<p>Hi,</p>
<p>So I didn't take a science SAT II, but took MATH IIC.. Am I totally screwed over??
I applied to Mech E, if that matters.</p>
<p>Thanks,</p>
<p>No, you are not totally screwed over, (but it's kind of hard to make an evaluation if that's all we know about you).</p>
<p>Because it was kind of a spur of the moment thing, I had thought all along that I was going to do Business Administration, but after telling many of my father's good friends (all self-employed pretty successful businessmen), they all told me that it would be better to first major in engineering, and then get a MBA. I am really into cars and engines, so I thought it would be a good idea to get a bs in mech E.</p>
<p>I will have taken 4 years of Science, (Honors Bio, AP chem, AP Bio, AP physics), and 4 years of Math (Honors Algebra Two, Honors Pre Calc, Calc BC and Ap Stats).</p>
<p>iVinshe,Thanks for the comment</p>
<p>iVinshe- i took the physics sat II in december but did not perform on par with my other sat and sat II scored because my class will not have covered the complete material until may, will admissions likely see that physics is on my senior year schedule in addition to junior year and take this into account during review.
i fear that my satII physics is going to keep me out of cal =[..</p>
<p>Hm, well shalala, I am somewhat confident that it's important mainly to have <em>some good scores</em> to get into Berkeley. It's a very numerically based system, and I think they're likely to just factor in the stronger scores, ignore everything else, and coldly give you an index based on numbers. I don't think friends of mine who got into EECS had purely good scores -- they probably had some less than awesome ones, but some good ones + good grades.</p>
<p>Your grades are more important than the test scores, to my knowledge. I think you have a good chance as long as you've kept up good grades.</p>
<p>Mraoshi - same goes for you, if you have lots of good numbers sitting around, that's a good thing. A science SAT II with good performance is a plus...not sure if it's required, however. If it's not required, it won't affect you that much is my guess...if it's required, well that could be a problem. </p>
<p>Generally the rule of thumb is if you have good numbers to show, you're going to be fine. But you have to have an abundance of good numbers.</p>
<p>And an addendum to mathboy's suggestions:</p>
<p>And if you don't have as many good scores as everyone else, a good essay is very helpful (especially if it was on your interests in cars and engines, and possibly how that could related to MechE). Actually it's helpful in general.</p>
<p>looking back i wish i had made my esay more technical, it was well-written, but didnt show much engineering knowledge, mainly interest.
only time will tell =] but im glad to hear that an sat II won't be the automatic death of me</p>
<p>i generally thought my scores were good, but the one satII was bad, and without superscoring my satI isnt that great because I bombed writing the first time arround, but was able to go up 110 points there if that is even considered.</p>
<p>Don't worry about it being too technical; that's what you're going to college for xP</p>
<p>Stop worrying; nothing you can do about it now. Good luck! Let us know how it goes.</p>
<p>you're right. less than two months until the decisions are posted =/ i wonder what time they mean exactly by the "evening of March 26th"</p>
<p>Yeah in all honesty, it is hard to say anything technical about engineering without actually taking some classes. Very few actually understand what the academics are like anyway, and the goal is that you have a solid math + science background so you can actually handle the engineering department here, which really will teach you what you need. </p>
<p>Maybe a little interest shown here and there in programming or something could be nice, but genuinely, I think you get into Berkeley engineering if and only if you have rather good scores!</p>
<p>Well for what it's worth, I was accepted to EECS, and really didn't have any aspirations in engineering...I always liked mathematics. I was afraid career options were impractically tough in the math realm or something. And guess what - I was accepted. I mean, it's actually a somewhat odd system - it can predict who will <em>handle</em> the curriculum somewhat well, but not who's actually an engineer specifically. I had good grades, etc, and very little to show in the way of engineering interest.</p>
<p>i feel the same as you did about careers in math/engineering: either theoretical and sparse or so practical that theyre dull. my essay was about diff projects and tools i had thru childhood and how i always wanted to experiment with tools that were my dads for the projects...</p>
<p>Does a 650 on the physics sat II indicate I cant handle the curriculum? (mech eng) its so low because I hadnt learned all the material but I dont know if Cal will realize this without my saying so and I didnt have the opportunity to say so since I took the tests in December.</p>
<p>my math scores are higher 790 and 770 on SAT 1 and SAT 2 respectively. </p>
<p>its in the hands of the adcom now =/</p>
<p>Shalala -- I eventually decided on just doing pure math...I needed a spark to tell me I was going to make it, since you have to be pretty into it to get anywhere in a theoretical subject. If you do get tenure as a professor at a good university, which is easier said than done, it's a great life - you go to academic conferences, sit in on seminars, and work on your personal research. Your life is all about intellectual interactions + contributions. As off topic as it is, I can't help but mention how nice an experience it was to go to seminars the professors attend, and give talks at here...the only issue is, these professors are truly exceptionally sharp people [most especially at a top math program]. </p>
<p>About your SAT II's -- I am of a firm opinion that if your classes didn't cover the material for the SAT II's explicitly, which many don't, then the score reflects very little on your ability to handle engineering here. You could've aced it, and do poorly in engineering here, or do poorly in the SAT II and do well in engineering here. </p>
<p>I also had a discussion on another forum about how I honestly think the SAT II's and SAT are too "game-able" or flawed to reflect much about college performance...other than the mere correlation that often good, high scoring students will just push themselves and do well at what they try. But in all honesty, just taking math -- neither the AP, nor the SAT II's in math reflect the nature of theoretical math for instance. You can game the system and get a good score if you study the right things. I remember, I just heard about this book by Rusen Me-- something or the other way back in the day, and read it for the SAT II without having taken precalculus, and was able to get an 800. To this day, I probably would be more intimidated by precalculus than by graduate level math :) </p>
<p>All said, guess what -- I took the AP exams in physics, but I never took the physics SAT II. Nobody cared =] So if you have other better scores, know Berkeley just kinda uses numbers to admit students. This can lead to some questionable admissions choices of course, but that's how it is. My notes above mainly are about how <em>I myself</em> don't think you should worry if you can handle the curriculum or not, based on an SAT II. Now, if you had a good course in physics, took the AP tests, and couldn't get 5's in the physics and math <em>DESPITE covering all the material thoroughly</em> then I'd worry more out of self-reflection, because these should not be that hard to do well on. </p>
<p>Hope that helps a bit.</p>
<p>Argh, my communication is horrible today -- about the professors, I meant the only thing is that they're so intimidatingly amazing at what they do that one wonders how to make it there ever...</p>
<p>OK actually I will ask -- have you taken AP (or IB) courses in math and physics? I think I can tell you with some conviction that if you got A's in those classes and they were reasonably well taught, you should be fine for the engineering department, even from their eyes, because I think grades matter more than test scores according to the way they weight things.</p>
<p>up until 11th grade I had straight As thru math, chem and bio
last year i went AB in bc calc last year and got a 5 on the exam
BC calc was taught really intensely at my school, we're 'international baccalaureate' and I feel like our tests were harder than the average bc calc tests so that we would be more than adequately prepared for ap. i was worried towards the end of the year because my test grades were low b's, but when the AP rolled along, it was a breeze.</p>
<p>I took MV calc first semester and got a B, now on to differential equations</p>
<p>as for physics, I take IB physics and its 2 years so i'm testing this june. last year I went BA and I got an A last semester (upward trend =])</p>
<p>hmmm. my grades in these subjects arent as strong as my overall gpa which looks not good for a prospective engineer, but I honestly believe that Bs in ib physics and mv calc have more merit than straight As in environmental science and statistics, and am counting on berkeley and other to universities recognize this..here's to hoping!</p>
<p>Mathboy98. you didn't take the SAT II Physics and you are in Engineering at Cal? Did you take some other science SAT II?</p>
<p>OK I am not an engineer right now, but I was accepted to the EECS program [long story why I didn't apply straight to math...was not sure I'd make it as a theoretical major]. I did have the chemistry and biology and math SAT II's back in the day though. It just doesn't matter what you take almost, I think, because you're kind of just a statistic of numbers to Berkeley, from how I see their system.</p>
<p>I took AP Physics, just never bothered with the SAT II. </p>
<p>Shalala, it looks like you're a pretty intelligent person in the math and science area, and you have a little extra math coming in, so that's not a bad thing. The AP tests are definitely too easy, and extra preparation for Berkeley is good. </p>
<p>I really hope for you that you get in, because I guarantee that some who're less qualified will get in; the annoying thing about Berkeley's admissions process is it's closed-minded to an extent in how numerically based it is - i.e. nice big GPA + some 2300+ SAT score really helps, I think. When there are many factors I could suggest which better predict success in something like engineering. </p>
<p>Heh, but my admissions process criticism can be left for another day...=] it can go on and on.</p>