How to Appeal a UCSD Rejection Letter
- By College Zoom
- In appeals
Preview:
A successful UCSD appeal letter limits you to 250 words and forces you to prioritize just two to three issues upon which your entire case for reconsideration rests.
The UCSD Appeal Process:
The good news? Appealing your UC San Diego (UCSD) rejection letter (which is submitted through your online portal) has no negative effect on your chances of being accepted in a future admissions cycle. So why not appeal, right? The less-than-desirable news? Appeals generally have a low success rate of about 2% and UCSD appeals give you only 250 words to state your case.
There's no beating around the bush here: UCSD appeals are deceptively hard. So, first, let's explore what makes their editing difficult. Then, we'll suggest a counter-intuitive strategy for making their development easier.
What Counts as New and Compelling Information?
A page of UCSD's public website narrowly defines new information as academic information. Meanwhile, UCSD's applicant portal, where you'll submit your appeal, explains that academic information isn't the only type of new information that UCSD is seeking.
In your UCSD applicant portal, you'll have to select one of 4 choices when categorizing your UCSD appeal statement:
- Error in original UC application
- Newly documented medical issues
- Extraordinary special achievement/recognition, since your original application
- Personal challenges not previously disclosed
Which choice you make is largely immaterial; however, as your appeal can (hint: should) compellingly address multiple issues, not just one. So, while you are only be able to select one theme, the strongest appeals address multiple deficiencies in your UC original application, in addition to introducing any new information from after you applied.
Lots of Quality Thought, But Even More Editing:
Many people scoff when we explain that it takes us longer to help a student develop a compelling 250 word UCSD appeal than it does to develop a two page UCLA appeal. Shorter seems easier, naturally, but it's exponentially more difficult to try and pack the same punch of a 1,000 word appeal in only 250 words. Achieving perfection requires fidgeting with your sentence sequencing (a lot).
To Make Things Easier, Avoid This Trap:
In trying to brainstorm for a response that is 250 words, your brain will naturally want to eliminate non-essential ideas that come to mind. This interrupts your creative flow, preventing you from meandering your way to your best ideas. To avoid devolving into a mental tailspin, it's actually better if you put the UCSD appeal aside and outline an appeal letter for another UC campus first. All of the other UCs afford you more page space and once you perfect a longer appeal you can whittle its two to three most powerful concepts down into a 250 word version.
Ultimately, your best appeal argument for one UC campus is the same best argument for all UC campuses. They all received the same UC application. Case in point:
"I was devastated to get my rejections for UCI and UCSD. My stats were below average and I knew the odds were against me but I thought I might as well give it a try. College Zoom helped me outline and write my appeal letter and two weeks after I submitted it, I got an email from UCI saying my appeal has been granted and I was accepted! I committed! Then, a few weeks later, got another email saying that my appeal had been granted from UCSD, too! I ended up choosing UCSD and I am so happy with where am I now. Thank you so much CollegeZoom!"
— Ellen K., UCSD Class of 2022
We'd Love to Help You:
We can walk you through the UCSD appeal process step-by-step and help you develop your strongest appeal letter.
We Begin by Grading Your UC Application
During the first session, we'll analyze your UC application to determine the most important focus points and then outline your appeal statement with you before the meeting ends.
We Will Pull the Right Information Out of You
The UCSD appeal is short and its 250 word limit is deceptively difficult. The challenge is saying as much as you can, as potently as you can, in limited space. Strong writers may only need that first meeting. Meanwhile, others may find that a second polishing meeting helpful for maximizing their use of the 250 word limit.
1.5 hours for the first meeting is needed ($450), unless your application required a portfolio. Then, we'd need 1 hour and 45 minutes for the first session ($525).
If you have multiple appeals to work on, we should target the longer appeal first. It's not only much easier and more intuitive for you as a writer to follow that approach, but a stronger UCSD statement will be your result. You'll see there is a filtering process of distilling down to the strongest details for the short UCSD appeal statement.
P.S. Your UCSD appeal letter can be re-used for your other UC appeal or waitlist letters. However, again, if you are writing a letter for another UC, focus on the longest letter first, and then cut it down to UCSD.
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