<p>by all means, appeal. It sounds like you really got disadvantaged by your illness, and good for you for keeping up your effort anyway. But please do take this opportunity to consider community college. It’s really not so bad if you go to a decent one, and then you’ve got a really good at transferring into a top-notch UC if you live in California. If you have parents who will pay for everything out of pocket, great, but if you’re being asked to take out loans, do consider CC. This is really not the kind of market to rack up needless debt with ridiculous interest policies, on the basis of feeling too ashamed to go anywhere not within the top twenty. Just look at the housing crisis!</p>