routinely reported not gaining admission, including my clients. Five or more years ago, McCombs’ internal transfer was almost exclusively GPA-based. They determined the number of available spaces, ranked applicants by GPA, and set a cutoff. They may have holistically reviewed a handful of the margins, but the process was predictable and straightforward.

Not anymore. I received record numbers of inquiries last year for help with the essay. I realized only later that this is because the process seems much more holistic than in previous years. Many 4.0s got denied since 2020.

They place a heavy emphasis on your resume, so occasionally sub-3.75 students with stellar ECs and essay gain admission. It may help to secure an internship, if possible, or leadership positions in student organizations, or join business-related groups. McCombs internal transfer applicants can submit an optional essay (someone please correct me if it’s required) that you should probably submit.

Internal transfer admissions rates are skewed because students with GPAs below 3.6 are less likely to apply to competitive programs such as CS, most engineering majors, and business. McCombs’ 40% admissions rate is misleading. The majority of external transfers have no chance based on their GPA. Since internal transfers have only two attempts, they are more careful about when and how they apply.

Prospective internal transfers should attend an information session offered once or twice per month. These sessions are not available to non-UT students for obvious reasons.

One way to secure your GPA is to take challenging courses like calculus or micro/macro econ outside UT, or in other places where you worry you may not be able to earn an A. Credits earned outside of UT are not considered part of your cumulative GPA. Double-check on whether your non-UT calculus class counts for prerequisites because McCombs seems to have changed their calculus requirement to M 408 Q, which combines topics into a semester rather than two, so two courses in M 408 K/L, N/S, or C/D satisfy the single new course.

Applicants also need to have completed, or be in progress of completing, by the spring of the semester they are applying, courses in microeconomics/macroeconomics and the first year of Calculus. You have a maximum of two transfer attempts, and they will not review students who have completed over 90 hours at UT. The suggestion for juniors is to finish their degree and look towards graduate school. Other alternatives include a McCombs Minor or one of their many certificates open to all majors.

You’re welcome to attempt a sophomore year transfer into CBHP. Competitive applicants will have a 4.0 and a maximum of a single A-.

Cockrell School of Engineering Internal Transfer

Click this link for the Cockrell Internal transfer portal

Cockrell has separate eligibility criteria, whether you’re a current engineering student or outside of the Cockrell school. It has been the case that non-engineers can transfer internally only in the fall, but if that is out of date, let me know.

Current engineering students are eligible to request a major change even in their first semester, and others can apply to change through their first four semesters, either for fall, summer, or spring.

If you’re an incoming UT freshman admitted to an engineering major that isn’t your preference or your goals and interests have changed, understand that you are not guaranteed a major change after arriving on campus.

Regardless, all applicants need to meet the following prerequisites to be eligible to apply:

• A minimum of 24 hours in residence and no more than 60 (except for freshman fall engineers who can apply with 12). AP/dual credit/non-UT classes don’t count towards the total.

• A 3.0 cumulative GPA and a 3.0 GPA in technical classes

• Completing Calculus M 408 C and having M 408 D completed or in progress

• Completing Engineering physics PHY 303K with lab PHY 103M

• Four or more technical courses. The physics and calculus prerequisites can count

• Maximum of two attempts for non-Engineers

Like with McCombs. there are Cockrell Internal Transfer information sessions you can attend.

Cockrell Internal Transfer Session Notes

A UT student attended a session and shared their notes that I’ve summarized here.

Around 500 UT students attempt to change their engineering major each term. The overall acceptance rate is around 45%. Students are limited to two attempts. Many more students want engineering than there are available spaces, particularly for in-demand programs like electrical/computer and mechanical engineering. You have two engineering choices, and selecting only one does not increase your chances. Cockrell does not disclose the number of available spaces in advance or after decisions are released.

The pools for non-Cockrell and Cockrell students are separate, so if you start in Natural Sciences, you’re compared with other non-Cockrell students in your proposed major. Non-Cockrell acceptance rates are slightly higher because they don’t have a pathway to an engineering degree. Applying earlier or on February 1 makes no difference, so do not rush your application. Decisions go out in mid-June.

There is a single staff member responsible for distributing spaces. It is the person who runs the session. Emailing her will not help your chances - she’s busy, so don’t bother her with try-hard questions. However, other staff members review and score each application twice independently. If there is a wide discrepancy in scores, a third person will review the file. Consequently, Cockrell takes the review process seriously and commits to a holistic review.

Although making most or all A’s will help you become much more competitive, a 4.0 is no guarantee of transfer, particularly if you drop the ball on the essay. Exceptional essays can compensate for an imperfect GPA. Occasionally, students with a lower than a 3.5 gain admission. Reviewers do not look at the resume section, so any relevant experiences need to go into your essay.

Transfer credit GPA does not factor in if you attended another university before UT enrollment. They focus much more heavily on your technical GPA and the overall GPA. So, if you made B’s or C’s in liberal arts classes, that’s less damaging than if it were in math and physics. Q drops and Pass/Fail do not matter. Taking restricted, space-limited engineering classes in your preferred major, like ECE 302 or 306, does not help your application.

Avoid idolizing figures like Elon Musk or Jeff Bezos. Try not to sound overly desperate or begging for a space. Your essays should focus as much or more on the how/why of your experiences and not just a list of what you’ve done. Almost everyone writes about climate change, so if you take this direction, you need to be highly specific to differentiate yourself from a crowded pool.

Admission Decision Criteria

Cockrell uses a holistic review process. From their site:

Internal transfer admission to all majors in the Cockrell School is offered on a space-available basis to those students who are best academically qualified. Academic qualification is objective and based on the in-residence cumulative GPA and the in-residence required technical GPA. For equally qualified applicants, preference will be given to the student who has completed more of the courses required for the requested major.

The Cockrell School does not have a standard GPA requirement for internal transfer admission. The cumulative and required technical GPAs of admitted students vary by semester and requested major, as does the number of seats offered. During the 2017-18 academic year, 67.3 percent of qualified applicants were given an internal transfer offer.

Required Essay (500 words)

What are your career aspirations, and how will an engineering degree help you realize those goals? What experiences have informed your belief that engineering is the best path for you?

The essay is a straightforward request to discuss your specific interests, hobbies, and courses that shape your engineering goals and professional ambitions. However, one essential difference is Cockrell practices a “double blind” application review approach. One reviewer looks at your academics and everything that isn’t your essay, then a separate staff member reads the essay without reference to anything else.

College of Natural Sciences and Computer Science Internal Transfer

The CS website refers applicants to the general Natural Sciences portal because the college, not the majors, makes the decisions. CNS offers transfers only for the fall semester, with deadlines in the middle of the spring semester before the change. First-semester UT students must wait until their spring semester to apply for internal transfer.

Generally speaking, all students, including current CNS ones, must meet the following eligibility criteria.

• Complete 24 credit hours in residence at UT Austin. Typically two long semesters (Fall & Spring).

• Complete the Admissions requirements: 1 Math and 2 Science courses from the provided options. Please visit this link for specific prerequisite courses for your major.

• Earn Math and/or Science credit in-residence with a B- or better.

• Although it isn’t required, it’s a good idea to attend a CNS internal transfer information session

Other advice they offer is a preference for students intending to graduate with single majors in four years. Moreover, “enroll in 12-15 credit hours per semester with no Q drops as evidence of being able to handle the rigor of CNS courses with grades of B- or better.” Admissions are based on the number of available spaces, which varies from year to year. Please visit the FAQ for more information.

Unlike other colleges or schools, they do not look at your resume or recommendation letters. There is a required essay: Describe how the intended CNS major would impact the achievement of educational and career goals.

Computer Science is, understandably, the most in-demand major in CNS and arguably the most in-demand at the entire university. Since there are many more students interested in CS than the 400 or 500 spaces available for each student classification, it’s often very challenging to gain admission. The CS Department is notorious for withholding admissions statistics for first-time freshmen and external and internal transfers.

Anecdotally, internal transferring seems a little easier than one would expect. I recall seeing recently from an admitted student information session that the admissions rate for internal transfers is surprisingly high, around 40-50%. A recent email reported 250-300 applicants each year, of whom around a third are admitted. So it seems that enough CS students transfer out of the program, freeing up spaces for non-CS students. I’ve also seen recent internal transfers online with 3.6 or 3.7, though to be confident, aim for a 4.0.

Moreover, the external transfer rate for UT CS is around 1%. In Fall 2024, only 6 external transfer applicants were admitted among 1,037 applicants. So, internal transfer into CS may be less daunting than anticipated. I don’t work with external CS applicants who do not meet a 4.0 and have substantial CS experience. Suppose you’re an incoming freshman trying to decide whether to enroll at UT in a major other than CS with hopes of internal transferring. In that case, that process is comparatively easier than external transferring, but by no means guaranteed.

Moody College of Communications Internal Transfer

Moody allows internal transfers and major changes for both the fall and spring. First-time freshman, however, can only apply after completing one semester at UT. Moody students requesting a major change follow the same procedures as non-Moody students, although the minimum to apply for the former is a 2.0, whereas the latter requires a 2.75.

Competitive GPAs are likely much higher than these minimums, but Moody does not disclose their admissions statistics or which majors tend to have more or fewer spaces than others. Generally speaking, the most in-demand majors are Advertising/PR, Journalism, and RTF. You should assume these are more competitive than less popular majors like Communication Sciences/Disorders or Communication Studies, for example. Moody requires all prospective major changers or internal transfers to attend an information session within one year of applying.

Consult this FAQ for more information, along with these recommended courses for non-Moody students. Moody allows for an optional essay where you can discuss your interests and goals.

College of Liberal Arts Internal Transfer

Liberal Arts, like Education and Social Work, is, generally speaking, the easiest one to change your major or internally transfer from a different college or school. You simply meet with an advisor and declare your new or additional major. You can view the portal here.

The most popular majors like Psychology and International Relations/Global Studies or those that require extensive prerequisites like Urban Studies or Environmental Science require applications. Economics is a popular major but non-competitive for internal transfers. Psychology, on the other hand, is highly competitive with a less than 20% admissions rate an a 3.9 average GPA. A BS in Environmental Science is both competitive and has core math/science prerequisites.

Overall, joining the College of Liberal Arts is much more straightforward than Business, Engineering, Natural Sciences, or Moody Communications.

Architecture and Nursing Internal Transfer

I include these two small programs in this post because they’re almost impossible to transfer into for either internal or external transfer students. Unknown to most people, they have the lowest first-time freshman admissions rates of all non-honors majors at around 10%. For first-time freshman applicants not admitted to these programs, I advise enrolling at another university to pursue your studies because internal transfer is a highly uncertain pathway.

Nursing is one of the few programs in the state or country that has a direct-entry BSN curriculum, whereas almost all others require two years of pre-nursing. You can view the eligibility for non-nursing UT students here. Anecdotally, I’ve heard Nursing admits maybe two or three transfers each year.

Architecture enrolls only around 100 students each year and is known as the most demanding program at UT. I knew only one Architecture student ever during my time at UT (because he was Plan II as well) - they tend to keep to themselves. If you want to give it a try, please follow this link and read it thoroughly. Architecture has the most extensive prerequisites, and if you’ve earned anything less than straight A’s, I wouldn’t bother trying. Anecdotally, they admit fewer than five internal OR external transfers each year.

A message to prospective External Transfers intending to change their UT major after enrolling

The most common scenarios I encounter are current business majors at other universities wishing admission to McCombs. However, McCombs’ external transfer process is extremely competitive, with around a 12% admissions rate and an average admit having a 3.93 or higher. They’ve either made a few B’s or don’t have the four prereqs of micro/macroeconomics and Calculus 1 and 2. So they apply first choice to less-selective majors like Economics or Communications. They or their parents present elaborate plans to burrow their way into McCombs later on. They think that they have things all figured out, but they make several faulty or uncertain assumptions.

Let’s say you’ve finished your sophomore year with 60 hours earned for grades or credit by exam, having completed most of the Core Curriculum. If you apply to and decide to enroll in Economics, you will spend your first year at UT taking courses that are likely not part of the core curriculum, nor will they count towards many hours in a Business degree. You can expect to spend your first year at UT doing little that contributes to your eventual graduation.

For students beginning in the fall, you need to prepare your internal McCombs application soon after your first spring semester begins. Then you need to make all A’s to have a shot - no easy task in adjusting to a new campus and rigor.

The earliest you can hope to complete your UT degree if you enter with 60 hours, begin in a different major, and even if you’re lucky enough to gain internal transfer admission, is 3 years and more likely 4 for a Bachelor’s degree in Business Administration AFTER arriving at UT. Even if you externally transfer and enroll immediately after your first year at another university, you’re looking at 4.5 to 5 years minimum to finish your degree from when you began your studies presumably following high school.

Let’s assume the worst-case scenario that you’re denied an internal transfer to McCombs. Now you’ve squandered a year’s time and money and must decide whether to finish your degree or pursue an external transfer should you wish to still pursue your major. For that reason, I recommend that internal transfers with a strong major preference also prepare and submit external transfer applications in the event they do not succeed with internally transferring.

The rule of thumb for external transfers: if you want to transfer to UT, please select your desired major if you have a strong preference, especially if you have more than 60 hours completed or in progress. Even if you have enough credits completed previously to graduate in four years plausibly, the vast majority of transfers take three or more years to finish their bachelor’s. Even though UT requires only 60 hours in residence to receive their degree, for transfers in most majors to complete their degree, less than 11% of external transfers finish in two years. Nearly 20% take more than four years to earn their UT degree or don’t finish at all (page 47).

Around a decade ago, UT commissioned a Commission to Increase Four-Year Graduation Rates to 70%, a target they’ve since hit. Increasing graduation rates is one reason they require first-time freshman applicants to lock-in a major at the outset and make changing majors more onerous than when I was a student a decade ago. One of the many changes implemented was to make it more challenging to change your major outside of your college or school, which often delays graduation and occupies resources for younger students. Think very hard before either transferring into a non-ideal major or enrolling at UT at all if not given your first choice.

Perhaps the only college admissions content area I’ve never dedicated blog, video, or book content to is UT-Austin scholarships. The primary reason is that UT-Austin reserves almost all its funding for students who demonstrate financial need. There isn’t a “scholarship strategy,” even for the Forty Acres Scholars Program (FASP), but this post is helpful for learning how and why aid packaging works nationwide.

Any merit aid that UT-Austin distributes is part of the admissions process submitted through the Common App, so there isn’t any advice unique to scholarships that doesn’t also apply to maximizing your admissions chances. Submitting strong admissions applications indirectly influences the few scholarship chances available. FASP consideration is part of your Common App submission, too. Since so many people ask about merit scholarships, even though it’s a dead end for almost everyone, I figured I’d make a post.

I summarize and provide insights into FASP. I provide an overview of UT's non-need-based aid to incoming freshmen and contrast UT’s stinginess for incoming students with its largesse for current UT students. I observe why the top 50 universities rarely offer need-based aid and contrast it with less selective universities, which reserve most of their scholarship budget to entice students to enroll. I address whether applying for outside non-institutional scholarships is worth the effort.

The easiest way to reach me is by email kevin@texadmissions.com and to complete this questionnaire for a free email admissions assessment and to discuss pricing and services.

I do not assist non-clients with FASP or outside scholarships as an à la carte service.

Forty Acres Scholars Program (FASP) application overview and essay tips

Established in 2012, the Forty Acres Scholars Program (FASP) is UT’s flagship merit-based full-ride plus stipend offer given annually to 20-25 incoming freshmen. FASP invites 150-200 semifinalists for interviews early each spring among 4,000 - 5,000 applicants or those invited to apply. Then, 50 are invited for an in-person weekend in early March. That makes the program five to ten times more selective than the most in-demand programs like MIT, Stanford, or UT’s Dean’s Scholars. The Forty Acres offer rate is approximately .5% among invited applicants and .02% among all UT applicants.

Here is a PDF of the funnel from the Class of 2024 cycle, along with a list of recent recipients and a list of FASP recipients over the past few years.

how Fasp is funded

Rather than a centralized fund, FASP has hundreds of smaller donors and a few prominent, permanently funded endowments. Here is the FASP 2024-2025 Donor’s List. That means FASP isn’t a single program but many individual scholarships, some of which are earmarked for specific majors like McCombs. During FASP’s first year, when I worked at UT, one Fine Arts student gained admission while ranking outside the top 10%. This observation entails that UT doesn’t take the 20 best of its 90,000+ applicants, but that it depends on donors’ desires, which is outside your control or knowledge. That makes assessing it even less predictable than admission to elite universities like MIT, Stanford, or UT Honors programs like CSB or Dean’s Scholars, with centralized processes, because FASP isn’t strictly centralized.

“stats” don’t really matter - selection is like a lottery

Stats don’t matter in the sense that a 1480 versus a 1510 SAT isn’t going to move any needles. Many academically perfect students will not receive an invitation to apply for FASP, and applicants outside the top 10% or scoring less than a 1450 on the SAT will be invited.

Still, you almost always need to be extremely high-achieving to be invited and receive the semifinalist. I’ve worked with two recipients and six semifinalists over the years, and they weren’t necessarily valedictorians with a 1600 SAT. So, some FASP recipients are the most impressive student that high school or community has ever produced, while others gain admission on merits other than a conventionally exceptional resume that FASP administrators feel will add to their program.

One pre-COVID client of mine, whom I was surprised got into UT in general, was invited to be a semifinalist; my theory is that they were part Native American. Perhaps FASP wanted to interview the top Native American in the applicant pool or something. It wouldn’t surprise me if some low-key back scratching happens among the VVIPs who fund this program and their elite social circles. Another semifinalist client of mine without VVIP connections received an invitation despite being outside the top 10% and a decent but not exceptional resume; however, they’d experienced substantial hardship and loss. So, maybe that was why. Another received a semifinalist invitation almost certainly because of a VVIP connection.

They’ve also hosted these weird, invite-only recruitment events at private residences where desperate teens and parents grovel to extremely wealthy donors. My former boss at UT attended one once, and the experience didn’t sound endearing. I’m unsure if these recruitment events still occur or what difference they might make.

expect a mess when applying to fasp

FASP is also the single most frustrating application at UT-Austin. Despite the millions of dollars of backing it and hundreds of people supporting the application process for over a decade, the application process and requirements are always a mess. The system changes yearly, and the FASP pages lack transparency.

I honestly can’t figure out why they can’t figure out how to administer their process. I’ve never made an FASP tips post because the requirements and process change every year so that any blog post would become outdated. So, I’m taking an overview approach instead.

The system has shifted from being a totally separate application to being part of the regular admission submissions on the Common App. In some years, anyone could apply for it. In others, everyone was considered, whereby presumably the top applicants were flagged by Office of Admissions reviewers to send them to FASP review staff. Sometimes, there are no additional essays; in others, the essay requirements are onerous. In those onerous cycles, applicants going for BHP, CSB, and FASP submitted nine essays of over 3,500 words.

For a few years around 2020, students had to copy/paste all of their regular application, essay, and resume inputs into a totally separate portal, and then answer three distinct essay questionss of 300 words each that all amounted to variations on “why do you want FASP and what will you contribute?”

It doesn’t take 900 words to answer why you want FASP: “the money and prestige.” Part of me theorized that they created onerous barriers to apply to limit the number of applicants and make the process more digestible for their bureaucracy.

fall 2025 fasp application cycle

Then, for the recent admissions cycle, Fall 2025, they claimed that there wasn’t a separate application. It was true that submitting your Common App makes you automatically eligible for consideration. After October 15, through a mysterious system, FASP released “invitations to apply” in small batches with nearly immediate deadlines. Some of these invitations went out around Thanksgiving and Christmas breaks and during finals, where applicants had less than a week or two to submit an additional essay.

They continued these invitations through January. Since FASP’s process was totally separate from the distribution of UT regular and honors admissions decisions, these invites caused tons of stress in schools and families.

Many people asked me variants of “if I didn’t get an invite, does that mean I was denied?” Conversely, invitees were eventually denied admission to UT entirely, so the invitation produced inflated expectations. Some rumors online claimed that 1,300 students received invitations, but I never saw definitive proof or official FASP sources to suggest this.

fasp essay tips Fall 2026

The Forty Acres program has changed its topic for Fall 2026 applicants. Frankly, it’s terrible. Almost every previous application cycle required students to write on some variation of “what as an applicant do you bring to Forty Acres and how will you contribute as a leader on UT’s campus.”

The new topic reads:

“The Forty Acres Scholars Program is more than a prestigious scholarship — it’s a vibrant, purpose-driven community built on the pillars of Community, Connection and Discovery. Review the program’s website and social media to understand its current offerings and in an essay of no more than 500 words respond to this prompt: What unique programming idea would you propose to further enrich the scholar experience and strengthen these core tenets?”

Rather than the terrible question asking an applicant to discuss their experiences, commitments, or achievements, the topic asks “tell us about us and how you would improve upon Forty Acres.”

This question is unhelpful on a few levels. What do Forty Acres applicant readers expect to learn from this topic on behalf of applicants?

No high school student has presumably completed a full-ride red-carpet multi-year program at a highly selective institution before. It’s even less helpful as an admissions review tool than university honors programs, asking students to share why they want to enroll in an honors program that is mostly or entirely unfamiliar to every applicant. This question invites pandering and will likely generate a high proportion of AI-generated responses. I expect most essays to be vaguer and more repetitive than the typical poorly-written average college essay.

Another reason it’s unhelpful is that Forty Acres already provides everything: housing, tuition, research/study abroad stipends, networking and extracurricular opportunities, etc. What could there possibly be to improve upon? And what could applicants write about in 500 words? Asking 17-year-olds how to “improve” a program designed by seasoned administrators yields very little useful differentiation across applicants.

The final reason the topic is problematic is that it privileges the most connected and elite applicants who already have huge structural advantages. A low-income, first-generation, urban, or rural student unfamiliar with campus life isn’t likely to have much, if any, idea of what an undergraduate education entails, let alone a program like FASP. Speaking as a former first-generation applicant myself, I would have had no frame of reference for questions like this at age 17. Suburban kids from high-income families are in the best position to read between the lines of what this question may be asking. The students who most need high education as a tool for upward mobility and to minimize their student loans are the ones least likely to have the resources to navigate applications like FASP.

So, my advice is to reframe the question to emphasize applicant-specific content, such as developing experiences and commitments from your recent past or those occurring in the present that can tie into your recommendation for what to include. One possibility could be: “I’m contributing to economics research with a professor at my local university to assess electricity prices when new data centers enter communities.” Then, you could tie that into a suggestion for “connect every Forty Acres student regardless of major immediately with a research opportunity” since research isn’t guaranteed with FASP.

Other ideas could include connecting FASP participants with opportunities to mentor low-income area schools. There could also be STEM or other sorts of outreach. Another possibility is including mental health support since there are significant social obligations that accompany joining a high-profile full-ride program. FASP might also provide preferential treatment for graduate/medical/law school, or additional support for post-undergrad fellowships such as Fulbright, Rhodes, or Marshall. The added value for FASP could be communication like “we can help minimize the uncertainties for what comes after your bachelor’s.”

The other hint in the question is to research more about what FASP means by “community, connection, and discovery” and to frame your response as somehow improving upon or adding to one or more of these dimensions.

Still, asking applicants, many of whom are desperate simply to get into UT, to consult social media posts that themselves amplify anxiety and drive FOMO is an added cruelty to an already dehumanizing and alienating college application process. If I were writing this essay, I would argue that the best way to improve FASP is to simplify and streamline its cumbersome application process.

It would be much more sensible for UT Honors programs to refer their top 5% or so of it’s 90,000+ applicants to FASP as an initial filter, then go directly to a semifinalist phone interview, rather than trickle invitations to thousands of applicants over the holidays. “Back in the day” when I used to review UT apps in the early 2010s, we scored students on a scale of 1 to 6, but we also had a special “star” type of function that we could apply to a few of our applicants each year for special consideration. The same could easily be done for Forty Acres rather than having an application portal entirely seperate from the Common App or My Status.

Perhaps the point is the HR bureaucracy that layers on inaccessibility, like multiple bank agent filters evaluating a loan, rather than efficiency in applying, reviewing, and distributing decisions. Exclusivity, scarcity, and difficulty of applying adds to the mystiquie of elite brands like Forty Acres.

semifinalist interviews and the fasp finalist weekend

Since semifinalist designations are pretty random, you just have to hope you get invited for an interview based on the arbitrary judgments of individual donors or FASP bureaucracy. The half-hour phone interview with UT alumni is pretty basic and nothing different than how top 20 private universities might interview.

Then, if you’re one of the 50-60 selected as a finalist, congratulations! Sort of! Who knows why it happened? Maybe you come from the “right” high school, desired major, or zip code? Be gracious in your achievement and consider not sharing it on social media. Don’t contribute to the FOMO.

Undoubtedly, hundreds of similarly qualified and excellent applicants didn’t advance to the semifinalist and finalist rounds, so the selection is akin to a lottery. The Finalist Weekend is like a hybrid recruiting event with panels and tours that also serve as a group interview where you’re constantly being watched and assessed. This “weekend interview” setup is common at other full-ride programs at prestigious universities.

Nevertheless, I searched Reddit posts and other blogs for in-depth details about the weekend, but nothing appeared. To be honest, it probably doesn’t matter since there isn’t a lot to prepare for. I don’t have any advice for this finalist weekend other than to be agreeable, ask questions while not being overbearing, make an effort to chat with the other finalists, mostly to make potential friends, and feign interest in the VVIPs where necessary.

UT-Austin scholarships for incoming freshmen

Besides FASP, UT-Austin offers few merit non-financial-need scholarships for incoming students. Since at least 2011, they’ve never given scholarships for any National Merit status or automatically based on rank/test score. They reserve most of their scholarship budget to meet financial need and help current UT students with undergraduate research, subsidizing unpaid internships, facilitating study abroad, and otherwise alleviating financial burdens.

my ut-austin scholarship experience

I personally received over fifteen scholarships through various sources, including endowed presidential scholarships in the History and Humanities departments, study abroad/research stipends from the Bridging Disciplines Program, and assistance from the Liberal Arts Honors (LAH) program. These fully funded my fieldwork abroad in Bosnia and Rwanda. Some of these were given to me automatically, and others required applications/essays that I completed early on each spring semester.

how ut-austin distributes financial aid and merit scholarships

Approximately 44% of UT undergraduate students receive at least some need-based aid, including 4,000 of UT’s 9,000 incoming freshmen with an average need-based financial aid package of $20,000. For its ~39,000 full-time undergraduate enrollment, UT allocates around $240 million in need-based aid, contrasted with around $25,000,000 in non-need-based merit aid. So, 90% of UT’s total aid budget is for need-based.

There are also $22,000,000 in non-need-based tuition waivers that cover varied programs for military veterans, some international students, faculty, and other special/niche programs. I base this information on the Common Data Set 2024-2025, pages 22-27.

The boundary between need-based and merit aid is often fuzzy, with some high-achieving applicants from low- and middle-income families receiving hybrid offers like Presidential or Impact scholars. The Terry Foundation also has generous hybrid aid offers to Texas public universities. The financial need category always subsumes merit, both in how packages are composed and the data reported.

international and out-of-state applicants will not get UT-Austin merit scholarships

Many international students see a Texas policy of giving in-state tuition waivers to those who receive $1,000 or more in merit scholarships. Still, in practice, international and out-of-state students virtually never receive scholarships. In fact, international students must demonstrate “proof of finances” as a precondition to enrolling. At less selective Texas public universities, this in-state tuition waiver is much more accessible.

It makes sense that UT allocates almost all of its budget for need-based aid to Texas residents to increase access for working and middle-class families, urban and rural students, and families with parents who didn’t attend college. The Texas Advance Commitment guarantees at least some money for all families reporting less than $100,000 on their FAFSA. I was a first-generation college student, so I understand the difficulties of growing up in a non-college-going community and enrolling at an elite university. In hindsight, some of my UT scholarships and success were likely because UT tagged me as first-gen.

Fewer than 5% of enrolling freshmen receive merit scholarships

In contrast, 422 incoming freshmen received non-need-based merit scholarships, less than 5% of the enrolling students. The average offer is $4,000. Since Engineering Honors (EHP) gives most or all of its enrolling students scholarships, perhaps a third of those 422 are EHP students. Another 20 or so receive the Forty Acres Scholarship Program (FASP) offers. Other honors programs like Canfield Business Honors (CBHP) also offer merit aid to their highest-tier students. This 422 figure excludes the 82 scholarship freshmen athletes.

Whatever institutional aid you might receive is almost always considered in conjunction with your admissions application that you submit on the Common App, so there isn’t much “extra to do” to be eligible.”

The Texas Exes scholarship fund offers scholarships to around 300 incoming freshmen, but the awards are generally small, on average $1,750. They sometimes have a need-based component or a niche requirement. Most Texas Exes scholarships require a separate application. I’ve had a few students get these Texas Exes offers, but the amounts are so small that it generally isn’t worth the effort to apply, and sometimes an in-person interview.

To reiterate, if your family makes more than $100,000 or you’re an out-of-state/international student, you should assume you will pay the full cost of attendance. Do not bother apply to UT as a non-resident if you cannot afford the approximately $225,000 total cost, nor should you plan on holding out for establishing Texas residency, which I discuss in this post.

How do scholarships typically work at top-50 universities?

top universities don’t need to lure students

UT-Austin is like most other top 50 public and private universities, offering few merit scholarships. Prominent public universities like the UCs, UW-Seattle, Michigan, UNC, UVA, Georgia Tech, and others do not need to subsidize non-resident tuition because they’re sufficiently in demand that non-resident families are willing to pay the full out-of-state cost. Elite private universities like the Ivy League and equivalent have yield rates over 70%, where most admitted students choose to enroll, meaning plenty of families are willing to pay the full cost. UT-Austin’s enrollment yield rate is stable at 45-50% for each cycle, similar to Michigan or UC-Berkeley.

Elite universities do not need merit scholarships to entice enrollment. They reserve almost all of their scholarship budget to meet financial need. Some universities like Rice University have relatively high cutoffs for what constitutes need-based aid, like families making less than $200,000 qualifying for half tuition, and those making less than $75,000 have all costs covered. Others make “no loan” guarantees for qualifying families.

Still, despite these financial guarantees, elite universities overwhelmingly enroll students from the top 1%. Living in resource-rich communities and attending elite private schools is the highest correlate of gaining admission to elite universities.

less-selective universities offer much more merit aid—UT-Dallas AES

Contrast how elite universities almost never give scholarships with a campus like UT-Dallas. They’re the third-ranked public university in Texas and around the top 100 nationally. They’re one of the strongest universities that covers the full cost of attendance for National Merit Finalists, of which ~175 incoming UTD students qualify.

UTD’s flagship Academic Excellence Scholarship (AES) provides varying amounts up to a full ride based primarily on one’s transcript and SAT. UTD doesn’t require any separate scholarship applications. Top offers tend to rank in the top 2% and score a 1550, with the lowest tier class ranks 10-20% and 1300-1400 on the SAT.

The UT-Dallas Common Data Set supports my claim that less prestigious universities allocate much more merit-based aid to entice students to enroll. The average UTD merit package is $10,600, and 20% of enrolling UTD students receive merit aid. Texas Tech has a helpful breakdown of which rank/test score equals what merit package. I have one or two clients admitted to UT and other top universities each year who take UTD’s honors and full-ride offer.

In exceedingly rare instances, top universities might give students merit scholarships

I had a Fall 2025 client who received two Rice merit scholarships, totalling $60,000 yearly. Rice said they give this offer to only a dozen or so applicants each year. That student declined Rice, Duke, UCLA, Georgia Tech, Purdue Honors, and UT’s offer to enroll at Penn M&T, the extremely selective combined Wharton/Engineering program, so based on their profile, they were one of the world’s top college applicants. Even so, they didn’t gain admission to UT Honors, MIT, CMU, Caltech, Princeton, Harvard, Yale, Columbia, and Cornell. Academically-perfect students with exceptional resumes will have similar outcomes. Getting into multiple top 10s for STEM regular decision applicants is equally rare. Perhaps a thousand applicants globally will juggle multiple top 10 university offers. So, if you’re an academically perfect student with a strong resume and are applying to a dozen high reaches, you will be lucky to get into a single campus.

Outside of that or perhaps one or two other exceptions in my decade of working with 600+ families, you should not expect out-of-state tuition waivers or merit scholarships at highly desirable universities. Some universities have their equivalent of UT’s FASP, but these are extraordinarily competitive and akin to a lottery. Moreover, I strongly caution against applying binding Early Decision to universities where cost is in any way a factor. I discuss the hazards of student loan debt at the bottom of my “Building a Reasonable and Debt-Minimizing College List” post.

Finally, unless your family’s net worth is mid-seven figures or higher, it’s almost never worth paying $300,000+ for an undergraduate degree. So, many of my clients don’t apply to binding ED because they don’t want to preclude a potential UT offer since it’s a high-quality education at a reasonable price. Almost everyone is better off going to A&M or UT-Dallas and graduating with little or no debt rather than taking on potential six-figure loans to pay full price for a top-50 university.

One demographic I work with are transfer students at one university desiring UT enrollment. Every year, I work with a few who enrolled at very expensive universities, sometimes over a UT offer as a HS senior, only to realize it’s not worth it. They pay a high price to learn a tough lesson that most universities aren’t worth the sticker price.

Should you apply for outside scholarships?

Probably not.

Applying for scholarships outside of institutions or government sources is not worth the effort. Nearly any aid you might receive will come directly from the university as part of your Common App and FAFSA/CSS financial aid applications. There is rarely anything “extra to do” to be eligible for merit scholarships given from governments and institutions.

Almost zero of the 600+ families I’ve worked with over a decade have received notable outside scholarships that alter enrollment options or significantly decrease the cost burden. The most straightforward way to reduce your total cost of attendance is to attend a school like UT-Dallas that gives generous merit aid to incoming students.

There are no tricks or hacks to substantially reduce the cost of UT-Austin and other top 50 universities.

do not pay a firm to complete your fafsa or help you find scholarships

Occasionally, families will ask me about engineering the FAFSA in such a way to disguise or withhold their “expected family contribution,” going so far as to divorce or declare their child as independent. There is a cottage industry of firms offering these FAFSA hijacking services. I do not recommend taking these paths. It’s like evading taxes through shell companies or creative accounting: it might work and save you money, and you could even get away with it, but will you sleep peacefully at night, knowing your child’s wellbeing and college enrollment could be at risk?

There are many scholarship search engines. Some, like Fastweb, are reputable and have been around for decades, but almost none yield anything worth your time and energy. You’re better off working a job and buying lottery tickets, seriously.

There are also many scams that I conspiratorially think have data harvesting intentions or “pay us some money so you can potentially get more money.” Many of these scams appear on reputable search engines and databases since the hosts, including Fastweb, may not complete due diligence about the legitimacy of a given program.

You should never pay someone to search for or apply for scholarships on your behalf. At best, paid “scholarship search services” are a waste of money; at worst, they’re a scam that could hook you with ongoing fees. Paying someone to find you money is nonsensical. Never provide your Social Security number.

outside high-dollar scholarships are uncommon and extremely competitive

There are several reputable need-based nationwide scholarship programs, such as the Gates Millennium Scholarship, Jack Kent Cooke, Dell Scholars, Horatio Alger, Burger King Scholars, Ron Brown, and Elks Most Valuable Student. Still, all of these have need-based requirements or require being a member of a historically marginalized community. That makes sense because wealthy donors, foundations, and corporations have a social mission to increase educational access and social mobility. Those social desirability and democracy incentives call into question the entire notion of giving free money to high-achieving applications with no strings attached or demonstrating need or hardship.

Nevertheless, a few programs have no need-based requirements, like Coca Cola Scholars, Davidson Fellows Scholarship, Regeneron Science Talent Search, and the Coolidge Scholarship. Only a few hundred students among the 300,000 or so who apply for the top 50 universities will receive these, so the odds of getting one are so exceedingly rare that it isn’t worth applying unless you’re in the highly rarified tier of students for whom Harvard, Princeton, Stanford, or MIT is a safety school.

One Coca-Cola Scholar recipient compiled a spreadsheet of potential scholarship opportunities two years ago that may be of interest. Note that I haven’t verified these or updated deadlines or requirements.

Interested in maximizing your admissions chances?

One of the biggest unquestioned assumptions about applying to college is whether and why you need to enroll immediately after high school.

When students hint at a gap year and parents fiercely resist, which is a conversation I regularly have, my response is: Why not? What’s the worst that can happen? A gap year can save some money, and your child is one year more mature and independent than before. Ninety percent of students who take a gap year eventually enroll in college.

Even offering the option of a gap year early on in a student’s academic career can alleviate some of the pressures to excel. Offering alternative possibilities will undoubtedly help students establish a sense of control over their lives. When they commit to a course of study or a career, they have greater confidence in their choice.

Gap years provide little downside and mostly upside

Once you question the admissions madness and see through society’s illusions and the many lies that universities tell, it’s hard to see the downsides of taking a year off.

For example, prospective MBA students are expected to have a few years of professional experience before applying. Most elite law schools prefer applicants who have taken at least some time off following their bachelor’s degree. Except for accidents of history and a society obsessed with prestigious undergraduate degrees, there are few, if any, compelling reasons for jumping straight into one’s studies. In most developed countries, including in the Netherlands, where my wife is from, the standard is reversed. Immediate college enrollment is somewhat outside of the norm.

Gap years can allow teenagers to explore their interests and better understand what they might want to do, or more importantly, eliminate less appealing academic or career possibilities. One benefit of pursuing a gap year abroad is it doesn’t have the stigma of remaining in one’s hometown or moving elsewhere in the United States that condescends to teenagers who don’t immediately enroll in college.

Gap years abroad guarantee growth

Going abroad guarantees that you’ll meet people from different backgrounds, even if it’s an English-speaking tourist or in a volunteer program bubble. Still, you would have to try very hard not to have new experiences while abroad. One of my clients in Fall 2024 completed a fully-funded NYSL-I Mandarin language immersion program in Taiwan during the summer after their junior year. They gained admission to UT Honors and requested a gap year to complete the fully-funded full-year program in Taiwan before beginning their studies. They will enroll at UT one year wiser and with a higher competence in Mandarin.

Some of the most interesting people I met on my travels are the teenagers who had the courage (and their parents the willingness to allow them) to take a year off between their studies. I met one of my best friends, Jan from Germany, when he was 19 and I was 26, while he was on his gap year in Central America and Mexico. He filmed my first UT Admissions Guy YouTube videos when I visited him in the Netherlands after he began his business university studies. I’ve spent time with his family and met his younger brother Luka while he took his gap year in Southeast Asia.

Gap years abroad are less expensive than universities

A typical year abroad may cost anywhere from a little bit more than a year at community college to less than the cost of attending your local public university. One memorable American gap-year teenage girl from rural New Hampshire deferred her Harvard enrollment to study indigenous languages in Mexico. Another was taking a mental health leave of absence from Brown University. We all met in 2015 in Quetzaltenango in Western Guatemala at the Spanish school PLQE. 

PLQE provided one of the best educational environments I’ve ever experienced, including my most rigorous UT-Austin honors classes. All our teachers were local Guatemalans with bachelor’s or advanced degrees and often worked as engineers, lawyers, or technocrats. PLQE also accommodated parents and their young children, retirees, and working professionals. Each student received five hours of Spanish instruction one-on-one, five days a week.

I spent six weeks there and improved my Spanish from upper elementary (A2) to lower advanced (C1). While I was taking lessons, Guatemala descended into political protests, resulting in the first president in Latin American history, Otto Perez Molina, to step down following a peaceful revolution. Taking advanced lessons with lawyers or social activists helped me develop more nuanced views on important issues of the day.

For around $300 per week, we received 25 hours of instruction per week and full room and board with a local family. Every afternoon and weekend, the school provided optional field trips covered by our tuition using local transport and guided by one of our teachers to women’s cooperatives, K’iche villages, rural campesino farms, and sites of natural beauty or historical importance. I sometimes served as a translator for less-experienced students.

Consider that one semester of tuition at NYU ($26,500) could fund the equivalent of 88 weeks of studying and living at PLQE. You could theoretically live at PLQE for four and a half years at the same price as a full year’s NYU tuition and living expenses.

Going abroad reframes beliefs and perspectives

One of the things I love most about traveling is that the things that seem to matter most back home are almost completely irrelevant abroad, for example, your age, skin color, education level, hometown, your material possessions, what you majored in, where you work, what were your SATs, etc. I seek out people who are curious and conscientious and who make an effort to know themselves and our world. All that matters are who you show up as each day and your openness to new experiences.

Saying yes to something is so much easier when you’re not worried about how it will affect your colleagues' or classmates' perceptions or your college admissions chances. It’s also easier to opt out and say no to something that doesn’t interest or serve you. There isn’t a pressure to commit to something out of a misplaced sense of obligation. That degree of freedom and autonomy is something you can never find while remaining in the same system you were born into.

Gap years provide more opportunities to explore interests and skills compared with universities

People taking gap years can explore their interests and develop their identities away from their parents’ prying eyes or hovering blades. The biggest complaint from them and friends like Jan is that they feel somewhat out of place relative to their more immature and less socially developed classmates when they eventually enroll in college. Their year or two away helps them excel in college and strike a more manageable work/life balance. Spending time away from one’s hometown or country lets you see the bigger picture and acknowledge concerns beyond a narrow worldview.

When I followed up with travel friends who’ve taken gap years and subsequently applied for and enrolled at their university, they universally reported that it was beneficial. Around 3 percent of Americans who eventually enroll in college take an intentional gap year, which is, frankly, higher than I would have expected.  Surveys suggest that students who take a gap year overwhelmingly report that it contributed to personal growth, increased maturity and self-confidence, improved communication skills, especially cross-culturally, and helped them find their life direction.  

I’ve met people on gap years learning non-college skills like permaculture, yoga and meditation, SCUBA or free diving, kayaking, salsa and other dancing, conservation, world music and art, wilderness survival, storytelling/blogging, etc. Americans aged 18 to 30 have access to one-year Working Holiday Visa (WHV) schemes that allow employment in Australia, Ireland, New Zealand, Singapore, South Korea, and Canada.

Working holiday visas allow the holder multiple entries and exits and to open a bank account for legal employment. They’re entitled to all the rights, benefits, and protections as residents of that country. I know people who have worked on ranches, farms, yoga studios, government agencies, wineries, cafes, and so on. My now-wife went to New Zealand for a mid-career gap in her late 20s, where we met at a campsite.

Gap years can improve university performance and future professional success

In college, students who took a gap year tend to have higher grades and graduate on time relative to their non–gap year peers, which contradicts parental concerns that their children will fall behind academically by taking a year off from school.  Taking a gap year may diminish the chances of having mental health issues in college that necessitate a leave of absence.

Gap years improve retention and graduation rates. Indirectly, gap years improve one’s graduate school prospects. Some universities even offer incentives for deferred enrollment. For example, Duke University began a scholarship program to a few dozen students each year to facilitate structured gap years.  When doing your college search, ask the admissions offices what their deferment policy is and if any scholarships are available to facilitate gap years.

Even though I’m a big fan of gap years, I  don’t think they are something parents should impose on their child. Allow it as a possibility and offer them space and resources to make the option realistic. It shouldn’t be a means to an end or an opportunity to bolster one’s resume for a future college admissions cycle. Yet, a gap year will improve your future admissions chances. Anticipating a gap year early in high school means you could forgo the senior year application process. Applying to college after graduating high school lessens a lot of the stress and peer pressure because anxious classmates and social media posts do not surround you.

Avoid rigid, fully-structured gap year programs

My advice for a gap year is to leave it semi-structured or entirely unstructured. Buy a one-way ticket somewhere, book a week’s accommodation at a hostel, and figure it out. Anyone who has done their own open-ended travels knows almost immediately that many people are “on the road,” taking similar journeys. You don’t stay lonely or alone or without direction for long. That tolerance for adventure is probably not palatable to even the most open-minded families. Instead, it may help to plan a month or two of volunteering or language school at places like PLQE.

I’m not naïve enough to think some parents, including mine, would ever permit their child to gallivant for a year without a “plan.” Still, I don’t recommend paying for some expensive gap-year program that structures an entire year down to the hour. Some of these paid-for gap year programs are better than others. There are even gap-year fairs to connect with programs (gooversea.com). Most programs are quite expensive, and there are consulting firms that charge hefty fees to Google what you could otherwise find yourself. One family reported excellent experiences with Winterline Global Skills, which teaches life and survival skills over nine to ten months. However, as with anything, research your options and become an informed consumer.

NYU professor Scott Galloway calls for gap years to become the norm and not the exception. It helps prepare children for the future. He laments, “An increasingly ugly secret of campus life is that a mix of helicopter parenting and social media has rendered many 18-year-olds unfit for college.” 

Many students at elite universities haven’t been permitted to develop the soft skills, the autonomy of thought, or the overall maturity required for thriving on college campuses.

Even if you decide to enroll in college immediately after HS, at least entertain the thought of delaying enrollment or applying rather than defaulting to what everyone else is doing.

I hope you’ve enjoyed this video and received some food for thought about a less conventional approach to your college career. The easiest way to reach me is by email kevin@texadmissions.com

Interested in maximizing your admissions chances?

Hoping to make the cut for UT-Austin? What rank and test scores do you need to be competitive? Worried you rank outside of the top 5%?

It’s no secret that UT admissions are more competitive than ever. For fall 2026, UT received approximately 100,000 applications, admitting around 15,000 applicants for an enrolling freshmen class of 8,000 - 8,500 for Fall 2026 applicants. The overall UT admissions rate is around 15%, but it’s substantially more competitive for STEM/business applicants, out-of-state students, and Texas residents who rank outside the top 5%.

The McCombs School of Business is one of the few programs that release their applied and admitted student data.

• Fall 2023: applied 11,433, admitted 1,625, and enrolled 1,044. Admissions rate 14%. Average SAT 1450 and ACT 32. Average rank 4.8%

• Fall 2024: applied 12,813, admitted 1,454, and enrolled 924. Admissions rate 11%.  Average SAT 1470 and ACT 33. Average rank 4%.

• Fall 2025, McCombs received 16,500 applications for admission and likely admitted around 1,000 students, for an admissions rate of 6%.

• Fall 2026 - if anyone has this information from an admitted student information session, please send it over kevin@texadmissions.com

If the McCombs admissions rate is around 6%, we can assume the admissions rate for the most competitive majors like CS, ECE, and biomedical engineering are in the low-to-mid single digits.

I recommend, in this recent post, strongly considering alternatives to Computer Science unless you have near-perfect academics and an excellent STEM/CS resume. You can also consult this post for STEM honors programs.

The admissions rate for Texas residents outside of the top 5% is likely below 10%. Less than 5% of out-of-state and international students gained admission.

My professional ethic

I prefer not to take students who are outside the top 15% or who score less than 1400/31 on the SAT/ACT, whose primary focus is UT-Austin.

It isn’t appropriate for me to accept fees when I feel the student has little to no chance of gaining admission to UT. However, in each cycle, I work with a few students who have lower academic profiles and are aiming for schools outside the top 50, such as Texas A&M, CU-Boulder, Clemson, Tennessee, SMU, TCU, Baylor, Oklahoma, South Carolina, Indiana, Wisconsin, etc.

Outstanding academics are necessary but no guarantee of admissions success. Since UT and most other universities “holistically review” their applicants, you need to have a strong resume demonstrating your “fit” for your desired program. Nowadays, it’s expected to have relevant experiences to be competitive, especially in STEM. Students with great academics who are well within the charts below will routinely get denied.

In this post, I present data from the past four years to visualize your chances and help you select your first-choice college/school/major. I have summarized my client data since 2017 and provided an overview of how UT uses rank and test scores. I discuss my process for producing these academic minimum rules of thumb and conclude with a conversation about how these can help build your college list and decide whether UT is a realistic match.

Summary of client outcomes from Fall 2017-2026

Approximately 63% of my first-time freshman clients (294 of 467) and 76% of transfers (94 of 124) have gained admission to their first-choice UT-Austin major since Fall of 2017. My CS, Engineering, CNS, and Business clients gained admission 175 out of 255 attempts (69% STEM acceptance rate).

Texas Residents rank and test score minimum recommendations by college and school

When students complete my questionnaire for a free consultation, I don’t hesitate to share the disappointing news if they are highly unlikely to get in. Every year, I also get a few wrong with students who receive pleasantly surprising news of their admission. There are always exceptions in both directions.

These are the rules of thumb, conservative estimates. I’ve built them based on general competition trends from previous years, the approximate number of spaces available, data from my clients, observations from online communities, and forecasting a more competitive environment in future years.

I use these to determine whether my professional services could help a student gain admission. I turn down many more prospective clients than I pitch because I only feel comfortable working with students who I feel have a reasonably good shot at getting in.

Drawing on three years at UT five years working with students independently, I provide below my best guesses for whether UT is worth applying and considering.

Note: I include only Texas residents recommendations here. International and out-of-state students should presumably have higher academics than these to consider UT a “match” school

Academic Minimum Recommendations for Prospective Fall 2027 Clients

I have excluded Fine Arts from these recommendations because the audition or portfolio plays a large role in their process. I have broken up Engineering into similarly competitive groups since, unlike most other UT programs, decisions are made on the major selection rather than the college/school.

STEM programs place more weight on the math/quantitative subscores, so there are exceptions to these rules of thumb, which present only the SAT Composite. You can convert your ACT score using these tables.

Cockrell School of Engineering Recommended Rank and Test Score

Below, I estimate the relative competitiveness between engineering majors and provide rules of thumb for UT Cockrell majors to be an academic match.

I have also shared the total undergraduate enrollment by major to show you how the sizes of each department vary drastically.

Here are my recommendations for each major.

Check out my new book Surviving the College Admissions Madness and Youtube Channel

What to make of these recommendations?

My message isn’t to deter anyone from applying to UT. My hope is that students and families begin managing their expectations will in advance of receiving their decisions. Putting all of your emotional eggs in the same college basket, especially one was selective as UT, is setting you up for potential heartbreak later.

Because UT makes admissions decisions based on a student’s first choice college or school, it is a good idea to at least have a family conversation about aiming for a different program if you’re anxious about your chances.

Having realistic expectations is important for building your college list with “match” programs where you have a reasonable chance of gaining admission. All students need at least one “assured” program where they will 100% gain admission based on their rank and test scores.

Again, these recommendations are conservative estimates whether UT is a realistic possibility. Last year, I had a few clients gain admission that I probably wouldn’t take on this year, and others who I felt confident would gain admission that don’t.

College admissions is extremely uncertain and unpredictable. Variables like rank and test score are two among many.

Interested in working together?

In this post, I overview the McCombs admissions statistics and application process, provide insights into the Canfield Business Honors program, and conclude with alternatives to McCombs. In another post, I cover the combined ECE and business (ECB) and CS and business (CSB) honors programs.

The easiest way to reach me is by email kevin@texadmissions.com and to complete this questionnaire for a free email admissions assessment and to discuss pricing and services.

McCombs School of Business admissions trends

For many years, UT-Austin’s McCombs School of Business received a relatively flat number of applicants, around 7,000 to 9,000 each year. However, like so many other competitive programs, COVID has experienced a significant increase in application numbers since COVID.

They’re also one of the only UT programs that have shared precise admissions data. A recent McCombs prospective information session shared concrete admitted and application statistics.

For Fall 2023: 11,433 applied, and they and admitted 1,625 for an enrollment class of 1,044. The admissions rate was 14%. The average SAT was 1450, and the average ACT was 32. The average admitted McCombs applicant ranked in the top 4.8% of their class.

Fall 2024 saw an 11% increase in applications, with 12,813 applying. The McCombs School of Business admitted 1,454 students for an enrolling freshman class of 924. The admissions rate was 11%.  The average SAT was 1470, with an average ACT of 33. The average rank increased by almost a percentage to the top 4%.

In Fall 2025, 16,500 applications were received for McCombs admission, and they likely admitted around 1,400 students, for an admissions rate of 8%.

How to apply to the McCombs School of Business

Students interested in applying to the McCombs School of Business must select it as their first-choice major on Apply Texas. All applicants apply as Business—Undeclared.

Enrolling McCombs students declare their major (like accounting, supply chain management, finance, etc.) after their freshman year. Students may have only one Business major and one minor. Double majors outside of the Business School can be pursued only after enrolling.

The Office of Admissions reviews all applications. The McCombs School of Business does not make decisions for regular admission. Still, you need to argue with specific examples why you deserve a space.

Reviewers, in particular, look for a demonstrated record of leadership activities in school and in your community. It is important that you expand upon any leadership activities in your resume and consider listing them at the very top under a dedicated leadership heading. Work experience and volunteering is also considered favorably. You should discuss your one or two most committed activities in your Leadership short answer.

If Calculus is available at your school, it is strongly encouraged you take it so you're ready to continue your math studies when you arrive on campus. If you have undertaken any independent study or certificates in personal finance, economics, statistics, programming, or entrepreneurship, discuss that in your Major short answer.

How does admissions work for Canfield Business Honors (CBHP)?

Applicants interested in BHP must select Business as their first choice. Honors reviewers will have access to everything that you submit on Apply Texas and upload on your My Status Page. They require an expanded resume and one recommendation letter. After submitting Apply Texas, you will also complete the brief Honors Application.

It is important to understand that BHP is both an honors program and a major meaning that there are many required courses throughout your four years at UT. BHP students are the only ones who can declare a double major within Business, for example BHP and a specific discipline like marketing or finance.

A common FAQ I want to address is that applying to honors in no way impacts or influences your regular admissions decision.

They are two totally separate processes: the Office of Admissions decides on regular admissions, while BHP reviewers select their applicants. Since BHP staff selects their applicants, they are very discerning about the types of students they seek and the kind of community they are building.

CBHP is a major where you take courses in most business disciplines. The classes are smaller, with 40-50 students, and are based on the MBA case-study format. Most CBHP students will double major in other business disciplines like finance, management, accounting, etc. CBHP also has dedicated extracurriculars, communities, and student recruitment events.

Admissions to CBHP is extraordinarily competitive. At minimum, you should rank in the top 5%, scoring at least a 32/1450 on the ACT/SAT. The typical admitted BHP student scores a 34/1484 on the ACT/SAT and ranks in the top 1.7% of their class. Many valedictorians and students with perfect exam scores will be denied. The admissions rate is probably around 10 to 15%, but the applicant pool is self selecting. The average CBHP applicant will be much stronger than regular McCombs admission applicants. The average admit will have five or six years of leadership experience with extensive relevant business experience, such as internships, independent projects, or DECA.

One big difference in their process is that CBHP no longer conducts phone interviews. I will wait and see what they do for Fall 2026 applicants. I’m not a fan of interviews and feel that they’re a waste of time, so I support CBHP’s decision not to conduct them anymore.

The CBHP essay

CBHP has changed their essay topic a few times in recent years, but the most recent one asked applicants to discuss teamwork and community with reference to one or two activities in your resume.

“Teamwork and community are pillars of the Canfield Business Honors Program. When reviewing your resume, is there a particular aspect that reflects these values? Tell us more about this experience and how you will bring these values to Canfield Business Honors.”

This question isn’t really different than the regular admissions supplement that asks you to discuss an activity you’re most proud of. The key thing to keep in mind is that CBHP will have access to your regular admissions essays, so it’s essential to discuss either a different activity from that which was mentioned in your regular essays, or to develop another angle in line with teamwork and community for an activity you’ve already discussed.

Here is an example of the recent question about Community:

During my freshman year, my friends and I assisted PB&Joy, an IB student-led club. Students bring peanut butter, jelly, and bread to prepare and deliver sandwiches to Dallas’s unhoused population. Mrs. Thompson is the club sponsor and the kindest, most compassionate teacher I’ve ever had.

PB&Joy became a social thing. Mrs. Thompson often said she felt grateful to spend time together on Fridays after school, and for my friends and me, it was like a transition into the weekend. Sophomore year, I spent more time making sandwiches, and Mrs. Thompson encouraged me to apply for the IB program. Junior year, I was one of 44 students among 1800 to join. I also loved having Mrs. Hunnicutt for Theory of Knowledge, which challenged my pre-existing beliefs while teaching me how to research. I appreciated how she never spoon-fed us the answers but taught us to think critically through the Socratic Method. 

I also became close with my SL Chemistry teacher, Mr. Elkins. Our class had only ten students, which freed up lab resources to find the coefficient of the hydrate in oxalic acid crystals. Instead of following predetermined, step-by-step experiments like sophomore chemistry, he gave us free rein to tinker and discover the results (or not). 

Finally, joining IB allowed me to deepen my commitment and serve as a leader at PB&Joy. I managed a table every week, onboarded younger students, and stayed after everyone else left to help Mrs. Thompson prepare for deliveries. Entering senior year, I’ve taken a more prominent role at PB&Joy. IB is my most important community at school because it provides a close-knit group in class and after school while having access to the resources of the wider school, not unlike BHP’s relationship with UT.

Alternatives to the McCombs School of Business

Finally, since business is so competitive, let’s discuss alternatives. Many applicants choose to seek admission to less selective yet related programs.

Moreover, many current McCombs students eventually change their major to something else because they find that business isn't a good fit for them. There are over 120 majors at UT, yet students often default to business because it seems like the easiest pathway to a stable career.

If you don't feel like you would be competitive for business or it doesn't match your interests, consider these programs:

• Advertising or Public Relations in the Moody College of Communications

• Communication and Leadership in the Moody College of Communications

• Corporate Communications in the Moody College of Communications

• Economics in the College of Liberal Arts combined with McCombs minors in Accounting or Finance

• Human Dimensions of Organizations (HDO) in the College of Liberal Arts

• Computational Engineering in the Cockrell School of Engineering

• Sports Management in the College of Education

• Arts and Entertainment Technology (AET) in the College of Fine Arts

• Actuarial Sciences or Applied Mathematics in the College of Natural Sciences

• Computational Physics in the College of Natural Sciences

• Informatics in the Information School

UT McCombs previously offered a Business Foundations Program certificate but have since discontinued it and replaced it with a Business Minor open to any UT students.

They have a number of other certificate programs in global management, real estate, public policy, and so on that students from any major can pursue.

It also seems they have a Summer Institute for Business Foundations Program open to students from any university, so if you’re aiming for a transfer or want to take UT coursework, it’s worth considering.

Applicants may also be interested in earning certificates once they arrive on campus. Students from any major can pursue Applied Statistical Modeling or Scientific Computation and Data Sciences.

One of my favorite programs open to any UT student is the Bridging Disciplines Program (BDP). BDP allows students to combine coursework outside of their major with research and internships. I completed an International Studies BDP, and business-oriented students may be interested in the Ethics and Leadership in Business, Social Entrepreneurship, or Innovation, Creativity, and Entrepreneurship Certificates.

I hope you’ve enjoyed this post about admissions to the McCombs School of Business. Are you interested in getting help with your UT-Austin application? The easiest way to reach me is by email kevin@texadmissions.com

Interested in maximizing your admissions chances?

The easiest way to reach me is by email kevin@texadmissions.com and to complete this questionnaire for a free email admissions assessment and to discuss pricing and services.

UT Computer science was once nearly-open enrollment

It might surprise you to hear that computer science majors at UT and other top universities have only recently become extremely competitive. During the first year that I worked at UT in 2011, UT CS received fewer than 600 applications and admitted over 50% of its applicants. Back then, petroleum engineering was the most desirable and competitive major since the price of oil was around $100. However, five years later, CS received more than five times the number of applications for around 2,700, but even then, the admissions rate was still over 20%.

UT refuses to make the CS admissions statistics public, but I suspect the range is 10,000 to 13,000 CS applicants in recent cycles while admitting 700 students. A comparison would be with UC Berkeley, who has published their CS stats, and fewer than 4% of their CS applicants get in.

Computer science application numbers have skyrocketed since 2015

Application numbers have skyrocketed in recent years with the emergence of AI, large language models, quantum computing, nanotechnology, and blockchain into the mainstream, making CS an appealing choice. Students and families also see it as a probable way to have a secure, well-paying job that might also offer flexible and work-from-home opportunities. There’s also been an explosion of coding boot camps, programming summer programs, and other opportunities to explore programming and CS outside of school. Specific to UT, Austin is increasingly a hub for prominent tech startups and legacy corporations.

A Computer Science degree no longer guarantees a well-paying, stable career

However, there are genuine concerns about the viability of computer science degrees in the years to come. The emergence of LLMs that program and code well enough that some employers are hiring fewer recent graduates. Hiring rates in 2024 and 2025 of mid-career white collar workers in most industries are at similar levels to those of the 2008 Great Recession. No-code programming allows users like me with no programming experience to make an adequate e-commerce storefront. The varied CS job subreddits seem to be freaking out over their job prospects. As the stock market continues to untether from the real-world economy and availability of “good jobs,” it’s becoming even more uncertain where, what, and whether to study in college. As the data-driven historian Dr. Peter Turchin argues in his book End Times, the US and many countries have too many people with elite degrees, with too few jobs that match their credentials and skill sets.

Overhiring during the pandemic has also led to significant layoffs from prominent tech firms in the previous two years. They’re taking away many cushy perks and work-from-home setups. A recent video, “Why ‘Learn to Code’ Failed,” makes the same argument that the supply and demand for computer science degrees are dysfunctional and don’t match the labor market. An interview in the New York Times with Ross Douthat and Daniel Kokotajlo, “An Interview with the Herald of the Apocalypse,” provides sobering theories about the coming obsolescence of human programmers and software interviews.

I wrote this post in February 2025, and almost every day since, there have been articles like this June 2025 one in The Atlantic, “The Computer-Science Bubble is Bursting.” The author makes the usual points about AI obsolescence and macroeconomic conditions and adds two new claims. First, she notes that AI/ML specialists seeking their first or second job also struggle to find employment in their field. She also observes that computer science enrollment is already declining, even at top 50 universities. Perhaps the bottom rung of the employment ladder is being removed entirely. Like many articles, they call for a return to the liberal arts, which is my personal bias, but this is a non-starter for most STEM-obsessed families.

It may be my confirmation bias, but not a day goes by without alarming articles like this August 2025 New York Times one, “Goodbye, $165,000 Tech Jobs. Student Coders Seek Work at Chipotle.” I’ve even seen shorts about CS/STEM grades from top schools like MIT, UIUC, Cornell, and Princeton struggling to get paid internships during college and jobs after graduation. Official data is increasingly unreliable with the recent firing of the Bureau of Labor Statistics head, yet data compiled by private sources and overall vibes point to an anemic economy and hiring environment.

The NYT article features one 2023 CS graduate who applied to 5,700+ jobs with no offers while providing a big-picture overview:

“Among college graduates ages 22 to 27, computer science and computer engineering majors are facing some of the highest unemployment rates, 6.1 percent and 7.5 percent, respectively, according to a report from the Federal Reserve Bank of New York. That is more than double the unemployment rate among recent biology and art history graduates, which is just 3 percent….

In response to questions from The New York Times, more than 150 college students and recent graduates — from state schools including the universities of Maryland, Texas, and Washington, as well as private universities like Cornell and Stanford — shared their experiences. Some said they had applied to hundreds, and in several cases thousands, of tech jobs at companies, nonprofits, and government agencies.”

‘Just get a CS degree’ isn’t the magic answer today that it was in 2015. Many undergrads, including some of my clients, are applying to graduate school in the hopes of up-skilling or riding out this initial wave of labor market disruptions borne from AI adoption and macroeconomic/tariff uncertainties.

So, even if you’re sold on a CS degree, it might be helpful to try to imagine the world into which you’ll be graduating. It wouldn’t surprise me if the demand for CS degrees decreases in the next decade and shifts to other programs. It would be a cliché to say that if it weren’t true, the careers and most in-demand skills five or ten years from now would be in fields we cannot yet imagine. For example, the Bitcoin white paper was released during my sophomore year at UT in 2008, and now, cryptocurrency is a global industry worth over three trillion dollars. Other examples not on the radar in the late 2000s include biomedical engineering and CRISPR technology, data science and big data, cloud computing, smartphones and the app store, electric vehicles, and privatized outer space industries.

I queried ChatGPT to forecast the most in-demand jobs over the next decade. It referred to a US Bureau of Labor Statistics study and a few other reports to generate the following. Software-related jobs are still likely to increase, but the competition for those college-degree-required jobs is substantially higher compared to those with lower labor supply, like green energy technicians or nurses:

“The fastest-growing U.S. careers requiring a college or advanced degree include Nurse Practitioners (45%), Data Scientists (41.7%), Information Security Analysts (41.4%), Medical and Health Services Managers (36%), Statisticians (32%), Epidemiologists (27%), Software Developers (26%), Occupational Therapy Assistants (25%), Physical Therapist Assistants (26%), Actuaries (23%), Environmental Engineers (15%), Hydrologists (13%), and Urban and Regional Planners (10%), while non-degree yet high-growth green energy roles include Wind Turbine Technicians (60%) and Solar Photovoltaic Installers (48%).”

UT-Austin Alternatives to computer Science

UT-Austin has many programs that are adjacent to computer science. Some of them are more competitive than others. Alternatives that are still pretty competitive include mechanical engineering with an emphasis on robotics and mechatronics, electrical and computer engineering, and aerospace engineering for drones and unmanned flight. Moderately competitive alternatives include the McCombs Management Information Systems program, Statistics and Data Science in the College of Natural Sciences, applied math, computational biology, and physics. The demand for data science and information-oriented careers are likely to exceed software or computer engineering jobs over the next decade.

Somewhat less competitive majors are Informatics, the Arts and Entertainment Technologies (AET) program in Fine Arts, and the new major in the College of Liberal Arts BS in Behavioral and Social Dats Sciences. You can also look at certificates or minors that any major can pursue in statistics and data science, Computational Science and Engineering, applied statistical modeling, elements of computing, quantum information science, and scientific computation.

Still apply for CS/Engineering at Texas A&M and UT-DAllas

I also raise these alternatives to also point out how some of these might fit better for our rapidly changing global economy and technology sectors. If you’re a student who ranks at the very top of your high school class, has a 1500 or higher on the SAT, and has a strong CS-related resume, then you should consider putting UT CS as your top choice. You can also apply for CS or computer engineering at other universities at A&M and UT-Dallas, where your chances are higher, and then try for different first-choice major at UT. Still, it’s a good idea to think more broadly about your future studies and career than computer science since that’s what almost everyone defaults to nowadays.

Interested in maximizing your admissions chances?

One of the most common questions I receive from parents is, “When and how did UT-Austin get so competitive?” They will say, “Back in my day, as long as you didn’t flunk out of school and had a decent SAT, you could gain admission. It didn’t matter what major you chose either.”

This sentiment motivated me to write my first two books, Your Ticket to the Forty Acres and Surviving the College Admissions Madness. The college admissions landscape has changed significantly in a single generation.

For fall 2025, UT Austin received over 90,000 applications for an estimated admissions offer of 16,000. That means UT’s admissions rate is around 17-18%.

In this post, I overview the past 25 years of UT admissions data. I share four reasons why UT is uniquely competitive among flagship public universities in the south. Still, they are part of a larger trend of top 100 universities everywhere becoming more competitive.

You can consult this post to see which rank and SAT scores make each UT major a target.

UT-Austin Admissions Trends since 2000

Consider that for Fall 2001, UT received around 21,000 applications and admitted 15,700 for a 75% admissions rate. When I applied for Fall 2007, UT received around 25,000 applications and offered admission to 14,000 students for a 56% acceptance rate. That’s only an additional 4,000 applicants over a six-year period.

I gained admission to Liberal Arts Honors as a high school senior. I have no doubt that my unimpressive resume and 29 on the ACT with a top 2% class rank would not have been competitive for UT Honors nowadays. I was a first-generation college student at a low-resource high school, but nothing was remarkable about my application.

Changes in the automatic admissions state law

In 2009, UT-Austin confronted an issue where almost all of their spaces for Texas residents were occupied by those guaranteed admission by ranking in the top 10% of their class. The Texas Congress passed SB 175, which modified the automatic admissions cutoff to constitute 75% of admitted Texas residents. For the past fifteen years, the automatic admissions cutoff has gradually decreased from the top 9% to the top 5% starting with Fall 2026 first-time freshman applicants.

For Fall 2012, the first year I worked for UT, the university still wasn’t super competitive. UT received around 31,000 applications for 15,700 admitted students, for an admissions rate of around 50%. Back then, only a few hundred students applied for computer science, and the most competitive major was petroleum engineering because the price of oil was much higher than it is today.

By Fall 2017, UT received over 47,000 applications and admitted 40% of their applicants. That’s still a long way off from today’s 17% admissions rate. For Fall 2020, the last pre-COVID admissions cycle, UT received 53,500 applications, but then by Fall 2022, that number increased to 66,000. UT added 7,000 more applicants the following year for Fall 2023. So, the rate of change has accelerated significantly in the past five years.

One reason UT is becoming increasingly competitive is that a similar number of high-achieving applicants are applying to way more schools. Students today apply to three times as many schools as in 1990, so that’s another way this generation is different from your parents. That’s why application numbers have increased everywhere, and not just at UT. UT is one data point in a much broader trend around the college admissions arms race.

Another reason UT is popular is the significant increase in out-of-state students, especially for STEM and Business majors. Moody Communications is also increasingly popular. Since UT is strong in basically every major, it’s less one-sided than other schools like Indiana, which is well-known primarily for business, or UIUC in computer science and engineering.

I address out-of-state admissions in another video, but the summary is that the out-of-state admissions rate has declined from 40% in 2017 to 5% today. The football team's two great seasons and continued migration to Austin make it an appealing city. Tech and finance firms are increasingly setting up regional headquarters or relocating entirely to Texas. UT and Austin being more attractive appeals to broader populations than a generation ago when Austin wasn’t quite on the radar like it is today. Austin’s population has increased from 780,000 in 2010 to almost a million today. It’s more than doubled since 1990.

A third reason is that more Texas residents are applying for UT than a generation ago. That’s one reason the automatic admissions cutoff has gradually decreased from 10% to 5%. When I worked for UT in the early 2010s, many top high school students in Texas didn’t bother applying.

If you can believe it, many families saw UT as a backup and safety school. Back then, few applicants were denied their first-choice major, unlike today when no class rank or SAT is safe for STEM and business majors. Since Ivy League and equivalent admissions processes weren’t anywhere near as competitive as today, top Texas students were reasonably confident they would get into a top 20 school. However, over the past decade, UT has been seen as a more desirable option and the top choice for many high-achieving students. The game theory and meta have changed because insecurity throughout the education and economic systems means anxious students apply to more schools to hedge their bets. Most students are lucky to gain admission to a single top 50 university.

The final reason UT and universities everywhere are becoming more competitive is aggressive marketing and recruiting techniques. I dedicate a chapter to these corporation-type marketing schemes in my Admissions Madness book. Still, big data and AI allow UT’s marketing and communications teams to target families in more precise ways than ever before. They aim to drive application numbers as high as possible to elevate their prestige on college ranking lists. They spend millions of dollars to elevate UT’s academic and athletics brand. Increased scarcity of spots on campus creates a flywheel effect where more students are denied, leading to more students applying to UT and other top schools.

I hope you enjoyed this overview of how and why UT Austin has become more competitive since the year 2000. The easiest way to reach me is to email directly to kevin@texadmissions.com

Interested in maximizing your admissions chances?

I cover the application requirements and competition landscape for the varied engineering and CS honors programs, along with the combined McCombs School of Business ECB and CSB honors. I finish with a brief discussion of honors essay tips and provide three honors essay examples.

The easiest way to reach me is by email kevin@texadmissions.com and to complete this questionnaire for a free email admissions assessment and to discuss pricing and services.

UT-Austin STEM Honors Competition Stats

First, I want to stress that these honors programs are unimaginably competitive. They are comparable to the nation's top STEM programs at Stanford, Princeton, and MIT. Students admitted to these UT Honors programs often get multiple offers from top 20 universities.

When I worked for UT in the early 2010s, back when UT received fewer than 1,000 CS applicants, the admitted Turing Scholars CS honors students still had perfect academics. A statistic from a Turing admitted student information session a few years ago shared that they deny 85% of their valedictorians. It’s exceedingly rare to gain admission to these programs if you rank outside the top 5% of your senior class or have anything less than straight A’s.

Competitive applicants will rank in the top 1% and score a 1550 on the SAT with a 780 or 800 on the SAT math. You must also have an exceptional STEM resume with deep experiences relevant to your major. That means nobody should expect to get into these programs, partly because most of them are also very small, similar to the other College of Natural Science honors programs like Dean’s Scholars and Health Science Scholars.

Most of you are not competitive - regular stem admission is the goal

I have many clients try for these each year, and despite my cautions and warnings that they are highly unlikely to get in, they apply anyway “just to see if they get in.” Then they’re devastated about inevitably not gaining admission, which distorts their benefits and gratitude for at least getting into regular CS or ECE, which also have admissions rates below 10%. So, there can be real emotional and psychological downsides to applying for honors when it’s likely out of reach. At the risk of sounding overly discouraging, most of you shouldn’t even bother applying to these CS and engineering honors programs. Nevertheless, applying for honors has no impact on regular admissions chances.

honors is one of many ways to have productive ut education

Honors is just one way among many to succeed. Honors also isn't a guarantee of success. UT-Austin is a world-class institution where you can receive a great education that opens doors for your future. The effort you put in, your motivation to push your boundaries, and the network you create matter more for your success and well-being than whether you're in honors or not. It is true that honors programs can open doors throughout your education and perhaps earlier than if you were a non-honors student. However, if you are not offered admission to a Freshman Honors program, there are many options after you arrive on campus especially when you finish your first year.

How to apply to UT-Austin Engineering Honors, ECE Honors, Turing Scholars, ECB, Robotics, Honors, and CSB

There is a brand new Robotics Honors program for Fall 2026 first-time freshman applicants for students applying first-choice to Aerospace Engineering, Computational Engineering, Electrical and Computer Engineering, Mechanical Engineering or Computer Science in the College of Natural Sciences. Here is the link to learn more.

“Why are you interested in robotics? How will this undergraduate robotics program help you achieve your personal and/or career goals? What impact do you hope to make in the field of robotics? Please limit your response to 500 words.”

Engineering Honors is the most straightforward. Refreshingly, they do not require any additional essays or requirements. You simply check the box on the Common App, and any applicant who selects an engineering major as their first choice is eligible.

At least in previous admissions cycles, Engineering Honors used a mechanical process based on the Office of Admissions scores to admit their students. Engineering Honors has always waited until the Office of Admissions finishes their admissions review and outcome distribution process. Basically, they admit the top ten percent or so of admitted Cockrell engineering applicants, perhaps with some distinction for the applicants' first choice major so that there is some major diversity within the program. They also offer scholarships to many, or perhaps all, of admitted Engineering Honors students.

Applicants who select Electrical and Computer Engineering as their first-choice major are eligible for both Engineering Honors and ECE Honors. If they select Business as their second choice, they can apply for the combined ECB honors program. Of all the UT Honors programs, Engineering Honors and ECE Honors make the least difference for the student experience.

Unlike the more involved Plan II, Business Honors, or Dean’s Scholars, ECE and Engineering Honors have few course or curriculum requirements. Some of my ECE clients get into ECE Honors but not engineering honors, and others get into engineering honors but not ECE honors. I honestly don’t know why there is a discrepancy other than to say that decisions are made from separate honors offices. The offices also do not coordinate when they release decisions, with most offers coming out at the end of February.

Like ECE Honors, Turing CS Scholars also doesn’t make as significant of a difference for the student experience compared with BHP or Plan II. Turing CS students take more intensive classes compared to their regular CS peers, but the latter have rigid degree requirements throughout the four years, and BHP students have a leg-up in nationwide career recruitment. It’s also possible for regular CS students to petition to join honors courses, although the probability of getting in off the waitlist is low. Some CS students use this as a “side door” to build their network with Turing and CSB students and potentially make them competitive for a Turing internal transfer attempt at the end of their freshmen year. Finally, Liberal Arts Honors (LAH), which is where I enrolled at UT, is the furthest end of a “rigid versus open-ended” spectrum. LAH students can make as much or as little of the resources as they wish.

I find that families place a hugely disproportionate weight on honors admission or not, which is unfortunate because more than 95% of Turing applicants will get denied. Then they feel disappointed about the non-honors UT CS offer, so don’t be bummed out if you gain regular UT CS admission but don’t get into honors. Nevertheless, if you wish to be eligible for Turing, you must select CS as your first-choice major.

I will discuss the combined ECB and CSB honors programs since they have identical requirements. CSB was created about a decade ago, and ECB more recently. Students in these programs complete the Business Honors major and take case-study-based classes. You can select business first and CS or ECE second and vice versa, but you should select the first choice major that you most want. If you don’t get business or CS as your first choice major, you won’t get the second choice either because CS, business, and ECE are never given as a second major.

ECB and CSB are arguably the most competitive honors programs, partly because the applicant pool is the strongest among any program. Many students have deep, dedicated experiences in business OR STEM, but very few have both. You need exceptional national and international-level accomplishments in both areas. Many of my clients get into Turing, Engineering Honors, or ECE honors, but I have only one or two who have a realistic shot of getting into CSB or ECB each year. I’ve only ever had one student admitted to them, an ECB client in Fall 2025.

UT-Austin STEM Honors Essay Tips and Examples

The prompts for Turing, ECE Honors, ECB, and CSB is basically the same. You have 500 words to share about your relevant experiences and how these honors programs can help you achieve your goals:

Describe your significant activities, employment, and achievements, particularly those relevant to the study of computer science. Also describe your educational and career goals.

The most important thing is to not overlap too much with your regular admissions essays since the Honors departments will have access to your common app. However, since the honors departments review each of their programs separately, it’s okay for there to be overlap between your Turing and CSB honors essays or the ECE and ECB essays.

Your honors essays must add new information beyond the regular admissions essays.

Either develop different experiences not mentioned elsewhere or provide other angles to experiences discussed in the Common App. Since these apps are read by honors staff rather than the more general Office of Admissions, it’s okay to dive deep into technical processes and utilize jargon. You can expect that your readers will have some background technical familiarity.

Your honors essay should utilize a “stick to the facts” approach rather than the storytelling with rhetorical devices approach that’s more appropriate for your Common App main essay. Your objective is to argue convincingly that you have the experiences and aptitudes to excel in UT honors classes and that you will contribute to the honors communities.

UT turing Honors Essay Example (Princeton CS RD Admit)

I attended my first hackathon, TAMUHack, during my junior year with two other teammates. We coded an innovative learning platform in 24 hours and pitched it to judges. Features allowed students to upload lecture videos and receive a suite of learning tools. These tools include condensed notes, practice quizzes, and a Q&A bot trained on the video's context.

Despite my prior focus on front-end development and Java, I quickly learned new programming languages, including Python and ReactJS. Learning Python quickly and only from the documentation was challenging yet extremely rewarding. Additionally, I learned how to integrate GPT-3 into our project, curating prompts that generated quizzes and notes in a JSON format. I also employed Flask to send server requests and render the generated content to the front end.        

Building the project’s frontend posed a challenge. Although I understood web development using HTML, CSS, and JavaScript, we opted for React JS for Tutor AI’s front end. With the help of mentors and online tutorials, I helped build a fully functional website. We presented Tutor AI to the judges, explaining its goals, different tech stacks, and potential impact. We won the best beginner hackathon project among over 800 participants. This experience taught me how to implement a variety of programming languages and technologies while introducing me to varied CS disciplines and fields like AI and FinTech.

My next hackathon experience was at KleinHacks. Four teammates and I competed in the AI category and developed an intelligent AI grader called IntelliGrade AI. We designed it to help users improve essays, product pitches, advertisements, and other types of content. Users upload any content onto the website and either upload a rubric, the intended audience of the content, or the material’s purpose. IntelliGrade AI provided suggestions to improve the content and assign it a numerical score. We tinkered with the GPT-3 API until it worked reliably.

My previous experience in TAMUHack helped with integrating Flask into our project to make server requests. My primary responsibility involved creating a frontend with a seamless user interface, which I built from scratch using an unfamiliar Python-based framework called Pynecone. Navigating the documentation led to many dead ends, but I leaned on my teammates to help lay out the site design and implement our vision in Pynecone. We earned first in the AI category and first overall.

These hackathon experiences, involving both frontend and backend development, have provided me with a well-rounded understanding of CS. At UT, I hope to continue my computer science studies to master full-stack development, computer algorithms, and the theoretical subsets of CS. I hope to pursue an AI and machine learning career to help develop innovative solutions that address real-world challenges. CS classes like Practical Machine Learning and Competitive Programming will complement undergraduate research through the Machine Learning Lab and the TAUR Lab. I’m excited to explore statistical machine learning and natural language processing to prepare me for my future career.

UT turing Honors Essay Example

My first task in Dr. T’s Lab required converting Per4ML Lab’s generated CSV data into an organized HDF5 format, using YAML configuration files. I also analyzed code from the lab’s GitHub repository that produced a low-end visualization and learned the Plotly library to produce clean and functional UIs in Python.

During my sophomore year, I identified correlations in T Lab’s massive datasets by implementing UC Riverside’s Dr. Ver Steeg’s LinearSieve machine learning algorithm. We read Dr. Ver Steeg’s research papers and Python scripts to understand how to pipeline datasets to the algorithm. After generating results, I used NetworkX and Matplotlib libraries to produce informative Node Graph and Parallel Coordinates visualizations. I color-coded for identification and adjusted line thicknesses/node sizes to demonstrate the magnitude of correlations within the data. We compiled these visualizations in a poster presentation for TXST’s REU program.

During the following summer, we collaborated with ABC Laboratory’s Dr. W, the subject-matter expert, to analyze correlations in Dr. T’s data using Circos. This visualization typically displays genomic similarities, where data bins are arranged in a circle connected by chords to highlight correlations.

However, apart from the Plotly documentation for Circos, we found few third-party resources online. I developed a basic understanding of the documentation and created a rudimentary visualization before implementing specific features to improve my visualization. I worked directly with Dr. W, who provided precise, constructive feedback to tweak the visualization, redefine our bins, and adjust the chord width to represent correlation magnitude. We submitted a research paper and poster with our results to the SC23 international conference.

Afterwards, I created a UI that eased interaction with LLMs by allowing users to upload CSV data to a chosen model, enter queries about their dataset, or select a pre-programmed option to summarize their dataset. I learned the CUDA/Pytorch and Transformers tools but encountered novel memory-storage errors. To resolve this, I wrote my code in the unfamiliar Jupyter Notebook and Google Colab software.

This past summer, I fine-tuned LLMs to better respond to queries regarding high-performance computing. I built pipelines to scrape research papers and manuals from Intel, IBM, and Nvidia from Arxiv, Google Scholar, and Google Search Engine. I conducted prompt engineering by inputting the documents into Llama 3 to generate datasets with questions, relevant keywords, context, and answers. Using these datasets, I finetuned Llama, Bert, and GPT LLMs, implementing Quantized Low-Rank Adaptation for optimization. I evaluated the finetuned LLMs using Natural Language Processing metrics like BLEU score. Currently, I am collaborating with Dr. T and her team to compile our findings in a research paper.

I am excited to enroll in Turing because I can collaborate with experienced doctoral candidates and professors conducting cutting-edge research. A smaller program within the larger university will help me make friends, build community, and form relationships with professors beyond my undergraduate degree. My long-term goals are to apply my ML skills and make autonomous software like self-driving cars smarter and more useful.

UT ECE Honors Essay Example

I have been interested in Artificial Intelligence since middle school when I took an introductory course in AI through the Duke Talent Identification Program. Afterward, I completed another two AI courses from IBM and Veritas AI. At school, I completed Computer Science 1 (Python programming), Computer Science 2 (C++ programming), and Computer Science 3 (Python data science). Since my school does not offer it, I self-studied and passed the AP Computer Science A (Java programming) exam.

I also sought opportunities to deepen my knowledge in specific areas of interest, such as space exploration and engineering. I completed the following courses through Johns Hopkins CTY: Colonizing Space: How to Build an Extraterrestrial City, Everything is Connected: Solutions for a Warming World, Engineering Design, and Aeronautical Engineering. Afterward, I explored AI applications in engineering areas like robotics, aircraft, and space exploration.

Since AI is becoming essential in many areas of engineering, such as robotics, aircraft, space exploration, and many others, I started to explore its applications. This led me to complete three research programs. I conducted original research on AI applied to astronomy, where I created machine learning algorithms in Python to identify and classify stars and quasars.

Then, I explored my AI interests by utilizing reinforcement learning as an end-to-end controller for autonomously controlling a drone. Recently, I became interested in AI image recognition technology. I'm conducting original research on deep learning applied to computer vision, developing and training a deep learning model to estimate objects' depth from a flat image accurately.

This summer, I participated in the NASA STEM Enhancement in Earth Science (SEES) Internship, where I analyzed satellite atmospheric PM2.5 pollution data and public transit data. I created Python scripts to investigate the impact of public transportation on urban air quality in five cities, determining the correlation between PM2.5 and transportation variables for each city.

I’m excited about the opportunity to take courses like ECE319H Introduction to Embedded Systems Honors to learn to develop the software of electronic components of complex systems employed in many industries, including automotive and aerospace industries, ECE370N Introduction to Robotics and Mechatronics to learn about actuators, sensors, adaptive control, and vision and pattern recognition, and ECE361E Machine Learning and Data Analytics for Edge Artificial Intelligence, to learn how to implement deep learning on edge devices, such as autonomous vehicles.

I'm interested in conducting research in UT’s Center for Autonomy’s Control and Learning for Autonomous Robotics Group. It includes scientists, electrical, computer, and aerospace engineers, and undergraduate students who work together to design high-performance interactive autonomous systems that involve robotics, control theory, machine learning, and game theory.

Finally, I hope to graduate with a Robotics Minor and to pursue the Integrated Bachelor of Science/Master of Science in Engineering program to earn my bachelor's and master’s in five years while writing a thesis.

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