Admissions data from the Cal Poly Office for Institutional Research indicates that some of the hardest majors to get into for incoming freshmen include highly impacted disciplines like Psychology, Biological Sciences, Aerospace Engineering, and Software Engineering. Because the university utilizes a strict major-specific selection process where applicants apply directly to a designated program, popular STEM and high-demand social science majors face extraordinarily low applicants-to-seats ratios, often requiring near-flawless academic records and weighted GPAs well above 4.0 for successful admission.