<p>Basically, Berkeley is my dream school. I fell in love with it when I watched the OC and learned about how liberal and prestigious it is. I was wondering what my chances of getting into this school are.
I have a 3.9 GPA (we have unweighted, sadly)
I am in the top 10% with a class rank of 45 out of 590.
I will have taken 11 AP classes at the end of my senior year.
I have already taken AP World, AP German, AP Lang, AP US, AP Psych and AP Euro and have received all 4s and 5s.
I will take AP Calc BC, AP Human Geo, AP American Politics and Govt, AP Comparative Govt and AP Lit at the end of my senior year.
My ACT score is 30 with a writing score of 10.</p>
<p>I have had a job since 9th grade and have worked 15 hours during the school week on average.
I am the President of German Honor Society, Secretary of Key Club and Tri Theta.
I am also involved in many more clubs including Student Council, Global Issues, Young Democrats, National Honor Society History Club, French Honor Society and Model United Nations.</p>
<p>My personal statements are about my mom having cancer and that affecting me and me living abroad in India.</p>
<p>Where do you live?
What is your intended major?</p>
<p>Your GPA, rank, course rigor, ECs, and job experience are really solid. You ACT score, although good, won’t make you a superstar applicant at Cal, the most selective UC of all. I’d have to say you are probably a very high match or low reach, depending on your intended major. I believe your test scores best match the mid-tier UCs such as UCSD, UCD, and UCI. I hope you apply to these schools, as well as UCLA, but there are many good options available to you. </p>
<p>Because you have some really good components to your application, I still think you have a shot at Cal and wish you the best of luck.</p>
<p>I actually live in Missouri ( i know that out of state makes the stakes even higher)
I am intending to apply for business and then hopefully international business</p>
<p>I would attend Mizzou since you are a MO resident. They have a very good business school. Not worth the added tuition to attend Berkeley. I’m a UCB parent but if we didn’t live in CA, I wouldn’t have paid the OOS tuition to send my son there. Are you considering any private schools? Also, being OOS and a business major makes it a little more difficult to be accepted at Cal and no guarantee that you’ll even get into their business school until after you attend), so I’d say you are a low reach. Sorry to give you a downer on Thanksgiving!!!</p>
<p>Test score/GPA are about on target for in-state, a bit on low side for OOS.
EC are way about average, but Cal doesn’t seem to weigh this very much.
Essay topic is very interesting and has a lot of potential though.
I think you can definitely expect to be at least a Spring admit and that’s if you’re unlucky.</p>
<p>Ignore caiacs. From what I’ve seen, he likes to bitterly shoot down incoming freshman and blast Cal in general.</p>
<p>Like I always say, “caiacs, dream crusher.” Caiacs is sort of right though. I don’t know about “weak,” but the applicant is probably not on the strong side of average. Her (I’m assuming since I don’t know many guys that watched the OC…) stats aren’t that great and that is what Cal mostly considers from what I have gathered perusing these forums. The ECs are great and the essay is probably a winner, but the rank + ACT + OOS is making it really tough.</p>
<p>It’s not just the weak stats. Berkeley admissions disregards minor school clubs except for leadership positions, and simply counts the total number of competitive extracurricular activities.</p>
<p>I try my best to give an objective-ish decision ranging from accepted, or does not deserve but will get spot anyways, to no chance.</p>
<p>Thank you guys for all of the advice and comments.
I am not offended at all by any of the negative comments because I believe that that you guys are just being honest.
A guy at my school got a 3.0 GPA and got admitted to CAL simply because he is a really good basketball player and got recruited. This is the only reason i am upset if I dob’t get in. Some things are just not fair.</p>
<p>And some California parents think it’s not fair out of state students have a higher admit rate (but not me…I’d rather have the money at this point…).</p>
<p>As for concerns about instate and out of state. Mizzou is a really good school but I live literally 2 miles from it and just want the real college experience. Living 5 minutes from home is just not college.</p>
<p>Can you elaborate on this? If out-of-state students are held to a higher academic standard, how do they have a higher admit rate? Are you saying that out-of-state students, as a group, have higher GPAs, &c?</p>
<p>^ I take it this works because there are more people applying to UCB in-state than OOS, and more people with lower stats (I know I ton of kids who are just like Oh! I’m applying to the other UCs, might as well throw in UCB and LA too to see if I get in. There were a number of kids in my school who had NO chance of getting in, but added it just for the heck of it). On the other hand, more OOS kids apply here because they really just want to go to UCB, and more of them probably have the stats for it (I mean, why pay OOS tuition for lower tier UCs if they have their own state schools?).</p>
<p>FWIW, Statfinder says that in 2009 the admit rate for California residents was 23.7%. Among all students, it was 21.6%.</p>
<p>So, in 2009, out-of-state students must have been less competitive academically (unlikely for the reasons you’ve mentioned), or were at a real disadvantage when compared with in-state students, simply because they were non-residents.</p>
<p>2009 is the latest year available on Statfinder… I remember reading somewhere that Cal is allowing more out-of-state students to attend in recent years to help with the budget. Do you know of any more recent information?</p>