<p>Pabjumba – D attends Iowa, I attended UIUC, and I live in CA, so pretty familiar w/the schools you are looking at (great choices, BTW) – for engineering, any of UCSB/UCD/UCSD are tough to get into, but the UCs are showing a lot of love for OOS $s these days, and the UCs also really love high GPAs over high test scores – so that should work in your favor. If your 10-11 weighted UC GPA is in the 4.2 - 4.4 range, you may have a shot at the UC’s you listed, although UCSD is notably tough.</p>