<p>Penn says that they review each and every application "holistically". While there is some truth to that, I know that some parts of the application are more important than others. My question is which are the most important parts? Obviously high school transcript is at the top of the list, but other than that I really have no idea. Help me out:</p>
<p>HS transcript
essays
standardized tests
letters of recommendation
extracurricular
quality of character</p>
<p>If you had to make a pie chart in which a certain percentage is given to each category, what would it look like?</p>
<p>My guess is something like this:</p>
<p>HS transcript: 35%
essays: 15%
extracurricular 15%
standardized tests 15%
letters of rec 10%
quality of character 10%</p>
No, but there are clear common denominators among virtually all applicants (less development cases, athletic recruitment, legacies, etc).</p>
<p>For example, 99% of students are in the top 10% of their graduating class. This makes it CRUCIAL for you to be at least in the top 10% or else even a 2400 might not be enough. Likewise, most matriculants have pretty high GPAs and SATs across the board.</p>
<p>In effect, the most important aspects of your application in a crude order and tailored just for Penn would be: Class Rank, GPA, SATs, Essays, level of interest in school, everything else.</p>
<p>Of course you can argue there are people with low SATs who got in with strong essays, but I am talking about a generalization - looking at the large picture rather than small anecdotes.</p>
When you put class rank first, is this mostly because of the 99% in first decile stat, or would being first percentile over, say, fourth percentile make a big difference?</p>
<p>@dunbar: yes, mostly because of the 99% first decile stat. As long as you’re in that mark, you’re in the clear. Of course, the higher the better, but top 10% is a must :)</p>
<p>@torcher: If you thought Penn is a state school, how did you end up in this forum? To get here, you had to click IVY LEAGUE -> University of Pennsylvania.</p>
<p>The transcript and standardized testing are the most important components, but only up to a certain point. Once you get past the top 10% and 2100+ range, it’s really up to your essays and EC’s.</p>
<p>well my school doesn’t rank so the top 10% thing doesn’t apply to me. If I have a 3.7 uw gpa and I am taking a very rigorous course load, what will they estimate my rank as?</p>
<p>My class rank from my old school is the more legit one. Which is the one that my counselor put down. And it was only based on weighted. So my unweighted gpa sucks but my class rank is top 5% even after I messed up life when I found out we were moving… so idk. I try to think that in that department it will be ok.</p>
<p>Ideally, to max out the portions of the ‘class rank’ and ‘scores’ areas, (besides being Val/2400) you would like to have top 1% and 2300+ to be in good shape for Penn and above (HYPS)… just being within top 10% or even top 5% is very shaky and you should probably have AT LEAST a 2200/33 to be in the range for Penn.</p>
<p>Torcher… thousands of applicants get admitted to penn with a below 2200 score. How can you say you must “AT LEAST” have a 2200 when the average score for admitted students is below that mark. (I believe it’s 2150… meaning about 50% of admitted students scored even less than a 2150)</p>
<p>I agree with soitgoes. Torcher, you pulled those numbers out of thin air, and they are indeed inaccurate. </p>
<p>If you were to back out the hooked, the numbers would look more like a 2300+ and 34+. But even then, the whole point of “holistic” admissions is that people – hooked or not – do get in with “sub-par” scores – whatever that means in this context.</p>