Hi everyone! So I’m currently in the process of filling out my UC applications and (similar to many others), UCLA is my “dream school” with a major in political science. Given my personal stats & extracurriculars, what do you think my chances of admission are?
-3.9 UC GPA
-SAT score of 1200 (re-taking soon)
-4 year member of student government, currently serving as the Vice-President
-4 year member of Key Club, served 2 terms as Historian and served 1 term as President
-4 year member of Black Student Union, served a term as Vice-President, currently serving as President
-National Honor Society
-AVID
-Member of school Gov. Club, serving as Chair of Voter Registration committee
-founded a student advisory panel with my school principal
-member of school site council
-a member of the California Young Senators program
I was thinking of maybe applying as a Global Studies major because political science is so impacted at UCLA, what do you guys think?
Welcome to College Confidential as a first time poster.
UCLA will be a Reach school (as it is with most applicants)
With a 12.4% acceptance rate for CA applicants, a lower than average UC GPA and lower than the 25th percentile SAT score it will be a tough admit.
You have good focused EC’s but these do not make up for lower than average academic credentials.
Here is some UC stastitical data to give you an idea of your chances and these are not major specific. UCLA does not admit by major into the College of Letters and Sciences so select the major you would like to pursue.
With your record, I would target UC Santa Cruz, Riverside and Merced for Match schools.
What other schools do you have on your list?
2018 Freshman admit rates for UC GPA of 3.80-4.19 capped weighted and not major specific:
UCB: 10%
UCLA: 9%
UCSD: 34%
UCSB: 38%
UCD: 41%
UCI: 38%
UCSC: 70%
UCR: 84%
UCM: 95%
Look at how many students applied and how many were admitted. You can safely assume that most students admitted to UCLA were close to the top of the class since the UCs explicitly compare all applicants from a given high school and most strong in-state students apply to the UCs. At my kids school there were 12 students admitted to UCLA (about 15% success rate amongst the applicants) and all of them were in the top 20 in the class.
So if (say) 10 students were admitted from your high school in 2018 then you have little chance with a class rank of 45. Conversely if 40 were admitted then you have a decent chance.
UCLA does not consider class rank however if you are ELC eligible ( top 9%) then that will be considered. Do you go to a low performing HS? Are you low income/ first generation which are also considerations? As stated above^, what is the acceptance rate for your HS? You are evaluated based on your overall application package but GPA, test scores and personal insight essays are considered the most important.
Application review criteria:::
* LOS ANGELES
*
Very important: Academic GPA, Application essay, Rigor of secondary school record, Standardized test scores
Important: Character/personal qualities, Extracurricular activities, Talent/ability, Volunteer work, Work experience
Considered: First generation college student, Geographical residence, AP/IBHL exam scores
Note: GPA, test scores, course work, number of and performance in honors and AP courses most important. Essay considered. Strong senior program important. Extracurricular activities, honors and awards also reviewed.
For the College of Letters and Science, the applicant’s major is not considered during the review process
@bgrslc . . . per Twoin18’s post #3, you can also go to the link provided and click on the 5th tab from from the left, called Fall Freshmen Average GPA by Year and UC Campus, per each high school. Then page down to what the listings for admittance is for your high school. The admitted average is what you’d be competing against, not the enrolled average. Conveniently, since it is a UC website, it will list gpa in capped form, not unweighted nor fully unweighted.
Be sure to click on Los Angeles, because the default it will post is the average from all nine UC undergraduate campuses. And you probably want the 2018, to get as close to 2020 as possible; 2019 will probably be inputted into the dashboard later this year. Good luck…