Decision: Accepted
Objective:
SAT I: 2260 one sitting; 2310 superscore
ACT: N/A
SAT II: Biology (780), Math II (800), Chem (760), US History (770)
Unweighted GPA (out of 4.0): 4.0; weighted 4.8
UC GPA: 4.40
Rank (percentile if rank is unavailable): 1/116
AP (place score in parenthesis): Bio (4), Calc BC (5 with AB subscore 5), Chemistry (4). English Lang (5), US History (5)
IB (place score in parenthesis): N/A
Senior Year Course Load: AP Statistics, AP Lit, AP Gov, World Religions, Peace & Justice, AP Psych, AP Physics I, AP Spanish Lang
Major Awards (USAMO, Intel etc.): AP Scholar with Distinction, National Merit Scholarship Finalist, nothing major
Letters of Recommendation (supplemental)?: Nope
Did you get into Cal during the month of February (you were one of the 2,000 applicants who received an early acceptance)?: yes, interviewed for Regents but didn’t get it
Subjective:
Extracurriculars (place leadership in parenthesis): Tennis team (1 yr JV, 3 yrs Varsity and team captain senior year), Model United Nations club (secretary 11th grade, president 12th grade), Science club (cabinet position 12th grade), various honor societies, CSF
Job/Work Experience: none…
Volunteer/Community service: National Charity League (past 6 years), food bank volunteering, tutoring through NHS and CSF
Personal Statement: First one was about my school, and second was about my summer at COSMOS; I would say 7-8.5 for each idk xD
Other
[ b] Intended Major [ /b]: Bioengineering
State (if domestic applicant): California
Country (if international applicant): USA
School Type: small all-girls Catholic school
Ethnicity: Asian
Gender: female
Income Bracket: >$150,000
Hooks (URM, first generation college, research, etc.): I think my research through COSMOS helped me out a bit at least for the UC’s
Reflection
Strengths: I think my test scores, GPA, and extracurriculars were pretty strong (I chose a few and stuck with them)
Weaknesses: My essays were decent, and I didn’t have any letters of rec
Schools were you accepted/waitlisted to? Accepted: UCSD, UCLA, UCI, Chapman, USC
Schools you were rejected from? Cal poly SLO, Stanford, Pomona College
Schools you are waiting for? Princeton, Harvard (lol)
General Comments:
I got into all of the UC’s I applied to! Also, just reading through all of these and comparing myself (bc who doesn’t?), I realized that you don’t need to take every AP class in existence or be nationally ranked in something or have a rack of medals to be accepted into prestigious schools. I definitely worked very hard, and I am quite certain that these schools do give a holistic review of your application because I took most of the APs offered at my school and in context I did quite well.
Congrats to everyone else who got in! 