@sjftlg I don’t believe everyone gets the alumni scholarship invitation from UCLA- my daughter was sent the invitation last year and was accepted to UCLA. She attends there and LOVES it! *She also received a UCB leadership scholarship invitation and chancellors invitation from UCSB and was admitted to those UC’s. I think the invitation its a good sign for your daughter. Hope she gets in!!
So I already posted this in another topic but I’m new to this site (clearly) and I don’t know which boards/discussions/(whatever they’re called) people look at more.
So. I received a supplemental request and I’m not sure why. Don’t get me wrong, I’m an extremely hardworking student but my test scores aren’t anything spectacular and my GPA is extremely low due to a huge huge hardship I faced my junior year and am continuing to face.
Current GPA: 2.8 UW (its rough I know but I have a huge reason behind it)- it was a 3.7 before the hardship I endured
SAT: 1850
ACT: 29
Classes: currently taking both AP and dual enrollment classes as well as almost all honors in the past
Extracurriculars: clarinet in marching band, very involved in church youth group, 2 mission trips to a poor village in Mexico, NHS until I got kicked out due to my hardship, basketball pep band, various concert band ensembles, nannying as a paid job, auditioned for and made it into a state regional band (first freshman clarinetist in school history to do so), auditioned for all state band once on clarinet, piano, guitar
Essays: my personal statement about my illness/hardship (briefly described below) was amazing; not to sound cocky but a few people who read it cried and one said she got chills, which made me feel pretty special. I honestly can’t 100% remember what I wrote for the other essays or what the prompts were, because I applied to so so so so many schools, but I am pretty sure one was about my mission trips in Mexico and the other was about growing up as a musician.
As you can see, I’m nothing spectacular. However as conceited as this sounds I will admit I am very musically inclined and am super into music.
As for my low GPA, I developed a mystery illness that forced me to withdraw from school my junior year. I lost all my credits from that semester except 1 in AP Lang. My local hospital, Phoenix Children’s Hospital, gave up on me since a diagnosis seemed unattainable so I had to fly 3,000 miles and get admitted to Boston Children’s Hospital in Massachusetts, an entire coast away from home. I went through extreme testing and extreme pain, and I got a diagnosis there but only to find out there is no cure. Thus I had to do home/online school the rest of my junior year which was extremely tough; I had trouble just passing my classes and catching up on credits.
I’ve always been an overachiever and academically inclined and never thought my GPA would ever be so low or that I’d be scared about even getting to graduate. Unfortunately, it happened to me and I thought my future was demolished. My top 2 dream schools are USC and UCLA and have been for an extremely long time; I toured them way back when and everything. Even though I know with my GPA I’d have zero hope of being accepted, I applied to the UC schools anyway just because why not?I didn’t even think I’d be considered but now I have this supplemental questionnaire, whoch, not going to lie, made me SO excited to see in my inbox today.
So my question… do they still look at kids with low GPAs like mine or did they send the supplement by mistake? Even if I’m rejected which will most likely be the case, I’m kinda proud that UCLA wants to know more about what I put on my app. I’m expecting rejection but I still want to try my hardest on this supplement, now that I have a small glimmer of hope.
I applied to UCLA along with UCSD and Cal but haven’t gotten an email giving me access to any UCLA portal yet. Should I be worried because I’ve already been emailed by UCSD and Cal with portal log in instructions?
Nevermind I just found out that we don’t need to activate an account…just have to log in.
@shijurodhaz Are you talking about MyUCLA or the decision site?
@oliviad98 I do not want to give you false hope, but I would also like to express how transparent people can be about these kinds of things. Schools like UCLA and USC are highly competitive to get in. And so it is easy to convince yourself that you are unworthy of them. I come from an IB school. And practically everyone in that program has 4.5+ GPA’s and 2000+ SAT’s. I come from a place where all people do is whine and complain about tests and have little to their name other than a number or two. I cannot determine whether or not your receiving this supplement will ensure your acceptance. But to me, “holistic review” has to mean something. These people sitting in admissions right now aren’t computers. They’re people. And they want to accept people into their school. Not numbers. Your situation builds heart and I have to believe that in spite of receiving all these 2250’s and 4.8’s that they would much prefer to have someone that has struggled and ultimately grown from their experience.
They have to look at kids with lower numbers. That’s why their averages are the way they are. If they didn’t, then their averages would be 2300 and 5.0. You better believe that there are tons of kids that have numbers through the roof like that. But sometimes that’s all they have. And colleges aren’t stupid enough to realize how valueless that would be at their school.
Be proud of your accomplishments and completely own that supplement. The rest of us are either accepted or rejected. They singled out you because they want to give you a chance. Make sure they don’t regret it. Good luck to everyone that has applied!
@2Roadsdiverged, what you say is true. I work at a school that gets a lot of kids into UCLA and most of our kids do not have very high test scores. Most are between 1800-1950. UCLA does look at grades more than scores though. Their admission officer even told us that when she came to talk to our school one day. Last year a C student got in and the top student didn’t. It shocked everyone and it is not the only surprise I have seen over the years. You are so right.
@Mysonsdad Hello. All of your posts on the site have been very helpful. Do you know if the UCLA admission offiicer who visits the schools has any influence in the admittance decision? I’ve met my D’s admission officer who visited her school a few times and he remembers me and my D. D also e-mailed him several times with questions and he reviewed her personal statement. Wondering if he follows her application review process or has any influence?
You can go to a colleges’ site and find out who your D’s admissions officer is. If the person you spoke to is not your D’s AO I don’t think it will help much. For example, S has spoken to several of his AO’s and some tell him straight up that nothing he says in the conversation can be added to their admission packet. Now, that being said, the AO your daughter talked to may say something to her AO, or if that is her AO then, we are all human, how do you ignore someone who made an impression on you.
@Mysonsdad At the school you were talking about where the C student got in while the top dog didn’t, something doesn’t feel right. Shouldn’t UCLA take the top student, because, while I know that UCLA has holistic admissions, according to the common data set, academics are given more importance than extracurriculars. So if we assume that the top student had only academics and the C student had only ECs, shouldn’t the top student get in?
The C student probably had top-tier SAT and SAT 2 scores.
you can do it Oliviad98 you can get in. I pray that you get in to UCLA even if I don’t. you deserve it in Jesus name Amen.
@McKilla99 @Kyuutoryuu I couldn’t agree with both of you more. We were all shocked she got in. She did pick a very unpopular major. I know her SAT scores sub par and she most likely did not take SST 2’s. She did not have any impressive EC’s from what I remember. She was a URM, but so was the Val and UCLA can’t take that into consideration. I don’t know anything else about her background so maybe there was some extending circumstance or maybe a parent works at UCLA. Maybe the files got mixed up. Not to take anything away from her, because she did get in, but it is most likely an anomaly.
UCLA cannot officially take into consideration URM status, but they always find the way to do it.
Hey, so at first I believed that getting an alumni invite was not significant but now I’m getting the impression that it is. Is it? I got one. I don’t want to give myself false hope. I think that my stats are pretty much at the UCLA average with my SAT being a little higher than their average.
@lyannastark Alumni at UCLA only invites a certain number (4,000) of applicants although everyone is welcome to apply. Alumni at CAL invites everyone. So for UCLA it is a good sign, for CAL it’s eh’
Here is a thread about it. It says about 70% of those who get the alumni invite get into UCLA…http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/discussion/1458538/ucla-alumni-scholarship-invitation/p1
Yesterday, a student at UCLA who works with the alumni committee called me, encouraging me to apply to UCLA’s Alumni scholarships again. (I had already received an email notification too.)
@Mysonsdad ah! I am always wary of getting myself false hope but now this makes me so excited and hopeful for UCLA. This means a lot so thanks!
@happywaterbottle yay! I guess it is good news for both of us then. 
@Mysonsdad Also, do you know if it is numbers based? I never thought that my numbers were that great but my activities were.