Cal Poly turned away 12,500 students with a 4.0. Here’s who made the cut for fall 2020
Cal Poly San Luis Obispo turned away 12,500 first-time freshman applicants with a grade-point average of 4.0 or higher as the university sifted through applications to select the fall 2020 freshman class.
The group of students offered admission had an average GPA of 4.10 and 1379 SAT score, according to a preliminary report from the university’s Admissions Office.
This year’s applicant pool wasn’t the largest its ever been — 52,373 high school students applied for the upcoming fall quarter compared to 54,663 in 2018. Still, admissions data confirms competition remains strong, and thousands of capable students still didn’t make the cut.
That’s particularly true for the College of Engineering, which accepted 5,196 potential first-time freshman out of 17,540 who applied. The average GPA of engineering students selected is 4.15 with an average SAT of 1440.
Two of every three first-time freshman students to apply were not offered admission.
The profile is different for transfer students. Of 10,893 who applied, 2,083 students with an average GPA of 3.45 were accepted to transfer to Cal Poly in fall 2020.
The most competitive college among transfer students is Orfalea College Of Business, which turned away nearly 85% of those who applied this year.
Now, it’s up to those transfer and first-time freshman students to decide which university they will select. May 1 is the deadline for admitted applicants to respond with their decision — and that process looks a little different this year.
Campus tours go virtual for coronavirus
Would-be students usually have the opportunity to visit campus to help make a decision about where to attend. That’s not an option while the campus is shutdown as a result of the San Luis Obispo County and statewide shelter-at-home order that effectively flattened the curve of confirmed COVID-19 cases.
Instead, newly admitted and waitlisted students attended a Virtual Open House on Friday and Saturday.
According to university spokesman Matt Lazier, that included “a virtual tour, virtual information sessions, opportunities to connect with students, faculty and staff directly and much more.”
Prospects could sign up for a chat session with a current Cal Poly student or take virtual tours of several colleges.
The university also had a full phone-a-thon campaign to reach out to prospective students and answer their questions directly, Lazier said.
