For most of my high school years I did not really try in school and ended up with a 3.2 GPA. I was more “fascinated” by programming and computers. I am now in my senior year in high school and have recently turned in my applications and my major was Electrical Engineering. I have a vast knowledge of low level programming languages and hardware descriptive languages such as Verilog and VHDL. I decided to apply to UC Berkeley, since it is good for Electrical Engineering. I have many extra-circulars outside of school such as contributing to programming and hardware projects.
Some of the projects that I have done that are:
CPU based on ARM instruction set in Verilog
Antivirus Coded in C++ and UI in QT framework ( I plan on starting my company with this in my freshman year of University)
Developer for a CryptoCurrency
Artificial Intelligence Chat-Bot
etc…
I read over some of the past acceptance letters and I saw students that applied talked about how they loved programming. However, If I got to look over their code I could easily see common errors or bad practice. Also not many students can write wonderful code in a low level language. So considering all of this, would UC Berkeley consider me as an undergrad student?
Look at UCB considers Very Important in their application review:
Berkeley
*
Very important: ACADEMIC GPA, Application essay, Rigor of secondary school record, Standardized test scores
Important: Extracurricular activities, Volunteer work, Work experience
Considered: Character/personal qualities, First generation college student, State residency
Note: Thorough review of academic performance; likely contribution to intellectual and cultural vitality of the campus; diversity in personal background and experience; demonstrated qualities in leadership, motivation, concern for others and community; non-academic achievement in the performing arts, athletics or employment; demonstrated interest in major.
LOR’s by invitation only as of 2017
You might be brilliant when it comes to programming but UCB is a University first and foremost. You need to be able to handle the class rigor including non-programming courses to get a degree.
I have an average SAT score of 1280 . I only took the SAT once and never studied for it.
My secondary schools are, I literally applied to all the UC’s except UC San Diego and 2 state school
My work experience:
I have not really had much except I was an intern at CISCO and was a part time malware researcher.
My Ethnicity: Asian Indian, I am not a first generation student.
Other Achievements:
I have received couple awards(~7) from platforms for reporting bugs in websites.
I have received an award from Mozilla Firefox for reporting a critical flaw in their software.
I have also looked over some programming and electrical engineering work at UCB, to me it does not look that trivial.
AP Classes I have taken:
AP Statistics - Currently enrolled in
AP Calc AB - didn’t bother to take the AP test
AP Chemistry - got a B in the class and a 4 on the AP test
AP Physics - Currently enrolled in
AP Lit
AP Comp Sci
Your SAT score puts at just the 25th percentile for UCB and your GPA is no where close to being competitive. With the # of applicants and competitiveness of the applicant pool, your EC’s and experience does not make up for a lack luster academic performance. Prove me wrong but UCB is a High Reach.
Many successful people come out of many different places. You will probably do very well wherever you wind up going. However, it may not be at what is considered a top tier school.
If you really want to go to Berkeley, go to community college and do very well. Keep the ECs up. It’ll still be a reach to go to EECs but you might as well try.
, I guess the University you attend does not really matters that much anyway imo