I’m an international student at a California private high school. On transcript my weighted academic GPA is 3.94 up to the end of my junior year. I took 4 AP’s junior year and 1 honor sophomore year and others are just regular classes. I didn’t do good on my freshman year with 3.17 GPA for the 1st semester. After that I got 2 B’s on both 1st semester of sophomore and junior year, one of the B on junior year is from religion class, which I heard colleges don’t really care about. The rest are all A’s. If without freshman year and religion grades, my GPA up to junior year would be a 4.2. On my senior year I’m also taking 4 AP’s. My current SAT is like R520, W650, M740, but I’m gonna retake on October and November and hopefully I can get above 2000 or even 2100. Also I have SATII Math lv 2 800 and physics 700 (I plan to retake and get above 770). No ACT, no IB. I have some academic awards, but they are all like schoolwide or national but very easy to get. I played 5 sports during my 9th and 10th grade and 3 of them are varsity but overall I wasn’t really good at sports. I don’t have many meaningful activities but I can fill up the list on UC/Common App. I plan to major in computer science (not college of engineering, they are hard to get in!), and the following are the school that I’m applying to:
UCB/LA/SD/Irvine/SB/Davis, UIUC, Purdue, UW-Seattle, UW-Madison, UT-Austin, UM-Ann Arbor, U of Virginia, and Penn State college park. Since I want to stay in So-cal, I will most likely go to UCLA/SD/Irvine if they accept me.
Overall, What are my chances of going to those colleges?
I will wait until you repost with your UC GPA before chancing. Since you are an International student and not a California resident, you will be paying $55K/year to attend the California UC’s. Is this affordable to your family?
Definitely need to get your CR score up but your SAT II scores look competitive. You also happen to pick on the more competitive majors for all the schools on your list.
4.21 without religion or 4.15 with religion. Also, our school does not rank students. Could you help to chance me based on that?
I can afford the tuition, and in fact, all those public schools I’m applying are the cheapest choices I have if I don’t want to attend a community college. Other private colleges are mostly above $60k a year.
For CR, I’m hoping above 600 on this October…
Also, I thought college of science are generally easier than college of engineering, but I admit that CS is a very competitive major anyway. Should I apply for undecided then?
I’m hoping that I can at least get into UCI. Based on data from previous years most international students get into UCI have an avg of 1800 on SAT, but there seems a score/grade inflation every year…
Average SAT score for UCI was 1878 this past year.
You have a competitive UC GPA for most schools, but with CS being popular and competitive, you want to be above the average in stats for these schools.
UCB/UCLA/UCSD: Reach unless you can raise your SAT to around 2100+
UCD/UCSB: Low Reach
UCI: High Match/Match
I would add UCR/UCSC to your list and drop some of the OOS schools (not too familiar with their CS programs) but I believe many are a Reach with current SAT.
I don’t think I want to add UCR/UCSC since my family cares a lot about rankings (general or by major). Also, those OOS schools are all good engineering schools and I think based on my stats:
Virginia/Ann Arbor are high reaches,
Madison is low reach/high match,
UIUC/Purdue/Austin/Penn State are matches (again, I’m not applying to any engineering programs). I will apply EA to all OOS schools if possible, but I don’t think it helps.
I forgot to mention my TOEFL is 102, but I think it is good to most/all schools I’m applying to
For safety, if I don’t get into any colleges I’m applying now, I will attend a CA community college and then hopefully transfer to any one of the top 6 UC’s.
So, now my biggest focus is SAT? On the practice test last month I got R580, W660, M800 (2040 total), but I have to work very hard these days since my school started Mid-August and I haven’t get any practice since then.
Also, I spend my 9th and 10th grade in Illinois (11th and 12th in CA), would that help for UIUC?
My Oct SAT scores are: CR650, M770, WR650 (Essay 9), 2070 total. I also have AP calc AB 5, Stats 5, CS 5, and Physics1 4. Please chance me again for all of the UC’s based on that.
Your new SAT score makes UCI/UCD and UCSB within reach. UCSD/UCLA and UCB will still be tough be definitely worth applying. Strong essays and EC’s will help.
Good luck.
Right now my top choice is UCSD, which I’m gonna apply for Computer Science (Jacobs School of Eng) as my first choice and Math - CS (Math Dept) as my second choice. Do I have a better chance of getting into Math - CS? What would be a “match” SAT score for UCSD? Can I still have any improvement on areas other than SAT? UCSD is a great school and I really want to go there.