<p>Decision: Accepted</p>
<p>Objective:[ul]
[<em>] SAT I (breakdown): CR (760), M (790), W (760)
[</em>] ACT: N/A
[<em>] SAT II: Chem (800), U.S. History (790), Math 2 (800), Physics (730)
[</em>] Unweighted GPA (out of 4.0): 4.0
[<em>] Rank (percentile if rank is unavailable): top 10% (class of about 400)
[</em>] AP (place score in parenthesis): Chem (5), AP Eng Lang (4), U.S. History (5), World History (5), Physics (5)
[<em>] IB (place score in parenthesis): N/A
[</em>] Senior Year Course Load: AP Calculus, AP Bio, AP Eng Lit, Honors Gov/Econ, AP French, AP Environmental Sci
[li] Major Awards (USAMO, Intel etc.): AP Scholar w/ Distinction, National Merit Finalist (I might have only written “Semifinalist” on the app because I hadn’t yet gotten notification of my finalist status.)</p>[/li]
<p>[/ul]Subjective:[ul]
[<em>] Extracurriculars (place leadership in parenthesis): 6 years of guitar, 1 year of drums/percussion, “Unpopular” Music Club - for ppl with a taste in music better known by our parents than by our own generation (Founder and President), Robotics Club, Science club (Co-founder and Co-president), Philosophy Club (Secretary)
[</em>] Job/Work Experience: lined soccer fields over past 3-4 years
[<em>] Volunteer/Community service: unpaid internship teaching drums and guitar to children in the local area
[</em>] Summer Activities: many things (reading, traveling, summer homework, songwriting, et al.), but none of which I described on my application
[<em>] Essays: I wrote two very PASSIONATE (this is the #1 thing the Cal AdComs care about) essays. The 1st was about how playing the guitar has made helped me conquer my fear of social judgment (I’m still an introvert, but now I perform my songs for people and am outspoken about my political beliefs which JUST HAPPEN to be pretty far on the left; don’t get the impression that there aren’t any rightists at Berkeley, because they make up a significant minority. I’m sure there are even a few Fascists since the campus is so diverse, not just racially or sexually but also ideologically.) ANYWAY, my 2nd essay was about how my AP Chem teacher hardly gave any instructions in labs and why I therefore had to figure things out on my own and stay hours after school each week troubleshooting. The message here - which I implied through this story, but did not explicitly state - was that I am a very perseverant and creative (because of all the things I tried w/ the troubleshooting) person. And, of course, I also wanted to convey that I was interested in and prepared for Cal’s rigorous chem program.
[</em>] Teacher Recommendation: N/A
[<em>] Counselor Rec: N/A
[</em>] Additional Rec: N/A
[li] Interview: Regents’ Scholarship: I think it went very well. My interviewer was genuinely interested in my activities and definitely saw that I was eager to attend Berkeley and to study chem and play music. By the way, she told me that I’d been accepted at the beginning of the interview, which is true for all prospective Regents’ scholars; this is how I found out what the decision was ahead of the regular notification date.</p>[/li]
<p>[/ul]Other[ul]
[<em>] State (if domestic applicant): CA
[</em>] School Type: Public, ~1600 students
[<em>] Ethnicity: White (Because I’m maternally Spanish and identify with that culture more than with my paternal British ancestry, I self-identified as “Hispanic” on the application. However, the UC system is not supposed to take race/sex into consideration for admissions decisions; I believe they only use this for statistical analysis.)
[</em>] Gender: Male
[<em>] Income Bracket: ~150,000 because both my parents work 10+ hours a day and essentially get paid according to how much work they get done (they both work in insurance inspection)
[</em>] Hooks (URM, first generation college, etc.): Nothing, really. Both my parents got BA’s. I’m not a first-generation college student, but I am the first person in my immediately family (as well as all known relatives more closely related than third cousins) either to seriously play a musical instrument or to choose a major in the hard sciences. Aside from that, as I already mentioned, I’m on the far left, but I didn’t explicitly say that on my application. I wouldn’t recommend getting political on your application, either (I’m addressing next year’s prospective applicants now) because you never know what biases the person(s) who read(s) your app will have.</p>
<p>[/ul]Reflection[ul]
[<em>] Strengths: GPA, SAT, passionate, well-written essays
[</em>] Weaknesses: didn’t have any unusual activities (unless you count the school club I started for ppl interested in non-mainstream music), and, clearly, I could have gotten more awards
[<em>] Why you think you were accepted/waitlisted/rejected: because I’ve got a lot of individuality and am passionate about my major as well as interests outside of it (i.e. I’m a good fit for Cal)
[</em>] Where else were you accepted/waitlisted/rejected: Accepted to UCSD and UCD, rejected from MIT. Once I hear from about half a dozen private universities in a couple weeks, I’ll update this list.</p>
<p>[/ul]General Comments: If there were an ideal example of someone who easily made it into Berkeley without doing much volunteering, that example would be me. I know people who applied to Berkeley who have 300+ hours of volunteering (which is a problem, because the people I’m referring to don’t actually enjoy the volunteering they do; if they did it for their own edification, it would be a different story). Their volunteering activities evacuated all the free time to do things they actually loved out of their schedules, and their grades suffered as well. My recommendation is that you find something you’re already passionate about and come up with a way to use that to benefit your community (like I do by teaching new musicians in my hometown to play the guitar and drums). It will look more meaningful on your application and will fit better into your schedule/life than will hundreds of hours of heterogeneous occupations. The latter can only make you appear to be undecided about who you are as a person and what you enjoy. From an existentialist perspective this is perfectly fine, but when it comes to college applications, you should at least make it SEEM like you have an idea of what your future will be. Yeah, I said it: college applications force you to simplify the most complicated and beautiful aspect of your existence, i.e. your journey to self-discovery. Unfortunately, that’s the way the system works. Anyway, I hope all this info was useful and that I didn’t waste your time.</p>