<p>so i got a lot of help off this site one short year ago, so I am offering my help in answering questions. feel free to ask me anything about the school, or applications in general. im not an admissions officer so i can't tell you your chances... good luck</p>
<p>Can you describe your average week? Like, How long do you spend doing hwk or having fun? How competitive is it?</p>
<p>when u wrote your 217 autobiography essay, did u write it as if u were 2/3 into ur life? Do you know what is typically done?</p>
<p>Cougar: Freshmen take 4 or 5 classes. If you are in engineering, the workload is considerably more because your classes arent 2x90mins but 4 or 5 x 60mins + a 3hr lab...</p>
<p>Personally, In Wharton, I am taking 4 classes, which is 14hrs/week of class. Work is cyclical. For the first 4 weeks, I probably had 10-15 hours a week of total work including readings and writing. (fyi I am redoing the equivalent of calc BC because i didnt get credit...so i dont do much work for that class). It is definitely a work hard play hard mentality, you can go out thurs fri sat, and basically relax on the weekends. And do the course readings and small assignments during the week (like 2 or so hours per night)</p>
<p>That changes during "crunch" time which has been the last two weeks. I had 3 midterms and a major assignment. The material isn't that hard because its intro level freshman classes, but you just have to put in the time to learn it. Also, I spent about 35 hours over 5 days working on this major assignment which was a presentation. Basically, during the crunch time, I did about 30 hours a week for the two weeks...so it is pretty manageable. I even had time to go out on the weekend. Fortunately, crunch time is over, so the only real homework I have are the course readings, which are basically 15-30 mins of readings per lecture...very manageable. </p>
<p>What is important to take out of this, is that I am doing basically how much work i did in HS, and am getting similar grades. If you went to a good school, you can manage the academics. The hardest part is getting in.</p>
<p>Wharton gets a lot of crap for being competitive, and its true, the people are fairly competitive, but not in a cutthroat kind of way. You just look around your class and realize that all these people are going to give it their all, and only 30% of you are going to get an A. It motivates you to work. As Freshmen, we haven't gotten crazy yet, but it suffices to say that you will find the library full here at 4AM on a given night, and people to work hard. I'd say its more of a collaborative competition. You get together with a group of friends and think "we will all beat the curve together." Its also a bit annoying when your math class, (filled with kids with an avg SAT score of 2150) will have 40% of the people getting C's and D's...but that just motivates you not to be in the bottom.</p>
<p>Alex: I didnt write the page 217. It was too ambiguous for me! Last year, i did the Why Penn and the "Describe a defining first experience"</p>
<p>Hi dlesk. After reading your post, it reminded me of a question I had. My perception is that in Wharton, most of what you do is "logical" compared to other studies. Do you find this true? Also, is a lot of the time actual discussion rather than lecture (I do realize this may change once you get into upper level courses) but I have thought that in the Wharton classees, most of what you do is "talk." Would you mind explaining or elaborating on this with your experiences. Thanks very much.</p>
<p>Well I've been here for 6 weeks and have 3 partially relevant experiences.
Management: The Prof has a conversational tone, talks for about 15 mins, then there is a discussion for 5-10, then we break off into groups to do the activity. Then the prof concludes with some remarks (conversational) and people jump in with comments. Its a good class, rarely feel bored.</p>
<p>Legal Studies: I dropped this class, but when I was in it, the class was a big discussion, and 25% of the grade is participation. Good dialogue</p>
<p>Econ: Intro Econ is mostly a lecture, but she does ask the class for examples... Like "who can give an example of a good with perfectly inelastic demand" and lets it go on for like 5 mins. The prof is very good though, and its only a 50 min lecture so you dont doze off.</p>
<p>But, from what I have heard, the Wharton "Core" classes are more lecture and exam based, but as you move up into higher level class in your JR and SR years, the classes are more involved and there is more discussion.</p>
<p>though i'm not in wharton, i've taken a healthy number of less quantitative wharton courses (like 3 healthcare management courses, negotiations, 2 legal studies courses, etc.)</p>
<p>and yes, because these classes are non-quantitative, it's a lot of discussion - can be quite difficult actually to sound / be smart, especially when participation is mandatory, but it's fun too</p>
<p>how was your financial aid (if you applied for it/got it)? </p>
<p>how hard is it to double major in math with wharton?</p>
<p>What business-related experience did you have that helped you in applying to Wharton? How important is that factor?</p>
<p>Just a follow up question... I think I would enjoy lecture classes more because I I generally don't like to participate. I would rather absorb material. Yes, as you said you are just a freshman, but is everything that is said generally well though out and well... good. This may seem somewhat irrelevant but I have been wondering about this for quite some time. And how big was your legal studies class? Because I would think its small if the professor needs to know who you are to give you a participation grade. And in a class like Management where there is some participation, is the participation counted? (also, will the professor normally just put you on the spot or do you participate when you want?) sorry for the very unorganized post</p>
<p>And one different question.
As you previously said, the curve is strict. But is it really hard to get an A or B for that matter.</p>
<p>Thank you so much.</p>
<p>@topoftheworld: i didn't apply for finaid, but i heard that its need-blind, which means they dont take financial circumstance into consideration for admissions</p>
<p>@bms: I had some business related experience, working at a corporate law firm for a summer beforehand, as well as operating my own business (a ticket brokerage) that i ended up writing an essay about. I think business experience can be a positive, but I don't think that it makes that much of a difference unless it is something really substantial (like something with tens of thousands of revenue). My business was modest (like 3k profit per year) but I think it really benefited me, because I related what I learned on the job (managing risk/reward, using excel to keep track of inventory and profits and negociation) to my essay, and how running the interest motivated me to study business. Basically, its not having the business that was important, it was how I explained the relevance to my business to my application to wharton.</p>
<p>@Millhouse</p>
<p>Legal Studies had around 60 people
Management was MGMT 100, which you should know if you have researched that it is 1/2 about leadership and 1/2 about planning a community project in a team, so participation is dependent on what you do in class and how you act on your team. in fact, your teammates contribute to your evaluation.</p>
<p>The prof usually lets people volunteer answers (and since its wharton, usually 1/2 the class puts their hand up), but sometimes she will ask someone who doesnt look engaged to see if they did the reading. but, i think the prof has only cold-called about 5 times so far, so its not frequent.</p>
<p>The curve isn't bad... In MGMT its 30%A and 60%B typically, in other classes its like 35%A, 40%B...most people get A's and B's... What you shouldn't forget is that Wharton isn't like high school, the tests are hard. Usually, a raw score much less than 90% is A. I know a guy who got a 58% in an OPIM class and that was a B-, so the curve can help you. Basically, getting an A is hard, but if you do the work, you should be albe to get at least a B</p>
<p>Just thought I'd chip in...</p>
<p>Alex2329 - There is no better or worse way to do it. Just make sure it's effective as an application essay.</p>
<p>topoftheworld123 - If you want to get a second degree in mathematics that would be a dual degree, not a double major, because math is offered in the College. So first you would need at least a 3.0 freshman year to be accepted into the College, and then you can find a bunch of overlapping requirements. The math major is only 13 classes, and only 9 of them truly need to be in the math department. You could count Stat 430 and Stat 431 (instead of taking Stat 101 and 102 in the Core) as math courses plus Finance 235 and Insurance 260 (could be business breadth courses or part of your concentration) as cognates. It's all about planning carefully.</p>
<p>bms209 - I had no business experience whatsoever; not even an economics course. I did, however, take calculus AB, calculus BC, and mulvariable in high school. I think that helped because a lot of Wharton is very, very quantitative, especially if you're going to concentrate in something like finance, which about 70% of us end up doing.</p>
<p>Millhouse - Classes vary widely by department, so it depends on your strengths. If you're very quantitative and logical, you'll like corporate finance (FNCE 100) because it's just complicated algebra problems. Managerial economics (BPUB 250) is also all about algebra and understanding a few graphs. In my corporate ethics class (LGST 210), participation is like 50% of my grade, we don't have homework, and nobody really gets C's. Intro to Management (MGMT 101) is all about BS and participation with lots of reading. Cost accounting (ACCT 102) is basically about understanding basic logic. And finally OPIM 101 is really really easy if you already know some programming languages, but really really hard otherwise. I think you get to learn the difference between memorizing and understanding (although memorizing is sometimes necessary), and you kind of know when you're ready to ace an exam. Some people just have to work harder than others to achieve that understanding.</p>
<p>What's your favorite part of Penn, as it relates to Wharton?</p>
<p>^
I know its cliche but its true-i like balancing my quantitiative business courses with arts courses. I am taking MGMT, Econ, Math this term alongside philosophy. Diversity is refreshing</p>
<p>That will help you with the why penn essay</p>
<p>A real reason, but not so useful to the why penn essay:
Wharton is a #1 program. There aren't any other schools I can think of where you can go to a top ranked program and have as much fun. There is a fairly decent social life here, and that was important to me. There is stuff to do at night, be it frats, bars, or clubs downtown. There are chill people that can party. I am not sure that schools like hypsm would have such a vibrant social life. At Wharton I can have a fairly fun college life and still get a good job when I get out (well hopefully, given the economy)</p>
<p>Would school life be any different for students in other colleges? For example, would a CAS student have more/less free time, etc.</p>
<p>Haha - the different amount of free time is probably one of the biggest bickering points between students of different schools. People have all kinds of stereotypes (Nurses with killer clinicals, engineers with epic labs, Wharton students with all-night group cases, CAS kids who do drugs every night because they have nothing else to do...) but the truth is that everyone manages his or her time differently, and the extracurricular activities you do dictate a lot of your schedule.</p>
<p>hey guys quick question,
on average how many days a week do you guys go to bars/frat parties and on average how many days do you just sit in your dorm and just like watch Tv or something, basically chilling. I ask this slightly retarded question because some kid told me he goes to about 5 frat parties a week and basically spends no time in his dorm and that almost all whartonites do the same. I know everyone's different but comments?</p>
<p>Do you have any advice regarding the application and the essays? What do you think we should demonstrate the most in our essays?</p>