California Jewish Parents: Did any of your kids mention their Jewish identity in their UC Personal Insight Questions (PIQs)? If so, I’d love to hear about their experiences with the application process. Both of mine wrote about their Jewish identity and its significance, with one sharing an experience of anti-Semitism. (Their essays were completed prior to Oct 7). I’m curious to know if others have noticed any trends or insights regarding admissions decisions in relation to discussing Jewish identity. Your thoughts are appreciated.
You should probably start a thread on this. I would be very interested to hear responses to this too, but I think the question will be buried in this thread. My D24 wrote about her Jewish identity in all applications - and after 10/7. Her activities scream Jew so it would have been silly to avoid the topic. We kind of decided that if she was rejected because she was Jewish, we didn’t want to be at that school anyway. D24 was rejected from Columbia ED while a girl at her school with similar grades and lessor activities was admitted. We will never know if religion had anything to do with it or if it was some other “holistic” factor. The two girls were very different majors so it could easily be something less nefarious.
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I agree it’s crucial (and brave) to be yourself in your applications. Your child is selecting their home for the next handful of years and they need to feel safe and valued there. But, rejection pain is more acute, too.
Mine also went for it with his identity in his essays. It would have been disingenuous otherwise. He’s had one rejection, but I do not assume it has anything to do with him, rather his stats were slightly below average for that particular school. I assume the same for your daughter, that there was an objective reason, and likely we’ll never know if there was a discriminatory reason.
He’s been accepted at 6 other universities, so I know they didn’t hold his essay and who he is against him. I could be naive re both our students, though. I hope not.
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I wouldn’t want my daughter to go anywhere she had to hide her Jewish identity or a school which did not have a thriving Hillel.
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My nieces/nephews are involved in Jewish orgs and it was the focus of either PIQ 1 (Leadership) or PIQ 7 (Making your community a better place). All were admitted to multiple UCs.
IMO:
It’s not about you (generically speaking). If about how you “fit” into a diverse community and how you can contribute to everyone else’s benefit. I assume schools will want to know you have something positive to bring to the table and help everyone understand the struggles we all face today.
At least for the PIQs, I wanted S24 to highlight what he can contribute to the UC community from his previous learned experiences.
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Very tangential, but while my S24 is not Jewish, he wrote a diversity/community about his childhood exposure to people of different religions including lots of specific references to Jewish people and organizations, and how he valued those experiences and would value a religiously-diverse college community. Some of his Jewish friends, though, cautioned him they thought that was risky in the current climate. But after talking to his college counselor he went with it anyway for any applications with appropriate prompts.
And so far so good, including just recently at WUSTL where a version of this essay was one of his supplementals.
Of course I don’t want to suggest that is the same thing as actually being Jewish, but I do think it is a data point in favor of the proposition that most selective US colleges still very much identify as places where religious diversity is embraced, including as applied to Jewish students. And for sure we shared the sentiment that if a college actually did have a problem with that idea, he would not want to attend that college, but again so far it has not seemed to be an issue anywhere.
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My son wrote one of his UC PIQs about being Jewish and how important it is to him and about being open minded and excited to meet people from all different religions and backgrounds. He has done very well with acceptances to UC schools.
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