Given the current housing situation, maybe not. Although hopefully there is some assumption on the part of UCB that students living within 15 minutes of campus are more likely to just commute rather than seek dorms or other off campus living arrangements. So maybe that is a part of why they are looking more closely at these applicants through LORs?
Thank you for the information. I could not find the deadline for change of major and I was not sure they allowed a change of major request since they have added the High Demand majors and alternate majors into the mix this year.
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Do colleges look for applicant zip code or their high school zip code if they are not the same?
On the UC application review criteria, see # 13.
Location of your secondary school and residence.
3.7 is not a bad GPA in my opinion. I checked our school UW 3.8 and W 4.6.
So what is the average weighted GPA? High/Low. I would think UW will impact both Capped and uncapped weighted GPA. Maybe the school falls below a certain threshold and hence …
Typically how many APs do the average students take - Lowell claims they offer APs in 28 subjects. Which sounds high.
Also Lowell is a very highly rated school in the Bay. So overall it does not make sense
Our school is farily limited in terms of APs. I think our school offers around 15? But you are only allowed to take APs in junior and senior year (with a few exceptions, like a student with advanced language knowledge taking an AP lang class prior to junior year, etc). After junior year, they say you are only allowed 3 APs per year (although there may be exceptions to that as well). So most students probably won’t have a ton of APs. My daughter, however, probably has fewer than average - most of the APs offered are STEM, and there are zero AP history classes, only AP Lit (no AP Lang, and she wasn’t able to get a spot in AP Lit because it filled up). So that is the main weakness in her application - lack of APs, although most other applicants from her school aren’t going to have 20 APs on their transcript or anything like that, either. I am not sure what the average weighted GPA would be at her school, though. I wouldn’t think much higher than maybe 4.3 or 4.4?
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To add: my daughter’s weighted is 4.1, I believe. However, she has taken several dual enrollment classes which, hopefully, will get included in her UC GPA as weighted classes and should bring that number up a bit.
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For sure.
I may have missed it but did Alameda HS also receive a seemingly disproportionate number of LOR requests?
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I wasn’t sure if “AHS” referred to Alameda High School or Albany High School. Obviously both are in close proximity to Berkeley.
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I was referring to Albany, not Alameda.
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Albany, by the way, is home to UCB’s student family housing, so it is definitely a well-established commuter route.
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When do they publish 2022 admissions by source data? The site is still showing upto 2021.
They usually update the UCOP website in February.
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Thank you!
Would LORs help students with a lower number of AP classes in the application process? For example, there might be students with overall good PIQs and extracurriculars but a low number of AP classes. Would a LOR help students have a higher chance of admission? Just a thought that came to my mind.
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That’s what we’re hoping - and I think you’re in a similar position? I do know that one of my daughter’s LORs specifically addresses her lack of access to APs, so hopefully that will help?
I am in a similar position. My school doesn’t offer many AP classes and limits the number that can be taken. I highlighted that in the additional comments section of the application so hopefully maybe they can take that into consideration. My LORs both show that I am capable of handling a rigorous workload so maybe that can give them some positive insight.
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They probably have a good idea from recent student history. Based on the student’s address when they applied, did they live there as a student, live in campus dorms, or live elsewhere? Now aggregate that by school, neighborhood, etc. to estimate how likely students from the school or neighborhood are likely to choose each type of housing if they attend.
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Would it be possible for a student living in San Francisco to commute daily to UCB? I know a family member who took BART every day when he was a student at UCB but that was over 20 years ago.
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