Chance Me: ED UPenn, UC Berkeley, UCLA. CA resident, 3.8 UW, 1520 SAT, CS/Engineering + Business

Chance Me / Match Me
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Stats & Demographics
GPA: 3.78 UW / 4.38 W (rigorous schedule, 11 APs + multiple Honors/Engineering courses + DE).
Testing: 1520 SAT
Ethnicity/Nationality: Indian-American
Income: High income
Intended Major: Computer Science / Engineering + interested in business and tech ventures
Lived in India for 2 years and went to preschool there (born in the US)

Coursework & Rigor
11+ AP courses (AP Calc BC, AP Physics C: Mech + E&M, AP Chem, AP Bio, APUSH, AP World, AP Psych, AP CS Principles, AP CS A if taken later, AP English, etc.)
Multiple Honors (Honors Precalc, Honors Engineering Principles, Honors Biology, Honors Chem, Honors English, Honors World History, etc.)
DE credit (Calc BC Review, etc.)
Linear Algebra at local community college
Overall strong math/science rigor with exposure to engineering and CS

Extracurriculars
Fundraising Manager / Leader for Indian Cultural Organization: Raised about 102K over 5 years through cold calls, events, and sponsorships; organized logistics, scripts, choreography, and built event website
Roblox Game Development / Entrepreneurship: Managed team of devs across time zones; ran advertising campaigns; scaled game to thousands of concurrent players; experience in budgeting, monetization, and retention strategies, over 30 million visits
English Tutor: Taught young girls in India English using my unique perspective and leveraged being bilingual in Hindi
AI / Research: Conducted research with UCSD PhD Candidate, trained environmental AI models using Google Earth Engine; applied computation to air quality and environmental data, publicized research, reached 400 monthly users in targeted areas (using this data to warn people in areas with bad pollution)
OSINT / Cybersecurity: International OSINT CTF competition – silver medal; applied real-world intelligence skills to missing persons case
Cyber Security internship at local company, only high school student selected, shadowed chief architect
Medical Transcription for Veterans Affairs Doctor
Drop shipping: made a Golf Merchandise Website and Clothing Brand
Accounting Internship with mid sized firm, does ecommerce
Tutoring Business: Created website, scaled to a couple tutors, taught chemistry, physics, etc.
Service Work: Helped family responsibilities and balanced cultural/community duties with school
Boy Scouts: Reached Star Rank
Other Activities: Exploring finance, crypto, business operations, moving/landscaping/junk removal small business with ad spend and client base

Awards & Honors
Silver medal in international OSINT competition (Tracelabs CTF)
Group recognized by Cystic Fibrosis Foundation and posted on Instagram page
DECA Top 50 in Regional Stock Market Competition
AP Scholar With Distinction
Commended PSAT Score

Essays / Recs
Essays: Should be strong — cultural leadership, real entrepreneurship, cybersecurity/AI projects
Recs: Strong options from mentors in cultural org, Physics C teacher, AP World teacher

Finances are not a problem.

Likely: UC Santa Cruz, UC Riverside
Toss-up: UCI, SDSU, Purdue
Reach: USC, UCLA, UC Berkley, UT Austin, UCSD, Urbana-Champaign, UDubb, UCSB, Carnegie Mellon, NYU
Far Reach: UPenn (ED), University of Chicago, Princeton, Yale, Stanford, Notre Dame

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Wow - you’ve accomplished a lot. Congrats.

I think you have it about right. The UCs and likely UW won’t see your test. Nor will the UCs see LORs.

I’d put Purdue into reach. I think UW is the hardest admit potentially on your list - but reach/high reach is quibbling. All your reaches are high reaches etc. they have a 2% OOS acceptance rate for CS.

I can’t judge your UCs but suspect Riverside and you haven’t listed Merced but it would happen. You may consider one of the Arizona schools as both are high level schools but an easy admit if you wanted a near assured safety.

Best of luck.

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Your list is reach heavy as you know. If you are CA resident, and are happy with your sure thing CA public universities, your list is fine.

It’s not easy to chance anyone for a place like UPenn which has a VERY low acceptance rate, but go for it.

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Congratulations on a competitive academic record and wonderful accomplishments.

Can you calculate out your 3 UC GPA’s and repost? GPA Calculator for the University of California – RogerHub

Here is some 2024 Freshman admit data for CS/Computer Engineering:

Campus CS Computer Engineering/CSE
UC Berkeley 1.9%/ UC Capped weighted GPA 4.20-4.30 Campus UC unweighted 3.89-4.00 Campus Weighted uncapped 4.31-4.65 EECS 7.6%/ UC Capped weighted 4.20-4.39 Unweighted 3.89-4.00 Weighted uncapped 4.31-4.65
UC Davis 19% Selective Major/ UC Capped weighted GPA 4.19-4.30 Campus UC unweighted 3.80-4.00 <25% Selective Major/ UC Capped weighted 4.09-4.29 Unweighted 3.80-4.00
UC Irvine 21% Impacted Major/ UC Capped weighted GPA 4.12-4.29 Campus UC unweighted 3.83-4.00 28% CE/CSE 24%/ UC Capped weighted 4.11-4.29 Unweighted 3.83-4.00
UCLA 4.1% Impacted Major/ Capped weighted GPA 4.25-4.32 Campus UC unweighted 3.90-4.00 CS Weighted Uncapped 4.66-4.92 Comp Eng 4.7% CSE 4.1% /UC Capped weighted 4.25-4.32 Unweighted 3.90-4.00 Weighted Uncapped 4.54-4.91
UC Merced 90%/ UC Capped weighted GPA 3.59-4.15 91%/ UC Capped weighted 3.59-4.15
UC Riverside 31% Impacted major/ UC Capped weighted GPA 4.03-4.28 42%/ UC Capped weighted 3.95-4.24
UC San Diego 12% Selective Major /UC Capped weighted GPA 4.19-4.31 Estimated <18% / UC Capped weighted 4.15-4.30 Unweighted 3.84-4.00
UC Santa Barbara 10% Impacted Major/ UC Capped weighted GPA 4.23-4.31 18%/ UC Capped weighted 4.20-4.30 Average unweighted GPA 3.91.
UC Santa Cruz CS BA 57% and CS BS 68% Impacted Major/UC Capped weighted GPA 3.96-4.26 57%/ UC Capped weighted 3.87-4.22
San Diego State 28% Impacted Major/ CSU GPA Campus Avg. 4.06 43%/ Campus GPA average 4.06

Best of luck.

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I am an in state california applicant btw probably should’ve mentioned that, and it’s a 4.41 weighted and capped and 3.68 unweighted (yikes)

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sorry i calculated it wrong, it’s a 3.77 UW, and 4.30 capped

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I note you have a lot of midsize private universities among your Reaches, but no Likelies or Targets like that. Many Likely or even Target privates might also offer you merit.

Even if you eventually decided to choose an in-state option, having some merit offers and such to consider is often nice.

If you are interested in suggestions along those lines, let us know.

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Have you looked at USC’s CS & Business and AI for Business programs? They are joint degrees between the Viterbi School of Engineering and the Marshall School of Business.

How interested are you in the business component and why are you interested in the joint degree? Admissions to the programs at USC are competitive. You would need to show that you know about the programs and do a good job articulating your reason for applying to them. Attending open houses, informative webinars, etc. prior to applying makes a difference at USC.

Within the UCs, a few offer undergrad business degrees. Berkeley and Riverside have had programs for several years. UC Davis opened their business school to undergraduates in 2025. Irvine offers a BA in business. Someone correct me if I am wrong, but I believe it is more difficult to double major or combine degrees across colleges at Irvine than it is at the other UCs.

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Purdue as a Toss-up seems right to me. Wouldn’t put it in reach.

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Semantics - toss up or reach, what is assured and affordable?

Not on his list but I assume UCM. And likely UCR.

The rest could be a shut out so if ok with that, then it’s ok.

If not, the student should find an assured or nearly so and affordable, hence I mentioned the Arizona schools.

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South Asian, High Income, Don’t need aid/price not an issue

Demographics:
South Asian
High Income
Live in california (US citizen)

Stats:

GPA: 3.87 UW / ~4.35 W / 4.03 Weighted Capped for UCS (4.5 uncapped) (competitive HS)

Testing: 1520 SAT (760 EBRW, 760 Math)

Coursework: 12 APs by graduation (Calc BC, Physics C, CS A, Stats, etc.)

Circumstances: My grades dropped because I had to become the primary care taker for my Grandma after she had complications with a serious disease (lived with her for past 16 years) which was a lot with my ECs. All bad grades are mostly in English classes, lived in India for 2 years and speak 2 other languages besides English. (was born in the US, moved to india for 2 years while my mom was completing residency and dad was attending classes because they were too busy)

Honors (Probably my weakest aspect besides stats):

OSINT CTF Top 10 Finish (6th place) (Trace Labs international competition) Niche, but rare for high school students, presence in defcon etc.
Cystic Fibrosis Foundation Community Service Award (awarded to an organization I co-directed)

DECA State Finalist

National Merit Commended (Cali cutoff pain)

AP Scholar with Distinction (mid, but listing anyway)

ECs (i think my most decent part):

Founder & Owner – Roblox Game Studio — Scaled studio to 40M+ visits, 8.1K CCU peak, $9–12K monthly revenue. Hired & managed 11 developers, ran ads, handled payroll, built analytics dashboards, filed patent for adaptive game economy system.

Researcher – UCSD — Worked with PhD student mentor using Python + Google Earth Engine to pull AQI data (studying affect of pollution on health; specifically pregnant women but ai model unrelated), trained AI models to analyze pollution trends; created site to help people in areas with bad pollution, accessed by 6K+ users.

Intern – Mid Sized Company (200~ employees) — 1-of-1 high school intern, shadowed product/security teams, significantly helped develop their golden data set for AI threat analysis model, improved results by 15%

Co-Director/Fundraising Manager – Raised $50K over 5 years for charity, choreographed dances, taught scripts, managed volunteers, cold-called donors, personally raised donations by 33% YOY

Founder - Created a tutoring business and hired 5 tutors, 1500+ total hours of tutoring done 600 hours provided for free to underserved students.

Accounting Intern – Managed $100K+/mo invoices, did credit checks, dispute resolution, Walmart/Amazon vendor portals.

President – Data Science Club — Founded first DS club at school, ran ML workshops, taught Pandas/NumPy

Other: Peer tutor, honor roll, random freelance coding gigs, volunteer hours. (probably wont mention in apps)

LORs: Positive but not glowing/personal (didn’t chat up teachers much).

Essays: Shooting for 8–9/10, personal narrative about trust, leadership, scaling a virtual economy, near-disaster rollback story.

College List: UPenn (ED M&T or Wharton), UCLA, UC Berkeley, USC, CMU, Northeastern, JHU, UMich Ross, (Im applying to 28 colleges a lot of T20s but some safeties as well.)

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Are you a US domestic (citizen or permanent resident) student or an international student?

Do you live in California?

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I live in california, sorry should’ve mentioned.

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Are you a US domestic (citizen or permanent resident) student or an international student?

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i’m a domestic student (was born in the US, moved to india for 2 years while my mom was completing residency and dad was attending classes because they were too busy)

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Intended or possible majors?

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Econ/ Business for all “Investment banking target schools” (ie. ross, wharton, uchicago, all ivys)

CE for all non targets, CMU, Northwestern, USC (I am applying for their combined program)

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Sorry to hear about this - but please don’t highlight the “why” grades dropped. That is making an excuse. You have no idea why your grades went down and it may not be seen in a good light. Besides, you have a 3.87 so nothing is down.

You didn’t mention budget (and it matters more than anything else) but I’ll say this:

Your ECs, especially the Roblox business you owned and operated - very impressive That you ran all the operations stands out.

I’ll assume you are applying to business?

My guess - no to Penn, CMU, JHU. Possible to USC, Northeastern, U Mich.

28 is too many - and I don’t know if you have Babson on your list, but it’d be a fantastic match for you. You might also look at the Lehigh IBE program and RPI with a dual to emulate M&T.

You might have saw the WSJ ranks that came out yesterday - Stanford, Babson, Yale. Babson has a tech entrepreneurship concentration and is generally considered the top entrepreneurship school in the country. U Houston, believe it or not, is another.

If IB is a goal, make sure you have ASU on your list and the IBIS program - if you’re able to get in. They are not on the 2nd tier of target lists (and Babson and Bentley both show up in the top 25 on a per capita basis).

Good luck.

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Civil engineering or computer engineering?

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Computer Engineering, thanks for all the help with my post btw