School & Group Visits
Welcome Teachers, Counselors, Advisers, & Community Organizations!
This page is intended for Washington State teachers, high school counselors, community college advisers, and community organizations with an interest in connecting their K-12 and community college students with the Allen School and learning more about the Allen School admissions process.
The Allen School is excited to offer multiple ways for your school to engage with us! In the School Visit Opportunities section of this page, you can learn all about inviting us to your school or program or bringing students to campus! We also want to make sure that you can provide accurate and up-to-date advising to your students who may be applying to our program.
The best way to learn more about the admissions pathways is by visiting our Direct-to-Major (High School Student) or Transfer Student pages. On this site, you can learn about the differences between application pathways and any recent changes to our admissions processes.
School Visit Opportunities
We are so glad that you are interested in scheduling a school visit with us! This section outlines the types of opportunities that we are currently able to offer but if you have an idea for something that is not listed, please let us know and we will do our best to accommodate it if we have the capacity to do so. School visits are hosted by the Undergraduate Diversity & Access team and our mission is to attract and educate the next generation of outstanding computer scientists and computer engineers who reflect the many dimensions of diversity in Washington State. While we will accommodate as many visit requests as we can, our priority is for schools and groups that serve students from backgrounds that are underrepresented in computing. Note that many of these opportunities are only available during the academic year (October – May). Please reach out to outreach@cs.washington.edu with any questions!
Description of visit options
This opportunity is for schools and programs that are already hosting a college or career fair. We are happy to travel to your location in Washington State or attend virtually if we are available. We have standard tabling materials but please let us know if there is any specific information you would like presented. Please note that we are unable to help with the planning of these events.
Our recruitment team offers classroom visit presentations that introduce prospective students to the UW’s Computer Science and Computer Engineering majors by highlighting the career opportunities and real-world impact of a computing degree, showcasing the student experience in the UW’s Allen School, and helping prospective students get connected with admissions counseling resources. These presentations are available for either both high school or community college students and are primarily intended for future first-generation college student audiences. We are happy to travel to your location in Washington state or present virtually!
The Allen School is able to welcome middle, high school, or community college students to campus for field trips. Programming may include building tours, research lab tours, computing workshops, and recruitment activities such as student panels or information sessions. You will be asked to indicate your interest in these activities in our school visit form but we cannot guarantee that all of these activities will be available during your visit. Please note that we are unable to accept field trip requests with over 90 students and that schools & community groups are responsible for providing chaperones for their field trip.
Our K-12 Outreach Student Ambassadors are available to present one of several educational activities for middle school and high school students to learn more about computing. Our computing-related lessons include a Machine Learning & Algorithmic Bias lesson, a Computing in Practice presentation covering the real-life implications in computing (a great lesson for students who are new to computing!), and a Diversity, Equity, Inclusion, and Access (DEIA) in Tech lesson series. We also offer “Day in the Life” Presentations or Student Panels will give your students a glimpse into a day in the life of a college student in computing.
Application at a glance
- Apply through the Direct-to-Major (freshman) Admission pathway
- Submit one application that is reviewed by the Office of Admissions
- Autumn Start Only
- Apply through the Direct-to-Major (freshman) Admission pathway
- Submit one application that is reviewed by the Office of Admissions
- Prerequisite coursework is not required
- All courses that are listed in the UW Equivalency Guide will transfer
- Autumn Start Only
- Apply through the Transfer Admission pathway
- Submit two applications: the UW Transfer Application (reviewed by the Office of Admissions) and the departmental supplemental application (reviewed by a committee of Allen School faculty and staff)
- Prerequisite coursework must be completed by the departmental supplemental application deadline
- All courses that are listed in the UW Equivalency Guide will transfer
- Courses from 4-year and out-of-state institutions may transfer if the school was regionally accredited but we are unable to evaluate transfer credit from these schools until a student is admitted. Students should compare descriptions in our course catalog with those at their previous institution
- Transfer applicants from Washington State Community or Technical colleges receive priority in admissions
- Admissions cycles available to begin in Autumn or Spring quarters
- Students can enter our majors after they have already enrolled at the University of Washington, however this pathway is especially competitive so we do not recommend it for students who already know that they would like to study computer science or computer engineering before coming to UW
- Learn more about the Current UW Student pathway
Allen School Admissions News
Spring Quarter 2022: A Change in the Prerequisite Deadline
New this year, all transfer students to the Allen School are required to have their prerequisite coursework completed by the departmental supplemental application deadline. This policy went into effect for Spring 2022 admissions. For the first two admissions cycles, we considered prerequisite exemption requests on a case-by-case basis. We will continue to have an exemption request process, however the criteria needed to gain an exemption will increase and students are strongly encouraged to wait until they are academically prepared to apply.
Autumn Quarter 2021: Computer Engineering Joins the Direct-to-Major Pathway
Effective for the freshmen class of 2021, applicants who select Computer Engineering as their first-choice major on their UW freshman application are considered for Direct to Major (DTM) admission into the Allen School instead of Direct to College (DTC) admission in the College of Engineering. Although computer engineering is an engineering degree, it is housed in the Paul G. Allen School of Computer Science & Engineering. Aligning admissions for the computer engineering and computer science majors provides greater transparency to applicants who intend to pursue either or these majors.
All freshman applicants who meet UW admissions criteria and who select Computer Science or Computer Engineering as their first-choice major on their application will be considered for DTM admission in the Allen School. The UW Office of Admissions will offer Direct to Major admission based on a holistic review that includes established criteria and selection guidelines developed in partnership with the Allen School.