It’s the UPG.

Here are some information to shed some light…

What is the UPG?

UPG, or the University Predicted Grade, is a composite score made up of the applicant’s weighted UPCAT test scores and weighted grades from high school. In addition, other factors like geographical location and school type are incorporated in the UPG as palugit and pabigat. The UPG is the basis upon which a student may be admitted to the University of the Philippines.

A Brief History of the UPCAT and the UPG

The UP Charter mandates that UP is not to deny admission to the University “by reason of age, sex, nationality, religious belief, or political affiliation.” Although it is not mentioned in the charter, UP also recognizes equity considerations on the economic or social status of applicants.

If this is the case, then why doesn’t UP just admit all applying students?

The University is bound to ensure that they have high academic standards since it is the university that bears the country’s name. Also, resources are scarce and budget is limited. Thus, the selection process is put into place, focusing on excellence.

Back then there was no entrance test. A student only needs some evidence that he or she had enough college preparation; he or she has taken the specified subjects by UP and has done some laboratory experiments. However,  by the 1920’s, UP has gained its reputation for excellence and was getting a lot of student application. In 1928 an entrance exam was administered and only the top students were admitted, depending on the number of slots available.

This might have been the first UPCAT.

Although there seems to be no problem of having an entrance exam, UP took steps to democratize admission in the 1940’s. It automatically admitted top students from high schools; public and private, urban and rural. In the late 1950’s, achievement, psychological and intelligence tests were given but these were for guidance purposes only. No UPG’s were implemented here. It was in 1961-1962 when the UP Scholastic Aptitude Examination (SAE) was employed to pick candidates for admission.

As years passed, the University noted a 30% delinquency rate which was quite high. To solve this, UP did some research. One of the findings was to combine test scores and scholastic performance to give a reliable way of predicting a student’s performance in college.

It was the UPG’s conception.

1967 was the year the UPCAT was born (although this is still different from today’s UPCAT). The UPG was not yet invented and the UPCAT was used on its own as a selection tool. To enter UP, you may then either pass the UPCAT or be at the top of your class.

In the 1970’s a resolution was passed to combine the three year high school average and the College Admissions Test scores. This made entrance to UP more difficult. It was 80% CAT and 20% high school grades back then. Then a series of studies showed that the high school grade’s weight should be increased.

Then in 1976, Prof. Romeo Manlapaz came up with a system that uses “multiple regression analysis” (I also don’t know what it is if you’re asking) to integrate the high school grades and the UPCAT scores.

The UPG was born.

(to know more about the UP Admission System’s history, you may also want to read Jo Florendo Lontoc’s Excellence and Equity: UP’s Great Balancing Act)

The UPG Formula

Shown below is the equation to compute the UPG.

But the UPG, simply put, is just comprised of the following:

• UPCAT test scores – about 60% of the UPG
• Academic grades from Grade 9 to Grade 11, – about 40% of the UPG

This however is not yet its entirety. The UPG is affected by so called palugit and pabigat.

The EEAS: Palugit and Pabigat

If you remember a while ago, I mentioned that UP took steps to democratize the admission system, meaning give every sector a fighting chance to be admitted to UP. In 1998, UP took it to the next level by implementing the Excellence-Equity Admissions System (EEAS). This adds a twist to the UPG computation.

Basically, the EEAS adjusts the UPG of applicants by a palugit of 0.5 who are coming from public barangay, public vocational, and public general high schools, excluding those administered by state universities and colleges and science high schools. Minorities are also given palugit.

The EEAS also has a pabigat.

A pabigat, on the other hand, is an adjustment going in the opposite direction. One instance that it happens is when a student applies for a campus that is not near his locality. He is given a penalty so it becomes more difficult for him to be admitted to the campus. Applicants in the locality gets more chances to be admitted.

Final Words

With all these things coming together, you now have your UPG; an amalgamation of scholastic performance, test scores and democratization factors. Complicated? Maybe.

Nonetheless, whatever the computation of the UPG may be, it is the university’s discretion and not yours. Your job as a student is to get the best grades that you can get and prepare well for the UPCAT.

The post Computing the UPG for the UPCAT appeared first on Review Masters.

Filing of Wait list Applications: starts on April 29, 2019 (Monday).
Deadline of Filing Applications: May 17, 2019 (Friday).

FLOW CHART OF APPLICATION FOR WAITLIST

FOR FIRST SEMESTER 2019-2020

UPLB Waitlist Criteria 2019

1. Must satisfy the absolute cut-off of 2.800 for wait list applicants
2. Must satisfy the UPG and prescribed subtest scores for degree program
3. Must have indicated UPLB as campus choice

Flowchart for Waitlist Application:

UPLB Minimum and College Criteria for Wait Listing 2019

1. Minimum Criteria : UPG of at least 2.800 and had chosen UPLB Campus
2. College Criteria (see table below) :

Table 1. College criteria for waitlisting

Important Links to Wait List Forms:

• Flowchart application for wait list 2019-2020
• Wait List Criteria for AY 2019-2020
• Wait List Form

The post Wait List, Reconsideration and Appeal Procedure for UPLB 2019 appeared first on Review Masters.

As the UPCAT day is fast approaching, the University of the Philippines has released the status of test permits. Also, the university has also announced some relevant statictics such as the number of issued test permits and the number of expected test takers.

A post at the Office of Admission in UP Diliman indicated the following data:

Expected Number of Examinees

0

Number of Issued Test Permits

0

Here’s an image of the announcement:

Based on these numbers, the examinees for this year is significantly lower than the number of test takers prior to 2015, which range from 60,000 to 80,000 students. This is due the implementation of the K to 12 program by the government.

The number of examinees is expected to increase again next year, 2017, for UPCAT 2018.

To all the test takers… good luck and God bless!

The post UPCAT 2017 Test Permit Status and Examinee Statistics appeared first on Review Masters.

Before the implementation of the K to 12 curriculum, the procedure for application was simple to understand. Those who want to take the UPCAT should belong to any of the following:

• Senior students (Fourth Year, Grade 12, Senior 6) of DepEd accredited schools or secondary schools abroad expecting to graduate at the end of the school year


• Graduates of DepEd accredited schools or secondary schools abroad


• Those declared eligible for admission to college after taking the Philippine Educational Placement Test (PEPT).

With the K to 12 program now being implemented by DepEd, parents, students and school administrators are confused whether Grade 10 students can take the UPCAT.

Now we ask the controversial question: Are Grade 10 students allowed to take the UPCAT this year?

“Only those, mostly coming from private high schools with accelerated programs,” said University of the Philippines president Alfredo Pascual last Saturday, July 18, during an event with some of the university’s alumni.

Can Grade 10 students take the UPCAT this year?

“Only those, mostly coming from private high schools with accelerated programs”Alfredo Pascual, UP President

High schools with accelerated programs are those school that were able to secure a permit from CHED to let their students graduate by 2016. These schools will in a way maintain their 4-year high school but implement the accelerated K to 12 program.

Last Friday, the Commission on Education issued a memo saying that those who can enroll in college in 2016 should graduate from high school. These high schools got permits from CHED to start K to 12 earlier than the mandated year. Some of these schools also served as pilot testers of the Kto 12 curriculum.

The list of schools in the memo are listed at the bottom of this page. There are 391 high schools listed as of writing.

In addition, UP Vice President for Public Affairs Prospero de Vera gave a statement that the UPCAT taker has to have a certification that he or she is graduating this 2016.

Pascual also said that UP estimates only about 20,000 will take the UPCAT in 2015. This is due to the drastic decrease in number of high school students expected to graduate this year. This number pales in comparison to the 87,000 who took the UPCAT last year.

Memorandum From the Chairperson Re. Enrollment for SY 2016-2017 and SY 2017-2018

The post Are Grade 10 Students Allowed to Take the UPCAT? Here’s the Answer. appeared first on Review Masters.

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Since its establishment in 1908, the University of the Philippines has prided itself on being the "premiere State University," the "university of the people," and "the national university." All of these descriptions suggest a university in the service of what has become a nation of 85 million Filipinos and there is no doubt that over nearly a century, UP has provided the nation with quality leadership in the arts and sciences, the professions, business, and governance, as well as in social and political reform. UP has also grown into a system of seven constituent universities spread out over a dozen campuses around the archipelago, enrolling about 55,000 students and employing some 14,000 faculty members and non-teaching staff.

The high quality of a UP education, the reasonable expectation of professional success upon graduation, and the low tuition fees that UP students pay have made entry into UP a powerfully attractive but also a formidably competitive proposition for thousands of fresh young high school graduates and their parents every year. Every April, when the UPCAT results are released, the jubilation of qualifiers and their families is matched only by the grief, distress, and consternation of the many more who fail to make it.

Roughly speaking, only one out of every six applicants qualifies for UP. In 2004, 64,041 applicants took the UPCAT; of this number, 11,381 students qualified. While the passers' total may seem high, it includes some overbooking to account for a statistically predictable number of "no-shows" passers who for one reason or other don't actually enroll. Out of the 10,803 who qualified in 2003, only 7,082 enrolled, including 759 non-qualifiers who got in through such alternative means as athletic scholarships and certificate programs.

While it may hardly come as a surprise for a graduate of a barangay high school in, say, Romblon or Sultan Kudarat not to pass the UPCAT, many graduates of exclusive schools in Metro Manila including Ateneo, La Salle, and the Philippine Science High School feel dismayed and even outraged to miss the cut-off. It seems impossible at first glance for such thoroughbred students not to make it to UP, but as this article seeks to show many other factors come into play beyond the natural advantages of privilege.

Indeed, to some extent, UP's admissions policy has had to counterbalance these advantages a good school with adequate facilities and well-paid teachers, proper nutrition, computers, and the other amenities of modern living in consideration of the need to be more representative of the nation at large and of its disproportionately poor population. As UP Vice President for Public Affairs Jose Dalisay Jr. pointed out in a recent article, "Can we defend spending more than P4 billion of public money a year on educating the sons and daughters of the metropolitan elite? Can UP still lay claim to being a 'national university' if it does not, in some way, reflect the national configuration in its student body?"

Of course, admissions involves much more than representation, and no one seriously argues with the University's giving priority to academic excellence above all. But UP clearly also has a lot to do to dispel the impression that it has helped those who need help least a supreme irony for an institution dedicated to social justice and transformation.

UP's burden: leveling the playing field

The cold reality is that many students whom the University should serve simply are not as well prepared for college as their more fortunate peers. Being poor and underserved disqualifies them further from opportunities to improve their lot. But if a state university like UP does nothing for them, it will simply help perpetuate the rule of a well-entrenched elite in our society.

Researchers have identified forces that impair, even destroy, students' chances for higher education, and ultimately for higher standards of living. They claim that (1) the determining factors that really control access to higher education are rooted in the home and the school environment of children from infancy onward; and (2) that most of the real screening for higher education has all along been done by the accident of socio-economic origins and the early environment habitually characterizing particular groups and subcultures.

The kind of learning a poor child or one from the hinterlands gets will be very different from that enjoyed by an urban, middle-class child with access to cable television, computers, the Internet, and other forms of information technology. As family income increases and the closer to urban centers the family is, the more "variety and level of learning materials and services such as books, mass communication programs, travel, music programs, painting exhibits available to the child."

More sadly, experts say that people's origins affect their spirit and aspirations. In the Philippines, the poor have taken to seeing education largely as a means to get a job and move up economically, with excellence much less important than just getting by. Why enter UP when they can get their diplomas even more cheaply at lesser schools? In short, there is no real inculcation of the value of love of learning, or of knowing the best of all that is taught and thought in the world. The disadvantaged and minoritized student nurtures a tendency to efface himself or herself, to refuse to compete with others, especially those better off.

The University recognizes that it cannot simply reject this student and that it has a social obligation to reach out to those who need an extra lift. UP must also ask itself: In choosing students with the best scholastic aptitudes, is it not getting students who will thrive even without its help, who will do just as well in life and for their families by earning their degree in other universities? On the other hand, some have asked if what has been called "affirmative action" is tantamount to lowering or compromising academic standards, to expending scarce resources on entrants more likely to drop out.

In the mid-'70s, economics Professor Edita Tan countered the prevailing idea that equity compromises excellence. In saying that "the ideas, values, organization of an ingrained elite are likely to be less rich and dynamic than those coming from the larger cross section of the population," the professor implied greater leaps in development with more representative participation in the University's make-up and in its work.

Tan's study also observed that "any university entrance regulation that is based on the score obtained in an entrance examination is liable to have a bias against students coming from poor families." This was why the high school average had to be factored in, which would later prove to be a better predictor of the student's performance in the University, in combination with the UPCAT subtests.

"The knack for answering examination questions (which were formulated by persons belonging to the professional urban class) can also be expected to vary by income and occupation of parents. It has been observed that verbal ability, which is needed in answering achievement tests, is more developed in children of the urban and more affluent class."

Professor Tan explained that verbal ability, which is needed in answering achievement tests, is more developed in children of the urban and more affluent class, is exercised more in richer families where there are more abundant things seen and used to communicate about. Informal learning was seen to be scarcer in poorer families.

UP Admissions Director Dr. Ly SyCip says that even the type of questionnaire itself poses an additional burden to some sectors. For example, answer sheets for computer assessment appear to scare people accustomed to the usual public-school-type mimeographed answer sheets. (Fortunately or otherwise the lotto ticket has in a way popularized the kind of answer sheet used in the UPCAT.)

These considerations have to be taken into account by UP's admissions system, including the UPCAT, which has followed a long evolutionary road toward greater democratization.

 The story of the UP admissions system 

Legally, the University's 95-year-old old Charter mandates UP not to deny admission to the University "by reason of age, sex, nationality, religious belief, or political affiliation." While there is no explicit mention of "economic or social status," the University has through the years recognized and adopted equity considerations as a mandate coming from its nature as a state university. The proposed new Charter explicitly states that "the University shall take affirmative steps to enhance the access of disadvantaged students to its programs and services."

However, the University's fundamental nature as an institution of higher learning set up to provide "advanced education" also binds it to ensuring high academic standards, including a student body of high intellectual caliber. Thus, its selection process, while ensuring adequate representation of the country's population, should put excellence above all other considerations.

In its earliest years, the University already had strict standards for applicants to its programs. It required evidence that the applicant had enough college preparation, meaning that he or she had had 14 to 18 units of the listed entrance subjects including evidence of having undertaken laboratory experiments. In cases where evidence could not be presented, an entrance examination was given. A University historian pointed out that the requirements "practically allowed only graduates with as much preparation acquired from private colleges."

By the 1920s, UP had already gained a reputation for excellence and was faced with larger student applications. Its scarce resources prompted it to adopt even stricter requirements for some colleges. In 1928, an entrance examination was administered where only the top passers qualified depending on the number of slots available.

At first glance, there appeared to be nothing discriminatory about the admissions system as it was believed then that merit, the ability to study, knew no class. But consciously or otherwise, the University took a step toward democratizing admission in the late '40s by automatically admitting the top-ranking high school graduates, ensuring that all types of high schools  private and public, urban and rural  could be represented. During this time, enrollment dropped due to the War. As a result, there were fewer applications than admission slots, which encouraged a more open admissions policy. The policy continued until 1960. Cutoffs were possible by pegging at varying levels the required fourth year high school grade average of the top ranking high school seniors.

Achievement, psychological, and intelligence tests began to be given to applicants in the late '50s, but only for guidance and research purposes, not as selective admission tools. It was in AY 1961-1962 when the UP Scholastic Aptitude Examination (SAE) was used to select candidates for admission to give a chance to students who did not qualify for automatic admission.

Through the years and despite the evolving selective admissions, the University noted a high delinquency rate (30%). To address this, studies were made, one of the findings of which was that the SAE was the least accurate single predictor of University performance. Dr. SyCip thinks that one-time tests only measure abilities at precisely just one point in time; on the other hand, ranking in high school is not an assurance that students are fit for University education. A combination of both tests and a measure of performance record over time would later be found to be the most reliable way of predicting University performance.

In 1967, the UPCAT (UP College Admissions Test) was born. This should not be mistaken for the UP College Admissions System being practiced today. Then, the UPCAT was used singly as a selection tool; the University Predicted Grade (UPG), which is computed using an equation that combines UPCAT scores with high school grades, had not yet been invented. From 1925 up to this period, UP's approach had been to use either secondary school performance (based on rank or grade in their fourth year) or test (such as UPCAT) scores.

In 1970, the University Council approved a resolution to the effect that starting AY 1971-1972, "the admission of undergraduate freshman applicants will be based on a combination of the three-year high school average and College Admissions Test scores." This made entrance to the University significantly more difficult, even as the new process continued to be refined through annual studies and evaluations. These studies found that a student's high school performance should be given more weight than 20 per cent of the student's admission score. (The existing formula amounted to 80 per cent UPCAT subtest scores and 20 per cent high school weighted combined rating.)

Then in 1976, Mathematics Professor Romeo L. Manlapaz (now retired but a consultant to the University for admissions policies) came up with a system factoring in the actual predictive ability (regression weights) of the high school grades and the UPCAT scores. Using a technique called "multiple regression analysis," Manlapaz arrived at an equation which integrated the high school grades and the UPCAT scores in a formula to come up with the UPG or University Predicted Grade (See formula).

The UPCAT scores amounted to about 60% of the UPG; the HSWA made up about 40%. The UPG formula remains in effect. However, much more remains to be improved on the equity side of the matter.
The late 1960s and the early 1970s will be remembered in history as a tempestuous period of political ferment in the Philippines, known as the First Quarter Storm. The call for social justice was particularly loud in intellectual circles, especially at the University of the Philippines, where the most radical ideas circulated.

University constituents began calling for more democracy in the admission of students to allow for greater representation of the poor. They had become increasingly dissatisfied with what they perceived to be the gentrification of the University.

The number of applications to UP had actually been rising, because of the University's attempt to reach out all over the country to high school graduates from various sectors by establishing 28 regional test centers. However, despite this increase in applications, not much ground was gained in terms of democratizing actual access of the poor to the University.

Some time after Professor Manlapaz came up with the UPG, he brought up the point in one of his statistical papers that the UPCAT had a socio-economic bias; that is, it had a tendency to favor students from rich families; those from private schools or Metro Manila; and those whose parents were college graduates, professionals, or executives.

An era of democratization

The University renewed its focus "to make its studentry more representative of the nation's population." A comprehensive program was drafted, which involved the piloting of a democratized admissions policy. Named the Experimental Democratization Sample (XDS), 94 freshmen constituted a first batch in AY 1977-1978 allowed into the College of Arts and Sciences in Diliman based on the following criteria: (1) a family income lower than P8,000; (2) an UPCAT score slightly below the Diliman cut-off [2.48 but better than 2.780]; and (3) as much as possible, at least one representative from each province. Each XDS student was given financial assistance to cover tuition, books, transportation, board and lodging, and learning and psycho-social assistance to help him or her adjust to the rigors of university life.

The first batch did as well as the regular freshmen, with a general weighted average of 2.39, and with four achieving scholar status. The second group of 166 performed as well as the first group, and the third group of 78 performed better, with one student achieving scholar status and 11 becoming college scholars. In the five years that the XDS was implemented, it was learned, for one, that "the academic performance of a student from a lower socioeconomic class can be better than that of a student from a higher socioeconomic class with comparable UPCAT scores, provided the former satisfied certain minimum UPCAT requirements and is given learning assistance in English." Thus concluded the Program Development Staff formed under the UP President in its 1977 report entitled "Democratization of Admissions."

However, the same report noted that "if the University implements the Democratization of Admission Policy even to its fullest extent, the number of students to be admitted additionally from the lower socioeconomic classes will be insignificant." This implied that democratization "[had] already been incorporated in the UPCAT" in a way that had already achieved the goal of XDS. XDS students were also sometimes looked down upon because of the circumstances of their entry into the University.

But other measures of democratization were implemented, such as allowing for more regional and cultural community representation. Campuses were allowed to set aside up to 30 percent of their quota to be filled up with top-ranking examinees from cultural minority groups and high schools (in Luzon and Metro Manila) which were not yet represented in the top 70 percent, and from depressed regions (in the Visayas, Mindanao, and the Cordilleras), provided their UPCAT scores were not lower than the campus cut-off score by 0.15. The top 70 percent were of course chosen based strictly on their UPG ranking.

In 1993, the University Registrar of UP Diliman noted sustained efforts to have a broader range of applicants. For instance, UP sent out UPCAT teams to various parts of Mindanao to inform high school students about the University, its academic as well as its financial assistance programs, and to invite them to take the UPCAT. UP College Baguio faculty members visited areas in the Cordilleras to do the same.

Also in 1993, testing centers increased to 42, and the number of applicants rose from 28,000 in 1988 to 45,000. Aside from this, some cultural biases of the subtests were reduced by providing both Filipino and English versions of the UPCAT, so applicants could give the UPCAT their best shot. 

The birth of the Office of Admissions, EEAS 

In 1994, the Office of Admissions was formed to handle admissions activities for the entire system. This was brought about by the fact that admissions had thus far been handled by the registrar of UP Diliman, even when it was a system-wide effort. A team formed under then Registrar Amelia Guevara studied the creation of the office. It included Dr. Guevara, Vice President for Finance Erlinda Echanis, and Chancellor Emerlinda Roman.

Under the auspices of the Office of the Vice President for Academic Affairs, then under Dr. Olivia Caoili, the Office of Admissions headed by Dr. Elizabeth Ventura buckled down to work by forming another team to evaluate the profile of UP students, run various scenarios, make hypothetical changes in the parameters for admission, and see possible changes in the students' composition. The study team was composed of then Budget Director Honesto Nuqui, computer science engineer Prof. Evangel Quiwa, Admissions Director Ventura, Dean Lisa Bersales of the Statistical Center, and Esperanza Ibanez, who had worked for admissions since 1958. It appeared that despite previous attempts at democratization, the composition of the students had not significantly changed.

The current Excellence-Equity Admissions System was arrived at after this scenario was run and found to be most ideal. The team using databases that harked back to the studies of Dr. Manlapaz had by then already undergone changes in membership, with new Statistical Center Dean Ana Maria Tabunda coming in. In 1997, the University Council of UP Diliman approved the EEAS and set it for implementation in 1998.

Thus, the EEAS evolved with its origins reaching back to the birth of the University itself.

At its most basic, the EEAS involves the use of a palugit of .05 in the UPGs of applicants coming from public barangay, public vocational, and public general high schools, excluding those administered by state universities and colleges and science high schools. This means that if one comes from a disadvantaged high school, his or her UPG gets an automatic .05 upgrade, resulting in the Effective Predicted Grade or EPG. The giving of a   palugit   is based on studies that confirm the high school type as the best indicator of an applicant's socio-economic standing (as opposed to stated income which is given to inaccurate reporting). A  palugit  of the same amount is also given to applicants who are legitimate members of cultural minorities. An applicant can be given a palugit only once.

Seventy percent of the admission slots is reserved for students with the best UPGs (or EPGs when applicable), palugit and all. The remaining slots are then to be filled by the next best students coming from under-represented geographical areas. If there are still slots available, then the next best performing applicants can have them regardless of geographical area. (For an illustration of the EEAS, see A Tale of Two Applicants)

Qualification means acceptance to the University System, but not yet to the programs applied for.  

Constituency changing  

The EEAS did not disappoint its visionaries, in that its results mirrored the projections produced by the pre-EEAS simulations. "The qualifying rate for public high schools improved through the years while that of private schools declined; qualifiers from the NCR have fallen; and qualifying is no longer biased toward income groups." reported the EEAS review team headed by current Vice President for Academic Affairs Maria Serena I. Diokno to the UP Diliman University Council early 2003.

Comparing 1997 and 2003 admission figures, while only 2,500 students from underprivileged high schools qualified in 1997, 4,266 made it in 2003. This constitutes an improvement in their qualifying rate from 16.8 percent to 22.2 percent.

Figures also show that in 1997, the general trend was, the higher the reported income of students, the better their qualifying rate, with the qualifying rate of those with P80,000 or lower annual family income standing at 15 percent and those reporting P501,000 to P1 million and P1 million to P2 million each accounting for 25 percent. By 2003, the qualifying rates of all income brackets had generally evened out, ranging from 16 to 18 percent.

Studies were also made on the performance of students admitted through the new admissions system. In summary, a study conducted across four years on the first EEAS batch indicates that "excellence" students do get better grades in the first two years. But by the fourth year, the difference between excellence and equity students is negligible. (See The EEAS Impact: Helping Students Make It)

Challenges ahead

However, the work of democratization is far from over. New situations within and beyond of the control of the university are constantly emerging, such as changes in the grading system of the public education system, new studies suggesting other socio-economic surrogates, the language problem in the subtests, limited analyses of student performance, the issue of gender equality, and many others. Old formulas have to be re-evaluated, and predictive abilities of tests updated.

The University recognizes that statistical systems are not perfect, and that the best argument it can rely on in defense of its current policy is the fact that each formula has been the result of several decades of studies, trials, evaluations, and lessons.

Of course, changes will continue to be entertained and accommodated if found reasonable and necessary. A new study is being undertaken by a special committee of the University Council of UP Diliman to look into further possibilities for improving the EEAS. The debates surrounding excellence-equity issues are often impassioned, but also instructive, as they cover not only technical and statistical but also philosophical and pedagogical considerations. This is entirely in keeping with the mission of the University as the nation's intellectual fountainhead in the spirit of critical inquiry, of academic excellence and leadership, and of commitment and service to the Filipino people.

The post Excellence and Equity: UP’s Great Balancing Act (UPG) appeared first on Review Masters.

I guess you would most likely vote for Jimmy Neutron, right?

Why, this 11-year-old American genius has sudden surges of thought which he calls Brain Blasts. So it would be a hands-down choice for Jimmy.

But don’t jump yet to this conclusion because our underdog favorite, SpongeBob, has something that Jimmy doesn’t have. And because of this “something”, the story (as the title of this article suggests) is given an interesting twist.

If you could describe SpongeBob with three words they would be optimistic, fearless, and relentless.

1. Optimistic

SpongeBob is a jolly sponge with a shining personality. When something terrible happens to him, he never panics. He analyzes the situation, and sees it from the best possible angle. When he and Patrick took the UPCAT, Patrick panicked while taking the test especially the Math section and was terrified at the thought of failing the UPCAT and the possibility of never making it to UP.

SpongeBob was completely optimistic. He had faith in his test-taking skills. These skills enable him to pass the UPCAT. Spongebob might have failed the UPCAT had he not been his usual optimistic self. Acquiring even a tiny portion of Spongebob’s optimism would surely boost your confidence level while taking the UPCAT.

2. Fearless

Although SpongeBob exhibits fear in many situations, his innocence mixed with fearlessness makes an exciting combination.

He knew that he was competing with 86,000 other UPCAT examinees when he took the test and many of them (like Jimmy Neutron) are a lot more intelligent then he is. But he was able to convince himself that no amount of scare tactics (e.g. UPCAT is extremely difficult, UPCAT is only for the genius, etc.) could derail his dream of making it to UP. He was able to erase test anxiety completely from his system.

3. Relentless

Just ask Squidward! Remember when SpongeBob wanted to play games with Squidward; 95% of the time, the latter said “No!” But SpongeBob kept asking, literally dozens of times, until Squidward finally gave in. He did the same during the time that he was still reviewing for the UPCAT. He kept on practicing with the UPCAT review materials he had. He kept on asking his teachers on difficult concepts and problems. He kept on visualizing himself as a freshman (I mean freshsponge) in UP. His relentlessness proved to be a key factor in his success of passing the UPCAT.

Now, how on earth did Jimmy Neutron fail in the UPCAT?

We all know that James Isaac Neutron (a.k.a. Jimmy Neutron) goes to grade school during the day and invents crazy gadgets at night. In fact, he has even designed a rocket that propels him high enough beyond the earth´s atmosphere, permitting him to launch a communications satellite made from…a toaster.

Well, indeed Jimmy’s a genius.

He belongs to the upper 2% of the population set apart from others by their ability to reason, problem-solve, and answer questions based on learned information. This is not to say that a genius is somehow better than everyone else. Work skills, social skills, and simple and complex motor skills may escape these brainy folks — and all these skills are just as important as smarts for determining an individual’s success. And that differentiate Jimmy from SpongeBob.

Here are the three things that made Jimmy lose his chance of qualifying in the UPCAT:

1. Pride

Because of so many achievements in and out of school, Jimmy became proud and it hindered him from growing and learning the techniques and tips to ace the UPCAT. He never asked for any help from anyone; neither did he take time reviewing for the UPCAT when everybody was! He was so overconfident in believing that his Brain Blasts would be enough to get a perfect score in the UPCAT.

2. Lack of Focus

Aside from the fact that he became complacent, he never intentionally prepare for the UPCAT. In fact, he was so pessimistic about the mental exercise (i.e. the UPCAT) especially that his love interest, Cindy Vortex, was allotting so much time reviewing for the UPCAT. So instead of studying with his girlfriend, he tried to invent stuffs that could annoy her and his other classmates while they were reviewing. He became so obsessed with destructive things that they occupied almost all his time when he was supposed to be reviewing.

3. Stress

Because he was endowed with highly unusual gifts, he was expected to pass the UPCAT with flying colors. His parents, his friends, his teachers, and everyone in Retroville were anticipating his spot among the Oblation Awardees. But because of lack of preparation, he became anxious during the UPCAT day. He made careless mistakes. He did not follow instructions correctly. He was even reprimanded by the proctor and threatened to be disqualified because he wrote his solutions on the test booklet instead on the scratch sheet. It was all messed up. And worse, he was not able to answer 30 items in the Math sub-test! It is now no wonder why Jimmy did not make it. This just proves that a genius is just as likely to fail in the UPCAT as anyone else.

The post Why SpongeBob Passed the UPCAT and Jimmy Neutron Did Not appeared first on Review Masters.

January is almost over. Alfredo Bagombong of Dapdap, Lucban, Quezon Province, and a fourth year student of Dapdap Barangay High School, feels his life suspended like a ripe patola as he tethers the family's carabao to a tree trunk at the edge of the tubigan. His neighbor, Jomari Abaricia, who studies at St. James Academy in the poblacion, feels the same suspension as he clears his desk of his books. Both took the UPCAT the previous August in Lucena City. The results are about to be released. The two are childhood friends but have hidden feelings of competition as is usual among neighbors in a small town. It was the same way for their mothers.

In the University, their test papers, grades and forms have been cross-checked, scanned, inputted, transmuted, coded, run, processed – not necessarily in this order. Complex computer programs and inhumanly patient admissions staff have been running and working tirelessly for the past five or six months, doing the math. Finally, the UPGs are computed and the tally sheets are printed out, ready for the University's assessment.

Alfredo's HSWA (his weighted average grade from his first to third year in the barangay high school) has been computed at 88.94; Jomari's stands at 92.10. Had they known their HSWAs, they would have been surprised because Jomari has always thought Alfredo's grades to be similar to his. But he doesn't know that Dapdap BHS has a grading system that stipulates 75 as the passing grade and 100 as the highest, while St. James uses a grading system with 70 as its passing mark and 95 as its highest grade. Dapdap's grading system naturally leaves its students with higher grades. But all is right, as the University has transmuted their grades, involving simple "linear extrapolation," converting both their schools' passing grades to 75 and highest grades to 95, evening things out for both of them. It now appears that Jomari has the upper hand in terms of high school performance.

Alfredo will have to admit that he has not done very well in school in comparison with the rest of the other honor candidates. All too often, he had been dissatisfied with his lessons, thinking that he could do better reading books in the library. And yet, there had not even been enough time for that, given his chores to do in the tubigan.

Alfredo remembers all those minutes he had squeezed into his spare time to review his old notes. He knew he had to do his best to get into UP, where his family would not spend as much on tuition. At the same time, he has been fascinated by UP. He wants to experience being in the country's best school. Perhaps he has a chance. Applying was an opportunity he did not want to miss. Just perhaps!

He paid particular attention to English, where he thinks he has a lot to do in order to catch up with Jomari. As a result, his UPCAT subtest scores now stand higher than most of the UPCAT takers, particularly in Language Proficiency where he got a standard score of 61.8 with a percentile rank of 86; that is, he performed better in that test than 86 percent of the UPCAT takers. UPCAT standard scores and percentile ranks are dependent on the general performance of the UPCAT takers of the batch. His next highest grade is in Reading Comprehension where he got a standard score of 59.6, better than 80 percent of the UPCAT takers. This should be no wonder to him, because, often dissatisfied with his teachers, Alfredo had taken to reading all by himself to satisfy his thirst for knowledge. He got a standard score of 54.2 in Science and a standard score of 49.6 in Math, his lowest score. He is willing to concede Math to Jomari, who is known as the math wizard. Alfredo remembers Jomari proving propositions in geometry. In Alfredo's barangay high school, students never get to prove anything, because their teacher does not teach it. On average, Alfredo's standard UPCAT score is 56.3, better than 73 percent of the rest of the UPCAT takers.

Jomari, meanwhile, has been pretty competitive in school. He does not have to do much, though, because there are relatively few in their batch, most of whom say that they are going to some private Manila universities for college. He has wanted to try out in UP because his father has been coaxing him to do so. In the end, he got standard scores of 59.9 in Language, 51 in Reading, 57.6 in Math, and 47.1 in Science. On average, his UPCAT standard score is 53.9, still better than 63.36 per cent of the UPCAT takers.

Jomari did not perform quite as well as Alfredo in the UPCAT. However, after his relatively high grades were inputted into the UPG formula, Jomari ended up with a higher UPG of 2.423. Meanwhile, Alfredo's UPG stands at 2.473.

The sun has just dropped behind the peak of Mt. Banahaw; the rice paddies are engulfed in the dusk of the mountain's shadow. Alfredo has an urge to think about his future but holds it off like fear. At the University, his school, Dapdap Barangay High School, has been noted as "disadvantaged," and a 0.05 palugit has been subtracted from his UPG, which now stands a little higher at 2.423. Alfredo and Jomari, for all intents and purposes, are tied.

In the forms, both listed UP Diliman as their first choice of campus. Both have seen the postcard pretty pictures of the University in their social-science textbooks. By this time, UP Diliman is experiencing the usual glut of applications, making admission to it the most competitive. UP campuses, through EEAS, have just set aside 70 percent of their quota for those getting the highest UPGs, palugit included (resulting in what is now known as the Effective Predicted Grade or EPG). This particular year, Diliman is able to fill its 70 percent with applicants who have EPGs of 2.31 and above. These brilliant students have just been assured of their slots. They of course do not include Jomari and Alfredo, with their EPGs of 2.423.

The odds are against them. But hope beckons as UP Diliman fills up the remaining 30 per cent of its slots. This is known as the geographic equity round. For this, Diliman has been choosing applicants coming from under-represented provinces. At this stage, both Alfredo and Jomari would have prayed that they had the highest EPGs among all those from Quezon province who took the UPCAT.

Earlier in the academic year, UP asked the Department of Education to provide the University with the senior high school population for the entire country. Using this data, UP computed the proportion of students to accept from each province, major town or city, so that admission would be more geographically representative. If in the competition for the top 70 percent, the province, town or city does not yet meet its quota, the University looks at the next-ranking applicants from the area to fill up the remaining 30 percent of slots. As it happens, there are as yet not enough qualifiers from Quezon Province in the top 70 percent based on this quota. Quezon is declared under-represented. Perhaps, Alfredo and Jomari would be considered next. However, the applicants to be considered for geographical representation must still have EPGs that do not fall below the campus' absolute cut-off.

Unfortunately, in the case of those applying in UP Diliman, Alfredo's and Jomari's prayers are useless because Diliman has a "deep selection parameter" of only 0.1 in coming up with its absolute cutoff for the remaining 30 percent. This means that, after filling its top 70 per cent with applicants who happen to have EPGs of 2.31 or better, Diliman will now only accept applicants for the remaining 30 per cent if they come from an underrepresented province, town or city and their EPGs are not lower than 0.1 below 2.31, or 2.41, UP Diliman's absolute cut-off.

Had Alfredo and Jomari found out that many more students from Quezon got EPGs higher than 2.41-enough to fill in the slots for their home province they would have run to each other as friends and consoled one another in their common misfortune. Their 2.423 was simply 0.013 short of UP Diliman's "deep selection parameter." In all likelihood, however, UP Diliman will not be able to fill up the 30 per cent during this "geographic equity" round because many from under-represented provinces, towns, or cities will simply have EPGs that fall below Diliman's absolute cut-off. The remaining slots will then be given to other applicants with the highest EPGs regardless of where they come from.
Mr. Abaricia Senior, had he known Jomari's non-qualifying status in UP Diliman, would be upset, for had he not himself made it to Diliman for college? Mr. Bagombong, on the other hand, has all this time settled for agriculture for his son. Their land is small, but he needs all the help he can get to harvest from it. It pleases him that his son has selected UP Los Baños as his second choice of campus.

And so Alfredo is now considered for UPLB, his second choice, where the UPG cutoff had earlier been stipulated at 2.800. However, the applicants who have made it to UPLB's top 70 percent have, in fact, UPGs much higher than 2.8. In fact, the lowest EPG for their top 70 percent is 2.516. Alfredo's EPG of 2.423 thus makes it to the campus' top 70 percent. Thus, Alfredo's academic fate, his being a UP qualifier, has been sealed. The next step would now be to evaluate him for the degree programs he has chosen in UPLB. This is the second stage in the admissions process. The first stage has dealt with whether or not an applicant can get into a campus.

During this second stage, each academic program uses its own predictor, which is computed also from the UPCAT subtest scores and HSWA. For example, Social Science courses rank qualifiers based on their UPGs, while Engineering courses would rank them based on their math predicted grades or MPGs. Qualifiers are processed using their predicted grades in math (MPG), the biological sciences (BSPG), the physical sciences (PSPG), or in the University in general (UPG) depending on the courses they have chosen. But Alfredo need not worry about these yet. At this point, he will be happy just knowing that he has qualified into UP. Perhaps, he can apply for a scholarship.

On the other hand, when choosing his campuses, Jomari felt that if not Diliman, then Manila would be the next best thing for him. Having failed to qualify for Diliman, Jomari is now being considered for UP Manila admission. Unfortunately, UP Manila can only accept about one-fourth the number of qualifiers that Diliman can. This results in an EPG cut-off that is even higher than UP Diliman's cutoff for its top 70 percent. Once again, Jomari falls short. Of course he might just qualify for geographic equity. Unfortunately, competition has been extra tough this year, and with the smaller number of slots available, the quota for Quezon qualifiers has been filled with a relatively high EPG cutoff of 2.353, higher again than Jomari's 2.42. Unknown to him, Jomari's UP plans have been thwarted for the second time.

Alfredo and Jomari, of course, will not know of the state of their applications until the results are released. Right now, Alfredo is busy reheating the leftover rice from lunch, while picking vegetable shoots to be steamed. His younger brothers and sisters would be coming home from either school or from working at a basket-weaving shop in Sitio Lansonisan. Meanwhile Jomari starts preparing for his term paper on Shakespeare. But his mind slips back to his application to UP, his father's alma mater.

He could have opted for UP Visayas. Mr. Abaricia Senior owns a fish pen at Dalahican Bay, but in recent years the harvests have been dwindling. His father has been thinking of sowing clams on the bamboo spokes, but he has yet to learn how. A fisheries degree in UP Iloilo would earn him and his family respect and a livelihood as well. He would be happy living with his distant cousins in Miag-ao. If he had placed UP Iloilo as his second choice of campus, what could have happened?

First, Jomari would have to contend with the fact that the University has specifically established its regional units to serve the geographical areas they cover. To avoid crowding out these campuses with students from Luzon (who may not even enroll if accepted) and for these campuses to continue focusing on serving their regions, a pabigat of 0.05 or more (depending on the campus) is added to the UPG of applicants from Luzon who want to enter UP in the Visayas or UP Mindanao. In this case, Jomari's UPG would have had a .05 pabigat added to it to become an EPG of 2.473. This is then what would have been used to process him for his second choice of campus. If he had, however, put down UP Iloilo as his first choice of campus, no such pabigat would have been added.

For this year, UP Iloilo's actual cutoff is 2.7. Jomari's EPG of 2.473 would still have been good enough to qualify him in UP Iloilo. Unfortunately, since Jomari never put down Iloilo as a choice of campus, he was never considered for Iloilo. As an afterthought, if his father were to insist on a UP education for Jomari, regardless of campus, he could always try to appeal his case to the Iloilo campus. He would simply present his non-qualifier slip on which is indicated his UPG. The UPG in the slip neither reflects the palugit nor the pabigat. The campus being appealed to makes its own assessment of these walk-in applicants. Perhaps they will waitlist them, ranking them according to their UPGs and later deciding whether to admit them or not depending on how many among those accepted through the regular processing do not show up. Perhaps, they will not accept them at all if they believe that the applicant only wishes to use the campus as a "jump-off point" to their first choices of campus. It does not really matter even if the UPGs being presented very well make it to the campus's cutoff. Even campuses are allowed some discretion in their judgment. But then again, Jomari can actually afford to study in the other prestigious schools in the city. This will be just as well for him, for he will be with his high school classmates, whom he has grown very fond of.

In any case, hopefully through their college education, Alfredo and Jomari will discover things far bigger than the discrepancies in the states of their lives as neighbors; circumstances larger than Barrio Dapdap, Lucban, Quezon Province; surely bigger issues than which one of Dapdap Barangay High School or St. James Academy or whose parents prepared their offspring better for moving on.

The post How the EEAS Works: A Tale of Two Applicants appeared first on Review Masters.

Admission Into the University Through the UPCAT

If you decide to take the UP College Admission Test (UPCAT), you will be one among many thousands who aspire to enter the University of the Philippines. (Last year, there were over 70,000 examinees.)

The UPCAT consists of 4 subtests: Language Proficiency, Science, Mathematics and Reading Comprehension. Standardized scores on these subtests are combined with the weighted average of final grades in the first three years of high school to determine qualification into UP. Moreover, to implement the policy of democratization to make the UP studentry more representative of the nation’s population, socio-economic and geographic considerations are factored in the selection of campus qualifiers.

Qualifying for a Campus

In your application, you are asked to choose two campuses from among nine (Baguio, Cebu, Diliman, Iloilo, Los Baños, Manila, Mindanao, Pampanga, and Tacloban) and indicate them in order of preference. You will also indicate two degree programs per campus on your UPCAT application form and rank them in order of preference. Your application will be processed according to your campus and course choices and in the order you specified.

All applicants are ranked based on their admission grades and then screened based on the choice of campuses. The top-ranking applicants, based on the quota and cut-off grade set by each campus, will qualify.  Entry into UP Diliman or UP Manila tends to be competitive because these campuses are chosen by more applicants.  If you qualify for your first choice, you will no longer be considered for your second choice of campus.  But if you do not qualify for your first choice, you are automatically considered for your second choice of campus.

Qualifying for a Program

Once you qualify to enter a campus, you are then screened for acceptance into one of the degree programs you chose. Different grade predictors are used for different programs. Campus qualifiers are ranked according to the degree program predictor. Top-ranking qualifiers are accepted according to the number of slots available for that program.

If you make it to the quota for your first choice of course, you will no longer be screened for your second choice. If you don’t make it to your first choice of degree program, you will undergo the same screening process for your second choice.  If you still do not make it, you will remain qualified for that campus but must then find a degree program that can accommodate you.  Remember, you are an UPCAT qualifier; you only need to find a program that will accept you. The campus Registrar’s Office will help you find that program. Qualification into UP is therefore a matter of qualifying for a campus, regardless of course choices.

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