Current sophomore: Increase my chances for Berkeley?

Applying to College
1

<p>Hello,</p>

<p>I'm a sophomore in high school at a small public school in Idaho (<200 in my class) and I really want to increase my chances of getting into Berkeley and other top colleges.</p>

<p>GPA: 4.0 (so far, hopefully keeping it that way)
I took the PSAT and without any preparation got a 206, which is okay, leaves room for improvement.</p>

<p>I'm pretty disappointed about my school's AP offerings. In total, there are three AP classes. One spanish class, one french class, and one senior English class. All the rest of the advanced classes are either titled "Accelerated" or "Honors." Will colleges (such as UC, who recalculates GPAs using their system) weight these in my GPA? My guess is no, but maybe. Here is a brief synopsis of my past and planned schedules:</p>

<p>9th grade: Accelerated English, Earth Science, Geometry, PE (required), World History II, Advanced Computer Applications, Publications. Unfortunately, the only advanced class offered in 9th grade was Accelerated English. I took Algebra I and II in 7th and 8th grade respectively, and had these added to my transcript as well.</p>

<p>10th grade (this year): Speech (required) / Gifted and Talented Internship, Accelerated Biology, Wellness (required), Trigonometry, Business Technology, French 1, Accelerated English. Once again, I am enrolled in all of the advanced classes that are offered.</p>

<p>Statistics class at local university over the summer, as well as a French camp and possibly Ecology Project.</p>

<p>11th grade: Honors Chemistry, Calculus, US History (dual enroll, or possibly AP, which will be added if enough people sign up), Honors English, French 2, Drawing (to satisfy Berkeley's 1 year of arts requirement), Economics / Gifted and Talented Internship.</p>

<p>Possibly taking a computer science class during this summer.</p>

<p>12th grade: AP Physics (apparently it will be offered soon), AP World Literature, AP French, US Government, Environmental Science / Gifted and Talented Internship, Calculus II and III (at a local university), possibly a computer science class.</p>

<p>I am also involved in the following extra-curricular activities:</p>

<p>Idaho Drug Free Youth
Latah County Youth Advocacy Council Youth Ambassador
Business Professionals of America
Knowledge Bowl
Environmental Club
Future Problem Solvers</p>

<p>I haven't received too many awards, but here are a few:
2012 AMC 10, First place in Idaho
Won an essay contest once
Hugh O'Brian Youth Scholarship recipient
"Natural Helpers" attendee</p>

<p>Okay, so my main question is, how can I improve my chances of getting accepted into top colleges? I am pretty peeved that my school offers so few AP classes, since I know that many applicants will have entire schedules filled with APs. I am a white male from a middle class family, though by Berkeley's standards, our income would probably be considered low (~$50,000).</p>

<p>Should I take more classes at the university over the summer? Main problem is that I'm pretty un-hooked. My dad is deaf, is that something to write about? A friend and I are participating in an alternative energy competition soon, and many of the people that do well in it get internships at another university about ten miles away. I'm hoping that'll lead to some good opportunities.</p>

<p>I'm planning to major in engineering, computer science, or maybe environmental science.</p>

<p>Sorry that this post is so long and rambly, just a "hick" kid looking for some help. For the record though, I am a huge liberal and do not fit Idaho stereotypes at all. Just clearing things up.</p>

<p>Thanks!</p>

2

<p>Unless you are wealthy, you should not target UC’s from OOS.</p>

3

<p>Berkeley’s standards, our income would probably be considered low (~$50,000).</p>

<p>then applying to UCs as an OOS student would be a waste. they’re not going to give you the aid you’d need. If you got into Berkeley, they’d expect your family to pay at least 20k per year. Doubtful on your family’s income.</p>

4

<p>You are in good shape (GPA-wise) for applying to good schools. Don’t worry about the AP issue. Colleges only care that you took and did well in the most rigorous courses YOUR school offers. Many schools have no AP classes.
Buy a good SAT or ACT prep book and work your way through it. You have time to do this.
Borrow a good college admissions book or two from the library and read the intro chapters about college admissions and prep. The Fiske Guide is a good place to start exploring colleges.
One other thing, coming from Idaho will give you a small leg up in admissions at some schools that are far away from Idaho. Why? Because schools like to brag that they have applicants from all 50 states and since Idaho has such a small population they often don’t get any apps from Idaho (or the Dakotas).</p>

5

<p>I am a California resident and help students with college admissions so I have to join the other posters. Cal would be at least $55K for you and with our budget problems they are not going to offer financial aid to you to pay for the out of state $22K extra cost. </p>

<p>Also the UC’s only consider 10th and 11th grades in their admissions evaluation so any honors classes or ap classes you that in those years will help boost your gpa. Many colleges request a high school profile which lists how many ap classes offered by your high school so admissions people will know how to gage your gpa against a student with a high school with tons of ap classes. Plus you could explain about your school in the additional info section of the common application. </p>

<p>The UC’s have a-g course requirements. Look those up to make sure you are on track to complete them. [Freshman</a> Academic Performance | UC Berkeley Office of Undergraduate Admissions](<a href=“http://admissions.berkeley.edu/freshmanrequirements]Freshman”>Freshmen Requirements - Office of Undergraduate Admissions)</p>

<p>You should like you have a good head on your shoulders. Do what you enjoy and love in terms of your EC’s and course work; try your best and I am sure you will end up at a great college for your interests. Just these days those majors you have mentioned are very impacted at the UC’s so think a bit outside of the box for schools. A great website is collegemajors101.com which talks about schools good for those majors. </p>

<p>There are also a lot of summer STEM programs that are free or at reduced costs (I know my DD did two this past summer). Start by looking some up on the summer programs section of CC here.</p>

6

<p>Money actually isn’t a problem. I have a sizable college fund (around $60,000) started by my grandparents.</p>

7

<p>--------bump--------</p>

8

<p>Chances for Stanford, Ivies, others? These are reaches, but I would love some suggestions for things I could do to improve my chances.</p>

9

<p>

</p>

<p>Need based financial aid will be about $22,000 short (that is the amount of the non-resident additional tuition). See the [financial</a> aid estimator](<a href=“Financial Aid Estimator - UC Berkeley Financial Aid and Scholarships Office”>http://calculator.berkeley.edu/). The only realistic possibilities for affordability are the Drake scholarship if you major in mechanical engineering (full ride, but an extreme reach), or (possibly, not sure) Regents’ or Chancellor’s scholarships (they do give these the non-residents, but the web sites are ambiguous about whether they cover the non-resident additional tuition – again, these would be very reachy).</p>

<p>$60,000 won’t be quite enough to cover the financial aid shortfall otherwise (if there is $88,000 in places not counted by financial aid calculations, then that may work).</p>

10

<p>Really guys, money isn’t a problem. I am mostly looking for ways to increase the chances of me being accepted.</p>

11

<p>High GPA with hard course rigor and high SAT’s should be your first concern.</p>

12

<p>Note that Berkeley’s College of Engineering is generally considered more selective than other divisions.</p>

<p>Computer science can be done either in the EECS major in the College of Engineering or the CS major in the College of Letters and Science.</p>

<p>UC admissions GPA does not give honors points for non-AP courses except for honors courses listed at <a href=“http://doorways.ucop.edu%5B/url%5D”>http://doorways.ucop.edu</a> (California public and private schools are listed). But an unweighted 4.0 in the hardest courses available should still be looked on favorably by the holistic admissions readers.</p>

13

<p>What can I do about the fact that I am taking all of the advanced classes that are offered? Will I be able to mention somewhere in my application that my school lacked a large selection of APs?</p>

14

<p>Your GC sends a school profile that explains your grading system, levels of courses, numbers of AP etc. etc. The college uses that info to help evaluate your transcript.</p>

15

<p>Start reading here for more information about Berkeley’s freshman admission process:
[Admissions</a>, Enrollment, & Preparatory Education | Academic Senate](<a href=“http://academic-senate.berkeley.edu/committees/aepe]Admissions”>Admissions, Enrollment, and Preparatory Education (AEPE) | Academic Senate)</p>