They tell them to be themselves, but they have to be as perfect as possible, not make any mistakes. They are teenagers, even adults make mistakes. And how many of those genuine, yet perfect essays and applications were looked over by paid college counselors? I am not bitter, just cynical about the process.
1 Like
Iâm sure there are some.
I was just talking about some very good, free advice on applications that were given at our kidâs high school that Iâm sure helped some kids to get admission. The tips and hints (such as what to focus on in your PIQâs) stuck with me and helped me help my children.
Iâm saying perhaps some of the high performing, well deserving children who have not had much success may have benefitted from that advice too. It might explain some seemingly strange decisions.
3 Likes
Donât give up hope on Cal. While unpredictable, she seems so well matched with all her community involvement - Cal values that. And there are plenty of stories out there about students rejected by multiple UCs, but then getting accepted to Cal. My fingers are crossed tightly for her.
3 Likes
How are you guys defining âperfectâ? A PIQ should make sense and be easy to read. That doesnât mean that it needs to be publishable. To me, a well written PIQ means that the student goes into very descriptive detail about what they did, what motivated them and what they got out of an experience. It is reflective. It is about the student.
Each PIQ has suggestions for what the UCs would like answered. As an example: PIQ #2 asks students to describe how they express their creative side. Easy enough. However, under the PIQ, it goes into further detail about what to include.
- What does creativity mean to you?
- Do you have a creative skill that is important to you?
- What have you been able to do with that skill?
- If you used creativity to solve a problem, what was your solution?
- What are the steps you took to solve the problem?
- How does your creativity influence your decisions inside or outside the classroom?
- Does your creativity relate to your major or a future career?
If one were to speculate what type of rubric a reader might be given, this would be a good place to start. They might ask the reader to evaluate, Does the student describe what creativity means to them? Has the student used creativity to solve a problem? How has creativity influenced the student to make decisions inside or outside of the classroom?" You get the idea.
Every college admission session I have attended has urged students to have someone read over their essays and application before submitting it. Having people read over an application doesnât mean that they are writing it for a student. A parent/teacher/counselor might suggest that a student go into more detail, fix a sentence that isnât clear, or add additional supporting information.
6 Likes
Over 100k applications plus holistic admission is guaranteed to yield some anamolous results. I view UC more as a lottery now, and while it may be worth a shot, there is no point in overthinking the application or rejection.
5 Likes
Iâm going to pull @edragonfly 's post over here because it was very well written.
I now work with low-income, first-gen high school students through a 1:1 mentoring program. The program provides excellent training for college mentors like me and my advice to all UC applicants is to really spend a lot of time on your PIQs, starting the summer before senior year. Get feedback and iterate. This is the only way you can stand out since stats and activities (usually accomplished musician/athlete/club president) are so common these days. You need to be memorable and the best way is to choose the PIQâs that showcase you the best and tell complementary stories about you. Also important is to strive for a balance of story-telling and reflection. The best PIQs are well-balanced between telling what happened and reflecting upon the eventâŠwhat did you learn about yourself, the world and how did it shape or change you, your outlook and what you want to do in your future. If the essays are all story-telling or all reflection, they donât showcase you as well as ones that are well balanced between story and reflection. Obviously, not going to help you or your student now, but if you have younger ones, you have more tools, knowledge and experience to help them. Not implying that your student did not have stellar PIQs, just advice to future students who hang out at CC forums.
2 Likes
I really think a lot of PIQs are ineffective because they either donât answer the prompt, or does not answer all elements of the prompt. This is often because kids are reusing their common app essays or pieces of those essays and submitting them as a PIQ. Common app essays contain a lot of fluff whereas PIQs donât want that kind of creative writing.
3 Likes
What exactly do you mean by that statement? That those two schools have lower admissions criteria?
Iâve heard there are a ton of waitlisted kids at UCSC this year.
Letâs move on from talking about one particular student.
2 Likes
Yes they do by virtue of having relatively fewer applications and being lower ranked
1 Like
Yes. This is the message given to our high school students.
Perhaps I didnât articulate it clearly, but this is what I meant by the advice given to help the students submit a good (Iâll use the word good instead of perfect) application with good PIQâs.
When I mention things like advice on grammar and spelling, weâre talking the expectations of a 17 year oldâs grammar and a 17 year old expecting to attend college should already know how to spell.
Advice on double checking comes from the understanding that these kids havenât experienced the real world yet and probably donât have a full understanding of the importance of making sure the information in the application is correct.
Those sorts of things.
2 Likes
And I think some of the problem is that sometimes people donât actually understand what a PIQ is and how it is VERY different from the common app personal statement and other kinds of admissions essays. We certainly did not understand this when we started the process! In fact, D23 had drafted 5 or 6 PIQ responses over summer and worked really hard at editing, refining them, making them as polished and perfect as possible, with the strategy of then choosing the 4 best to submit. And then she attended an admissions session at Cal in the fall and asked what they were looking for and realized she had written them all ENTIRELY WRONG. She actually had to scrap all of her hard work and start over just a few weeks before deadline. But her new versions were real PIQs, not personal essays. I think this helped her a lot. But we easily could have submitted her original responses - which were GOOD, but werenât PIQs - and gotten a totally different result.
2 Likes
I wonder if the acceptance rate at all the UCâs will drop significantly this year. It certainly seems very different from previous years with so many being waitlisted at whichever campus or rejected.
I think those rankings everyone is so fixated on will also change. Iâm wondering if the so called âlower rankedâ UCâs will end up being much more closely aligned with the âhigher rankedâ ones as many more high performing students start to attend whichever UC they were offered admission to regardless of itâs supposed rank.
4 Likes
In case Lindaâs moderatorâs note wasnât clear enough, please refrain from discussing and commenting other peopleâs childrenâs situations. And do not respond to hidden posts. They will be deleted.
4 Likes
23 posts were split to a new thread: Concerned about UC decisions
A post was merged into an existing topic: Concerned about UC decisions
However, essays are least fair as many pay writers, have educated family members that will write the essay, or use other means to perfect it. Testing is the only true unbiased measurement of hard work. Sorry to say.
2 Likes
People can pay for tutors and test prep just as they can pay for writing coaches. People with money and resources will always have some advantage. Unfortunately, there is no such thing as a truly level playing field, whether itâs testing or essay writing. That is one of the reasons that there is preferences for 1st gen and low income students as they are the least likely to have these kinds of advantages. But nothing, nothing, not even testing, is truly unbiased.
7 Likes
16 posts were split to a new thread: Why Pick a UC