1. Emphasize Hardships and Challenges Overcome in UC Essays: The UC’s want you to place your grades from 10th and 11th grade in context. For example, if you had a bad semester due to hardship, including an environment that discouraged educational goals and aspirations, being forced to take care of a younger sibling, commuting an hour or more to school, having to provide translation services for a parent that does not speak English, and this impacted your grades, address this in one of the UC essays or in the Additional Comments Field. The UC’s take into account obstacles overcome and this will place in context the admission committee’s evaluation of your UC-weighted GPA.
2. The Parts are Greater than the Sum: Unlike the Ivies and other elite private universities, the UC’s admit well-rounded students and not specialists. Since the UC’s use an aggregate point rating system where points are added for extracurricular activities, leadership positions, hardship overcome and academic achievements, the parts are greater than the sum. Because of this, it’s important to mention in the UC essays what leadership positions you held within organizations, your academic accomplishments, specific achievements, etc. You want to accumulate as many points as possible in the UC essays by using a kitchen-sink approach to talking about accomplishments and achievements.
3. Be Well-Rounded but Have a Theme: The UC’s admit well-rounded students, but that doesn’t mean your application shouldn’t have a theme. The best UC applications still have a theme that serves as an umbrella connecting all the activities. For instance, if you are class president and an Eagle Scout, talk about what leadership characteristics connect the activities you performed for both.
4. Applying to Letters & Science Versus College of Engineering: You need a higher UC Weighted GPA to gain admission to the College of Engineering than to Letters & Science. For those who are interested in majoring in computer science or engineering, this means you have to determine first whether your Weighted UC GPA is more competitive in Letters & Science or in the College of Engineering. For those with lower UC Weighted GPA’s, we recommend applying to Letters & Science, taking the prerequisite computer science/engineering courses then applying for internal transfer to the College of Engineering.
5. Maximize your UC Weighted GPA: The UC Weighted GPA is the single most important metric determining admission to the UC’s. Because of this, we recommend that students maximize the number of AP and Honors courses they can earn A grades in during 10th and 11th grade.
6. Show Depth of Involvement in Extracurricular Activities: The UC’s admit well-rounded students, but they still want to see depth of involvement in 2-3 main extracurricular activities. This means it’s more advantageous to hold several leadership positions and show 4 years of involvement in 2-3 activities than it is to be a serial joiner who quits activities after a year or two.
7. UC’s have Top Engineering Programs Outside of UC Berkeley: When engineering firms hire, they care more about performance than pedigree. Google will hire a computer science graduate from UC Santa Barbara who finished top third over a computer science graduate from UC Berkeley who finished bottom half. The UC’s have many top-ranked engineering programs outside UC Berkeley and UCLA, including UC San Diego, UC Santa Barbara, UC Irvine and UC Davis. Don’t limit yourself to just Cal and UCLA for engineering.
8. Don’t Pick a UC Based on Premed Reputation: When medical schools admit applicants, they don’t factor in the difficulty or the prestige of the undergraduate institution you attended – a 3.9 GPA from UC Berkeley is the same as a 3.9 GPA from UC Santa Barbara, even though it’s harder to get a 3.9 premed GPA at UC Berkeley. Pick the UC you can see yourself succeeding at academically and graduating with a high GPA (3.8+). For most students, this will mean that UC Santa Barbara will give them a higher shot of medical school admission than UC Berkeley.
9. Getting Off the UC Waitlist: To get off the waitlist at the UC’s, you must write a letter of continued interest highlighting circumstances that came to light after you submitted your application. This can include a late-diagnosed learning difference that places your UC Weighted GPA into context or having to stay near home to take care of a sick relative. The LOCI must highlight an extenuating circumstance not previously disclosed in the submitted application.
10. Don’t Pick a UC Based on Prelaw Reputation: When law schools admit applicants, they don’t factor in the difficulty or the prestige of the undergraduate institution you attended – a 3.9 GPA from UC Berkeley is the same as a 3.9 GPA from UC Santa Barbara, even though it’s harder to get a 3.9 GPA at UC Berkeley. Pick the UC you can see yourself succeeding at academically and graduating with a high GPA (3.5+). For most students, this will mean that UC Santa Barbara will give them a higher shot of law school admission than UC Berkeley.
All of our blog posts are written by Former College Admission Officers who serve as members of our admission consultant team.
