https://www.reddit.com/r/UBC/comments/14gme8i/what_was_the_math_major_cutoff_i_didnt_get_in_at/
Was going to post a reply on reddit but realised that maybe you guys have thoughts on this situation.
From atom9408:
this is insane. ubc has gotta do something with this.
it must have been the spillover of people who didn't get into cs choosing math and stats as their backup and taking the seats from people who actually went to uni to do math or stats. this is actually ridiculous. another reason why this whole general first year thing is bullshit and harms students.
like i genuinely feel so terrible to have to take part in this system to take seats from other students. first year is a rough adjustment. i don’t know why they make it to be the most important year for science students.
It definitely feels bad but I think it's not the fault of the system, there's just not enough resources to make everyone happy. I would argue making you choose your program when you enter from high school just shifts the time frame and furthermore is a worse predictor of success in university. Of course the ideal solution is to just increase resources in popular faculties, but that's not part of the system.
Also, I don't see the argument for why rejects shouldn't have priority over people who want to do that degree. On the practical side of things, that will just lead to people who want to do CS just try to estimate the admission average and apply to math as their first choice if they don't like their chances. It also really diminishes the point of ranking your specialisations if you know your application is going to get discounted for your second and third choices.
It would be interesting, however, to compare where the marks come from for cs rejects vs people who want to do math as a major. Maybe there's a large population of people who only want CS, and take easy courses to boost their grade. Curbing the effectiveness of that strategy would be a good way to equalize things.
I think it's a fucked up situation that doesn't really have a solution. Would love to hear any ideas y'all have.