finding out about decisions

Colleges & Universities A-Z University of Pennsylvania
1

<p>I hate to sound like a sore loser, but is there any way we can contact Penn about our decision to find out why we were deferred/rejected? If new people haven't already seen this, here's my profile. How could it be that I was outright rejected and not even deferred? My college counselor and my parents were quite shocked. </p>

<p>-GA resident, male
-Ethnicity: mixed Hispanic (Spanish) and Asian (Filipino)
-UW GPA: 3.94ish
-Weighted GPA: 4.14
-school doesn't rank, but I got an award for being the junior with the highest weighted GPA, meaning I'm a would-be valedictorian.</p>

<p>SAT I's
Math: 800
CR: 730
Writing:710</p>

<p>SAT II's
Math II: 800
Chem: 720
U.S. History: 710</p>

<p>AP scores:
US Gov and Politics: 5
APUSH: 5
AP Chem: 5
AP Eng. Lang: 5</p>

<p>Senior Load
1. AP Calculus BC
2. AP Statistics
3. AP Biology
4. AP Physics C
5. H British Literature
6. Economics (I wish my school offered AP.)</p>

<p>-school doesn't offer honors classes, but mentions "due to the rigorous curriculum of the school, no classes are designated as honors" in school description.</p>

<p>My only B's have been graphic design freshman year, AP Gov last year(will a 5 on the exam atone for this), and a mandatory composition class at our school this summer? I got straight A's junior year.</p>

<p>-will mention Math, Economics, and Chemistry respectively as my 1st, 2nd, and 3rd choice majors. I want to be an investment banker or hedge fund manager when I grow up.</p>

<p>EC's:</p>

<p>Boy Scouts
-Eagle Scout (just did my board of review). My project was building benches, pressure-washing old ones, and putting sealant.
-Senior Patrol Leader during 10th grade, Patrol Leader during 9th
-broke a national record for hiking. I hiked the Bartram Trail (100 miles/5 days, has a lot of elevation): honored by Governor Sonny Purdue and national head of boy scouts for this feat
-LOTS of community service projects
-raised money for inner-city kids to buy scout uniforms
-Philmont Summer 2010-completed trek 34, the hardest trek Philmont has to offer (Only 5 crews this entire summer out of the 1000+ that come to Philmont did trek 34).</p>

<p>Tennis (all 4 years)
-private lesons
-varsity tennis</p>

<p>Academic Quiz Bowl team (10-12)</p>

<p>I founded and am president of our school's food critic club. We go to restaurants about once a month and write critiques about them, which are published in the school newspaper. I'm trying to see if we can get published in the Zagat Survey.</p>

<p>Trumpet
-Superior Rating (9,10,11) at Solo Ensemble Festival
-Community Jazz Band (9-12)
-GISA all-select band member (11th grade) (top band members of private schools in GA)
-played for church on Sundays
-invited to play at school's open house 10th grade</p>

<p>Piano for 11 years
-invited to play at several concerts</p>

<p>Duke TIP summer program (summers after 9th and 10th grade, I respectively studied macroecon. and robotics)</p>

<p>Academic Awards:
-Georgia Certificate of Merit
-Phi Beta Kappa Award (given to Junior with the highest weighted GPA in class)
-National Merit Semifinalist</p>

2

<p>Do you mind if I read your essays? Then I could give you an objective perception of your application so that you can have better applications. I can swap you my essay so we’re mutual and you don’t think I’m a creeper/thief.</p>

3

<p>Also, what part of GA do you live in? Just curious; I live in Gwinnett.</p>

4

<p>Just because you’re rejected/deferred from Penn doesn’t mean you won’t have a good chance at similarly selective schools :). It could be that your essay didn’t “click” with the admission officer reviewing your app, or it could be any possible reason. Make sure that there wasn’t anything blatantly amiss in your application (a bad rec, materials missing, etc) and you can try again for other schools in the RD round.</p>

5

<p>It seems like your scores are good and I feel terrible you were not accepted because it shows in your passion here. But I agree your essays or maybe your recommendations or lack of leaderships in ec’s may have hurt you. I hope in time you can move on and let go of your anger and get accepted by a school that really wants you.</p>

<p>I also don’t think admissions will give you an exact reason for denial.</p>

6

<p>Just hoping you can come to peace with the decision, not saying it is easy at all, but I want you to let us know in a few months that you got into a school that really appreciated all you have to offer - which seems like a lot.</p>

7

<p>I PMed you back. Let me know if you didn’t receive it because my sent messages aren’t saved. You can also send me your CommonApp essay if you’d like to and I’ll swap.</p>

8

<p>Good luck with your future admissions and I hope everything works out!</p>

9

<p>Meh. I’m still pretty cheesed.</p>

10

<p>The admissions staff cannot and does not give reasons for its decisions other than they did not feel the fit was there. If you are looking to be told “just 50 points higher on your SATs” or “7 more hours community service a month”, you are out of luck.</p>

<p>Application decisions are made holistically, so there is not one thing that makes an applicant undesirable.</p>