“UC Berkeley is a reach for all. Not sure why you think it’s less of reach for you than Cornell and Penn.”
This is a myth on CC that needs to be debunked - there are a lot of applicants where UCB is a match, and for a few a safety, I know this is hard to believe, but for the best students in California, this is the case. UCB does not look at ethnicity, legacy, it does have a hook for athletes and possibly first-gen, so the process is more straightforward. OOS is dicier, I agree, but the again the top OOS students with the grades and test scores and rigorous transcript, it can be a match. The issue for top OOS students will be the cost, in that sense it could be a reach.