Just a dose of hope and reality

Colleges and Universities A-Z University of Pennsylvania
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<p>I have to admit, reading these threads has gotten me a little depressed at my shot of getting into Penn. If you believe the majority of the 'chancers', anyone who doesnt score a perfect 2400 SAT w/ amazing EC's and Internships doesn't have a prayer of admittance. But you have to step back for a second and realize the sample size you're seeing here at CC. For every 2400 bragging about their score on here or lamenting that their GPA is "only" a 3.99, there is someone with a 2000 (which is no less impressive in my eyes) who has opened a "fat envelope" too. I just want to sort of open the eyes of some of the posters here.</p>

<p>Confession time: I have a 2050 SAT. <em>gasp</em> :P I never took an academic team to the national championships, and Im not the son of some guy who used to go to UPENN (stiil not sure how that makes you more qualified...). But what I do have is a human element behind the application. I'm sure the admissions officers have to sort through piles of ,should I say. "robots" spitting out their achievements to them. But after you sort past the numbers, there is no drive, no passion. </p>

<p>According to Penn, the 4 most important admissions factors are "secondary school record, reccomendations, essays, and character/personal qualities. You read that right, 3 of the 4 biggest things Penn looks for in you app is what kind of a person you are, not what you have done. In the SECOND TIER of importance are standardized test scores, extra-curriculars, and special talents. (those are the stats that are most frequently used in the chance forums). In fact the middle 50% of students scored between a 2000 and a 2300 on the SAT. In fact students with between a 600-640 CR were 12% of the time, MATH: 14%, and WRITING: 11%. </p>

<p>I honestly dont think that a test of reasoning skills taken at 9 AM is a tremendous indicator of 'intellegence'. And I also dont think there is much of a difference between someone who scores a 2000 and a kid who scores, say...and 2150. A point system isnt enough to prove to ME definitevley that someone can/can't handle Penn's curriculum.</p>

<p>I dont mean to call out anyone out with this post, I just want to throw a warning out there to all the prospective Quakers out there trusting their chances at attending Penn to teenager at a computer screen. Thats what we have admissions officers for. :)</p>

<p>btw: even with my mediocre stats I have recieved intrest from Columbia, Princeton, NYU, and Washington University in St. Louis....not to shabby :P</p>

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<p>Just want to comment on your “robot” remark… I see your point, that these super achieving students have little to offer besides their impressive paper intelligence. However, schools like Penn are in the business of finding ACADEMICALLY passionate students. In this sense they succeed by resorting to “robot” stats. I’m not arguing your post, its just a little off base to lessen the perceived academic rigor of the applicants Ivy League schools are looking for.</p>

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<p>Thank you!
I’m looking forward to applying to penn next year, it is definatly my dream school. But these students, with there 2300 that aren’t high enough, are seriously freaking me out! I do not fit the profile whatsoever. I’m just hoping penn will notice that I’m not one of those “robots” and that I have much to offer to their great school. </p>

<p>Its great to hear a little bit of reality.</p>

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<p>I agree, as long as your grades are good, ~3.6+, SAT scores that are not 1500 (3 sections) and a decent list of ECs should have a good chance at Penn (and any school). I believe it comes down to how someone can personally express their interests in a school in an essay and/or interview.</p>

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<p>Thank you! The only thing this site has done for me is convince me that I will get rejection letters from every school I apply to.</p>

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<p>The SATs have been the most consistent predictor of college success compared to any other part of the application. Also, these “robot” students, are students who work their hardest and to be honest are the most likely to succeed at college. With a low SAT score and GPA why would Penn take you over someone who has higher stats.</p>

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<p>^^^you obviously don’t understand what being ivy league means. They want the best. They have like 40% valdictorians and like 80% in the top decile i beleive. And those students who are below 2000 usually pay their way into ivy league(happened at my school) or have something amazing about them</p>

<p>Also, the packets you get in the mail are from taking the SAT. Its a marketing device used to pad their numbers and make them seem more selective. Wow this seems like a jealousy thread that everyone who does better than you in school is a heartless robot.</p>

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<p>In my opinion - these “robots” are (not all) but mostly kids who have been pushed by their parents and have never seen anything besides their books. You don’t have to have a 2400 on the SAT to be ambitious and want to achieve great things. I understand that ivys are the best of the best and only want the best of the best but that includes regular people who work hard and have real dreams, not only kids who have been convinced in the 4th grade that they have to attend an ivy or their life will be over. </p>

<p>I’m reading crazy things on here about people preparing for the SAT since grade school, do you really think these kids’ dreams are their own ?</p>

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<p>haha i guess robot really wasnt the best word choice. :stuck_out_tongue: I know there are incredibly smart and talented people out there that would be/ are great fit for Penn and other Ivy’s. I just got the vibe from some of these posters that everything theyve ever done in life was geared towards college acceptance. Sometimes you just need to slow down and really enjoy what youre doing. </p>

<p>collegebound41: I know Ivy’s want the best, personally Im either going to be valedictorian or saluatorian in my class of 169. Im just saying that just because John Doe scored 50 pts higher than me on a standardized test doesnt make him a better candidate for acceptance. Penn is need-blind (I think) so people don’t pay their in, but Im sure quite a few get born in (via legacy) or recruited through athletics. Im not quite sure how viewbooks pad a schools numbers at all, but it at least shows that Ivy’s DO look at kids with high, but not quite perfect scores.</p>

<p>Thanks for the support you guys :)</p>

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<p>Merely performing well does not make one a “robot”. I know many people at my school who have lower SATs and GPAs than I, but operate quite a bit more “robotically.”</p>

<p>Most people who chance know that there’s possibilities for getting in, no matter what the stats are. That’s why we use things like reach, low reach, fallback. It isn’t stating that there’s no possibility for getting into a certain school, it’s merely stating that it’s harder. You’re essays have to be more outstanding. Conversely, if one states a school is a fallback, that doesn’t mean the applicant is automatically accepted. It merely means that the essays don’t have to be that great.</p>

<p>Pretty much the people above me stated everything else I wanted to say. And, just because you may have received a packet from Princeton, NYU, Columbia, and Washu doesn’t mean they really want you to go to that school. I remember there was some anger at schools sending these packets because it got the hopes up of people like you. As collegebound said, it’s so that everybody knows of their schools, so they can get all the applicants they can, so they can get the best class they can (which, in turn, raises selectivity). Why would they be giving interest in you when you haven’t sent in anything that would indicate non-"robot"icness. The only reason they are sending these packets to you are because your scores are pretty good, so they want you to apply, and see from your essays and other things if you might work well at their school.</p>

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<p>I completely agree, preforming well doesnt make you a robot. Im not saying don’t try to suceed and hope a genie shows up and lets you in. But with some of the posts on this site, some people might be led to believe that the hard working achiever “non-robot” is the exception, and not the rule. I know most the chancers dont give a straight out no, but there are times when 2100 SAT students are being told that they have a very-slim chance of acceptance which I think is a little misleading. <strong>EVERYONE HAS A SLIM CHANCE OF ACCEPTANCE TO AN IVY</strong> Penn’s acceptance rate is a shade under 17%…and thats high for a school of its caliber. </p>

<p>You said the magic word: essay. Ive seen kids with 2400 be turned down on this site. Based purely on academics, theyre obviously in, but obviously the admssions staff saw something they didn’t like. Not only does the school have to be the right fit for you, but you sometimes have to be the right fit for the school. Im not quite sure why your schools against schools sending information to “people like me”. (superiority complex much?) And I seriously doubt they are sending them out to mes with our heads and “get our hopes up”. If they don’t want me to check them out, they wouldnt contact me. You are right though, all they have from me right now is my test score, but now they need to get to know us better. Life would be easy from Admissions Officers if they sorted the apps by SAT score and took the top 10,000 off of the pile.</p>

<p>btw: Columbia got to know me through z i n c h.com (“I am more than a test score”) thought some of you guys might be interested in it. :)</p>

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<p>By “people like you”, I was speaking merely of people who think that being sent those packets means that the school wants you there. It wasn’t saying anything bad about those people, but merely saying that some people haven’t been told of that/inferred that already. And most people on this board recognize that it’s actually a problem that Penn doesn’t send out those letters, for it makes people less knowledgeable about Penn, so fewer people apply there. That’s one reason why Penn is one of the least well-known of the Ivy League. I wasn’t the one who claimed that they send those out to make them more selective, but rather claimed that was a corollary. Rather, I claimed they send it to most people they feel that have a chance, and would like to know more about them, which would apply to most of the applicant pool (I’d read my last paragraph closer, I was saying a lot of similar things to what you did about them sending the pamphlets and viewbooks, tbh).</p>

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<p>haha sorry bout the misunderstanding :stuck_out_tongue: Yeah, I gotta admit, I had no clue Penn was an Ivy till about 1.5/ 2 years ago. I always just knew them as the least intimidating football team in the NCAA “The Fighting Quakers”. But at least you know if your getting packets, they think you have a shot. :)</p>

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<p>Let me bring you back down: legacies and athletes don’t need the same kinds of scores, although some are “cc quality,” as the so called average applicant.</p>

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<p>Do you realize that These schools pay for names of kids who score over 200 on PSAT in 10th grade? That means most non- incompetent kids receive letters. So they express interest in everyone, only to swat them away like flies during Regular Season. I am almost sure that everyone posting on this thread has received a letter/ email from a top 10 university.
For the “robot,” i sort of see your point. But lets be realistic, a subpar GPA and a 2050 is no comparison to a 4.00 and 2350. </p>

<p>I dont want to be disparaging but the way AdComs see your “human aspect” is through your EC’s. If you do not do any, for all the Adcom knows, you could be sitting on your coach eating Doritos watching cartoons for 3 hours an day.</p>

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<p>If only…</p>

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<p>Reality check: Every top school sends out information packets to kids they know won’t be accepted in order to make their selectivity look better. It means nothing and it certainly shouldn’t be seen as them telling you that “you have a shot.”</p>

<p>“Everyone has a slim chance of acceptance to an ivy” - Look at the data. Valedictorians have a 45% admit rate, while those who are in the second decile have a 3% admit rate. People with high SAT scores also have a higher admit rate, and whether or not that’s fair doesn’t matter because that’s just how it is.</p>

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<p>The most important thing to take away is that you should never attempt to divine your chance at x school from a CC post, or through comparison with your collegeconfidential peers. For the most part, this website is a nesting ground for the egos of overachieving bragsters, and most certainly does not accurately represent the general applicant pool. Yes, OP, you are absolutely right, there are lots of students without perfect SAT/grades who are admitted to top schools on the merits of their personalities and personal statements.</p>

<p>But let’s be frank here; your analysis is off-base and naive. When you look to brand-name colleges, they care less about “human element” than they do about your grades and test scores. Ultimately, whatever brings up the SAT or grade average on the freshman class profile is what goes–personality and all else becomes secondary, maybe tertiary. </p>

<p>The Ivies are an impersonal bunch, and while I agree on many of your points (SAT is not an accurate measure of scholastic aptitude so much as a test of endurance), it’s best not to have too much hope in a robotic system like Ivy admissions.</p>

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<p>“But after you sort past the numbers, there is no drive, no passion.”</p>

<p>are being intelligent and having a “human element” mutually exclusive…?? almost everyone i know who got 2350+ on the SAT weren’t people who worked like robots to get it – most of them were just naturally good at test-taking and just smart people overall, but that doesn’t mean they don’t offer other positive qualities outside of their scores.</p>

<p>“I honestly dont think that a test of reasoning skills taken at 9 AM is a tremendous indicator of ‘intellegence’. And I also dont think there is much of a difference between someone who scores a 2000 and a kid who scores, say…and 2150. A point system isnt enough to prove to ME definitevley that someone can/can’t handle Penn’s curriculum.”</p>

<p>Of course a single test is not a perfectly accurate indication of one’s intelligence. But taken together, you can’t say that an SAT taken multiple times, on top of 3 SAT II’s and several AP scores won’t at least provide a baseline in determining whether someone is more intelligent than another. and the point is not whether one can handle penn’s curriculum over another – most top schools admit that a large majority of the pool of applicants could handle it. but at this level, it really is the marginal differences that can become the difference between acceptance or not</p>

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<p>I’m not a robot, but I worked my ass of for the scores that I did get and have a few extremely gifted friends who got perfect scores without much effort. I’m not sure I’m a fan of how you’re insulting all students with fantastic scores, whether you meant to do that with this thread or not. I know few people who have great scores but little else to offer. </p>

<p>That being said, I was hinging on the idea that Penn would see me as a great human being and try to ignore that I’m not really at the top of my class, so I can see through to what you’re getting at with this thread. I fell in love with Penn and was actually really, really personal in my Common App “personal statement”… I almost didn’t let my parents edit it. Knowing that Penn saw my personality and accepted me for me feels amazing. I truly do believe that you don’t necessarily have to have off-the-charts numbers to get into a school like Penn, because I didn’t break 2300 and I wasn’t in the top 10% but I got in somehow (I mean, I actually do go to a really small private school, but you catch my drift).</p>

<p>But as I scanned through this thread and some of its posts, the cringe-worthy spelling and grammar mistakes that go beyond just “forum talk” served as a little reminder that being able to spit out a perfect 800 on the SAT writing section really does put you in a better position. That kind of stuff shouldn’t be getting in the way of how you are expressing yourself… it’s pretty basic.</p>

<p>Just don’t downplay the value of basic reasoning skills. Tests, while imperfect (oh trust me, because I am a “bad tester” and have had so many tearful conversations about this with so many different teachers and colleagues), are designed to gauge certain types of academic abilities and it’s to your advantage to work with them. I promise you that if you can come to terms with your school tests and your SAT’s, and you really sit down and evaluate your performance and figure out what’s getting in your way (maybe it actually is a lack of knowledge getting in your way, or the fact that you’re a little slower than most which was my issue for a while), you can end up with scores that you feel satisfied with… scores that feel reflective of you.</p>

<p>I love your spirit and your optimism, and I wish you luck. But I also encourage you to actually talk to some people in “the toll-free club” (three 800’s, haha) and realize that at least six times out of ten, they really are pretty remarkable and it’s exciting to think about what types of things they will/would be able to accomplish at a place like Penn.</p>

<p>EDIT: The part that seemed actually kind of rude to me, just to clarify: "I’m sure the admissions officers have to sort through piles of ,should I say. ‘robots’ spitting out their achievements to them. But after you sort past the numbers, there is no drive, no passion. "</p>

<p>I see your passion in this thread, and it’s stunning. But be careful about downplaying the passions of others without actually knowing them or even referring to anyone specifically.</p>

<p>EDIT #2: And even with the human element, there are simply too many remarkable and driven people our age and many are interested in Ivies. There are certainly enough driven, passionate, genuinely interesting people to fill at least three classes of freshmen at Penn. Having solid stats that you worked really hard for might be something to which an admissions decision is forced to boil down. Is that wrong? You tell me. I don’t really think that’s wrong. But it ends up feeling like there has been a lack of equity, just because we see this remarkable student being turned away simply because of a space issue. At a school with an acceptance rate as low as 17%, you can’t deny that space is an issue. It sucks. :frowning: I’d love to tell you that just being a great personality could get you in but I have to agree with the poster who referred to your post as slightly (and heartbreakingly) naive.</p>