Chance me please! (unusual circumstances) - Stanford, UCSC, UCLA

Chance Me / Match Me!
1

Hi, everyone! So, I have a chronic illness that killed my grades and kept me from attending school during my early high school career. I was forced into special ed from second semester freshman year all throughout sophomore year. All the classes I took during this time are marked on my transcript as “modified”. I barely have enough credits to graduate. I’m not allowed to take AP/honors classes because I’m missing prereqs so I’m taking college classes this year. Things are going much better now but the damage has already been done. There aren’t a lot of stats out there for others in similar situations, so it would be immensely helpful if you could help me determine my chances of getting into these schools.

Tests:
-SAT: 1500
-ACT: 32
-Math 2: 770

Cumulative GPA: 3.4 / UC GPA = 3.7
-Freshman: 3.1 (one D-, several Cs)
-Sophomore: 3.3 (only finished 2 classes)
-Junior: 3.8
-Senior: 4.2 W/3.7 UW so far

Other:
-One rec is amazing, other was written in broken English
-Attending competitive Cali public school
-200k income
-White/Asian girl

ECs:
-Made a few apps/wesites, won regional award for one with 10k+ downloads, attended hackathons at prestigious colleges
-Volunteer coder at top site with 200M views/year (12)
-Classically trained pianist since age five, composer, producer, multi-instrumentalist (9-12)
-First chair flute in school’s top band (10-12)
-VP/co-founder of Anime club (12, lmfao rip)

Senior year classes:
-College: Calc II, Multivariable on MIT OpenCourseWare (couldn’t register for the actual class), English, Mandarin
-Regular HS: Physiology, Economics, U.S. History, Advanced Band

Schools:
-UCs: Santa Cruz, Davis, Berkeley (requested LORs), UCLA (requested additional info)
-Privates (pls don’t laugh): Stanford, Hopkins, UChicago, Case Western, Colby College, Lewis & Clark

So far rejected from Hartwick College (lol), accepted to Whitworth w/18k merit. If I don’t get into a good school, I might take a year off to build up my resume and reapply. Back up plan is either community college, trying for a tech job, or starting a startup. What do you guys think?

I would be eternally grateful if you could give me some insights on my chances at these schools. Thank you so much for your help!!!

2

ucs will be tough bc of gpa, thats their primary focus
I feel like stanford, hopkins or uchicago might accept you because of very interesting circumstances, but do not count on it, still an average/low chance bc of gpa

3

@kjake2 Thanks. I’ve heard the UCs are pretty holistic, I was hoping they’d overlook my GPA some but we’ll see

4

Bump

5

While UCs use holistic admissions reading, HS GPA is probably the most important aspect of your application (even more so than at other colleges).

https://www.universityofcalifornia.edu/infocenter/freshman-admissions-summary indicates that in 2015, applicants with 3.40-3.79 HS GPA had 3% admission rate to UCLA and 47% to UCSC.

6

@ucbalumnus Well that’s a bummer. Thank you for sharing that information though. Better to be let down now than later lol

7

My UC GPA in only non-modified classes is 4.0 though… IDK whether they’ll calculate my GPA using all classes or just the non-modified ones

8

All a-g subject courses starting 10th grade will have their grades counted for UC GPA calculation.

9

UC’s will be very tough because of their focus on GPA. That said, it might be worth submitting a letter from your guidance counselor or another adult who can explain the circumstances around your low GPA. I would find some other schools (safeties) that you are more likely to be accepted to.

Best of luck!! Chance me back? http://talk.qa.collegeconfidential.com/what-my-chances/1967907-chance-me.html#latest

10

@ucbalumnus That’s the thing though…IDK if they’re a-g courses. I had to manually enter “MODF [class]” instead of choosing it from my school’s classes on the application but I emailed their admissions department earlier to see if my modified classes made me eligible for admission and they said yes

11

@politicsdancegal Thank you! It’s kinda late for those options, I’m a senior but I’m not too worried because I’ve already gotten in somehwhere