I think the conception that Penn is looking for “action intellectuals” largely comes from Penn’s reputation as a strong business/engineering school. I think their English major would look for analytical intellectuals in the same way as Yale’s.
UPenn has amazing resources for English because of the KWH and a higher acceptance rate than Yale. Your chances will definitely be better there, especially if you’re in contact with the KWH and can persuade them to recruit you! If the difference between Yale and UPenn isn’t significant, I’d say do UPenn.
If your safeties are for financial reasons, maybe add some private school you’ll get a lot of merit to. If for any reason you are unable to attend these schools, you might be disappointed in a NY public. Just a thought! I was gonna apply to a SUNY as a safety too, but overall I figured I would be unhappy attending if it was my only option financially. Luckily, I got a lot of need based aid, but thats not a sure thing and considering you haven’t filled out fasfa yet, you probably don’t know your EFC.
Any suggestions for East Coast privates you think I should look into? @a20171
If you could get presidential which I definitely think you could, Villanova and Northeastern, you’d probably get a similar scholarship to BU on your list. Providence College and Loyola MD also give good merit for high stats but not really sure how they compare to Geneso rank wise (might be lower). George Washington University has a full tuition scholarship but it’s really competitive. The only school on your list that you’ll be very competitive for is BU (not really sure about emory’s policies) but Georgetown probably not and Vassar, Wellesley and all Ivies don’t give any merit
Do you mean competitive for merit? (“The only school on your list that you’ll be very competitive for is BU…”) I will probably apply for Macaulay Honors at CUNY & the scholarship at UMD as well. @a20171
Yes i meant scholarship wise, admission wise as stated above you’re competitive for all. If you’ll be happy at a public school theres nothing wrong with only applying to SUNY and CUNY as safeties. I was just saying based on your list you seem to prefer privates.
I do like SUNY Geneseo, but if there are schools of a similar caliber with full scholarships, that would also be great. Right now I’m thinking of potential merit options as being BU, Geneseo, Binghamton, CUNY & Maryland, though I will look into Northeastern’s program. @a20171
You obviously are really good at writing based on ECs! I think you’re a shoe in for Penn. If you don’t get into Penn:
Yale, Princeton, Harvard - Probably rejection because these schools suck
Brown - Accept/Waitlist
Boston University, SUNY Geneseo, Emory, Georgetown, Vassar, Wellesley: Acceptance
You’ve got great EC’s that paint a very defined picture of yourself. Chances everywhere look good to me assuming you’ve got a rigorous course load, could use an extra point or two on the ACT if you’re looking for HYP admission though… (Chance me anyone? I’ll chance back (http://talk.qa.collegeconfidential.com/what-my-chances/1969229-what-are-my-chances-for-upenn-columbia.html#latest)
I see a lot of people saying that their science ACT’s for February were ~5-7 points lower than previous tests, so I’m kind of excited to be taking that section again. (It’s been bugging me out for weeks now!) Thanks. 
@jaymiegaymie
Your profile is really strong, and your extracurrriculars show a nice overall theme. I’d say you’re a shoo-in for all of the non ivies. You also have a real shot at Brown, Penn, and Yale (I’ll say you get into one/two of these). Princeton and Harvard will be much harder due to their selectivity and overall less “artsy” student body (so I think the admissions officers would see less of a fit), so I predict 2 rejections/ 1 waitlist+ 1 rejection from these two. Thanks for chancing me and best of luck!
Thank you! Best of luck to you as well. @lacazette9
Penn, SCEA/RD Yale & RD Princeton, Brown, Harvard, Boston University, SUNY Geneseo, Emory, Georgetown, Vassar, Wellesley:
I’d say you stand a good chance at all of them for acceptance or waitlisting, but college admissions are a crapshoot so :"/
SUNY is a safety imo.
For ED Penn vs SCEA Yale, I agree with what another poster said - Yale is more liberal-arts-focused/humanities-driven, and thus I feel that they’d value your depth in terms of writing ECs much more than Penn would.
Thank you! Best of luck for the next few weeks. @desideratum
@desideratum @writergirl0316 While Yale is more liberal-artsy than Penn, when it comes to English and writing specifically, Penn is just as strong as Yale and with just as strong a tradition in the field. So Yale would not value your depth any more than Penn would. For example, if Penn didn’t value depth they would have set up the KWH to recruit top talent and nurture them throughout their undergrad career and later.
Also this is just my opinion, but I think if you are going to study English,writing, or humanities in general it might be good to be in an environment that is more practically-minded (and of course has similarly strong department), just to kind of balance things out.
ED Penn: accept
RD Penn: accept
SCEA Yale: accept
RD Yale: accept
Brown: waitlist/accept
Princeton: waitlist
Harvard: accept
BU: accept
SUNY: accept
Emory: reject (i have a feeling they’ll think you’re overqualified)
Wellesley: reject (ditto)
Vassar: reject (double ditto lmao)
Georgetown: accept
You have one of the strongest profiles I’ve ever seen, and your “hook” is extremely strong. The people I know who are this strong in other fields have gotten into every single college.
From your lips to adcom’s ears! I can only wish. Best of luck to you! @blackwidow7
Just read your stats; I think you have an excellent shot at being accepted to Penn!
I really, really do! So, I want to caution you (like the other poster above) about reusing an essay written previously, as your “college essay”. Its not a “google search” admissions runs the essays through, it’s state of the art plagiarism software that they use. If you submitted it anywhere, they will find it. Since the work is your own, I doubt they would make a case against you for plagiarism so-to-speak but they will definitely see it was written previously and that raises eyebrows/strikes a chord of dishonesty. IMO, A writer that reuses work rather than complete a writing assignment won’t put your application in the best light.
It sounds from your resume that you have a lot of talent and skill; I am sure you can put together a fresh essay that will shine!
If you are looking for other strong non-ivy writing schools, I have heard that Hamilton College, Emory, and Johns Hopkins have great programs FWIW…
Hey, I really like writing too! I don’t really know how good I actually am, but I know that I definitely love writing more than anything else. Unfortunately, I don’t have many writing awards to show because my parents aren’t very supportive of that particular hobby >.< I won 3 hon mens and 2 gold keys regionally in Scholastic this year, and still don’t know about nationals (tomorrow noon… ugh). I’m only a freshman so I guess there’s time. But for you, I think your record looks pretty solid. Maybe you might have a little bit of trouble with Ivies, but other than that, you’ll have no problem.