My son just found out today that he was admitted for Fall 2017 University Park.
GPA: 3.6 unweighted
Rank: 49/475 top 11%
SAT: 1270 superscore 650-Math
Mostly Honors and 2 AP classes
4yr varsity wrestler- captain senior yr
4yr co-ed soccer- captain jr/sr yrs
FBLA 3 years-officer: Historian sr yr
Student ambassador 3 years
Model UN: founding member senior yr
Hook: OOS-NJ
This was his first choice school, had all his paperwork in by Nov 15. Amazing LOR written by teacher who graduated summa cum laude from Columbia and great personal essay about overcoming failure as a wrestler and translating those lessons into his future endeavors— but did admissions even read these? Not sure, but wanted to mention to other applicants in the future.
He has also applied to Rutgers, Purdue, UMass and UConn-- no word yet, but Penn State is his dream school–1st choice. Good luck everyone.