They have more applicants with similar stellar stats and even some with better stats than they have room to accommodate. 9APs is less than many kids and many have 4.0s unweighted. And the essays, which in my opinion are a pretty subjective criteria of assessment, have a good amount of weight in the decision.
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Please do not take offense to this comment but a 3.85 unweighted gpa is frankly average for the top UCs. My kidâs gpa is 3.75, 4.15, 4.55 and though they are strong, compared to other applicants she is just average. Like your son she played club soccer at the highest level for a nationally ranked club and had strong ECs. Reality is that even with this, she probably didnât stand out because there are just so many strong applicants. What I have deduced, is that fit is more important than ever. I am not sure, but I think my kidâs essays helped her. She spent a lot of time on them and wrote very personal stories, creating a consistent narrative about her as a person, her ideals, her challenges. The other thing that may have helped her was course rigor, she took 10 AP and 6 Honors classes her sophomore and junior years. In the end she got accepted to UCB, UCI, UCD, UCR but was rejected at UCSD and UCLA, waitlisted at UCSB.
As an aside I often wondered if it would be better to try and game the system by purposely getting a lower gpa in the 25th percentile of admits but make up for it with very strong test scores and ECs. There are just so many strong applicants once you get into the 3.75 gpa and above range.
What I have learned through this process with my oldest kid is that the pursuit to get into a top school is too stressful. I probably didnât help things because I am a proud UCSD and UCLA alum and likely put pressure on her indirectly and without meaning to. I am already planning for my second kid to apply out of state at less competitive schools. I donât want to see her so stressed and crushed just because she didnât get into some idealized vision of a top school.
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does anyone know how many were waitlisted/rejected/accepted etc?
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I think @tboooe summed it up nicely. It is true when you look at the admitted student profiles, below a 4.0 unweighted for schools like UCLA and UCB just doesnât make the grade anymore. Also this year with all UCâs having to go test blind did not help the situation. My attitude has always been that High School and College are just small stepping stones in life that they should enjoy their time to be a kid, take classes that interest them and strive to be their best, not someone elseâs idea of best.
My favorite words of wisdom are âWhere you go for Undergrad will not define you, it is what you do with the opportunities you are given that will make you successfulâ.
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@FlooredDad You and your son should be proud of what he has accomplished so far and how he has developed as a person. His future is bright. We look forward to the person he will become.
From what I understand, the college admission process is two-way match: 1 - what your student is looking for and 2 - what the college/university is looking for with respect to assembling a cohort that fits âinstitutional priorities.â It is hard to discern what these institutional priorities are.
IMHO, I would not take the UCLA or UCB results as a signal that there was anything âlackingâ in your elder sonâs application nor that you need to adjust anything for your younger son. Best of luck for both kiddos.
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No offence taken and thank you for the elaborate response.
I see your point about not having perfect GPA, yet I was told the process is âholisticâ:
- applicants from tougher high schools will have some sort of adjustment
- applicants who spent a lot of time on non-academic ECs clearly cannot spend the time on
more academic ECs
I did that process in a different century on a different continent and the process was clear and fair. I am not sure I can say the same for UCs in 2021.
Wanting to know this too, is it just me or was there a large increase in waitlists this year?? Working on my waitlist essay rn LOL
yeah im hoping its a similar spread to previous years so around 30% are admitted off WL 
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Unfortunately holistic also means subjective. Frankly I am more surprised my kid got rejected from UCSD than I am that my kid got into UCB.
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Over the 8 years that I have been following the UC admissions, the # of waitlisted students has been increasing but also the # of applicants in general has also increased.
My two cents is that CS and nursing are competitive at every school. It looks like bioengineering is quickly catching up. If that is your second sonâs passion, encourage him to apply even more broadly.
Would u expect a drop or increase in admits from the waitlist? Iâm hopeful for an increase bc of the large amount of colleges students applied to this year, in addition to a lot of OOS students not wanting to pay the Cal tuition
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There is no formula, yet there is one: Let your kid do the best in what they like most and let them push themselves a bit out of the comfort zone but not too much so they maintain their overall well being. Try to do your best in academics, take the most rigorous courses that your kid has the potential to succeed in, put your passion in 2-3 ECs, not a lot(sports/arts/music/STEM/humanities/competitions etc. etc.), and for UCs specially find opportunities to make an impact around your community (school, local, regionalâŠ), i.e give back to the community. And then, the college will pick the student that fits their class. Of course if youâre an accomplished athlete, the path will be a bit different since recruitment is a factor. Disclaimer: My perspective only :).
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thank you!
@skweezy2021: i believe they waitlisted more students this year due to the increased applications but I also think they will not admit as many as last year but more than the previous year. The UCâs know the OOS yield due to the finances so they expect many not to enroll and this year will probably be no different than previous years. 2020 was an outlier.
I would predict that the waitlist admits would be similar to previous years and might be slightly lower since there was a huge increase in applicants this year.
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does everyone (who would qualify) get an invite to the seeds scholarship? i am in no way a stem-standout, so is it worth applying to?
Thank u so much! Thinking the same bc the waitlist additional essay is also a deterrent to students but only itâs looking like only time will tell
Hello Iâm from the transfer fall 2021 thread. Can I get some confirmation if you guys got the waitlist glitch AS SOON AS roughly 3 days before the actual announcement? Our official release date is April 23rd for reference. I am asking cause most of us have the âwaitlistâ option aka âIf you wish to withdraw from further considerationâ. However a lot of us speculate that this is just the default setting of the withdraw option as we are too early into the admissions deadline/period.
Whatâs the earliest day counting before the official deadline when you noticed any changes to the withdraw option.
My sourcecode also has the admission deposite refundable message but I believe that is given to everyone.
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I did not see people here or on Reddit start to talk about it until 24-36 hours before decision release.