I’m a high school senior and I have a UC GPA of 4.364 (I’m ranked #32/600 students at my high school) and my current SAT score is a 1450. I retook it and I would like to score higher (at least 1480). I would love to get into UC Berkeley or UCLA, however, the mid-tier UCs–such as UCI, UCSB, UC Davis, and UCSD–are all fine with me. How likely am I to get into at least one of these colleges? Also, by how much would I need to improve my SAT score from a 1450 in order to get into UC Berkeley?
you will be a competitive applicant for all of the UCs - note though they can be finicky so, apply broadly
good luck.
You are a competitive applicant for all the UC’s and your SAT score of 1450 puts at around the average for 2018 admitted UCB Freshman. Since UCB should be considered a Reach, any improvement over 1450 will help your chances. Much will depend upon your intended major since Engineering/STEM majors will be on the higher end of the SAT score percentiles.
2018 UC capped weighted GPA averages:
UCB: 4.23
UCLA: 4.23
UCSD: 4.16
UCSB: 4.13
UCI: 4.13
UCD: 4.11
UCSC: 3.96
UCR: 3.81
UCM: 3.71
2018 Data:
25th - 75th percentiles for SAT:
UCB: 1360-1540
UCLA: 1340-1540
UCSD: 1300-1520
UCSB: 1270-1500
UCD: 1220-1480
UCI: 1230-1490
UCSC: 1210-1450
UCR: 1130-1380
UCM: 1020-1280
Best of luck and I am sure you will have several options in the Spring. Make sure you spend time on your personal insight essays to help round out your application.
Your calculation of your UC GPA might be a bit off since under normal circumstances, the max capped UC GPA is 4.33-4.40 and you mentioned that 31 students are ahead of you at your school.
Look up previous admissions for the last 20+ years from your school on the UC site: https://www.universityofcalifornia.edu/infocenter/admissions-source-school. Except for the ultra competitive courses like EECS it’s pretty predictable who gets in since they compare and rank all applicants from a particular school.
So for example if 6-12 students typically get admitted to Berkeley and UCLA each year, then accounting for overlap in admissions the top 10 students probably have an 80% chance of getting in to one or the other (at least for L&S although Engineering would be harder) and students outside the top 20 have a very low chance of admission.
In your case, unless you are at one of the very best high schools in the state, your chances of getting into Berkeley or UCLA when there are 30 students ahead of you are probably not that high. But your chances at the mid tier UCs may be much better. For example our mid ranking HS has roughly the top 10-15 students getting into UCB/UCLA, the top 30-40 getting into a mid tier UC and the top 60-80 (out of 400) getting in somewhere in the UC system.