Since now first year University of California (UC) applicants are not required to submit SAT or ACT scores, many students ask, “What will ‘replace’ the missing information from test scores?” Yet, as Ms. Han Mi Yoon-Wu, UC Director of Undergraduate Admissions stated in her response to CMC’s Open Letter to the University of California:
In the meanwhile, rest assured that under our Comprehensive Review policy, the full extent of each applicant’s academic and personal accomplishments will be taken into consideration within the context of the opportunities that are available to that student. No single factor plays a deciding role in how an applicant is evaluated.
University of California Admissions Review Policy
Since 11 of 13 Comprehensive Review criteria concern an applicant’s academic performance and ability, potential applicants should review their transcripts and reflect on their academic ability, and extracurricular activities to first understand their qualifications for admissions then secondly promote those qualifications effectively when submitting a UC application this fall.
I will, over a number of posts, briefly review each criteria the UC admissions officers will be using to evaluate applicants, hopefully to educate applicants ahead of the application period this fall.
The first criteria for UC Comprehensive Review is:
Academic grade point average in all completed “a-g” courses, including additional points for completed UC-certified honors courses.
University of California Admissions Review Policy
For students who attend high schools where the Spring 2020 grading policy changed to universal Pass/No Pass-style marks, although their GPA will not increase nor decrease, the UC is currently reviewing how they’ll modify their evaluations to account for the lack of GPA credited letter grades.
Without test scores, the UC admissions evaluation will be more subjective, so being educated about how they’ll be evaluated applicants can prepare accordingly.
In my next post, I’ll review the criteria:
Number of, content of and performance in academic courses beyond the minimum “a-g” requirements.
University of California Admissions Review Policy
A University of California San Diego and Harvard graduate, as well as a former high school teacher, Jill Yoshikawa, EdM is meticulous in helping clients navigate all aspects of the educational experience, no matter the level of complexity. She can be contacted at [email protected] or (916) 769-6092
