This would likely apply to my daughter and, yes, I do think ECs and PIQs made a huge difference. She didn’t really have any “big name” ECs but the ECs did demonstrate substantial leadership (related to her major) on a municipal, regional, and statewide level (and one international org). Of her ECs only 2 were school-based clubs - the rest were outside of school and in the community. I do think that helped set her apart from other applicants.
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While I agree that some activities may stand out for certain majors (ex. engineering/CS), I don’t believe that any activity would pull an application out of the pile.
If a student went to ISEF, that might stand out for a STEM major. However, the name/title of the org is not enough to impress the reader. Applicants need to share what they did, how much time it took, what they learned or got out of the activity.
If you were a reader, compare an ISEF finalist who wrote about the topic of their research to an applicant who was in their HS robotics club, spent 20 hrs/wk for 4 years, was elected team captain and then president of the club. If the later went into detail about their responsibility, time commitment and what they learned from the experience, that might receive a higher score than the ISEF finalist who wrote about their research but not what they did.
Granted it was a few years back, but my D20 who now goes to Cal had ECs only from what was available at her high school - ASB, marching band and drama. She showed leadership in each of the clubs, but had no other involvement in the community.
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My son mostly had music ECs, but no big awards, just a whole lot of depth in school orchestra and community involvement, plus miscellaneous ECs from exploring various interests (film, photography etc). He didn’t do any of the typical STEM ECs I’ve seen on many kids profiles here. With the UCs so far, he has been admitted (to engineering majors) at UCSD, UCSB, UCI, UCD, UCSC, waitlisted UCLA. I don’t think his ECs were impressive in themselves, he simply pursued his interests… but I think he wrote well about the ECs he had.
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Yes that makes perfect sense re. ISEF and other broader, competitive activities in that category. I suppose I am talking about activities on a more granular level - smaller, more focused activities, where the substance of the internship/fellowship is well understood by faculty in certain departments. These would probably have a more regional focus, or at least be divided between NorCal and socal. The scenario that I imagine taking place is that dept heads communicate with admissions staff over the years, and will indicate to them that candidates with XYZ internship on their ECs have traditionally performed well and are of greater interest to the department. Another example (hypothetical as I don’t actually know about this subject!) would be something like a high school internship with the Monterey Bay Aquarium being flagged for Marine Bio candidates at UCSC. There is presumably a well established relationship between the aquarium and the SC marine bio faculty, so they would therefore “trust” the selectivity of the program. (Again - hypothetical as I don’t know how selective their programs actually are)
Surely the UC admissions departments leverage the knowledge and community connections of their faculty across their respective regions, thereby adding more opportunities to effectively sort and select candidates for admission. When candidates come in with ECs that are well-known to specific faculty and departments there must be a way for admissions to identify those. Perhaps different departments send admissions lists of keywords/key ECs?
As parents we all know that certain selective programs seem to offer a substantial boost to college apps - I’m just trying to suss out whether there are any programs that are particular catnip to UC admissions 
Interesting! Thanks! Maybe deep school involvement is something they flag for as well.
Congrats to your son! Great to hear that he had success by pursuing his authentic interests. That is encouraging!
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I think the variety of responses shows that holistic review really is just that and therefore there is no one way to catch an AOs eye - each candidate is evaluated on the entirety of their application and their individual interests, skills, and experiences. If they take great advantage of school clubs by becoming a leader, that will be judged favorably. If they instead get involved with activities on a community level, that can be judged favorably. If they pursue and demonstrate their passions through their ECs, then that may be viewed favorably. But there’s no one formula that ensures success (or failure).
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In short, no there are not.
The UCs really seem to like their Nobel Prize Winners, but short of that… 
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Lol, yes that does seem like a pretty good EC!
I don’t know if my DD’s EC’s were particularly “prestigious” but I thought she put together a very nice mix. She listed and described several academic awards like the AP Scholar, and summer jobs (coaching swim team little kids, Starbucks barista) and one internship, and her ECs of sports (team captain for XC/track), and school clubs like Journalism, Interact, Model UN, Robotics (some with leadership), including community service at a food bank. She did use all 20 spots and wrote good descriptions up to the alloted character max. No “research” or founding non-profits.
Yes that sounds about right. Still, it is astonishing to me that UCs are able to holistically review hundreds of thousands of applications without resorting to some deep algorithmic data mining.
I will throw out one last scenario to get all your thoughts: in this years cycle, I know two students who had below average stats (ie 3.8 UW/3.9W, 1 or 2 APs total, scant ECs). Both were accepted to 1 UC each, Davis and Irvine. Total shocker for all involved. What they had in common was activity related to social activism around one very specific cause (think of a large feminist uprising in a repressive country that is currently taking place). Their stats were such that they normally wold not have progressed past early review but clearly they both got closer looks. I maintain that there is some sort of flagging that takes place that enables AOs to take closer looks at kids doing specific things - whether they be specific programs or activities or causes.
(Will add that I’m asking these questions mainly out of curiosity, I have no skin in the game currently, but have followed since my D22 went through her round of apps. I’m just an information-obsessed observer at the moment lol)
Thanks - again it’s great to hear that “well rounded” anpplicants are getting a close look. That’s great for the kids.
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When I looked closely at the UC admission data from last year I saw immediately that for many UC campuses the MAJORITY of students had 25+ a-g classes and the MAJORITY took 10+ AP classes. I had no idea that such specific “quantities” matter (as in, the more the better) and had a correlation to admission. When I discovered that (prior to DD’s several UC acceptances), I asked my DD to count up her a-g and APs and let me know what they were. Sure enough, she had 25+ a-g classes and 12 AP/honors classes, and right then I was kind of reassured that statistically speaking she’d likely be admitted to at least one of the 7 UC campuses she applied to. And I was also reassured when I saw data that the top 9% ELC (which she is) tend to be admitted to one or more of the UC campuses as long as they “apply widely” (which she did). But she was just lucky she isn’t a Computer Science major because I see those with her same stats rejected and waitlisted from UCs right and left.
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Yes that combo seems to be the best indicator of success at least on a regional basis. (Although I know there are some ELC folks who struck out everywhere. )
I’m most curious about the kids that did NOT have those two indicators. What pulled them out of the pile and what point in the review process were they actually pulled out of the pile for a close look? With a lower than average gpa and lesser course rigor, what makes a candidate stand out? Obviously it’s the PIQs and Activities, but with 3-6 minutes of review time for each application what does that actually look like? Are points or multiplication-factors assigned by readers? Like, +2 for club president, x2 for published research, etc?
The other thing that may come into play in such cases is supplemental review. Some applicants are flagged to provide additional information - whether letters of rec or essays or whatever (I think it is very campus-dependent). And those who take advantage of the opportunity to provide more info/context might also be helped a bit (whereas they might otherwise be rejected outright).
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do those letter indicate more positive bend (ie majority of additional info requests tend to be admitted etc)? usually what are the reasons for asking for additional info?
I remember @Gumbymom posted some stats at one point. From those it looked like it could definitely help those who submitted additional info (submitting additional info is optional, and not all bother to do so).
There are a number of reasons: such as a drop/increase in grades, lack of AP classes, personal challenge mentioned in the PIQs, some kind of commitment that limited the ability to take advantage of ECs, various things.
Congrats on the acceptance so far! Uc Berkeley is coming up and fingers crossed she gets accepted there!
My comment is for the class rank. My son had a 3.88 Uw gpa, 3.21 uc weighted gpa. His high school ranks on unweighted gpa so he was #80 something out of 700. He was accepted to SB, SD and Berkeley, wait listed other UCs. Therefore I don’t think rank matters in his case.
Also, his essays were true to himself, nothing fancy but down to earth, you can tell there’s no bluff. I was a bit concerned but it worked out!
Again, best of luck!