How does UCLA handle international students?

MYOS1634
Sun, 21 Apr 2013 17:44:13 +0000

Your yearly averages for each year will be calculated, along with your last year of lower secondary school (and any other grade in a subject that would “count” as high school in the US, such as algebra). They will be converted. For the conversion, your counselor will have to estimate what percentage, nationally or regionally, get that score (top 10% top 20%?) Remember to include all “majors” or “tracks” if your school system has tracks or secondary majors. It’ll create a yearly GPA and a total unweighted GPA.
Beware that UCLA does NOT award financial aid to international students and that they receive something like 90,000 applications. The odds of your being accepted are thus slim, even if you’re exceptional. Therefore you’ll need to look at many schools, asking for brochures (“request info”). That’s what you should be doing your sophomore year.
You’ll need more than grades and scores, too. You’ll need proof of your leadership skills, your passion for non academic things: Science Olympiad, History Competition, etc. If your school does not offer clubs, you’ll have to secure permission to create on on something you’re passionate about.
For the TOEFL you only need to get the minimum score but for the SAT you need to work very quickly and accurately. Many international students mistake the easiness of many questions for “an easy test”. The difficult is in getting no more than 3, or 5, or 10 mistakes in the tests, depending on the score you wish to achieve. You need to prepare by practicing a lot, otherwise you may know how to answer but you won’t have time to!