<p>blingdoop is right when it comes to UC admissions; my friend equated it to the admissions officers taking the stacks of paper and throwing them down a flight of stairs - the ones that reached the bottom steps were admitted.
In short: it’s so incredibly, frustratingly arbitrary.
People who don’t deserve to get in will get in. People who deserve to get in won’t. It’s so random and almost evil.</p>
<p>My AP Lang/AP Lit teacher, who I regard in the highest of esteems, put it the best way I’ve heard when it comes to the college essays:
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<p>The best advice I have for you, and any future undergrads, is to completely disregard any rejection letters from any college. Just because you didn’t get into LA or Cal doesn’t mean that other people are better than you - it just means that the admissions officer was on crack that day. You will end up where you belong - have faith in that.</p>
<p>If you’re curious, I was accepted to CPSLO, Davis - rejected other UC’s (didn’t apply to Merced, Riverside, or Santa Cruz).
To be honest, my application to UCSB was actually a fluke - at the time of application, I thought UCSB was a horrible school. Once I did research on it, after my rejection from UCSD, I realized that I wanted to go there more than Davis. =]</p>