Selecting a Pre-Med School

UC recalculated weighted capped GPA = 4.11

Unweighted gpa for sophomore and junior year = 3.85 and weighted GPA = 4.29
And took as many IB courses as possible all throughout high school (about 5-6 IB/IBMYP courses every year)

http://talk.qa.collegeconfidential.com/university-california-general/2127392-faq-uc-historical-frosh-admit-rates-by-hs-gpa-2018.html has 2018 admission rates by GPA range from a UC web site.


Campus  4.20-   3.80-   3.40-   3.00-
        higher  4.19    3.79    3.39
UCB     37%     10%      1%      1%
UCLA    41%      9%      2%      1%
UCSD    70%     34%      7%      1%
UCI     75%     38%      7%      1%
UCSB    80%     41%      8%      1%
UCD     89%     52%     14%      3% 
UCSC    92%     70%     33%     12%
UCR     96%     84%     49%     15%
UCM     98%     95%     82%     45%

As you can see, your UC recalculated weighted capped GPA of 4.11 was in the second column, so that the six UCs you applied to ranged from high match (UCD) to reach (UCB and UCLA). Unfortunately for you, UCs are not that test score sensitive (CPSLO is somewhat more test score sensitive, so that presumably helped you there).

@premed20172023 . . .

Okay, so you went IB instead. IB weighted will be less than AP, so 4.29 is good. Your total stats: uwgpa/wgpa/SAT = 3.85/4.29/1,510.

Here’s your quote a few posts back,

This is astounding… You obviously didn’t do any procedural things wrong in filling out your app, because at least SD and SB waitlisted you. I think at least one will have to offer you admission, because you beat the qualification standard by miles.

What about your personal statement? Did you have someone peruse it to make sure it sounded unique, cogent, personal, etc.?

I think, too, that you should have a legitimate case for appeal at least at one of the campuses you mentioned. I’m sure you’ll be proactive, so I think you’ll have a chance.

Hoping for the best.

No point in going to UWash unless you can afford it AND you’re certain about MD/PhD.

Otherwise, UWash’s med school will not admit you. You’re OORegion.

@firmament2x I had a few people look over my personal statement to make sure it was personal and unique and heard good things, so I’m not quite sure as to what went wrong. But I am definitely hoping to get off the waitlist and/or have a successful appeal!

What went wrong is that your UC list did not include any solid matches (UCSC or UCR) or the likely school (UCM).

Well, @ucbalumnus . . . I believe your chart showing rates of acceptance for tiers of UC gpa are just incidental to the process of acceptance. UCLA, for instance, doesn’t use this marker in its admissive process and I’m sure Cal doesn’t either.

If UC gpa is supposed to standardize all high schools which have varying amounts of “honors courses” – which I use as a catch phrase – it’s not going to come near to do doing so because some high schools are woefully underfunded to have many honors offerings – or at least not enough move its students gpa significantly over 4.0. This is why UCLA looks at unweighted and fully weighted grades, the latter to verify that the student has used his (higher ranked) high school to its ultimate. Additionally, UC is supposed to eliminate freshmen grades in the calculations, but I assure you that UCLA looks at them and undoubtedly closely monitors senior grades.

Surely, each UC has different emphases in grades and scores. UCSD considers UC gpa greatly, as they report ~ 4.1 on its CDSs. (UCLA just recently started reporting unweighted on its CDS ~ 3.87 in 2017-2018, and on this academic year’s report it’ll be 3.88-3.89 – and these run commensurate with your acceptance rates for UC recalculated grades.)

Most importantly, the UC website is just stating things in UC gpa as a standard of reporting so those reading the reports are comparing apples to apples.

Because UC gpa cannot capture all the differences between high schools, the adjustments UCLA makes in the admissive process is to consider high school quality with uwgpa and wgpa (and scores) along with of course the complete holistic quality of the applicant. As you can tell, the OP (sorry, just trying to be as clinically referencing as I am able) has taken IB courses to its best as can be done at his/her high school. And again, IB will be lower, because those who go the AP route can jump into honors pretty quickly, whereas IB students have build up to the process.

Re: #27

Not particularly relevant. If UC reported admission rates by unweighted or fully weighted GPA, the OP would still likely fall into the GPA range where all of his/her UC applications were to high match to reach campuses, with no match or likely campuses. The OP’s GPA would shift, but so would that of all other applicants being compared against.

Sorry, @ucbalumnus , but I’m trying to multitask, so if my explanation has been lacking, I apologize.

Again, though, all the UCs know and adjust their thinking to those who go IB versus AP; they know that IB students will not have the ascendant weighted gpas that AP students have. OP has taken his high school to its highest and best use as can be done:

Just as an example of how UCs adjust, UCLA’s and Cal’s admissions run Internationals through a different admittance process, and UCLA has yet another one for out-of-state students and I’m sure Cal does too. UCLA and Cal place a greater emphasis on the SAT or ACT for foreign students, and this manifests itself with > 1,400 scores (more like 1,450) at the 25th percentile for these students at both universities, about 10-13% of the student body. This is needful because the conversion of grades is tough from foreign to the American system; additionally, foreign countries apparently don’t invoke weights, or at least as much.

A multi-tiered approach to admissions applies to CA students (I’m repeating myself): those who attend underperforming high schools and those attending moderate to good ones, and IB versus AP with respect to the OP.

So let’s recap the different admission processes at UCLA and probably Cal (I’d utilize a tree diagram, but it’s too much work).

With respect to global residence: Those from the US versus those from other countries (IB applies to foreign students also).

With respect to US students: Those from CA and those from the other 49 states, and those from AP and those from IB. OOS students need higher SATs/ACTs.

With respect to CA students: Those from good high schools and those from bad high schools – those from poor ones will have excellent unweighted, not particularly high weighted gpas, and they’ll have lower scores; add AP v. IB adjustments.

So it’s hard to really mash all them together in one policy; the admissions readers have to adjust for each of these subsets of students.

Add that each UC has a different protocol of admissions, not one is alike. The UC site takes these different guidelines towards admissions, and makes them uniform in its presentation as best it can, e.g., as in UC gpa. Each UC has a lower reported SAT and ACT because there’s a good 130% who report scores (or, rather, each UC reports all scores) – when there should be a one-to-one score per student, or at worse a ~ 110-115% which most privates cite in their CDS. In addition, UC doesn’t superscore.

Edit Last sentence, last paragraph: Each UC has an artificially lower reported SAT and ACT because there’s a good 130% reportage of scores by the records departments at each university when there should be closer to (edit: “a”) one-to-one…