Depending on their high schools and the UCs to which they are applying, there is an excellent chance neither gets in.
How about a bit more realistic hypothetical involving two students who both clearly satisfy the UC qualification requirements, but are applying to the more competitive UCs. LORs aren’t considered by UCs, but assume that EC’s and other factors are relatively equal in the context of what their respective schools have to offer:
Candidate 1: 1420 SAT, 4.28 GPA, top 4% gpa in a top quintile HS, 17 AP/IB offered.
Candidate 2: 1240 SAT, 4.04 GPA, top 4% gpa in a middle quintile HS, 13 AP/IB offered.
How do these students compare for admissions purposes?
Which of these students is more “deserving” of admission to a one of the more competitive UCs, and based on what?
Which (if either) of these students would most likely to benefit from test blind admissions?
Would that benefit be inherently unfair to the other?
In the STTF report, UC illustrated the poor retention statistics for students with SAT scores of 700 (total score, not per section). Given that, it is clear that students with a score of 1000 can get into a UC if their GPA is high enough within their school. It certainly won’t be the competitive ones, but even at the uncompetitive ones, their retention is poor.
We know that both candidates will get into at least one UC given the top 4% GPA. I am also assuming that the GPAs you presented are UC-calculated GPAs, which gives extra points for rigor.
So if we were down to one spot for a competitive UC and these were the only candidates remaining under consideration, and we had no other information about the courses taken, I would choose candidate 1 as that GPA suggests higher rigor.
If you then wonder why I didn’t mention the higher SAT score, again I don’t think that a high SAT score adds much information for an already strong student. It just confirms what we expect.
If you flipped the SAT scores, I would come to a different conclusion.
At the end of the day, the root issue is limited spots in the places like UCLA/UCB where kids want to attend the most and how admission is determined, right?
Why do kids/parents want UCLA/UCB? is it the location? prestige? price?
Maybe the solution for all these is an expansion of the system. Create more UC campuses in the location where people want to go, if the location is important. Give more funds to UC Merced/Riverside/Santa Cruz than UCLA/UCB. Also, expand enrollment in UCLA/USB.
I know some UCB classes are still online… why not make many classes permanently online so that more kids can attend? make online degrees an option for some. You can get Stanford MSEE while working full time - taking classes online but taking the test at the campus. Same admission process, the same diploma but you can take classes online.
Also, invest more in the CSU system to make it on par with UC. Make CSU more desirable and comparable to UC.
However, I suspect this will reduce the ranking of UCLA/UCB and that is not what people want.
Artificial scarcity makes things more desirable and people want to control who gets the scarce diploma from UCLA/UCB.
I don’t quite understand why there should be an impacted major? If a whole bunch of kids wants to major CS, make it available for them online.
University of Mississippi is classified as R1, but it auto-admits Mississippi residents with 2.50/16 or 2.00/18 (HSGPA/ACT) or NCAA minimum. While UC Merced lists 0.20% of frosh with HSGPA < 3.00, University of Mississippi listed 11% in its latest (2016-17) common data set.
So Carnegie classification R1, R2, etc. does not necessarily imply anything about frosh admission standards.
The question is why do we have a housing shortage? We should solve that problem instead of limiting student enrollment because there is no housing like UCB.
Don’t require all freshmen to live on campus to begin with. Work with the city to make it easier for developers to build student apartments (tall order for places like Berkely). Student apartments are a very attractive investment for many since rents are guaranteed by parents.
My nephew spent his entire freshman year at UCSB home in Fresno. I have a feeling he would have been fine doing another year at home.
If the UC system’s primary goal is to educate California students, then reduce OOS and international admission. If that causes a funding issue, then enable need-aware admission for existing OOS/international slots. Fill OOS/international allocation with CA students who can pay full tuition. then it allows more CA students to get into UCLA/UCB.
I’m sure this is not going to fly. just a thought.