<p>First off I’d like to thank the current Penn students a ton for all their help, the information on this thread is priceless. I know you guys are probably busy but taking time out of your days to help out prospective students like me truly deserves gratitude. </p>
<p>Anyways, I’m a rising senior in high school and would like to ED to Wharton. I have a few essay topics that I would like to get some feedback on and I’d like to know if I’d fit into Wharton’s atmosphere/if I’m the caliber of a Wharton student. Are there any current Wharton students that I could PM to help me out? Again, thanks for all your help!</p>
<p>1) In terms of the dorms/housing, I know that some schools like Princeton have dormotorie advisors that live with the students. Does Penn have anything like that? </p>
<p>2) In terms of student organizations, is it easy to start your own club/organization at Penn? </p>
<ol>
<li>There are also RAs, GAs and house deans along with faculty masters. </li>
<li>What organization? There might be one related to your interest already. Also, there are tons of clubs that arent SAC recognized but are still active.</li>
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<p>Re: Starting organizations and clubs… First of all, there’s a club for just about everything you could imagine. If you have an interest for which there is no club, it’s very easy to start one… find people with similar interests and establish the club! You can reserve space in dozens of places around campus. If the club is something you want to pursue, you can apply for funding through the Student Activities Council (SAC); you will need to prove that there is interest, that the club has a purpose and that said purpose is not addressed by another club. If approved, you’ll have a budget and an officially recognized club! </p>
<p>It isn’t necessarily easy, but that’s by design - SAC shouldn’t just give away its budget to anybody!</p>
<p>Oh, and in some classes you’ll be required to purchase textbooks from elsewhere (the bookstore just behind the official bookstore, small bookshops just off-campus, Amazon, etc. etc.)</p>
<p>Many professors don’t finalize their choices for textbooks until pretty late in the game, so you will likely not know about half of your textbooks until the first day of class. That’s fine, though… nobody expects you to have textbooks on the first class, and you rarely do anything of substance the first week (certainly no legit homework or anything)</p>
<p>If money is an object (I’d say it was for about half of my friends), there are some things to keep in mind.</p>
<ol>
<li>The bookstore is the most expensive place to purchase books.</li>
<li>The two little stores (one at 34th and Walnut and the other at 39th and Spruce) are also ridiculously expensive, and there is rarely any overlap between those books and bookstore books, so it’s unlikely that you can find the same book for a better place at one place.</li>
<li>The bookstore will make used books available, especially for large classes where tons of students do the book buyback… you will only get 10-20% off, and some of the books have writing in them. Might not be worthwhile.</li>
<li>Look online at places like AbeBooks and Half.com to find decent deals… I got a few textbooks for about 40% of the original price (i.e. instead of paying 250, I paid $100).</li>
<li>Weigh your options… do you really NEED the book? I know that when I took classes that I really wanted to take, I would always buy the books because I can see myself reading them in the future. For the dumb little requirement courses, I’d buy the books if they were reasonably priced. Otherwise, I would borrow from friends or use reference copies at the library. That probably saved me $500 over the course of four years.</li>
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<p>Well, the thing is that I’m a transfer student, and I’m used to buying my textbooks off Amazon to save money… but I got a full ride at Penn, and I believe they were supposed to cover the expenses for my books, which is why I’m so confused. If they weren’t covering my books, then I would just wait to buy them off Amazon.</p>
<p>If I’m not mistaken, the way Penn organizes its financial aid is just in different buckets of cash. You’ll probably be advised to set up direct deposit so they can issue a refund check to you (that’s what I did), and then they take every payment they’ve received (they consider financial aid awards a “payment”), bump them up against tuition, room and board, and then issue a check for the “overpayment.” </p>
<p>Scenario (using fake numbers since I don’t know what the actual cost of attendance is):
Tuition - $22,500 / sem
Housing - $4,000 / sem
Food - $2,000 / sem
Books - $500 / sem
Personal Expenses - $1,000 / sem
Total - $30,000 / sem</p>
<p>Expected family contribution: $17,500 / sem, including $1,500 in Stafford loans
Financial Aid award: $12,500 / sem</p>
<p>Now, let’s say that you pay $16,000 up front for the fall semester. The Stafford loan will get applied, so now you’ve paid $17,500. Next the financial aid award gets applied, so you’re up to $30,000… but the University only bills for tuition, room and board - not books or personal expenses - meaning that the university has charged you $28,500. As a result, you will get a reimbursement of $1,500 for the semester. The same thing will happen the following semester.</p>
<p>ITA, library, some cafe/barista jobs (I know my friend worked at Cafe Prima in Harrison and they let her do hw whenever there were no customers)</p>
<p>@student1029: Unfortunately, I never lived in the Quad so I can’t give you the specifics. However, the general trend is that the higher floors generally have more spacious/nicer rooms. Since you’re on the 4th floor, the rooms should be pretty decent!</p>
<p>A couple friends of mine used the Public Storage facility at 63rd and Market, but the vast majority of people just asked friends living off campus if they could store their stuff there. Before my senior year, there were six kids whose things were hanging out in my off-campus house’s basement! Much cheaper (i.e. free) and more convenient (i.e. a few blocks instead of a few miles) method than anything else.</p>
<p>whatisinevidence: Definitely ITA. I also worked in the library during my freshman year, but it’s actually harder to find time to study/read on the job. Being an ITA is also a good way to meet others.</p>
<p>One other thing I did was find an SAT tutoring gig on the side – paid good money, but definitely try to stay local.</p>
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