Tuesday, February 9, 2016
Inside JK's Admission
Although many people in our class were desperately hoping that JK would get admitted into Berkeley, I am sure that there were not many people who actually believed that he would get in. He participated in many extracurriculars and was a decent student, but his SAT score only reached 880. For this reason I am curious as to what you think that reasons were for his admission. He is a minority student, which is considered in the admissions process, but cannot be the sole reason for his acceptance. What did the admission office consider in JK's application, and what did they see in him that made them accept him? JK's acceptance begs the question of how important the SAT really is in the admission's process. If we consider Omar who got a 1200 on the SAT and his denial, we can clearly see that the SAT score does not matter as much as some people make it out to be. So then, why do people spend thousands of dollars preparing for a test that has not always proven to hold much bearing? Thoughts?
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I think that JK was accepted to Cal because of his work ethic and drive to rise above his circumstances. I remember that he talked about not wanting to be a "stereotypical black person", and worked hard to achieve this goal. In addition, he had great extracurricular activities, from taking on two internships to doing three sports per year. Overall, I think that they wanted to see that he was truly determined in all senses, not just to get into a particular university. Concerning Omar, I do not see how he was denied, given that he seemed very similar in circumstance and statistics to Jenny and Betsy, perhaps even better.
ReplyDeleteTo your question: "why do people spend thousands of dollars preparing for a test that has not always proven to hold much bearing?" I think that a good SAT is something that builds confidence in the student about their own abilities, as well as the confidence that the colleges have in the students. Having a higher SAT score gives the school more reason to believe that the student will get good grades, thus they are more comfortable accepting students with higher SAT scores. This does not mean that they will not accept people that do not have high SAT scores, as long as they see a motivated student. I think that parents will pay high amounts of money because they want their child and the college to feel confident in their abilities.
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