Does having a job help your UC Berkeley application?

UUC Berkeley's admissions readers have scored applicants' paid work, and the campus's own research, the 2005 Hout report, shows that the right kind of job raised a student's read score. Families who can't afford summer programs often assume their child's after-school job is a gap in the application, something to apologize for or mention briefly. Berkeley's research says the opposite, with a precision few colleges have ever published.

The catch is that readers could only score what the application told them, and most job entries tell them almost nothing. The scale they used shows exactly what was being counted.

How Berkeley's study described work experience

In the re-read study behind the 2005 Hout report, readers answered a set of questions about each applicant's paid work. Was the student employed during sophomore or junior year, and for how many hours a week at most. Did the position have academic content. Did it carry real responsibility. Did it require special skill. And were the earnings spent on needs, which the sheet defined as helping support the family, covering basics like gas, food or rent, or paying for tests and applications. Hout added the last four into a scale from zero to four, and a higher score improved the odds of a good read score. A job held only to fund spending scored zero.

The coding sheet even listed examples of responsible positions: lifeguard, camp counselor, tutor, coach, league referee, translator, child care provider, programmer, team leader. Many of these are ordinary jobs. What made them count was what the student was trusted to do.

Many of these are ordinary jobs. What made them count was what the student was trusted to do.

Say what the reader needs to score it

A former Berkeley reader who now speaks publicly is firm that readers will not infer family duties or the reasons behind a job. If you work twenty hours a week at a pharmacy because your family needs it, and you write only the employer and your title, the reader has nothing to score. Robert Penman, who worked in Berkeley's admissions office and now leads admissions at UC Davis, gave the same advice on a UC panel: jobs and family responsibilities count, so list them.

In the UC's work experience category, write the description to answer the sheet's questions. Give your hours per week during the school year. Name what you were responsible for: the register at closing, two new hires you trained, the inventory spreadsheet. Name any skill the job required. If the earnings go toward family needs or your own school costs, say so in a plain clause, without drama. Unpaid duties belong on the list too. Caring for younger siblings every afternoon or translating for parents at appointments can go under extracurricular activities, with the hours stated.