Berkeley: Did I screw up my chance?

<p>In waiting to hear back from my dream school, I can't help but ponder if I made a fundamental mistake in my essay. Alright, I applied to UCSB, UCD, and UCI under the major Political Science With an Emphasis in Public Service. However I also applied to UC Berkeley simply under the Political Science Major since they don't offer a concentration in Public Service. My mistake that I can't stop thinking about is if I should have written "My Major is Political Science" and not "My major is Political Science with an emphasis in Public Service" as I did in my essay which went to all of the above schools. Will the people at Berkeley's admissions see this and say what is this guy thinking? or will they understand I was applying to more than one school with one essay? Honestly, other than that, I think my essay is really good.</p>

<p>It's the #1 cause for rejection according to Newsweek, 2006.</p>

<p>I bet they'll understand. The UC application provides <em>no</em> instructions for sending different essays to different schools, nor is it built to do so. I think you don't need to worry about this at all.</p>

<p>Yea, you will probably get rejected from all of the schools. Better luck next year!</p>

<p>...</p>

<p>I can't see how this would make any difference whatsoever. In fact, Berkeley may look highly upon your interest in public service. </p>

<p>BTW - if you do go to Cal, they have started a Global Poverty and Practice minor with a major public service component.</p>

<p>Yeah I saw that program, it looks really interesting. I am just afraid to get my hopes up high since I get rejected when I applied back in HS. Does anybody know the average transfer GPA of Poli Sci students to Berkeley?</p>

<p>you'll be fine...last year I stated on my essay that I wanted to major in sociology with an emphasis in law and they do not even have a program like that there. It didn't stop me from getting accepted so I don't see a problem with your essay.</p>

<p>btw, Cal is the only one out of your list of schools that actually reads essays for transfer students. The other 3 and especially UCD only read freshmen essays. </p>

<p>you might want to post this thread in the UC transfer forum instead of the regular transfer forum, you might get more feedback...just a suggestion</p>

<p>LOL undecided</p>

<p>alright sounds good, thanks</p>

<p>Central, i don't know the avg. transfer gpa for a polisci major but a berkeley representative told me that a "safe" gpa for people in our major (as i am a poli sci major as well) is a 3.8 adding that social sciences are extremely competitive. </p>

<p>hope this helps.</p>

<p>Aren't social sciences highly competitive too because it also includes the highly impacted major "Social Welfare"?</p>

<p>The only way they'll reject you for that is if you have bad grades.</p>

<p>At least it is only two more weeks until we know.</p>