It’s not you that was rejected, it’s your application. Chances are, you didn’t give enough details that were 100% representative of who you really are and what you’ve really done. So if the fit wasn’t conveyed in your application, the admissions officers wouldn’t see it unfortunately. You got into Berkeley, so you definitely have a lot going for you!
It’s what you do with your education that matters. There are people that are highly successful that did not get into to 50 schools and there are people that have gone to top schools that are “mediocre”. You can always transfer if you want next year. Don’t be that person that has to be 1st all the time. No one, I repeat, NO ONE likes that person. They are not fun to be around (I don’t care what your friends say). Admission officers don’t like overly cutthroat applicants. They don’t seem like a good addition to the student body and can make several peoples’ (professors, fellow students) experiences unpleasant.
Rejection letters are absolutely not a judgement of worth and you’d be unwise to take it as such. It basically comes down to a small group of admissions officers trying to put together a well balanced class knowing full well that a good number of the students they can’t take due to size constraints would also do well at the school. Someone I know who used to be an admissions officer at an Ivy said that they actually felt really sad about the many outstanding candidates that they had to turn away. You did great to get into Berkeley. Move ahead, have a wonderful college experience, and do fantastic things with your life!
According to U.S. News, Berkeley is the NUMBER ONE global university for Chemistry (above MIT, Stanford, Harvard, and Northwestern) and NUMBER TWENTY national university (between Rice and Emory/Georgetown).
According to Times world university rankings, Cal is the EIGHTH best university in the world, above Yale, Cornell, Penn, and Northwestern.
Mediocre? I don’t think so.
You’ll be fine.
Any student applying to those schools has to know that the overwhelming majority will be rejected. It just happens. Seats are few, qualified applicants are many. It really is nothing personal.
I personally know applicants accepted into Stanford, MIT and Cornell with lower stats than you. You are qualified to be at any of these schools including HYP.
Schools select the top students based on a variety of criteria not necessarily related to academics or academic stats. They use things to help them select among the hundreds, even thousands, of all of the students qualified that apply. I know that the students that got accepted with stats lower than yours had a hook. It might be sports, race, sex( (in a predominantly male field) , state they live in, etc.
All the top students have applied to all of the top places. But, now a days, the schools are trying to end up with top students with a very diversified student body. That means 50 states, many countries, equal male/female, large percentage of varied ethnic groups, groups that identify with other sexual orientation, as well as students who hav accomplished something very extraordinary.
Competition has become more than just academic accomplishments. It is intense.
Berkeley has great graduate schools but its undergraduate program while very good not similar to the other schools you are mentioning. Keep in mind all the top UC’s admit huge numbers of transfer students from the CC that could never gain admission to any of the top schools. I’m not saying this is necessarily wrong but it is a fact.
@SAY, not similar, but for certain kids, it could be an environment that is as good or better. HS kids get caught up by where kids from HS go and so forth, but IMO, that’s stupid. Opportunities are what matters, and for certain career paths and types of kids, Cal actually isn’t worse and is cheaper. For example, if you’re a CS major who wants to work in the Bay Area and are already awesome in CS, is Dartmouth or even Yale better? Frankly, I don’t think so.
BTW, research U’s are research U’s. That’s not to say that they are all the same and some schools do care about undergraduate teaching more than others, but you can find profs at Harvard who don’t give a rat’s ass about undergrads and profs at Cal who care deeply about their undergrads. Also, in many departments (obviously the less popular ones) you can find small classes even at giant state schools.
Op, I say you’re suffering some insecurity, there is nothing second class about Berkeley but so what if it’s second class. It’s all in your head.
I think that a barbeque of the literature of Stanford, MIT, NU, Caltech, Princeton, Penn, and Cornell would be in order.
They all lost out! Hahaha!
You on the other hand are no worse off.
College admissions is not a measure of your self worth. These decisions are mostly made by recent grads who couldn’t get better jobs. Don’t be one of them!
@Purple I never said better or worse but rather not similar. At the most selective schools what is different isn’t the factuality but rather the student body. After all the professor who teaches freshman math or chemistry will be roughly the same at any of the top 40 schools. As I stated before Berkeley has a large number of students in each class with SAT’s 300-500 points below any of the students you will find at the other schools on this list. This is because they admit the transfer students based almost entirely on grades from CC and ignore the HS grades/SAT’s. But yes the STEM classes at UCB will still be plenty rigorous.
One thing to consider–and it’s unfortunate. When looking at elite admissions one thing I’ve noticed is the idea that many people like me are uncertain where they will get in, so they apply to many if not all the Ivys and top 25 schools. The thing is a certain number of people will get into multiple of these schools–if you’re qualified for Princeton, you’re qualified for Brown. Yes there are tons of well qualified, smart kids, but there there some extremely well qualified kids that will get into several. It seems more and more unlikely that a kid just gets into one ivy or whatever school–kids will rack up acceptances. With that in mind, the mentality of let me just get into one by apply to many is a little mislead. Most people will not into all, but a large handful of kids will get into 3, 4, or 5 typically. I’m not saying this so you feel worse, but take heart in that it’s so competitive and some people just take up several spots even if they will not enroll 
With that in mind, I’m totally up for college admissions being a stable marriage algorithm, but that would necessitate equal financial aid for one thing, and that doesn’t really exist.
@SAY, I don’t disagree with what you say. Only thing I’d quibble with is the idea of whether a few hundred points of test scores of the average student matters or not. The matter of the fact is that the top students at a school like Cal will be as good as those anywhere, and that’s shown by the fact that Cal produces high-achieving alums at the same rate as the lower Ivies (which means that in absolute numbers, Cal would be producing several times more PhDs, prestigious national award winners, and elite professional school matriculants compared to many elite privates outside of HYPS).
@SAY, oh come on.
“This is because they admit the transfer students based almost entirely on grades from CC and ignore the HS grades/SAT’s.”
That’s a terrible argument.
When you’re over twenty years old and already have more than a year of college under your belt, high school GPA and SAT scores hardly matter. Heck, they stop being relevant when you enter college. It doesn’t matter if Joe in Calculus I class had a 2300 SAT and Jane scored a 2050. At that point, a student’s ambition and work ethic are more important.
As far as CC transfers lowering the quality of the student body: Look up Joseph Gallardo from the University of Texas at Austin. He graduated at the bottom of his high school class (after 6 years of enrollment), took a gap year, went to the local community college, attained a 4.0 GPA, transferred to UT, and then excelled there. I don’t think his background lowered the prestige of UT Austin; rather, the university is proud to boast his accomplishments.
@Fredjan It is not an argument but rather a fact. While there are many anecdotal stories it is silly to argue that on average that 300-500 SAT points doesn’t matter. If that’s true then no testing matters but yet all the top schools take the tests very seriously. You can find numerous students at Cal with SAT’s of 1600-1800 because all you need to be admitted is a 4.0 from CC. Now while I would agree that 100-150 points overall means little it is also true students with a 1700 versus 2200 just are not similar in academic ability. I don’t know anything about the UT transfer rules but the top UC’s admit very large numbers of students who are not qualified by the usual measures to be admitted to any selective school. This is a fact well known to anyone who is familiar with the UC transfer system and is done on purpose to get around prop 209. But Purple is quite right that the top students at Cal are very bright and that the STEM classes there are probably tougher(mostly Asian) than even at Stanford.
Yeah you’re mediocre. Anyone who goes to HYPSM will consider you as that. http://www.slate.com/blogs/business_insider/2015/04/02/stanford_graduates_get_fought_over_by_tech_companies_like_snapchat_and_have.html
Berkeley and cmu Cs are as good, do you think they’re getting THIS much compensation?
On the matter of snapchat: http://www.businessinsider.com/snapchat-early-and-first-employees-2013-11?op=1
See how even the non-stanford employees were mostly alums of other VERY elite privates. Most of the students who graduate from thee schools have a cliquish feel and will automatically subconciously believe that you are “mediocre” and exclude you. And these people will be important and powerful due to being talented, ambitious and having powerful alumni connections.
The way I describe, HYPS isn’t necessarily the academic elite of this country, it’s more so the social elite, and social privilege still matters.
@theanaconda, it’s very clear that you don’t know how the world works.
@SAY, that discrepancy occurs because freshman and transfer admissions use different admission criteria.
wrt testing: Indeed, at eighteen traditionally the best measures of academic potential are H.S. GPA and test scores. At twenty, after a year or two in college, they’re not so important. What matters most is college GPA, and a 4.0 student has already shown himself to be academically competent.
Will he/she be among the top of his class? Maybe, maybe not. Most probably won’t. However, do recall that Alfredo Quinones-Hinojosa started out at a CC, transferred to Berkeley, graduated with top honors, and then went to Harvard med.
Also, whether these transfer applicants will be competitive enough or not for elite private admissions is irrelevant. Berkeley is, after all, supposed to serve its California population, and its prestige is still exceptional. Some might even rank it above certain private universities that rejected our OP.
@PurpleTitan, I wouldn’t worry much about him/her. That poster is clearly being intentionally obnoxious.