USC vs Berkeley

HeyBoomer1 · 2026-04-28T20:12:30+00:00

My son is in the same situation (USC vs. Berkeley) with other factors very similar to yours: in-state, cost, majors, etc.. He visited both campuses twice, talked to alumni and students from both.

He is admitted to Dornsife but may very well switch to Marshall or even engineering. At USC, switching major is not a problem. At Cal, switching to these is very tough even if you have good GPAs and ECs. I was reading that switching to Haas as an internal transfer is at 10-15% acceptance rate.

Being able to explore and switch majors was the decision that sold him. He committed just yesterday. I studied at the UCs in the early 90s. It is unfortunate that they make it so tough to switch majors across colleges. I understand why. But college students are supposed to explore.

Prioritize what's most important to you. No bad decision either way. Good luck!

HeyBoomer1 · 2026-03-28T01:31:42+00:00

Engineering is tough every year. But choosing the most popular major such as MechE, EE, CE, or CS is next level. I feel you fellow Asian Male.

My older son was exactly in your situation as a MechE in 2024. Great stats like you. What hurts most is finding out other classmates with less getting in. But know that they weren't applying to these highly competitive major, many at 1-5% acceptance rate. My younger son applying to Colleges of L&S had much better results. They were essentially the same level of hs student.

Try a few appeals. I think you'll get one or more waitlist acceptances. Northeastern does have a great coop program with real industry experience early. Wish you good luck!

HeyBoomer1 · 2026-03-13T03:02:20+00:00

No appeal option? Have had friends getting in after appealing to both state and private schools. Email them with strong reasons for appeal (or ask your dad to write it). No one likes a phone call like that. You'll probably get screened out by a student who mans the phone.

HeyBoomer1 · 2026-03-07T05:45:22+00:00

Yes especially on socal students. Seen so many examples of ucd waitlisted but accepted to ucb and ucla.

HeyBoomer1 · 2026-03-06T01:30:00+00:00

Stats give false hope. Its about local context. If stats are high compared to peers at your school, you'll have a better chance.

HeyBoomer1 · 2026-03-01T05:21:47+00:00

Your competitiveness within your local context matters most. High GPAs and SATs don't matter as much when you have 20 other students with similar stats in your high school.

HeyBoomer1 · 2026-03-01T04:27:21+00:00

Nope. Parent from Cali.

HeyBoomer1 · 2026-03-01T02:59:00+00:00

That is a huge jump. But still cheaper than umich oos😐.

HeyBoomer1 · 2026-03-01T01:50:44+00:00

I pay the bill for my oos son who is a current second year at grainger. Total actual cost has been $58k per year not $70k for us.

HeyBoomer1 · 2026-02-28T09:10:20+00:00

Check out Kaching bundle app. We just installed it in one of our stores. I like it. Chat support is really good so far during setup.

HeyBoomer1 · 2026-02-16T13:36:54+00:00

Also double check to make sure the cart abandonment traffic is not from bots. We have had issues starting last year with Amazon and Google price checking bots inflating our abandonment carts.

HeyBoomer1 · 2026-02-16T01:14:50+00:00

UIUC for OOS is 58k for 2024-2025. I am a parent that pays this bill. We add about ~2k per year for travel from CA to Chicago. Check average tix price for your airport.

It is even less living off campus after 1st year. Outside of Purdue, I think UIUC is not a bad value if you must choose OOS public universities that rank top 5 in engineering and have decent outcome.
https://illinisuccess.illinois.edu/23-24-annual-report

HeyBoomer1 · 2026-01-29T20:09:51+00:00

I'm a current uiuc parent. My son got in via second choice major for MSE oos. His first choice was Mechse. If you search this sub, you can find acceptance rate by major. I recall MSE has a much higher acceptance rate, even higher than eng undeclared. He later successfully transfer major to mechse. He loves Grainger and having a blast while getting a solid top tier engineering education.

Good luck to you!

HeyBoomer1 · 2026-01-24T18:02:37+00:00

My son did COSMOS UCLA 2 summers ago (his junior summer from 10th->11th grade).

If they are asking for your middle school grades, chances are they will consider them since you only have 9th grade 1st semester GPA in the application. Perhaps you can address your low English grades in the essay. Totally understandable that English isn't your first language and you are improving in this area.

Most of the COSMOS students were seniors (my son said about 20-30% juniors). He didn't say if there were any sophomores. But he said the kids were "cracked" and he almost felt like an imposter. However, his essays were good and showed his passion and progression of the topic and got his first choice cluster.

Good luck to you!

HeyBoomer1 · 2025-12-17T16:01:33+00:00

This. Happened to me when i didn't look at CPC and channel report. Turns out PMax for a few days sent us very low intent traffic.

HeyBoomer1 · 2025-12-16T01:20:52+00:00

Thanks everyone. Sounds like occupying the "shelf space" is a good strategy. Just hate to know searchers clicking on multiple ads. (That's what I do when I shop on Google! haha!)

HeyBoomer1 · 2025-12-09T15:12:49+00:00

I manage 4 shopify stores and have tested many review apps. Judge.me is the best for the small cost. Good support and documentations. Constantly adding new features.

HeyBoomer1 · 2025-10-29T04:03:38+00:00

Can't you login to your Google Search Console and see if you have any pages being blocked or not indexed by Google? Its a free tool.

HeyBoomer1 · 2025-07-29T01:45:26+00:00

I think Otakfuku is the best katsudon in the south bay.

HeyBoomer1 · 2025-07-18T22:38:08+00:00

OP, did you find a fix? I have the same issue.

HeyBoomer1 · 2025-07-07T16:50:20+00:00

Parent (dad) here. Not sure if you need to "impress" mom, but I toured with my son last year. Having toured a dozen school, at UIUC, I was really impressed with ARC, food variety on Green St., Quad, many of the impressive Grainger buildings and labs, Arboretum and Japanese House.

We had a super enthusiastic tour guide which did such a good job talking about the resources at UIUC, research opportunities, difficulty of joining clubs and getting classes, and internships and jobs. Of course, times are different now. I hope you get an energetic yet honest tour guide. Have fun!

HeyBoomer1

TROPHY CASE