Just curious - did your child apply to the less competitive UCs? I don’t know your child’s stats, but I would think that even without the ACT score, there’d be a decent chance of admission at UCR, UCSC, UCD?
FWIW our instate son has a 1500 SAT that we also feel is hurting his chances at the UCs. Before they went test-blind, he had only planned to apply to UCI, UCSD, UCLA and UCB, but once they announced, I told him we need to hedge our bets and apply to more. (he was accepted at UCR, but would choose Cal Poly).
Keeping hope alive for you. This year kinda sucks for all of these kids, but I’m really hoping that it works out the way it’s meant to for each of them.
UT Austin is very tough for OOS students to penetrate indeed. But, it’s definitely not a perfect model either, even for the top in-state kids - the CC UT Austin applicants thread is…interesting. It’s crazy how the decision releases have been handled. Lots of families wondering what happened.
Yes, I was actually thinking of Texas as I wrote that. In my mind that’s more fair than the ELC deal from UC. Even last year before test blind our good friends daughter who was valedictorian, 4.0/4.5 with 1500 SAT got skunked at UC. She’s now at Scripps College, it’s a great school but the top kids in state should absolutely have a spot at a top UC campus.
Seabass927, my son is in the same situation with respect to UCs and the SAT. He managed to take the SAT once before everything shut down and received a 1500. In previous years, that would have provided a slight advantage in UC/CSU admissions (plus he would have taken the SAT again), but this year it means nothing. My 4.2 WGPA son (4.29 CSU) received acceptances to UCSC and UC Riverside, but is still waiting to hear something from SLO and of course the other UCs. It’s all a crapshoot.
Others are stating that Cal Poly and other schools are having to make decisions among a sea of 4.2+ GPAs without much more to go on, I completely agree. I’d be very interested to hear from AOs after this cycle of admissions, I imagine their jobs became much more difficult without having test scores.
From my reading of the UT Austin threads here on CC, I don’t think it is any different than the UC’s/CSU’s. There are a ton of very high stats kids that are getting shut out of their preferred major. It seems this would be identical to getting your last choice of UC’s.
Personally, we are CA residents and waiting on Cal Poly, so seems likely shut out, but accepted to UT CS Turing scholars program. Tons of possible reasons for the discrepancy, so just take it as another data point.
Total crapshoot. Your kid heard from UCSC, mine hasn’t (4.22 CSU/4.52WGPA), but mine was accepted to SLO. He has two high stat friends who have also heard nothing from SLO (applied to aero and comp engineering).
I don’t envy the AOs’ jobs this year. I wonder how many schools across US will remain test-blind or test-optional once normal life resumes.
UT Austin, UNC, and UVA have abysmal OOS admission stats (like half of the in state rate, down to maybe 10-15% OOS), but if you look at the UCs, their OOS stats are twice the in state (in some like 50% OOS). I get that residents of each state pay into the pot for state schools, but I wish there was a sharing process or something where we could go to any State school at the same cost. In the current system, the UCs though in a state with the highest taxes are prob the most expensive for in state students with cost of up to 40K/yr with housing. At that rate some OOS schools cost same.
I agree with @spaceaquarium regarding OOS acceptances and admissions. Look at the UC’s, you will see the same thing. Also far less OOS students apply then in-state so the competition is less intense.
I don’t envy them either. Lots of schools around the US have already said they will be blind or optional for next year and beyond. It sucks the 2021 grads are the experiment class because they’ve already been through so much. My D21 is now just laughing if she gets waitlists or rejections at schools where her numbers are at or well above the stats, because at this point all we can do is have a sense of humor. Her friend who is #2 in a class of over 850 kids got waitlisted at SLO, and she had that pegged as her safety.
Yep, I’ve looked at the OOS UC data with a fair amount of fear and loathing. Different systems are using different approaches, and it doesn’t seem that any of them are totally satisfactory. And you’re right - our high cost to attend even for in-state makes some OOS attractive. U of AZ is cheapest 4-year cost on our kid’s accepted list by almost $30,000 because of the merit aid, and Purdue’s cost is competitive with the more expensive but less desirable UCs.
(sorry if I’ve taken this on a tangent, gumbymom!)
Difficult for CA kids who want to stay in state for whatever reason. Especially CA kids who are set on competitive or smaller majors not offered at all CSUs.
Agreed. UCs really need to re-eval commitment to in state residents and the cost of attendance. There is a reason why many CA kids a fleeing to other states. I looked at Purdue and their tuition has been “frozen” for like 9 years with a total cost of of 42K for OOS. They also have very streamlined access to classes so are not impacted like most UCs, so in the end the cost is likely lower for OOS at Purdue than in state at UCs.
Lot of interesting discussion on schools values, getting waitlisted and acceptances at Top schools, value of test scores etc. These are not easy topics and we all have different sensitivities and some will make us uncomfortable. It is best to just give your opinion and refrain from telling others what’s good about them or not, unless the person has asked to be specifically evaluated or being “chanced”. For example,I get very uncomfortable reading when people say test optional policy is keeping my kid away from top schools. I also understand as parents we want the best for our kids, so if we do not get what we think our kid deserved or should get, there will always be a reason that we’ll have on why my kid did not make it to this school that he/she/they wanted most. That’s who we are as parents and as parents we also like to brag how best my kid is. It is always going be the college’s fault or the process to deny admission to my kid, not my kid’s.
Different systems are using different approaches, and it doesn’t seem that any of them are totally satisfactory. And you’re right - our high cost to attend even for in-state makes some OOS attractive. U of AZ is cheapest 4-year cost on our kid’s accepted list by almost $30,000 because of the merit aid, and Purdue’s cost is competitive with the more expensive but less desirable UCs.