Honors Program

2025 EECS Alumni Honors Event

EECS Honors Program

The EECS Honors Program is designed to provide very talented undergraduate students interested in undergraduate research. Honors students pursue an academic concentration outside of the department, engage in research, receive a special faculty advisor, and are invited to special events with faculty and EECS Honors alumni.

Current Honors Students

Benefits

  • Option to complete honors thesis and receive letter-graded research units
  • Official notation of honors degree on Berkeley transcript*
  • Faculty Advising with Chairs of the EE and CS divisions
  • Annual event with alumni
  • Membership in the Honor Program LinkedIn group with program alumni

Contact

EECS Honors Program Coordinator
205 Cory Hall
eecs-advising@eecs.berkeley.edu


Info Session Slides

Admissions Requirements

  • At least 45 units completed at UC Berkeley if admitted as a first-year student. At least 12 units completed at UC Berkeley if admitted as a Junior Transfer.
  • Minimum overall and technical GPA of 3.7
  • Declared in EECS, ECE, or Computer Science major.
  • Must be a part of the Honors program for at least one year – Applying in Spring 2026 means graduating in Spring 2027 or later.
  • Students must have lower-division major requirements completed or in progress.
    • For EECS: CS 61A/B/C, CS 70, ELENG 66/64 (formerly EECS 16A/B)
    • For ECE: CS 61A/C, Math 54, ELENG 66/64 (formerly EECS 16A/B)
    • For CS: Math 1A/B, CS 61A/B/C, CS 70 (or Math 55 if DM in Math), Math 54 or ELENG 66 (formerly EECS 16A) or Math 56 (Linear Algebra [Math 91 Fall 2022])*
    • Junior transfer students may apply without CS 61C completed.
  • Submit the online EECS Honors Application Form
  • Applications are accepted in Fall and Spring semesters only. They should include a resume, a proposed Program Planning Form, and an essay explaining the student’s motivation for applying and interest in their proposed breadth area.
    • Essay. This essay is an important part of your application and should be carefully organized and well-written. The essay should address both: a) How your proposed breadth courses will address a unifying theme and your area of interest. b) Your educational goals, including any applicable work and research experience, and future research interests. Maximum length: 3000 characters.
  • In the form, applicants will need to attach the following supporting documents:
  • DEADLINE for Spring 2027 Admission: Wednesday, December 9th at 4 pm PT
  • The committee evaluates applications for various signs of aptitude, including a well-written essay, grades, above-average course loads, sincere commitment to a breadth area outside EECS, and an interest in undergraduate research.
  • Fulfill all Bachelor’s degree requirements for Computer Science, EECS, or ECE Degree.
  • Maintain a 3.50 cumulative and technical GPA.
  • Complete at least four units of “Supervised Independent Study” or other approved research credit.
  • Study in a breadth area outside the EECS department, consisting of at least three upper-division courses (totaling at least 10 units)
    • These courses may be taken in a single department, or in related departments if they address a unifying theme. Explanation of the breadth interest is part of the honors application; these courses may be changed later by petition only.
    • Cross-listed courses with CS/EE/EECS are not allowed.
    • These courses must be taken for a letter grade.
  • Honor Students have the option to complete an Honor Thesis. Senior thesis expectations and grades will be agreed upon by the student and their sponsoring faculty. Students should then enroll in four units of EE H196 or CS H196 during their senior year. They may complete these units for a letter grade.  Honors Thesis Form. Please note students must complete at least four units of “Supervised Independent Study” or other approved research credit before pursuing the Honors Thesis.

Check out the EECS Honors FAQ!

Honors Program Class of 2026

We’re so proud of our new graduates! Here’s a peek at where a few of them are headed next:

  • Yash Aggarwal, Algorithm Developer at Hudson River Trading
  • Joy Barsoum, Stryker Medical Device Engineer Rotational Program
  • Avery Chen, Stanford MS in Computer Science
  • Siddharth Chilamkur, MS at Columbia University
  • Imra Dawoodani, AI Engineer at a startup
  • Alex Frantzis, Internships at Apple and Degenkolb, followed by seeking work before applying during the next PhD cycle
  • Atharva Gupta, MS in Computer Science at Georgia Tech
  • Abraham Hsu, Software Development Engineer at Amazon
  • Nyx Iskandar, Founding Research Engineer at Foam
  • Terry (Taehan) Kim, PhD in EECS at MIT
  • Braden Leung, Software Engineer at Google
  • Sophia Liu, MS in EECS at UC Berkeley
  • Apollo Loh, Master’s in Computer Science at ETH Zurich
  • Thomas Lu, PhD in Computer Science and Engineering at the University of Michigan
  • Steven Luo, PhD in the School of Computer Science at Carnegie Mellon University
  • Jason Machle, Software Engineer at Everpure
  • Arfa Momin, Graphics Fellow at The New York Times
  • Socrates Osorio Diaz, OpenAI
  • Richik Pal, Software Development Engineer at Amazon Q
  • Sam Poder, EECS 5th Year Master Program
  • Swetha Rajkumar, MS in Computer Science at Stanford
  • Kailash Ranganathan, Research Engineer at Baseten
  • Ahmed Shakil, EECS 5th Year Master Program
  • Aneri Sheth, Solutions Architect at NVIDIA
  • Stella Song, CoreOS Software Engineer at Apple
  • Sriram Srivatsan, PhD at Cornell University
  • Surya Tallavarjula, PhD in Physics at Stanford
  • Catherine Tan, Software Engineer
  • Raymond Tsao, EECS 5th Year Master Program
  • Garima Upadhyay, Software Engineer
  • Sylvie Venuto, New Graduate Software Engineer at Databricks
  • Aakarsh Vermani, PhD in Computer Science at Stanford
  • Chloe Shen Yi Wong, EECS 5th Year Master Program
  • Christopher Zavala, PhD in Bioengineering at UC Berkeley–UCSF
  • Jiayi Zhang, Software Engineer
  • Tyler Zhao, Data Scientist at Zoox
  • Jennifer Zhao, PhD in Computer Science at NYU
  • Wesley Zheng, EECS 5th Year Master Program

Honors Student Achievements

Including but not limited to:

  • Yash Aggarwal (2024), Arthur M. Hopkin Award
  • Nitish Dashora (2023-24), Goldwater Scholarship and (2022-23), Astronaut Scholar
  • Simon Zirui Guo (2022), Arthur M. Hopkin Award
  • Chase Norman (2022), Selected to participate in the Heidelberg Laureate Forum (HLF)
  • Anjali Kantharuban (2022), Gates Cambridge Scholarship
  • Jennifer Grannen (2021),  Timothy B. Campbell Innovation Award
  • Simon (Xuanlin) Li (2021), Arthur M. Hopkin Award
  • Leyla Kabuli (2021), Arthur M. Hopkin Award, University Medal
  • Danny Halawi (2021), Eugene L. Lawler Prize
  • Eden McEwen (2020), Goldwater Scholarship and the SPIE Education Scholarship
  • Candy Xu (2020), Jim and Donna Gray Endowment Award
  • Ahad Rauf (2020), Warren Y. Dere Design Award and NSF GRFP Fellowship
  • Matthew Yeh (2020), Arthur M. Hopkin Award
  • Russell Mendonca (2020), Finalist for the CRA Outstanding Undergraduate Researcher Award