<p>Sorry about your son, but welcome to college admissions. Its just crazy and nothing will EVER make sense.</p>
<p>When I applied 2 years ago, I had Santa Barbra and Riverside as my safety schools and applied to all the big UCs. I ended up getting accepted to Cal, rejected from LA, accepted to SD, rejected from Irvine, accepted to Riverside, and got rejected from SB. (My stats are in a super old post so search for it if you want).</p>
<p>In any case, you should NEVER take any school for granted unless they sent you a letter saying they’d accept you if you applied (which is what Riverside did for me). The admissions process is crazy and a lot of it is subjective</p>