Getting accepted to a Cal State University as a first-time freshman is becoming more competitive now than it has been in the past.
According to data from the CSU website, the enrollment yield rate of first-time freshman applicants in 2010 was the lowest since 2003, with enrollment decreasing by 5 percent.
Erik Fallis, CSU spokesman, said that it’s not a matter of the CSU increasing its selectivity.
“The base CSU criteria is set for the same level of student performance today as it has been set for decades, but impaction is having an impact on specific campuses because it is shifting that bar,” Fallis said. “And that is changing some access for students.”
Fallis went on to say that students who are accepted to a CSU and do not accept also affect the enrollment yield rate.
Eric Hernandez, who is now a graduate engineering student at CSULB, was accepted to CSULB straight out of high school in 2001. He said that increased requirements for first-time freshman might not necessarily be a bad thing in terms of preparing students for college.
“You don’t really have to try very hard to do well in high school, and in college they obviously have a higher standard,” Hernandez said.
Hernandez, who is set to complete his master’s degree next winter, went through Questioning Understanding and Engaging in Success through Technology (QUEST) at Millikan High School in Long Beach. QUEST is a program designed to prepare students for the competitive admissions processes at the University of California and the CSU.
Hernandez said he wasn’t worried about getting accepted to CSULB. He was so confident that he didn’t bother applying to any other schools.
“I don’t think that thought ever entered my mind,” Hernandez said. “I just didn’t think I wouldn’t get in.”
The path to college was pretty well laid out for those in QUEST, according to Hernandez.
“I didn’t have to worry about not getting the classes because it was a different schedule from the rest of the school, and it was just kind of a sheepish mentality,” Hernandez said. “It was just ‘follow the course’ and there was plenty of help to not do badly.”
For Christina Maurillo, a 19-year-old Laguna Niguel resident, the process of applying to CSULB has been a bit more stressful. Maurillo is currently enrolled at Saddleback College in Mission Viejo and hopes to transfer to CSULB in fall 2013.
“I was actually really nervous about applying because I heard that they’re cutting back on how many people are actually getting in,” Maurillo said.
Maurillo said she originally planned on starting school in the fall but couldn’t complete the units necessary in time for the deadline.
“I was taking six classes this semester, and within the first week I was dying so I dropped one,” Maurillo said. “I thought you could take them in the summer before going into school.”
Although Maurillo only has two classes to take before the next application deadline, she is looking at the positive side of it.
She hopes to begin working toward getting her pilot’s license in the summer and eventually become a commercial pilot in the future.