We often work with students who are legacies. Legacy status can help at many top schools but not all of them. And in general, the topic of legacy status isn’t the easiest to navigate. We have been working on a series of guides to help parents navigate legacy status at top schools and today we want to talk about UCLA.
Does UCLA do legacy admissions?
Short answer, no. None of the UCs do, due to a UC regents' decision. They are very explicit about this policy, saying, “There are no 'legacy admissions' at UCLA — or at any of the other University of California campuses. The UC application does not ask applicants where their parents or family members graduated from college. Nor are the alma maters of an applicant's parents or family members considered in the admission process.” UCLA is part of a small list of top schools that don’t consider legacy including UC Berkeley, MIT, CalTech, and the University of Washington.
Why is UCLA so against legacy admissions?
The school has been extra careful after a California admissions scandal led to a state audit. UCLA was recently audited by the state along with UC Berkeley, San Diego, and Santa Barbara. This audit looked at their admissions data from 2013-14 through 2018-19. The audit came after accusations of "improper influence in admissions decisions.” The audit found that 64 noncompetitive applicants received admission to one of the audited UC campuses. Around 20 athletes and 40 children of high-level donors were admitted and shouldn’t have been given their grades. 64 students over 5 years and multiple schools, doesn’t seem like that much, but it caused a big scandal.
Sometimes we don’t believe it when schools say “We don’t favor children of donors!” But in the case of the UCs we do, simply given the recent hardline policies they have adopted after this audit. We also tend to believe public schools more than private schools in general.
What does this mean for my student?
The short answer is that their legacy status won’t be considered. That doesn’t mean they won’t get in, it just means it won’t be considered. If your student has a great application then they still have a great chance. UCLA has a holistic review for applicants. This means they are looking at both the academic and personal information presented in the application.
UCLA has about an 11% acceptance rate, making it very competitive to get in. Students need to have great grades, test scores, extracurriculars, and essays to be considered. The UCs don’t use the Common App and their application requires more essays than the Common App. This can freak students out who are not strong writers because it is a lot more writing than at other schools. The UC application is one that we do with many of our students every year and putting their best foot forward is important but can be tricky in this application.
If your student is serious about UCLA we suggest working with a counselor. Many of the UCs are impacted right now and UCLA has the lowest acceptance rate of the schools. This makes the strength of the application highly important. Even students who have strong academics need to also have strong personal appeal given the holistic review model. There are a lot of tips, tricks, and trends that counselors know will turn a good UC application into a great one.
Parents sometimes are shocked that legacy status won’t help their kids get into the UCs. It’s not the best news for alumni parents, but we have also found that many legacy students have been working hard for years to follow in their parent's footsteps. This makes them great candidates who often just need a little help. They probably have good grades and we can help with everything else. Getting students into college is what we do and crafting a great application is a skill. So if you are nervous about your legacy student getting into UCLA, let us help you.
It’s what we do! Reach out here.