Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:some myth busters from a Cal alum and Cal father:

1. it's not hard to get classes at Cal, especially for your major. the only impediment to a 4-yr graduation is rigor - cal is hard AF! in fact, there's a saying here in the bay area: it's hard to get into stanford, but easy to get out; it's easy to get into berkeley, but hard to get out. this makes perfect sense - stanford and the ivies rely on student satisfaction for endowment so they need to tread carefully when hazing their students. Cal gets funding regardless so they can be much more tiger momish.

2. professors do the lectures and grad students (GSIs) conduct small group discussions. this is more or less similar to privates.

3. it's easy to get research opportunities at cal, even for ones unrelated to your major. my buddy did a bunch of athro research as an engineering student. tbh, however, cal puts so much on your plate it's hard to find time to do research.

4. most of your classes at cal will be 25-30 students. imo, perfect size. any less, i feel like you're being deprived of diversity of ideas and experiences.

5. professors have office hours so there's plenty of opportunity to get to know your professors. how do you think cal sends more students to grad schools than any university in the country?

6. transfer students are amazing, hard working, and just as talented as traditional students. I was a transfer and had no problems getting a high gpa. same goes for my transfer colleagues. in fact, we tend to work harder because we have a chip on our shoulders.

7. berkeley is indeed on par with the HYPSMLGBT whatever. don't get mad at us for believing so, get mad at the rankings. only one ranking has cal outside of the top ten. times higher education considers cal as one of the world's elite six along with cabridge, oxford, mit, stanford, and harvard.

lastly, to answer the question posted by the original poster, save your money and go to cal. your kid will be challenged, but he/she will be better for it in the end. forbes came out with an article last year detailing the growing disillusion companies have with private schools due to the over-coddling and lack of real world education they're giving their students. you should check it out.

Let’s just say you sound like a Cal transfer student. As to what you missed by not attending a more prestigious undergrad school, I can only say that ignorance is your bliss.

Then let me wallow in my ignorance, my cal-induced salary, and the 100k that I saved to get it.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:some myth busters from a Cal alum and Cal father:

1. it's not hard to get classes at Cal, especially for your major. the only impediment to a 4-yr graduation is rigor - cal is hard AF! in fact, there's a saying here in the bay area: it's hard to get into stanford, but easy to get out; it's easy to get into berkeley, but hard to get out. this makes perfect sense - stanford and the ivies rely on student satisfaction for endowment so they need to tread carefully when hazing their students. Cal gets funding regardless so they can be much more tiger momish.

2. professors do the lectures and grad students (GSIs) conduct small group discussions. this is more or less similar to privates.

3. it's easy to get research opportunities at cal, even for ones unrelated to your major. my buddy did a bunch of athro research as an engineering student. tbh, however, cal puts so much on your plate it's hard to find time to do research.

4. most of your classes at cal will be 25-30 students. imo, perfect size. any less, i feel like you're being deprived of diversity of ideas and experiences.

5. professors have office hours so there's plenty of opportunity to get to know your professors. how do you think cal sends more students to grad schools than any university in the country?

6. transfer students are amazing, hard working, and just as talented as traditional students. I was a transfer and had no problems getting a high gpa. same goes for my transfer colleagues. in fact, we tend to work harder because we have a chip on our shoulders.

7. berkeley is indeed on par with the HYPSMLGBT whatever. don't get mad at us for believing so, get mad at the rankings. only one ranking has cal outside of the top ten. times higher education considers cal as one of the world's elite six along with cabridge, oxford, mit, stanford, and harvard.

lastly, to answer the question posted by the original poster, save your money and go to cal. your kid will be challenged, but he/she will be better for it in the end. forbes came out with an article last year detailing the growing disillusion companies have with private schools due to the over-coddling and lack of real world education they're giving their students. you should check it out.

As a LSJU alum, this is some massive amount of cope. No one at HYPS legitimately thinks of Cal as on par for undergrad. It's why the vast majority go to HYPSM vs Cal as evidenced by Cal's mediocre yield. Cal if anything has to rely more on student satisfaction for funding with a paltry $3.1B endowment, but they choose not to as professors care more about research.

There's nothing to be proud of to say your school treats you poorly as some euphemism for "rigor". At Google, we hire more from Stanford on a per capita basis and within the applicant pool than Berkeley as well. Always has been.

Yeah, keep telling yourself you work at Google. What is up with this website? I’m pretty new here and notice a lot of people lying their behinds off just to prove a point — and you can tell they’re lying coz they’re spewing a festering mass of nonsense.

No HYPS grad thinks Cal is on par with them at the undergraduate level? Like, you’ve actually spoken to them? You really think that they think EECS, engineering, CS, business, physics, mathematics, psychology, etc students at Berkeley are inferior? Do you know that for some of these majors, not only you must navigate Cal’s overall admission rate, then you have to prove yourself the first two years to be able to major in them?

As someone who met Ivy League transfers at Cal and new people at Stanford, I can assure you that while that might be the mindset for some as ignorant high school students, that attitude quickly changes the moment they get to university and meet people from other schools and see their curriculum. It’s completely gone by the time they start working and see themselves surrounded by elite public school grads at some tech company. You can ask any Stanford kid right now who knows anything about Berkeley and he will readily admit that Berkeley is the more rigorous school. This is common sense around here. And it’s not for lack of resources to help students, but premeditated hard arse curriculum. I once asked a GSI in an introductory logic course if they covered the same crap. His response was, “lol no, wee never covered this at Dartmouth — this is beyond introductory stuff.”

Berkeley sends more people to tech than any other school and hiding behind exclusivity will not exonerate Stanford and the ivies from that fact. The easiest thing to do is gobble up the highest achieving nerds and send them to places they would’ve gotten to regardless of what school they went to. The true barometer of a great institution is how well it uplifts people from all sort of social classes. Nobody does that better than Berkeley, Michigan, ucla, UNC, etc.

Lastly, I fail to see what yield rate has anything to do with Cal’s near-mythical prestige. There’s plenty of reasons why people choose to attend a school. Some might want to be closer to home, some might like snow, some might like sun and the beach, some might like rigor, some prefer balance — but one thing you’ll never hear anyone say when explaining why they chose a school over Berkeley is because it has better academics than Berkeley. Unless the other options are MIt, Stanford, and maybe Harvard, there’s almost no subject where you pick a school over Berkeley because of academics. Facts.

Anonymous wrote:some myth busters from a Cal alum and Cal father:

1. it's not hard to get classes at Cal, especially for your major. the only impediment to a 4-yr graduation is rigor - cal is hard AF! in fact, there's a saying here in the bay area: it's hard to get into stanford, but easy to get out; it's easy to get into berkeley, but hard to get out. this makes perfect sense - stanford and the ivies rely on student satisfaction for endowment so they need to tread carefully when hazing their students. Cal gets funding regardless so they can be much more tiger momish.

2. professors do the lectures and grad students (GSIs) conduct small group discussions. this is more or less similar to privates.

3. it's easy to get research opportunities at cal, even for ones unrelated to your major. my buddy did a bunch of athro research as an engineering student. tbh, however, cal puts so much on your plate it's hard to find time to do research.

4. most of your classes at cal will be 25-30 students. imo, perfect size. any less, i feel like you're being deprived of diversity of ideas and experiences.

5. professors have office hours so there's plenty of opportunity to get to know your professors. how do you think cal sends more students to grad schools than any university in the country?

6. transfer students are amazing, hard working, and just as talented as traditional students. I was a transfer and had no problems getting a high gpa. same goes for my transfer colleagues. in fact, we tend to work harder because we have a chip on our shoulders.

7. berkeley is indeed on par with the HYPSMLGBT whatever. don't get mad at us for believing so, get mad at the rankings. only one ranking has cal outside of the top ten. times higher education considers cal as one of the world's elite six along with cabridge, oxford, mit, stanford, and harvard.

lastly, to answer the question posted by the original poster, save your money and go to cal. your kid will be challenged, but he/she will be better for it in the end. forbes came out with an article last year detailing the growing disillusion companies have with private schools due to the over-coddling and lack of real world education they're giving their students. you should check it out.

Let’s just say you sound like a Cal transfer student. As to what you missed by not attending a more prestigious undergrad school, I can only say that ignorance is your bliss.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:some myth busters from a Cal alum and Cal father:

1. it's not hard to get classes at Cal, especially for your major. the only impediment to a 4-yr graduation is rigor - cal is hard AF! in fact, there's a saying here in the bay area: it's hard to get into stanford, but easy to get out; it's easy to get into berkeley, but hard to get out. this makes perfect sense - stanford and the ivies rely on student satisfaction for endowment so they need to tread carefully when hazing their students. Cal gets funding regardless so they can be much more tiger momish.

2. professors do the lectures and grad students (GSIs) conduct small group discussions. this is more or less similar to privates.

3. it's easy to get research opportunities at cal, even for ones unrelated to your major. my buddy did a bunch of athro research as an engineering student. tbh, however, cal puts so much on your plate it's hard to find time to do research.

4. most of your classes at cal will be 25-30 students. imo, perfect size. any less, i feel like you're being deprived of diversity of ideas and experiences.

5. professors have office hours so there's plenty of opportunity to get to know your professors. how do you think cal sends more students to grad schools than any university in the country?

6. transfer students are amazing, hard working, and just as talented as traditional students. I was a transfer and had no problems getting a high gpa. same goes for my transfer colleagues. in fact, we tend to work harder because we have a chip on our shoulders.

7. berkeley is indeed on par with the HYPSMLGBT whatever. don't get mad at us for believing so, get mad at the rankings. only one ranking has cal outside of the top ten. times higher education considers cal as one of the world's elite six along with cabridge, oxford, mit, stanford, and harvard.

lastly, to answer the question posted by the original poster, save your money and go to cal. your kid will be challenged, but he/she will be better for it in the end. forbes came out with an article last year detailing the growing disillusion companies have with private schools due to the over-coddling and lack of real world education they're giving their students. you should check it out.

As a LSJU alum, this is some massive amount of cope. No one at HYPS legitimately thinks of Cal as on par for undergrad. It's why the vast majority go to HYPSM vs Cal as evidenced by Cal's mediocre yield. Cal if anything has to rely more on student satisfaction for funding with a paltry $3.1B endowment, but they choose not to as professors care more about research.

There's nothing to be proud of to say your school treats you poorly as some euphemism for "rigor". At Google, we hire more from Stanford on a per capita basis and within the applicant pool than Berkeley as well. Always has been.

Here is data on Cal's acceptance and yield at the top high schools:

https://www.sfchronicle.com/projects/2024/uc-admissions-acceptance-rates/

Cal yield at the top bay area privates and publics:

Menlo School - 50%
Stanford Online School - 43%
Nueva - 25%
Gunn - 51%
Paly High - 59%
Crystal Springs - 42%
Harker - 17%

Pretty unimpressive.

Anonymous wrote:some myth busters from a Cal alum and Cal father:

1. it's not hard to get classes at Cal, especially for your major. the only impediment to a 4-yr graduation is rigor - cal is hard AF! in fact, there's a saying here in the bay area: it's hard to get into stanford, but easy to get out; it's easy to get into berkeley, but hard to get out. this makes perfect sense - stanford and the ivies rely on student satisfaction for endowment so they need to tread carefully when hazing their students. Cal gets funding regardless so they can be much more tiger momish.

2. professors do the lectures and grad students (GSIs) conduct small group discussions. this is more or less similar to privates.

3. it's easy to get research opportunities at cal, even for ones unrelated to your major. my buddy did a bunch of athro research as an engineering student. tbh, however, cal puts so much on your plate it's hard to find time to do research.

4. most of your classes at cal will be 25-30 students. imo, perfect size. any less, i feel like you're being deprived of diversity of ideas and experiences.

5. professors have office hours so there's plenty of opportunity to get to know your professors. how do you think cal sends more students to grad schools than any university in the country?

6. transfer students are amazing, hard working, and just as talented as traditional students. I was a transfer and had no problems getting a high gpa. same goes for my transfer colleagues. in fact, we tend to work harder because we have a chip on our shoulders.

7. berkeley is indeed on par with the HYPSMLGBT whatever. don't get mad at us for believing so, get mad at the rankings. only one ranking has cal outside of the top ten. times higher education considers cal as one of the world's elite six along with cabridge, oxford, mit, stanford, and harvard.

lastly, to answer the question posted by the original poster, save your money and go to cal. your kid will be challenged, but he/she will be better for it in the end. forbes came out with an article last year detailing the growing disillusion companies have with private schools due to the over-coddling and lack of real world education they're giving their students. you should check it out.

As a LSJU alum, this is some massive amount of cope. No one at HYPS legitimately thinks of Cal as on par for undergrad. It's why the vast majority go to HYPSM vs Cal as evidenced by Cal's mediocre yield. Cal if anything has to rely more on student satisfaction for funding with a paltry $3.1B endowment, but they choose not to as professors care more about research.

There's nothing to be proud of to say your school treats you poorly as some euphemism for "rigor". At Google, we hire more from Stanford on a per capita basis and within the applicant pool than Berkeley as well. Always has been.

some myth busters from a Cal alum and Cal father:

1. it's not hard to get classes at Cal, especially for your major. the only impediment to a 4-yr graduation is rigor - cal is hard AF! in fact, there's a saying here in the bay area: it's hard to get into stanford, but easy to get out; it's easy to get into berkeley, but hard to get out. this makes perfect sense - stanford and the ivies rely on student satisfaction for endowment so they need to tread carefully when hazing their students. Cal gets funding regardless so they can be much more tiger momish.

2. professors do the lectures and grad students (GSIs) conduct small group discussions. this is more or less similar to privates.

3. it's easy to get research opportunities at cal, even for ones unrelated to your major. my buddy did a bunch of athro research as an engineering student. tbh, however, cal puts so much on your plate it's hard to find time to do research.

4. most of your classes at cal will be 25-30 students. imo, perfect size. any less, i feel like you're being deprived of diversity of ideas and experiences.

5. professors have office hours so there's plenty of opportunity to get to know your professors. how do you think cal sends more students to grad schools than any university in the country?

6. transfer students are amazing, hard working, and just as talented as traditional students. I was a transfer and had no problems getting a high gpa. same goes for my transfer colleagues. in fact, we tend to work harder because we have a chip on our shoulders.

7. berkeley is indeed on par with the HYPSMLGBT whatever. don't get mad at us for believing so, get mad at the rankings. only one ranking has cal outside of the top ten. times higher education considers cal as one of the world's elite six along with cabridge, oxford, mit, stanford, and harvard.

lastly, to answer the question posted by the original poster, save your money and go to cal. your kid will be challenged, but he/she will be better for it in the end. forbes came out with an article last year detailing the growing disillusion companies have with private schools due to the over-coddling and lack of real world education they're giving their students. you should check it out.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I would be thrilled if my kids went to any of the above!

Same. I went to an east coast LAC and husband HYP. We visited Berkeley a few years ago, and I was surprised by how much I liked it. I would be happy if my DC ended up there. We also visited Stanford... and honestly, I liked the Berkeley vibe more. Of course, Stanford is amazing so it's not a knock on it at all.

My kid chose Berkeley over Caltech for CS/Econ double major.

Anonymous wrote:Berkeley has jumped the shark


https://www.dcurbanmom.com/jforum/posts/list/1296398.page

There’s a difference between CSU and UC, oh my lord.

Berkeley has jumped the shark


https://www.dcurbanmom.com/jforum/posts/list/1296398.page

Anonymous wrote:I would be thrilled if my kids went to any of the above!

Same. I went to an east coast LAC and husband HYP. We visited Berkeley a few years ago, and I was surprised by how much I liked it. I would be happy if my DC ended up there. We also visited Stanford... and honestly, I liked the Berkeley vibe more. Of course, Stanford is amazing so it's not a knock on it at all.

I would be thrilled if my kids went to any of the above!

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:

Anonymous wrote:I’d take any of the ivies over Berkeley

Like Dartmouth, Brown and Cornell over in state Berkeley for stem? Yeah, no way.

Definitely yes. Those ivy schools are miles ahead of Berkeley in prestige. And prestige exists for a (good) reason.

Do you always use the word prestige in every sentence?

Not true, a Berkeley stem degree caries more weight. Yale, Dartmouth and Cornell are in the middle of nowhere. Berkeley is close to Silicon Valley, can get research opportunities at Lawrence Berkeley up the hill etc. Sure the classes are large and harder to get in, less hand holding. If you can’t handle that Berkeley is not a good fit and look elsewhere.

The truth is Berkeley is full of lottery winners who are trash students. They’re definitely not a good fit for Berkeley but they got in regardless. The days when Berkeley cs students ride the Silicon Valley waves will be long gone.

Just because Berkeley is test optional it doesn’t mean it’s a lottery, they still select the top students because they’ll look at AP exams, dual enrollment, grades, extracurriculars, which are all correlated with SAT scores.

I am a CA resident and while it’s too early I’d definitely think carefully between Berkeley vs Ivy if my kid got in. I already have more than the ivy tuition covered in a 529 account, so it’s not only the cost but also top students here take dual enrollment classes worth one year of college credits, so that opens the opportunity to get a BS and master degree in four years. I’d pass Dartmouth, Brown, Cornell, and Yale in favor of Berkeley or UCLA any time. Nobody here cares about UVA.

Not sure if you can the difference between test optional and test blind.

Meant test blind, the point still stands.

Yeah, but that's a pretty big point. Berkeley won't even look at a 1600 or 36. At least with the test optional schools, there's an opportunity for smart kids to distinguish themselves by submitting scores. I think somewhere during Covid and BLM and all that noise, the UCs really embraced that colleges' primary purpose should be social mobility. And that changes things. There is a lot of mediocrity at Berkeley and admissions feels very random today. And the fact that you can use APs to graduate from Berkeley in a soft major in a couple of years further diminishes the experience and the brand. I don't think HYP are great either for undergrad, but for different reasons. Fortunately, there are more than four schools in America, and people can make their choices.

I agree test blind is wrong, but that doesn’t mean Berkeley is all of a sudden a lottery of undeserving students. I bet the students chosen in the test blind process have high standardized scores even if not considered.

Also, a test score is just a data point, not the absolute best method to select students. It didn’t change dramatically the student profile.

They absolutely do, the SCOIR data at our school shows a very high correlation between SAT score and UCB admission.

This 100%.

+100 Very high correlation at our Bay Area private

Considering Berkeley is test blind, I don't see why this even matters.

This matters in the context of what one pp was alleging, that being test-blind means that UCB was randomly admitting a lower caliber of student. At our oos private, this isn't the case. The students UCB accepts are excellent all around, so they are clearly using other available metrics to make an informed choice.

i think this just means class rank and ECs means more at any school

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:I’d take any of the ivies over Berkeley

Like Dartmouth, Brown and Cornell over in state Berkeley for stem? Yeah, no way.

Definitely yes. Those ivy schools are miles ahead of Berkeley in prestige. And prestige exists for a (good) reason.

Do you always use the word prestige in every sentence?

Not true, a Berkeley stem degree caries more weight. Yale, Dartmouth and Cornell are in the middle of nowhere. Berkeley is close to Silicon Valley, can get research opportunities at Lawrence Berkeley up the hill etc. Sure the classes are large and harder to get in, less hand holding. If you can’t handle that Berkeley is not a good fit and look elsewhere.

The truth is Berkeley is full of lottery winners who are trash students. They’re definitely not a good fit for Berkeley but they got in regardless. The days when Berkeley cs students ride the Silicon Valley waves will be long gone.

Just because Berkeley is test optional it doesn’t mean it’s a lottery, they still select the top students because they’ll look at AP exams, dual enrollment, grades, extracurriculars, which are all correlated with SAT scores.

I am a CA resident and while it’s too early I’d definitely think carefully between Berkeley vs Ivy if my kid got in. I already have more than the ivy tuition covered in a 529 account, so it’s not only the cost but also top students here take dual enrollment classes worth one year of college credits, so that opens the opportunity to get a BS and master degree in four years. I’d pass Dartmouth, Brown, Cornell, and Yale in favor of Berkeley or UCLA any time. Nobody here cares about UVA.

Not sure if you can the difference between test optional and test blind.

Meant test blind, the point still stands.

Yeah, but that's a pretty big point. Berkeley won't even look at a 1600 or 36. At least with the test optional schools, there's an opportunity for smart kids to distinguish themselves by submitting scores. I think somewhere during Covid and BLM and all that noise, the UCs really embraced that colleges' primary purpose should be social mobility. And that changes things. There is a lot of mediocrity at Berkeley and admissions feels very random today. And the fact that you can use APs to graduate from Berkeley in a soft major in a couple of years further diminishes the experience and the brand. I don't think HYP are great either for undergrad, but for different reasons. Fortunately, there are more than four schools in America, and people can make their choices.

I agree test blind is wrong, but that doesn’t mean Berkeley is all of a sudden a lottery of undeserving students. I bet the students chosen in the test blind process have high standardized scores even if not considered.

Also, a test score is just a data point, not the absolute best method to select students. It didn’t change dramatically the student profile.

They absolutely do, the SCOIR data at our school shows a very high correlation between SAT score and UCB admission.

This 100%.

+100 Very high correlation at our Bay Area private

Considering Berkeley is test blind, I don't see why this even matters.

This matters in the context of what one pp was alleging, that being test-blind means that UCB was randomly admitting a lower caliber of student. At our oos private, this isn't the case. The students UCB accepts are excellent all around, so they are clearly using other available metrics to make an informed choice.

Does your kid want to be one of 35,000 undergrads or 6,000 (Princeton, Harvard). Easy test for my kid

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I’d take any of the ivies over Berkeley

Like Dartmouth, Brown and Cornell over in state Berkeley for stem? Yeah, no way.

Definitely yes. Those ivy schools are miles ahead of Berkeley in prestige. And prestige exists for a (good) reason.

Do you always use the word prestige in every sentence?

Not true, a Berkeley stem degree caries more weight. Yale, Dartmouth and Cornell are in the middle of nowhere. Berkeley is close to Silicon Valley, can get research opportunities at Lawrence Berkeley up the hill etc. Sure the classes are large and harder to get in, less hand holding. If you can’t handle that Berkeley is not a good fit and look elsewhere.

The truth is Berkeley is full of lottery winners who are trash students. They’re definitely not a good fit for Berkeley but they got in regardless. The days when Berkeley cs students ride the Silicon Valley waves will be long gone.

Just because Berkeley is test optional it doesn’t mean it’s a lottery, they still select the top students because they’ll look at AP exams, dual enrollment, grades, extracurriculars, which are all correlated with SAT scores.

I am a CA resident and while it’s too early I’d definitely think carefully between Berkeley vs Ivy if my kid got in. I already have more than the ivy tuition covered in a 529 account, so it’s not only the cost but also top students here take dual enrollment classes worth one year of college credits, so that opens the opportunity to get a BS and master degree in four years. I’d pass Dartmouth, Brown, Cornell, and Yale in favor of Berkeley or UCLA any time. Nobody here cares about UVA.

Not sure if you can the difference between test optional and test blind.

Meant test blind, the point still stands.

Yeah, but that's a pretty big point. Berkeley won't even look at a 1600 or 36. At least with the test optional schools, there's an opportunity for smart kids to distinguish themselves by submitting scores. I think somewhere during Covid and BLM and all that noise, the UCs really embraced that colleges' primary purpose should be social mobility. And that changes things. There is a lot of mediocrity at Berkeley and admissions feels very random today. And the fact that you can use APs to graduate from Berkeley in a soft major in a couple of years further diminishes the experience and the brand. I don't think HYP are great either for undergrad, but for different reasons. Fortunately, there are more than four schools in America, and people can make their choices.

I agree test blind is wrong, but that doesn’t mean Berkeley is all of a sudden a lottery of undeserving students. I bet the students chosen in the test blind process have high standardized scores even if not considered.

Also, a test score is just a data point, not the absolute best method to select students. It didn’t change dramatically the student profile.

They absolutely do, the SCOIR data at our school shows a very high correlation between SAT score and UCB admission.

This 100%.

+100 Very high correlation at our Bay Area private

Considering Berkeley is test blind, I don't see why this even matters.