Hi, so I am applying early decision to the Wharton school to major in finance. I am a Caucasian female and am in a high income bracket (probably between top 1 and 5%). I go to a pretty competitive suburban public high school in Illinois (~2000 students). Our school is pretty strong academically, but we only have a couple at most get into Ivies each year. There is a handful that apply to UPenn each year, but as far as I know, none have been accepted.
Test scores:
SAT: 1510 in one sitting; 1530 super score (I might take it again since I took these early in junior year)
SAT Essay: 21/24
SAT Math II: planning to take (probably will get in the high 700s or 800)
PSAT: 1470/1520 (definitely a commended scholar, hopefully a national merit semi-finalist or finalist)
GPA: 4.0/4.0 (unweighted) and 4.58/4.0 (weighted)
Ranking: my school does not rank, but I have the highest honor roll recognition
APs: (I got As in all of these)
Freshman year: AP Human Geo (only one allowed) - 5
Sophomore year: AP World - 5; AP Seminar - 3 (this was a trial class when I took it)
Junior year: AP Calc BC, AP Physics 1, AP US, AP Lang, AP Econ micro/macro (expect to score 4/5s)
Senior year classes: Calc 3 & differential equations (dual credit), AP physics C, AP Stats, AP Spanish, College writing composition (Dual credit)
FYI: The business classes at my school are senior blow offs that nobody takes seriously (I took college business as a sophomore), so I decided to take physics C instead of another business class because I wanted to challenge myself academically even though it doesn’t relate to my major (finance)
Extracurricular:
DECA- 4 year member, VP as a sophomore, President as a junior and senior, placed 2nd and 3rd in Illinois state as a sophomore and went to internationals
(state and nationals were cancelled for junior year)
Founder and president of small charity for pediatric cancer (will continue next school year, not much money raised yet and we did not have end of year fund-raisers due to Coronavirus)
Marching band- 4 year member, section leader as a senior (section leaders have a lot of responsibility like running rehearsals etc); our band places around 4-5 in state for Illinois
Concert band (in the highest level band at my school since sophomore year)
District honor band (since junior year)
Symphony orchestra (since junior year); FYI all of the music ECs are for trumpet
Congressional debate (only freshman and sophomore year)
Spanish club and a member of the Spanish National honors society
National Honors Society
I have a small stock portfolio that I manage. I started it in 5th grade with about $1000 of my own money and now have close to $10,000 (this is my passion)
Writing a book about investment and finance for teens
Work experience:
Paid math tutor
Job at Menards starting end of junior year
Recommendations: the two core teacher recommendations I want to get are from my AP Lang teacher and my AP US teacher. Both of which seemed to like me a lot and I was a top student that participated a lot in both classes. I am also going to get an additional recommendation from my DECA advisor, who I think knows me very well. When I started freshman year, DECA wasn’t very big or well-organized, and I have worked with my advisor a lot over the past couple years to restructure the club.
In my essays, I want to emphasize my passion for music and my passion for business/finance, both of which I think are reflected well in my ECs and leaderships roles. Even though I do not have that wide range of ECs, I am very passionate and highly involved in band/orchestra and DECA. Academics are very rigorous and marching band is VERY high commitment, so it is difficult to do any more than I already am.
I think that my biggest weakness for top schools would be my SAT (it’s above the average accepted students but still not the strongest) and my lack of community service hours. I don’t know how much community service matters, but I know most people go in with a lot of hours. I have practically no community service outside of the requirements for NHS and SNHS.
I think that’s about all, let me know if there’s any other information you would want about my profile. Thank you so much if you read through all of that. What do you think my chances would be for Wharton ED?
I think you have a really good chance at getting in <3