How does the UC system works?

College Search & Selection
1

<p>title ^
For example.. You live in Chicago and your school added your transcript on everything counted with freshmen year - senior year. (Gpa ranks etc.)</p>

<p>How do the Adcoms do this since they don't count the grade you got in ninth grade? do they make their own calculations or what? And would the rank change if your gpa gets higher?</p>

<p>And if you're applying end of junior year, what do you put on your application forms for the extracurricular/honors/jobs part if you know what you're doing in your senior year? Or do you just keep it blank?</p>

<p>thanks for your input!</p>

2

<p>If you are asking about the Univ of California, and not the other UofC (Chicago), don't be concerned about your transcript per se. The application requires you to list every HS academic class ("a-g") and grades (no plusses and minuses). Even Frosh grades are listed, but not used in the UC gpa calc. However, since your are OOS, your app will go to an OOS app reader who may adjust the gpa, based on his/her knowledge of your HS curriculum. For example, only UC-approved honors courses count for the bonus point; Calif high school submit thier honors curriculum to UC for approval but OOS high schools do not, so the app reader may make an adjustment.</p>

<p>For senior year courses (and ECs) you just list them on the app under senior year. The UC expects a strong senior year schedule, so don't list a bunch of APs and then drop them at the semester break.</p>

<p>btw: UCs are very expensive OOS, and not great with finaid.</p>

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<p>Yeah, i was talking about UCLA.</p>

<p>What adjustments would the OOS App reader makes towards your curriculum etc.</p>

4

<p>To get a UC GPA they take your a-g classes, round off to full grades (drop the + or -), add a point for up to 8 semesters of AP classes or honors classes that are certified by the UCs and that is your UC GPA. Note that some AP classes will not count for the extra point, such as AP Art History. The honors classes that count for an extra point are limited, and if you are out of state unless your high school has a fair amount of kids regularly applying to the UC system, your high school honors classes won't count for extra points. That said, 8 semesters is 4 year long classes, or two AP classes sophmore and junior year. Anything after that doesn't get the extra bump either. You can find out more on the UC website <a href="http://www.universityofcalifornia.edu%5B/url%5D"&gt;www.universityofcalifornia.edu&lt;/a&gt;.&lt;/p>

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<p>UCDAlum:</p>

<p>Sorry, but that is incorrect. Every AP course does count for a bonus point. (I have it in writing from the UCOP.)</p>

6

<p>^^ not all AP courses are certified (hence why the CollegeBoard is making teachers do audits). + I think only the five core courses (English, math, history, science, language) are those that are used to calculate GPA.</p>

7

<p>Sorry, I stand corrected. No idea why it emphasizes the 8 semester limit on the website.</p>

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<p>All true, but it's even more complicated than that. First, "transferable college courses" (generally, college courses which would be accepted for unit credit for a transferee to UC) also are eligible for an extra GPA weight point. More significant is the fact that while the 8 semester limit is used for the "official UC GPA", which is used in the basic UC eligibility equation, it probably does not govern admissions decisions at the more selective campuses - Berkeley, UCLA, UCSD, UCI, UCSB and UCD. UCSD epressly uses an "uncapped" GPA in its published admissions formula. The overall GPA used in UCSD admissions is in fact capped at 4.5, but that's a number that's almost impossible to get to if you only weight 8 semesters out of two years, even with straight A's. Berkeley and UCLA use a "holistic" approach in which the difficulty of course schedule - i.e. all of the APs, honors, etc. courses - is a "factor." </p>

<p>So beyond the basic UC eligibility question (and that threshhold is quite low, miles below the Berkeley/UCLA admissions level for all but recruited athletes) it's not clear that the "UC GPA" has any significance other than helping an applicant to compare his/herself to the UC campuses' freshman profile of last year's admitted students, which is reported based on the "UC" GPA.</p>

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<p>Hmmh. thanks for the info guys!</p>

<p>Do you think i would get into UCLA? I'm planning to major in Neurobiology/pre-med.</p>

<p>Here are my stats.</p>

<p>Gender: Male
Ethnicity: White
Location: Chicago, IL
High School: Public + Semi - Competitive</p>

<p>Academics:
GPA: 3.7 (W) [Huge upward trend since freshmen year (2.72 to current)]
GPA: 4.10 (W) Not counting freshmen grades.
Class Rank: Top 10%
Class Size: 315</p>

<p>Courses: (Reg = 4.0 Hrs = 4.5 AP = 5.0)</p>

<p>Freshmen: (horrible first semester, however i did improve vastly second semester. 1.8 --> 3.66 which equals a 2.72)</p>

<p>French II: C/B
Algebra I: D/B
Freshmen Lit & Comp: D/A
Biology: C/A
Health(1 semester) B
Geography: B/A</p>

<p>Sophomore: (Good year 3.75 --> 4.0 which equals a 3.875)</p>

<p>French III Honors: B/B
Chemistry: A/A
Algebra II: A/A
Human Genetics(1 semester) A
Human Physiology(1 semester) A
Geometry(did in summer after freshmen year) B/A
Computer Science Honors(1 Semester) A
Sophomore English Composition: A/A</p>

<p>Junior: (Best year 4.28 --> 4.20)</p>

<p>AP Biology: B/B
AP USH: A/A
French IV Honors: B/B
Advanced Math: A/A
Trigonometry(did in summer after sophomore year) A
American Literature: A/A
Earth Science Honors: A/A</p>

<p>Senior: (Projected) </p>

<p>AP Physics B
AP French V
AP Calculus AB
Creative Writing(1 semester)
Speech(1 semester)
English Literature
Law(1 semester)
Government(1 semester)</p>

<p>Scores:
ACT: 34
SAT II: Biology (M) 790
SAT II: USH 800
AP Biology: 5
AP USH: 5
AP French IV: 4
AP Physics B: 5
AP Calculus AB: 4 </p>

<p>Extracurriculars:
Soccer: 4 years (Varsity 3 years)
Volleyball: 4 years (Varsity 2 years)
Volunteer service: At a hospital - 750 hours+
Jobs: Held one at target since freshmen year</p>

<p>Teacher/Principal Recs: Should be very good (the teachers love me)
Essays: Excellent (plan on writing about life changing experiences and how i overcame my disability)</p>

<p>I am aiming to do pre - med and continue onto medical school in UCLA
I can speak 4 different languages; Polish, French, English, and Sign Language.</p>

10

<p>kyledavid:</p>

<p>pls post a UC url to support your assumption that only 5 subjects count.</p>

<p>From doorways/pathways site:</p>

<p>Honors Level Courses
The University grants special "honors" designation and extra credit in students’ grade point average computation only to those high school honors level courses that meet the following criteria. The University strongly encourages that such courses be available to all sectors of the school population.</p>

<p>AP Courses. Advanced Placement (AP) courses in the "a-g" subjects which are designed to prepare students for an Advanced Placement Examination of the College Board are automatically granted honors status, even if they are offered at the 10th grade level (e.g., newly developed courses/exams in Human Geography and World History). For more information about AP, go to the College Board’s web site.</p>

<p>IB courses...</p>

<p>Other College courses (as kluge mentioned)...</p>

<p>Other Honors courses...."</p>

<p>UCAlum: they cap the number of semesters so as not to disadvantage kids in high schools with limited or no AP and honors courses. Also, it eliminates a little game playing, i.e., honors orchestra doesn't count for a bonus point, so it would discourage a student from taking it if there was no cap. Note, however, that elc calculations ARE uncapped.</p>

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<p>And note:

[quote]
In addition to the preliminary GPA used for establishing UC eligibility, campuses may look at an applicant’s academic record in a variety of ways during the selection process. These GPA variations may include a fully weighted GPA that includes all honors grade points earned in grades 10 and 11 (this is the GPA used to rank students at each high school for purposes of identifying ELC students) and an unweighted GPA in which no honors grade points are included.

[/quote]

<a href="http://www.universityofcalifornia.edu/educators/counselors/resources/askuc/answers/honors.html%5B/url%5D"&gt;http://www.universityofcalifornia.edu/educators/counselors/resources/askuc/answers/honors.html&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/p>

<p>P-izzle: I'd say your academic history puts you in the running. Not a sure thing, not a "no hope." My guess is that UCLA would view your 10-11 GPA as being slightly below a 4.0, which is, bizarrely in my opinion, below average for UCLA admittees. But only a little; your test scores are great (well above UC averages) and your EC's and adversity factors look very good. Apply and see what happens.</p>

12

<p>You don't have to worry about freshman year too much. They don't really count it. You also might want to check off all the a-g requirements. You didn't mention an art or performing arts class, but perhaps you were thinking orchestra didn't count or something.</p>

<p>From what you posted it looks like you are taking your senior AP classes after you took the tests, is that true? (Not that it would matter or anything, I was just wondering...)</p>

13

<p>Oh, those were projected. (the calc, fre, and phys) i forgot to mention that.
And I didn't take any orch/band or art classes =.</p>

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<p>Maybe you could mention you'll your fine arts/performing arts class in the summer? I think that was the only requirement you were missing, and I'm not sure any other universities have a performing/fine arts requirement. So you could say you'll take it summer before going to UCLA if you get in. (Orchestra, band, vocal music, drama, dance, art, photography all count. Lots of options there.)</p>

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<p>OP,
I think you should take a look at these statistics, which show how few OOS are at the the UC's, compared to Calif residents. Historically, OOS students have about a 1 in 10 chance of acceptance- very similar to applying to Harvard, Princeton, Yale or Stanford. That is unlikely to change as the UC's are mandated by Calif law to provide an education for Calif students in the top 10% of their class, and the babyboomlet has provided a huge bump in the number of qualified applicants from Calif.
<a href="http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/showthread.php?t=365439%5B/url%5D"&gt;http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/showthread.php?t=365439&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/p>

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<p>Yikes, that doesn't look good. Well what other colleges would you recommends me to look at provides neurobiology as a major?</p>

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<p>
[quote]
OOS students have about a 1 in 10 chance of acceptance...

[/quote]
</p>

<p>mparkmom: that is incorrect. Last year at Cal, for example, 4446 applied from OOS, 889 were accepted which is a 20% rate. The in-state acceptance was 25%, and International was 11%.</p>

<p><a href="http://students.berkeley.edu/admissions/freshmen.asp%5B/url%5D"&gt;http://students.berkeley.edu/admissions/freshmen.asp&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/p>

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<p>Hello? 20 + 25 +11 does not equal 100% The instate % is a lot higher.</p>

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<p>you don't just add percentages.....sorry</p>

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<p>Sheed, you're right, I miss read post 17, however, the acceptance rate at Cal [ Berkeley] is not representative of the over all UC system OOS acceptance rate, which is about 10% over all.</p>