Does UCSD offer merit scholarships?
Decision: D24 Rejected ( First UC Rejection)
Merit scholarships awarded (if any):
Major (and division if applicable) applied to: Aerospace Engineering
ACADEMIC STATS::
UC Unweighted GPA: 3.88
UC Capped Weighted GPA: 4.27
UC Fully Weighted GPA: 4.54
ELC (top 9% CA HS): Yes
Comments about course load (including senior year):
Number of a-g courses: close to 40
Number of UC Approved Honors courses: 6+
AP courses/exams (scores in parentheses): Cal BC(5), Physics 1(4), Euro(4), Psych(5), 6 more in progress.
IB courses/exams (score in parentheses):
DE courses: 2
Major Awards (USAMO, Intel etc.): National Merit Finalist.
SUBJECTIVE::
Extracurriculars: Eagle Scout, Club founder president, Varsity Debate team
Job/Work Experience: none
Volunteer/Community service: Fundraised and worked for local food pantry.
Summer Activities: COSMOS, ASDRP
Personal Insight essays (general details/topics): Pretty Decent
Supplemental/Augmented Review: No
DEMOGRAPHICS:: Asian
State/location of HS (if domestic applicant): Nor Cal
Country (if international applicant):
Applied for need-based financial aid? No
First Generation? No
Other acceptances/waitlists/denials:
Accepted: UIUC ,TAMU ,Purdue, Twin Cities, Boulder , ASU , UofAz, SJSU, UC-M, UC-R, UC Davis , UCSC, UCLA
Rejected: Georgia Tech , UCSD, MIT, UT Austin
Waitlisted: UC Irvine
Awaiting: UCSB, UCB, Cal Ploy, USC and some Ivies.
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Daughter was waitlisted. Going to chalk this up to some form of yield protection as well. We are OOS, and her GPA and rigor put her above 85% of accepted UCSD students (4.0uw, 5.3w, 11 APs, many honors, a few college level ECE). letters of recommendation were super strong, was in top 2% of class of 550, won a major award, co-cap of soccer team, etc.
I know a previous poster claimed being overqualified/yield protected was just a rumor, but I’ll respectfully disagree since it makes very little sense for UCSD to NOT take into consideration yield potential. Not so much for manipulating rankings, but for making sure they don’t lose out on kids they feel have a higher chance of going.
She’s still waiting to hear back from ucla and uc Berkeley.
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UCSD does offer merit scholarships, but not very many, and not for that much. The web page is here: Scholarships for Entering First-Year Students
One of the college confidential pages has data on amounts and number - of I can find it I’ll update.
Thank you. Has the scholarship already been released or not?
Seems the merit scholarship will be posted on March 30th.
I don’t see a UC GPA in there. Are you comparing your D’s 5.3 weighted (I assume this is your high school’s system?) to UC GPAs that typically top out around 4.4 (capped) and 4.8 (uncapped)?
Your daughter’s profile looks strong, but many in-state students with very strong profiles are rejected or waitlisted, too. UCSD is not an easy admit.
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Decision: Accepted, Structural Engineering
Merit scholarships awarded (if any):
Major (and division if applicable) applied to:
ACADEMIC STATS:
Calculate your GPAs with GPA Calculator for the University of California – RogerHub
UC Unweighted GPA: 4.0
UC Capped Weighted GPA: 4.4
UC Fully Weighted GPA: 4.8
ELC (top 9% CA HS): Yes
Comments about course load (including senior year):
Number of a-g courses:
Number of UC Approved Honors courses:
AP courses/exams (scores in parentheses): 12 (All 5s)
IB courses/exams (score in parentheses):
DE courses:
Major Awards (USAMO, Intel etc.): National Merit Finalist
SUBJECTIVE::
Extracurriculars: School Paper, 3 yrs. Editor-in-chief, DEI Program for 2 years at a UC, Varsity Swimmer and Water Polo Player (4 years, captain, awards), Club Swimmer (way too long, haha)
Job/Work Experience: Swim Coach community swim team (2 years)
Volunteer/Community service: Ecology Club, Service oriented club
Summer Activities: Factory Farming Awareness Fellowship, Environmental Conservation Leadership Program, Swim Coach
Personal Insight essays (general details/topics): No idea how these are evaluated but she at least edited them well. Lol.
Supplemental/Augmented Review: No
DEMOGRAPHICS::
State/location of HS (if domestic applicant): In state
Country (if international applicant):
Applied for need-based financial aid? yes
First Generation? no
Other acceptances/waitlists/denials:
Acceptances: UCSD, UCLA, UCSC, UCD, Purdue Engineering/Honors College, SLO, Oregon State, ASU/Honors College
Denials: Stanford, MIT
Waiting: UCB, UCSB, Williams, Middlebury
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UCSD does not accept LOR’s as part of their admission process.
Believe what you want to believe and I will leave it at that.
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Decision: Accepted
Merit scholarships awarded (if any):
Major (and division if applicable) applied to: Marine Biology
ACADEMIC STATS::
Calculate your GPAs with GPA Calculator for the University of California – RogerHub
UC Unweighted GPA: 3.92
UC Capped Weighted GPA: 4.23
UC Fully Weighted GPA: 4.5
ELC (top 9% CA HS): No, but she did have Statewide.
Comments about course load (including senior year):
Number of a-g courses: 26
Number of UC Approved Honors courses: 15
AP courses/exams (scores in parentheses): Biology (4), Chemistry (3), Environmental Science (4), Lang (4), Calc BC (IP), Gov (IP), Physics (IP)
IB courses/exams (score in parentheses):HL Bio (IP), HL English (IP), SL Spanish
DE courses: Envir Science Class at UCSC, Envir and Indig Studies Class at UAS
Major Awards (USAMO, Intel etc.):
SUBJECTIVE::
Extracurriculars: Cheer (4 years), Marine Bio Club (secretary and then president), Science Explorer’s Club (historian), Girls in Ocean Science, Attended Marine Bio/ Cultural camp in Alaska, SEA Quest Research Class (online), Civics Engagement project about the environment, UCSD Pre-college Marine Bio class,
Job/Work Experience: She babysat and house sat but didn’t include on application.
Volunteer/Community service: , NCL (400 + volunteer hours and lots of leadership), PAWS club at animal shelter, Church nursery (200 + hours)
Summer Activities: Scuba diving with Shark Conservation class
Personal Insight essays (general details/topics): She spent all summer perfecting them so I think they were good.
Supplemental/Augmented Review: Yes or No: No
DEMOGRAPHICS::
State/location of HS (if domestic applicant): Southern California
Country (if international applicant):
Applied for need-based financial aid? No
First Generation? No
Other acceptances/waitlists/denials: Accepted CSUMB, CSULB, UC Berkeley, UCI, UCSD, UCLA, SDSU, Cal Poly Slo, UCSC
Waiting on: UCSB
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Yes it’s apples and oranges. I don’t have the UC gpa details. I used a calculator linked here and lots of variation depending on what I put in. In fact saying more honors courses seemed to lower gpa so a bit odd. In a nutshell she took 7 classes per year (but some are half year and others are full year), and everything she took was either an AP, college ECE, or honors. She had one B+ in 4 years as a sophomore and everything else was an A. So given it was all As and all honors, I would think that’s about as high as things can go. If lower rigor or grades would give her a higher UC score, then I’m at a loss 
I didn’t think ucsd would be an “easy” admit. But I am very surprised she was waitlisted. The email said they would let her know “some time this summer” if she put herself on the waitlist. Too late really.
That’s the capped GPA that you are thinking of. UCs use all three GPAs: unweighted, weighted capped, and weighted uncapped.
You can use RogerHub to calculate the UC GPAs.
For out of state students, UC will count AP, IB, and (I believe) DE courses as honors. Out of state courses listed as “honors” on the HS transcript are typically not weighted for the UCs.
(In state “honors” high school classes are also not necessarily weighted. In a CA HS, only “UC approved honors” classes are counted as honors for the UC weighting.)
There’s more information on this page about the UC GPA and under what circumstances a class counts as honors.
Ok, so her unweighted also isn’t quite 4.0. The UCs will recalculate unweighted GPA based on 4, 3, 2, 1 (no fractional point for +/- grades) so her unweighted is going to be more like a 3.98. This is great, but there are a lot of great applicants in the UCSD applicant pool.
In general, I think you might be underestimating other applicants relative to your D. However, your D is a strong applicant, and I’m sure she will have great options. Best of luck in finding the perfect school!
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Is this what you are looking for? Comparing UC Honors Programs & Regents Scholarships
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Would Honors have been included with the acceptance letter today? Or is it coming separately?
My Son
Decision: Rejected
Major (and division if applicable) applied to: Computer Science
ACADEMIC STATS::
UC Unweighted GPA: 3.94
UC Capped Weighted GPA: 4.3
UC Fully Weighted GPA:4.65
ELC (top 9% CA HS): Y
Comments about course load (including senior year):
Number of a-g courses: 28
Number of UC Approved Honors courses: 6 H, 11 AP
AP courses/exams (scores in parentheses): one 4, the rest 5
IB courses/exams (score in parentheses):
DE courses: 3
SUBJECTIVE::
Extracurriculars: Cofounder/VP of large Coding Club, published programming tutorials with a large audience, game developer, ASB with technician role, and codes/self-studies in his free time.
Job/Work Experience: None
Volunteer/Community service: SAT tutor with ~60 service hours
Summer Activities: CC
Personal Insight essays (general details/topics): He talked about making/helping manage the club, working on games, his love of history and how it’s impacted him in computer science, and making coding tutorials to help young developers.
Supplemental/Augmented Review: No
DEMOGRAPHICS::
State/location of HS (if domestic applicant): Orange County, CA
Country (if international applicant):
Applied for need-based financial aid? No
First Generation? No
Other acceptances: Accepted CSUN , ASU, CSLB, CSUF, UCM, UCR, Penn State, CPP, UCSD
Waitlisted: UCD, UCI
Rejected: UCLA, UCSD
My daughter is waitlisted for 4 colleges. No hope that she will get into Cal. She had applied for Public Health. 
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This year waitlist will move fast. She will get in god willing
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Why do you think they will move fast? With a delayed commit day of May 15th this year I would think it would be slower. Is my thinking wrong? My daughter has 4 UC WLs and we are so baffled. I was expecting at least some rejects but thought UCD for sure and now not sure what to think
It is same for my daughter.So annoying !! As of now, I think rejection would have been better . You are hanging in there with hope some miracle will happen.
What a rollercoaster day! My daughter is happy to gain acceptance to UCSD though her dream school was UCLA (rejected at 5 pm).
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