What Happens after UC Admissions Readers Grade Your Application?

Colleges and Universities A-Z University of California - GENERAL
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Here is more information regarding the Comprehensive review process from the UC Counselors Conference 2022.

-Internal readers are those individuals within the admissions office such as evaluators, recruitment and outreach specialists, and other admissions team members.

-External readers are those individuals outside of the admissions office. These individuals are often high school counselors, teachers, or leadership; campus outreach staff such as EAOP staff; independent counselors, graduate students, department staff, alumni, etc.

-All applications are reviewed regardless of whether the student meets all minimum admissions requirements.

-Multiple reads often occur as part of various quality control measures instituted by the campuses. Each campus may have different requirements on the number of times an application is read.

There are 3 types of Comprehensive review:
Fixed Weighted where points are given to certain criteria on the application. This method is used by UC Riverside

Holistic where no fixed weight or values is placed on any one criteria. This method is used by UC Berkeley, UCLA, UC San Diego, UC Irvine, UC Santa Barbara, UC Davis and Santa Cruz

Hybrid which is part Quantitative and part Qualitative. This method is used by UC Merced.

PIQ’s:
The PIQs relate to one or more of the Comprehensive Review factors and help inform admission readers of the full context of the student – family, school, accomplishments, challenges, experiences.
Students are encouraged to use the PIQs to address information that does not appear in other parts of the application, or to explain something on the application more fully. This will be especially important for students who were unable to engage with many common extracurricular activities and with increased
hardships across the U.S. due to the pandemic.
Each of the campuses uses the PIQs to differing degrees, which points to the different methodologies and processes used at each campus.
Some campuses use PIQ’s for scholarships.

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Thanks for sharing the link, I am aware about this review process, I was trying to learn more about the post process where the student can ask for the different indexes. I wanted to know if this is applicable only for UCs where you are accepted or can you get this from UCs where you are rejected. Also wanted to know if there is a time frame where they can ask for this info or can they ask anytime while they are a student.

I found out that they generally see a response in 45 days.

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I am no expert but you can request a FERPA review of your application from the school you attend like @gauchoengineering for UCSB.
You can ask any school for Feedback regarding a rejection but I am not aware they will allow you to review your application file for a school denial.

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how many a-g courses you took over 4 years? typically students at my high school take 24 a-g courses over 4 years.

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@cattycatcat @gauchoengineering
Just a follow up regarding the # of PIQ essay readers. According to the 2022 UC Counselor conference, it is at the discretion of each UC campus how many times the essays will be read. In UCSB’s case, only 1 reader was necessary so the statement that all essays are read twice is no longer valid. I am sure the change has occurred due to the increase in UC applications.

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This is interesting and potentially troubling. The Hout report outlines a process in which a more senior/experienced reader conducts a review if two readers differ substantially in assessments. With one reader, that check is gone. Was any more guidance given at the counselor conference w.r.t. checks on single readers? The data exists to perform a statistical analysis of reader biases… was there discussion of such checks at the conference?

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I only saw a transcript of the conference and did not see any feedback regarding using 1 vs 2 essay readers. All that was mentioned is that each campus can determine the number of readers.

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Based on the process described above by Edward there seems to be a fixed weight. Is that not considered holistic?

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UCSB is considered Holistic according the UC counselor conference. Only UC Riverside is Fixed weighted and UC Merced is a Hybrid. All the rest of the UC’s use a holistic comprehensive review of UC applications.

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Perhaps for the first time ever (!) I can tell you something about UC you don’t know? You be the judge! My kid and I sat through the UC Merced run PIQ workshops. During these workshops the speaker said Merced weighted the PIQs for 30% of the admittance decisions and other UCs had other weighting schemes. Does that sound about right?

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For all the UC’s, PIQ’s are considered Very Important so to me it makes sense. Other areas considered Very important are the UC GPA’s and HS rigor.

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UCSB used to do a presentation where academic factors (GPA, test scores, etc.) were 50% and PIQ, A&A etc. were the other 50%. They have since adjusted how they evaluate applications. Having Merced stated that PIQ weigh at 30% makes sense.

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Wow, you think the PIQs are worth 50% for the higher ranked UCs? My kid will benefit from the PIQs (I hope) as we are immigrants, person of color etc. But 50% is a lot given it’s just who they are not what they’ve done.

Why do you say 30% for Merced makes sense, why not 50%?

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At the most selective UCs, students need to be strong in both areas, academics as well as PIQs / other holistic factors. The exact weighting isn’t as meaningful, because kids really need to be pretty strong in both…

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Can somebody clarify if it is possible to have fixed weights for GPA,PIQs and still be holistic?. The presentation that @Gumbymom linked says no fixed weights.

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I need to clarify something. Do any of the UC’s consider 9th grade grades in the GPA evaluation? I know some go with capped and some with uncapped or both based on 10th and 11th grades. But do any do the overall uncapped gpa based on 9-11 grades?

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My understanding is that the UCs do not include 9th grade in any GPA computation. However, they still see which classes were taken in 9th grade, and they also see what the grades were. So, the holistic evaluation of the student’s record could potentially take the 9th grade classes and grades into account, when considering the rigor of the student’s preparation and the student’s academic strength. There is certainly less emphasis placed on grades from 9th… but the grades are still present in the student’s application (unlike middle school grades).

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Thanks, I was getting confused based on a couple of comments I saw in other threads. Another question is if UCs use a computer program to score the students academics how does rigor in the 9th grade, for instance, get captured. Would be great to learn how this scoring actually works

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I think we do not have enough information to know exactly how rigor is calculated or evaluated. But you should assume they are looking for the student to challenge themselves as much as possible, within the opportunities available to them. High school context is really important when evaluating rigor, and I think this is something the UCs try very hard to understand and include in decision making.

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