Why are the bottom 25% SAT scores so low for the "elite" public colleges?

<p>ucb:</p>

<p>Cal’s College of Chemistry totals ~750 undergrads. Great student-faculty interaction. Yes, the Frosh classes can be large, but they get small really fast. And yes, there are plenty of grad students wandering the halls, even more than the number of undergrads.</p>

<p>In Chem, Cal is ranked #1 followed by Harvard, Illinois, Caltech and MIT. In Chemical and Biomedical Engineering, Cal is ranked #3 (MIT is #1). (grad programs ranked by nrc.)</p>

<p>IMO Cal’s CoC is one of the few UC programs worth paying OOS prices for.</p>