Did anyone else receive a text message from Berkeley asking to join their chatroom on ZeeMee? I’m wondering why they are asking to join such a platform considering no other UC has sent anything like that yet.
My son received this message for both UCB and UW. He was puzzled and wondered if it was some kind of spam / scam.
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Yes, D23 did, but ignored it.
My son did as well.
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Ok. Just wondering because it was weird to receive it.
ZeeMee can be pretty useful as a tool to connect with other applicants. It has no relevance to the status of your application. Basically these companies buy applicant data from universities and application providers for marketing purposes.
Yeah, it’s a good platform to connect with other applicants. I joined the app, and they have over 90,000 applicants and current students combined.
Should I submit my SAT score as an International to Berkeley? Its 1480 with 800 Math and 680 English.
The UCs don’t accept/consider SAT scores in their evaluation of applicants, so no need to think about that one further.
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Exactly but I see an option for uploading test scores.
Ah, it looks like there’s an English language proficiency aspect of the application for international students, which could be what you’re seeing, but I don’t have insights on that beyond what the page lists. Sorry to not have more info for you; perhaps someone else here knows more.
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Not that actually. If english is the primary language of your institution for three or more years then the English language proficiency is waived.
thank you! Understood why it was there in the first place.
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UC will not consider SAT or ACT test scores when making admissions decisions or awarding scholarships. If you choose to submit test scores as part of your application, they may be used as an alternative method of fulfilling minimum requirements for eligibility or for course placement after you enroll.
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There’s no point in submitting SAT scores since all UCs are test blind
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Thank you everyone!
Hi there – just a note to say that I really think UCB puts a bunch of local kids/schools (ours is the most local school – Berkeley High) into the pool for LOR, just because we are local and they are trying to sort out a big group of local kids and want more info. So many of my daughter’s friends (and my daughter) got the LOR request, and they are all middle to high stats kids who don’t really fall into any of the other likely categories to trigger augmented review. The college counselor at the high school basically told my daughter as much. It’s because we are local that she probably got the request. Probably not predictive of much – some kids who got it will get in, some will get waitlisted (that’s what happened to her older brother, my son who was accepted to all other UCs he applied to but only waitlisted at Cal), and some will be rejected. But at least it’s a chance to give your readers a little more info about you.
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That’s interesting to hear, Goldrush2. It definitely seems true in my daughter’s case - before the break, her counselor told her that out of 75 kids who had applied to UCB approx 70 had gotten the request. However, this is the first year it has happened for her school - they never made this request routinely before. Something has changed. We don’t know what. And we don’t know how they chose who would get them and who wouldn’t (we’re assuming the ones who didn’t get the request are strong “yes” applicants because they are high stats students, and the rest them are less strong “maybes” for one reason or another.) But it is very interesting to hear that it’s happening at other local schools, too. My daughter’s school has traditionally had a pretty high acceptance rate for UCB, so we’re hoping this new LOR thing isn’t a sign that this is changing and the acceptance rate will decrease this year.
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Usually, they say that the LOR requests go to people who are “borderline applicants” which means you are not in the yes pile or no pile and they need a little more information to make a final decision. However, no one really knows the real meaning behind the LOR requests. In the 2021 application cycle there were I think 130k applications submitted and out of those applications they requested LORs for around 16k. Of the 16k requested only around 4k actually submitted letters. Of the people who submitted letters around 2300 were accepted which is around 53%. I remember seeing this data somewhere but can’t recall from where.
If you do enroll at a UC, the 680 EBRW score fulfills the Entry Level Writing Requirement, so you do not have to take the Analytical Writing Placement Exam to try to fulfill it, or take additional frosh writing courses in college before or with the usual frosh writing courses (at UCB, if you do not have the ELWR fulfilled, you need to take the 6-credit COLWRIT 1A instead of your choice of 4-credit frosh writing courses).
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