We are at UC Berkeley
and we are recording in front of
one of our favorite libraries
East Asian library
i'm involved in the admissions process
if you don't have anything in your extracurricular
grammar also
okay we're gonna move
there are some crazy scenes happening
Welcome to Slice of Alice channel
welcome
today we're welcoming one of my best friends - Fuzuki
Can you tell us and elaborate on what you do at Berkeley?
like what you do or at berkeley right now
I'm involved in the um admissions process
for freshmen and transfers
I read some of the applications that go in
to this university
yeah i'm sure a lot of students will want to know more about like
how to get into uc berkeley
yeah i think people want to know like
oh what gpa they need to get if they don't have a good gpa
Can they still apply to berkeley
um yeah anyone can apply even if you think
you have like a low GPA
it's like you know
worth giving a shot
and as long as you have like a strong extracurricular activities
like in personal statement which you talk about yourself
if you have passion for what you're doing or learning
it's important that you have you know originality in your storytelling
so those are some just GPA is one of many factors that's involved
and what about the personal statement
what kind of personal statements are you looking for
personally
I like reading stories that are very original and unique to them and not necessarily you know
talking about high grades or um coming from you know a well-resourced school and having
the opportunity within a program provided by the school um those are things that definitely
is important to include in like extracurriculars but in the personal statement i think it's more
important that you have um your own story like why you chose the major you're applying for
or what was your upbringing like
how is it affecting your current environment
yeah yeah just like we want to know more about like who you are
and why you're applying for this university
and why this environment is suited for your learn long-term learning so yeah
do you think you can tell the difference if someone didn't write their own personal statement
well i think there's some gut feeling i have
um kind of if you're kind of embellishing it
i can kind of tell
um so but it's just important to stick to what your experience is in your words
and not um
not fancy words
and don't worry too much about grammar and your english skills
that's not super important
Grammar also?
it's fine
it's fine yeah yeah um it's yeah
It's more about the content
that's really nice
okay that's really nice and i think it's really good news to a lot of students
if they're like applying like from foreign countries
but i feel like if you're you know applying as transfers maybe you should care more about your English?
I'm not sure about that
actually a lot of international students are transfers
or transfers are international students
so um it's not that important for transfers either
so we know that if it's because there's a section that you might put you know English is not your first language
this is my first language
that's pretty self-explanatory
and it's again it's not about the skill english skills you have
it's more about the content itself
if it's communicated well within the essay
Is there like any traits that when you look at one's gpa and personal statement
you would decide
oh this is the one
he or she has to be in berkeley
i think the ones that um
kind of spark to me
are the ones that have like
like really going beyond
like you might have like a high school club you're participating in or
you might be like a team captain
and that's something that we definitely look into but
if you're doing off campus or outdoor school activities where you
for example create your own non-profit organization
or just in general volunteering your time personal time
to the course, you are interested in
I think those are definitely, things that I like seeing
because that builds up so much character and what they're interested in what they care about
how did they go up?
they climb from the side?
the dog is calling help
okay we're gonna move
there are some crazy scenes happening
for high school students
do they have to participate in like school activities
or it's fine that they didn't participate any
or simply just have a really good grade
oh you mean oh no high school extracurricular activities
yeah
um it's um i think if you don't have any extracurricular activities
They have 4.0 GPA
having a really good grade is really important but
if you don't have anything in your extracurricular
that's part of the evaluation so it just doesn't add up like
to where the expectations need to be
so um if you don't have any that can be a setback
but what if they have like
low gpa like maybe 2.5
but their personal statements are really good
and they did a lot extracurricular activities
would that be your consideration
uh yeah i think so
it's worth applying
like it's an overall evaluation
so you definitely want a high GPA
maybe they're not 2.5 because
they're like certain GPA you need to have in order to you know
um kind of be able to be considered
but if you're doing like
Is there reasons why you're not having a good GPA
um like a personal reason or maybe the school was underfunded
they didn't have enough teacher
you might want to mention that in
either the notes or your personal statements
because there are prompts that could um touch upon
that you might have gone through
so definitely good to lay it all out
so that yeah
let the reader knows uh what your circumstances are
So do you think it's easier to get into Berkeley through freshmen or is it easier to get in as a transfer
I think as an international student it would be easier to um transfer just because you know
your english skills might not be up to local stand not standards but you know
you definitely have a setback if your english is if english is a second language for you so
going through the process of getting used to listening
and being taking classes in english
just kind of gives you a step-by-step transition into a more rigorous studying environment academic environment
so i don't think it's easy per se but i think it's an easier transition into 4 year universities
distraction
you can show there
ok our interview is up
Thank you Fuzuki for sharing
yeah no problem
thank you for listening
Thank you for watching
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