Harvard is not alone. UC students Without 8th Grade Math Skills Skyrockets

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:The poster claiming to be shut out of UVA with a 1550 and all the T20's never did say what part of their application was not up to par. No mention of rigor, GPA, AP's scores, EC's, LOR's. Nothing.

Why are people like this? Of course no one knows what part of the application was “not up to par.” The whole system is designed to be mysterious and unpredictable. There’s no official ranking of ECs. You never see the LORs. There’s no way to compare GPA from one school to another, and even within schools, many don't rank. Kids with unweighted 4.0s scoring in the top 0.5% of the SAT have no way of knowing where they might plausibly be allowed to go to college.

Please let’s not let this turn into another grievance fest. Ok I get the point that you think that certain high scorers should be auto-admits to your state public flagship. But your kid with the “unweighted 4.0 and 99.5% SAT” is going to “be allowed” to go to any number of great colleges.

It really is unfair that a kid from San Diego or the Bay Area who pushed themselves to get As/5s in multiple APs, is ready to excel at a top UC loses their seat to a kid who can’t do middle school or elementary school math. Let’s not fool ourselves that these kids who need ES level math are the best and brightest or simply math challenged while being gifted writers. They aren’t! If UC published the state verbal as well as math scores for their admits, you would be just as shocked. These kids don’t blossom at UCs. They drop out or barely get through easy majors and take up tons of resources. The only positive they add is to pad the bottom of the curve. In a curved class, you want these kids as your classmates.

The other reason UCs admit so many unqualified kids from low income areas, is that many decline. So in addition to the unqualified enrolled students, there are many more admits. The smart ones realize that housing isn’t guaranteed anywhere except UCLA and it is extremely expensive to live and commute near UCSD. The smart ones do CC for two years while working or go to their regional Cal state school, living at home to graduate debt free.

Until I see data showing that lots of kids with perfect unweighted GPAs and 99.5% SATs are getting rejected from all UCs, you’re just blathering.

University High in Irvine says hello. With 33 NMSF and more than 100 commended NM Scholars. The school gets shut out of UC Berkeley, UCLA and UC San Diego. Uhttps://www.universityofcalifornia.edu/about-us/information-center/admissions-source-school

That is an unbelievably presumptuous (and incorrect) assumption. For one, you know nothing about University High. I live in the area, my DC goes to a similar Independent school, and they are not “shut out” of anywhere. Unless you are in the top tier of GPAs at a given HS, you won’t get into UCLA or UCB, but that is the same case regardless of what school you go to. And truth be told, that is totally O, as that the way it works at pretty much so all schools in CA. That said, the kids from University have lots of choices — including Ivy’s, SLACs, new Ivy’s etc. Importantly, they also have the means to attend any school they want, and in fact most of them end up happily going to other top 20’s.

You are honestly full of crap and very uninformed.

And I just realized that you are talking about Irvine’s University High, so my rant was partially wrong. Your University is in Irvine, so it is probably heavily Asian and “college prep” but that doesn’t matter. You still need to be top of class to go to an elite UC. That is the same story at Lowell in SF if you are talking about similar schools. It’s about consistency and taking the top GPA performers by school in the state.

The point is that it is much much harder to be top of your class at University High in Irvine and the kids who are at 50th percentile rank at Uni are likely more prepared for college than the top 10% at Compton High. Yet the schools like Compton have their students admitted at a higher rate than at Uni.

For comparison, for Fall 2024, Lowell High School had 93/462 kids admitted, which is 20%, well above Berkeley's overall acceptance rate.

[Anonymous]

How does UVA compare?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:If you work in schools, this isn’t surprising.

+ 1 million

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:The poster claiming to be shut out of UVA with a 1550 and all the T20's never did say what part of their application was not up to par. No mention of rigor, GPA, AP's scores, EC's, LOR's. Nothing.

Why are people like this? Of course no one knows what part of the application was “not up to par.” The whole system is designed to be mysterious and unpredictable. There’s no official ranking of ECs. You never see the LORs. There’s no way to compare GPA from one school to another, and even within schools, many don't rank. Kids with unweighted 4.0s scoring in the top 0.5% of the SAT have no way of knowing where they might plausibly be allowed to go to college.

Please let’s not let this turn into another grievance fest. Ok I get the point that you think that certain high scorers should be auto-admits to your state public flagship. But your kid with the “unweighted 4.0 and 99.5% SAT” is going to “be allowed” to go to any number of great colleges.

It really is unfair that a kid from San Diego or the Bay Area who pushed themselves to get As/5s in multiple APs, is ready to excel at a top UC loses their seat to a kid who can’t do middle school or elementary school math. Let’s not fool ourselves that these kids who need ES level math are the best and brightest or simply math challenged while being gifted writers. They aren’t! If UC published the state verbal as well as math scores for their admits, you would be just as shocked. These kids don’t blossom at UCs. They drop out or barely get through easy majors and take up tons of resources. The only positive they add is to pad the bottom of the curve. In a curved class, you want these kids as your classmates.

The other reason UCs admit so many unqualified kids from low income areas, is that many decline. So in addition to the unqualified enrolled students, there are many more admits. The smart ones realize that housing isn’t guaranteed anywhere except UCLA and it is extremely expensive to live and commute near UCSD. The smart ones do CC for two years while working or go to their regional Cal state school, living at home to graduate debt free.

Until I see data showing that lots of kids with perfect unweighted GPAs and 99.5% SATs are getting rejected from all UCs, you’re just blathering.

University High in Irvine says hello. With 33 NMSF and more than 100 commended NM Scholars. The school gets shut out of UC Berkeley, UCLA and UC San Diego. Uhttps://www.universityofcalifornia.edu/about-us/information-center/admissions-source-school

This! Every Californian parent of high-stats kids knows this - hence the popularity of Michigan and UVA for them

Very few kids from Cali that I know chose UVA or Michigan. Chicago, Brown, and WashU are more attractive options if they go out of state. Even Oregon has more draw.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:The poster claiming to be shut out of UVA with a 1550 and all the T20's never did say what part of their application was not up to par. No mention of rigor, GPA, AP's scores, EC's, LOR's. Nothing.

Why are people like this? Of course no one knows what part of the application was “not up to par.” The whole system is designed to be mysterious and unpredictable. There’s no official ranking of ECs. You never see the LORs. There’s no way to compare GPA from one school to another, and even within schools, many don't rank. Kids with unweighted 4.0s scoring in the top 0.5% of the SAT have no way of knowing where they might plausibly be allowed to go to college.

Please let’s not let this turn into another grievance fest. Ok I get the point that you think that certain high scorers should be auto-admits to your state public flagship. But your kid with the “unweighted 4.0 and 99.5% SAT” is going to “be allowed” to go to any number of great colleges.

It really is unfair that a kid from San Diego or the Bay Area who pushed themselves to get As/5s in multiple APs, is ready to excel at a top UC loses their seat to a kid who can’t do middle school or elementary school math. Let’s not fool ourselves that these kids who need ES level math are the best and brightest or simply math challenged while being gifted writers. They aren’t! If UC published the state verbal as well as math scores for their admits, you would be just as shocked. These kids don’t blossom at UCs. They drop out or barely get through easy majors and take up tons of resources. The only positive they add is to pad the bottom of the curve. In a curved class, you want these kids as your classmates.

The other reason UCs admit so many unqualified kids from low income areas, is that many decline. So in addition to the unqualified enrolled students, there are many more admits. The smart ones realize that housing isn’t guaranteed anywhere except UCLA and it is extremely expensive to live and commute near UCSD. The smart ones do CC for two years while working or go to their regional Cal state school, living at home to graduate debt free.

Until I see data showing that lots of kids with perfect unweighted GPAs and 99.5% SATs are getting rejected from all UCs, you’re just blathering.

University High in Irvine says hello. With 33 NMSF and more than 100 commended NM Scholars. The school gets shut out of UC Berkeley, UCLA and UC San Diego. Uhttps://www.universityofcalifornia.edu/about-us/information-center/admissions-source-school

That is an unbelievably presumptuous (and incorrect) assumption. For one, you know nothing about University High. I live in the area, my DC goes to a similar Independent school, and they are not “shut out” of anywhere. Unless you are in the top tier of GPAs at a given HS, you won’t get into UCLA or UCB, but that is the same case regardless of what school you go to. And truth be told, that is totally O, as that the way it works at pretty much so all schools in CA. That said, the kids from University have lots of choices — including Ivy’s, SLACs, new Ivy’s etc. Importantly, they also have the means to attend any school they want, and in fact most of them end up happily going to other top 20’s.

You are honestly full of crap and very uninformed.

And I just realized that you are talking about Irvine’s University High, so my rant was partially wrong. Your University is in Irvine, so it is probably heavily Asian and “college prep” but that doesn’t matter. You still need to be top of class to go to an elite UC. That is the same story at Lowell in SF if you are talking about similar schools. It’s about consistency and taking the top GPA performers by school in the state.

The point is that it is much much harder to be top of your class at University High in Irvine and the kids who are at 50th percentile rank at Uni are likely more prepared for college than the top 10% at Compton High. Yet the schools like Compton have their students admitted at a higher rate than at Uni.

No it’s not harder within the population of that particular school. Top 10 percent of class is top 10 percent. That’s kind of the point. Your point is that the University kids probably have better test scores but UC isn’t admitting based on that. If you want a school that those there are plenty to chose from.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:My friend who is a professor at
USC says that they have many more students who can’t hack it and fail out than
there used to be. He’s been teaching there for more than 20 years. More of his doctoral grad students also can’t make it through the program, ever since Covid. He is in a STEM field.

Trying to be inclusive.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Here's an idea: FIX EDUCATION in primary and secondary grades, and get rid of the corrupt teachers' unions that don't care about educating our younger generation. If there are inequities, they should NOT be addressed at the end of the college admissions process. The "vulnerable" populations deserve access to the same kind of education that is offered in other districts.

THIS exactly. How can you not understand this needs to start at day 1 not 18 years later???

I think everyone knows this- now actually try to fix it. It’s like saying “we should fix poverty!” It’s a nice sentiment, but good luck trying to make equal outcomes in a scarce resource society.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:The poster claiming to be shut out of UVA with a 1550 and all the T20's never did say what part of their application was not up to par. No mention of rigor, GPA, AP's scores, EC's, LOR's. Nothing.

Why are people like this? Of course no one knows what part of the application was “not up to par.” The whole system is designed to be mysterious and unpredictable. There’s no official ranking of ECs. You never see the LORs. There’s no way to compare GPA from one school to another, and even within schools, many don't rank. Kids with unweighted 4.0s scoring in the top 0.5% of the SAT have no way of knowing where they might plausibly be allowed to go to college.

Please let’s not let this turn into another grievance fest. Ok I get the point that you think that certain high scorers should be auto-admits to your state public flagship. But your kid with the “unweighted 4.0 and 99.5% SAT” is going to “be allowed” to go to any number of great colleges.

It really is unfair that a kid from San Diego or the Bay Area who pushed themselves to get As/5s in multiple APs, is ready to excel at a top UC loses their seat to a kid who can’t do middle school or elementary school math. Let’s not fool ourselves that these kids who need ES level math are the best and brightest or simply math challenged while being gifted writers. They aren’t! If UC published the state verbal as well as math scores for their admits, you would be just as shocked. These kids don’t blossom at UCs. They drop out or barely get through easy majors and take up tons of resources. The only positive they add is to pad the bottom of the curve. In a curved class, you want these kids as your classmates.

The other reason UCs admit so many unqualified kids from low income areas, is that many decline. So in addition to the unqualified enrolled students, there are many more admits. The smart ones realize that housing isn’t guaranteed anywhere except UCLA and it is extremely expensive to live and commute near UCSD. The smart ones do CC for two years while working or go to their regional Cal state school, living at home to graduate debt free.

Until I see data showing that lots of kids with perfect unweighted GPAs and 99.5% SATs are getting rejected from all UCs, you’re just blathering.

University High in Irvine says hello. With 33 NMSF and more than 100 commended NM Scholars. The school gets shut out of UC Berkeley, UCLA and UC San Diego. Uhttps://www.universityofcalifornia.edu/about-us/information-center/admissions-source-school

That is an unbelievably presumptuous (and incorrect) assumption. For one, you know nothing about University High. I live in the area, my DC goes to a similar Independent school, and they are not “shut out” of anywhere. Unless you are in the top tier of GPAs at a given HS, you won’t get into UCLA or UCB, but that is the same case regardless of what school you go to. And truth be told, that is totally O, as that the way it works at pretty much so all schools in CA. That said, the kids from University have lots of choices — including Ivy’s, SLACs, new Ivy’s etc. Importantly, they also have the means to attend any school they want, and in fact most of them end up happily going to other top 20’s.

You are honestly full of crap and very uninformed.

And I just realized that you are talking about Irvine’s University High, so my rant was partially wrong. Your University is in Irvine, so it is probably heavily Asian and “college prep” but that doesn’t matter. You still need to be top of class to go to an elite UC. That is the same story at Lowell in SF if you are talking about similar schools. It’s about consistency and taking the top GPA performers by school in the state.

The point is that it is much much harder to be top of your class at University High in Irvine and the kids who are at 50th percentile rank at Uni are likely more prepared for college than the top 10% at Compton High. Yet the schools like Compton have their students admitted at a higher rate than at Uni.

No it’s not harder within the population of that particular school. Top 10 percent of class is top 10 percent. That’s kind of the point. Your point is that the University kids probably have better test scores but UC isn’t admitting based on that. If you want a school that those there are plenty to chose from.

the top 10% students in these very different high schools are not equivalent in terms of achievement and preparation, not based just on test scores. that is the point.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:The poster claiming to be shut out of UVA with a 1550 and all the T20's never did say what part of their application was not up to par. No mention of rigor, GPA, AP's scores, EC's, LOR's. Nothing.

Why are people like this? Of course no one knows what part of the application was “not up to par.” The whole system is designed to be mysterious and unpredictable. There’s no official ranking of ECs. You never see the LORs. There’s no way to compare GPA from one school to another, and even within schools, many don't rank. Kids with unweighted 4.0s scoring in the top 0.5% of the SAT have no way of knowing where they might plausibly be allowed to go to college.

Please let’s not let this turn into another grievance fest. Ok I get the point that you think that certain high scorers should be auto-admits to your state public flagship. But your kid with the “unweighted 4.0 and 99.5% SAT” is going to “be allowed” to go to any number of great colleges.

It really is unfair that a kid from San Diego or the Bay Area who pushed themselves to get As/5s in multiple APs, is ready to excel at a top UC loses their seat to a kid who can’t do middle school or elementary school math. Let’s not fool ourselves that these kids who need ES level math are the best and brightest or simply math challenged while being gifted writers. They aren’t! If UC published the state verbal as well as math scores for their admits, you would be just as shocked. These kids don’t blossom at UCs. They drop out or barely get through easy majors and take up tons of resources. The only positive they add is to pad the bottom of the curve. In a curved class, you want these kids as your classmates.

The other reason UCs admit so many unqualified kids from low income areas, is that many decline. So in addition to the unqualified enrolled students, there are many more admits. The smart ones realize that housing isn’t guaranteed anywhere except UCLA and it is extremely expensive to live and commute near UCSD. The smart ones do CC for two years while working or go to their regional Cal state school, living at home to graduate debt free.

Until I see data showing that lots of kids with perfect unweighted GPAs and 99.5% SATs are getting rejected from all UCs, you’re just blathering.

University High in Irvine says hello. With 33 NMSF and more than 100 commended NM Scholars. The school gets shut out of UC Berkeley, UCLA and UC San Diego. Uhttps://www.universityofcalifornia.edu/about-us/information-center/admissions-source-school

That is an unbelievably presumptuous (and incorrect) assumption. For one, you know nothing about University High. I live in the area, my DC goes to a similar Independent school, and they are not “shut out” of anywhere. Unless you are in the top tier of GPAs at a given HS, you won’t get into UCLA or UCB, but that is the same case regardless of what school you go to. And truth be told, that is totally O, as that the way it works at pretty much so all schools in CA. That said, the kids from University have lots of choices — including Ivy’s, SLACs, new Ivy’s etc. Importantly, they also have the means to attend any school they want, and in fact most of them end up happily going to other top 20’s.

You are honestly full of crap and very uninformed.

And I just realized that you are talking about Irvine’s University High, so my rant was partially wrong. Your University is in Irvine, so it is probably heavily Asian and “college prep” but that doesn’t matter. You still need to be top of class to go to an elite UC. That is the same story at Lowell in SF if you are talking about similar schools. It’s about consistency and taking the top GPA performers by school in the state.

The point is that it is much much harder to be top of your class at University High in Irvine and the kids who are at 50th percentile rank at Uni are likely more prepared for college than the top 10% at Compton High. Yet the schools like Compton have their students admitted at a higher rate than at Uni.

No it’s not harder within the population of that particular school. Top 10 percent of class is top 10 percent. That’s kind of the point. Your point is that the University kids probably have better test scores but UC isn’t admitting based on that. If you want a school that those there are plenty to chose from.

the top 10% students in these very different high schools are not equivalent in terms of achievement and preparation, not based just on test scores. that is the point.

Ok, other that test scores then what quantitive factor makes them more prepared.

[Anonymous]

Apparently the top 10% of students at many high schools in California can't even perform simple addition. That is the real scandal. Presumably UC San Diego is taking the best and brightest from these schools but they perform worse than a 4th grader in an AAP program. I mean, we really are talking about 9 year old 4th graders besting 19 year old freshmen enrolled in one of the best public colleges in California. That is a breathtaking indictment of the state, UCSD, local schools, teachers, students and parents. They are all at fault.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:The poster claiming to be shut out of UVA with a 1550 and all the T20's never did say what part of their application was not up to par. No mention of rigor, GPA, AP's scores, EC's, LOR's. Nothing.

Why are people like this? Of course no one knows what part of the application was “not up to par.” The whole system is designed to be mysterious and unpredictable. There’s no official ranking of ECs. You never see the LORs. There’s no way to compare GPA from one school to another, and even within schools, many don't rank. Kids with unweighted 4.0s scoring in the top 0.5% of the SAT have no way of knowing where they might plausibly be allowed to go to college.

Please let’s not let this turn into another grievance fest. Ok I get the point that you think that certain high scorers should be auto-admits to your state public flagship. But your kid with the “unweighted 4.0 and 99.5% SAT” is going to “be allowed” to go to any number of great colleges.

It really is unfair that a kid from San Diego or the Bay Area who pushed themselves to get As/5s in multiple APs, is ready to excel at a top UC loses their seat to a kid who can’t do middle school or elementary school math. Let’s not fool ourselves that these kids who need ES level math are the best and brightest or simply math challenged while being gifted writers. They aren’t! If UC published the state verbal as well as math scores for their admits, you would be just as shocked. These kids don’t blossom at UCs. They drop out or barely get through easy majors and take up tons of resources. The only positive they add is to pad the bottom of the curve. In a curved class, you want these kids as your classmates.

The other reason UCs admit so many unqualified kids from low income areas, is that many decline. So in addition to the unqualified enrolled students, there are many more admits. The smart ones realize that housing isn’t guaranteed anywhere except UCLA and it is extremely expensive to live and commute near UCSD. The smart ones do CC for two years while working or go to their regional Cal state school, living at home to graduate debt free.

Until I see data showing that lots of kids with perfect unweighted GPAs and 99.5% SATs are getting rejected from all UCs, you’re just blathering.

University High in Irvine says hello. With 33 NMSF and more than 100 commended NM Scholars. The school gets shut out of UC Berkeley, UCLA and UC San Diego. Uhttps://www.universityofcalifornia.edu/about-us/information-center/admissions-source-school

That is an unbelievably presumptuous (and incorrect) assumption. For one, you know nothing about University High. I live in the area, my DC goes to a similar Independent school, and they are not “shut out” of anywhere. Unless you are in the top tier of GPAs at a given HS, you won’t get into UCLA or UCB, but that is the same case regardless of what school you go to. And truth be told, that is totally O, as that the way it works at pretty much so all schools in CA. That said, the kids from University have lots of choices — including Ivy’s, SLACs, new Ivy’s etc. Importantly, they also have the means to attend any school they want, and in fact most of them end up happily going to other top 20’s.

You are honestly full of crap and very uninformed.

And I just realized that you are talking about Irvine’s University High, so my rant was partially wrong. Your University is in Irvine, so it is probably heavily Asian and “college prep” but that doesn’t matter. You still need to be top of class to go to an elite UC. That is the same story at Lowell in SF if you are talking about similar schools. It’s about consistency and taking the top GPA performers by school in the state.

The point is that it is much much harder to be top of your class at University High in Irvine and the kids who are at 50th percentile rank at Uni are likely more prepared for college than the top 10% at Compton High. Yet the schools like Compton have their students admitted at a higher rate than at Uni.

No it’s not harder within the population of that particular school. Top 10 percent of class is top 10 percent. That’s kind of the point. Your point is that the University kids probably have better test scores but UC isn’t admitting based on that. If you want a school that those there are plenty to chose from.

the top 10% students in these very different high schools are not equivalent in terms of achievement and preparation, not based just on test scores. that is the point.

Ok, other that test scores then what quantitive factor makes them more prepared.

The ability to answer 7+2= x+6

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Apparently the top 10% of students at many high schools in California can't even perform simple addition. That is the real scandal. Presumably UC San Diego is taking the best and brightest from these schools but they perform worse than a 4th grader in an AAP program. I mean, we really are talking about 9 year old 4th graders besting 19 year old freshmen enrolled in one of the best public colleges in California. That is a breathtaking indictment of the state, UCSD, local schools, teachers, students and parents. They are all at fault.

I’m not sure why some people think the UCs choose the best and brightest or even from just the top 10% of the class, They really don’t do this. They will skip past the top 10% and admit some random kid with lower GPA. They use enrollment modeling to ensure the average gpa stays high, they get the diverse racial make up they want and they pump up the FGLI numbers.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:The poster claiming to be shut out of UVA with a 1550 and all the T20's never did say what part of their application was not up to par. No mention of rigor, GPA, AP's scores, EC's, LOR's. Nothing.

Why are people like this? Of course no one knows what part of the application was “not up to par.” The whole system is designed to be mysterious and unpredictable. There’s no official ranking of ECs. You never see the LORs. There’s no way to compare GPA from one school to another, and even within schools, many don't rank. Kids with unweighted 4.0s scoring in the top 0.5% of the SAT have no way of knowing where they might plausibly be allowed to go to college.

Please let’s not let this turn into another grievance fest. Ok I get the point that you think that certain high scorers should be auto-admits to your state public flagship. But your kid with the “unweighted 4.0 and 99.5% SAT” is going to “be allowed” to go to any number of great colleges.

It really is unfair that a kid from San Diego or the Bay Area who pushed themselves to get As/5s in multiple APs, is ready to excel at a top UC loses their seat to a kid who can’t do middle school or elementary school math. Let’s not fool ourselves that these kids who need ES level math are the best and brightest or simply math challenged while being gifted writers. They aren’t! If UC published the state verbal as well as math scores for their admits, you would be just as shocked. These kids don’t blossom at UCs. They drop out or barely get through easy majors and take up tons of resources. The only positive they add is to pad the bottom of the curve. In a curved class, you want these kids as your classmates.

The other reason UCs admit so many unqualified kids from low income areas, is that many decline. So in addition to the unqualified enrolled students, there are many more admits. The smart ones realize that housing isn’t guaranteed anywhere except UCLA and it is extremely expensive to live and commute near UCSD. The smart ones do CC for two years while working or go to their regional Cal state school, living at home to graduate debt free.

Until I see data showing that lots of kids with perfect unweighted GPAs and 99.5% SATs are getting rejected from all UCs, you’re just blathering.

University High in Irvine says hello. With 33 NMSF and more than 100 commended NM Scholars. The school gets shut out of UC Berkeley, UCLA and UC San Diego. Uhttps://www.universityofcalifornia.edu/about-us/information-center/admissions-source-school

That is an unbelievably presumptuous (and incorrect) assumption. For one, you know nothing about University High. I live in the area, my DC goes to a similar Independent school, and they are not “shut out” of anywhere. Unless you are in the top tier of GPAs at a given HS, you won’t get into UCLA or UCB, but that is the same case regardless of what school you go to. And truth be told, that is totally O, as that the way it works at pretty much so all schools in CA. That said, the kids from University have lots of choices — including Ivy’s, SLACs, new Ivy’s etc. Importantly, they also have the means to attend any school they want, and in fact most of them end up happily going to other top 20’s.

You are honestly full of crap and very uninformed.

And I just realized that you are talking about Irvine’s University High, so my rant was partially wrong. Your University is in Irvine, so it is probably heavily Asian and “college prep” but that doesn’t matter. You still need to be top of class to go to an elite UC. That is the same story at Lowell in SF if you are talking about similar schools. It’s about consistency and taking the top GPA performers by school in the state.

The point is that it is much much harder to be top of your class at University High in Irvine and the kids who are at 50th percentile rank at Uni are likely more prepared for college than the top 10% at Compton High. Yet the schools like Compton have their students admitted at a higher rate than at Uni.

No it’s not harder within the population of that particular school. Top 10 percent of class is top 10 percent. That’s kind of the point. Your point is that the University kids probably have better test scores but UC isn’t admitting based on that. If you want a school that those there are plenty to chose from.

the top 10% students in these very different high schools are not equivalent in terms of achievement and preparation, not based just on test scores. that is the point.

Ok, other that test scores then what quantitive factor makes them more prepared.

The ability to answer 7+2= x+6

That’s a test. Doesn’t count so GPA is next. Works for Europe but those white kids aren’t considered dumb.

[Anonymous]

[Anonymous]

Scary. Hundreds of college students who can't do 5th grade math.