<p>My brother just finished gr.11, and feels that he won't be prepared to apply or to attend a couple of his choices, one being UPenn. He wants to do a year of university here in Canada first, and then apply to his dream schools.
His GPA is 3.85/4.0
He plays soccer and is playing in Europe with a professional league
He wants to apply to the Vagelos Program, second choice being the College; he wishes to be either a dentist or a vet.
He's organized a few national sports events, and has a large range of Ecs</p>
<p>I've been telling him that he's more ready than he thinks but he really wants to do what he calls " a practise run" at a university here first.</p>
<p>My question is, would he be allowed to apply to UPenn for the freshman class, as a freshman in another university up here in Canada?</p>
<p>Call admissions. I am not 100% clear on what your brother’s collegiate state is right now, but I believe transfers occur for rising sophomores… Correct me if I am wrong.</p>
<p>I’ll let you know Rudess.
I know personally that you can’t transfer into one of the dual-degree programs, which he is looking into. Our school offers IB but he didn’t take it full because it prevented him from taking courses he was really interested in, and taking a large variety of them at that. He didn’t want to restrict his choices in the future (I kind of feel that I did by going through with full IB) and he had no time with the level of soccer he plays. He took a few HL courses but I think he’s looking into building his academic resume, than anything.
I was in his scenario last year and ended up going against my doubts and frailties and applied to Penn. Got into M&T, but I also had to go out of my way for it. Several interviews, even went down and met the prof that I declared I wanted to do research with. The regeional rep was extremely dis-interested as well. Was of no help and ignored all my emails and only contacted me to tell me that she “had no one available in my area, sorry.” Harvard, personally, was an easier feat than UPenn.</p>
<p>“I was in his scenario last year and ended up going against my doubts and frailties and applied to Penn. Got into M&T, but I also had to go out of my way for it. Several interviews, even went down and met the prof that I declared I wanted to do research with. The regeional rep was extremely dis-interested as well. Was of no help and ignored all my emails and only contacted me to tell me that she “had no one available in my area, sorry.” Harvard, personally, was an easier feat than UPenn.”</p>
<p>This intrigued me. Did you do all of this out of your own free will, or did someone recommend you to go to this extent? How did you get several interviews? Sorry, a little confused by your statement above :)</p>
<p>My MIT alumni-interviewer proved to be more of a help and connection than my UPenn regional rep. He was also a Penn alumni, and when I found out I asked if he could put in a referrence. He was more than willing (he was an M&T graduate, and then did his grad-school at MIT so this was huge)</p>
<p>Let me explain. When the Ivies first did their tour of Canada they ended up hitting my city. I had already contacted my regional representative and she had already told me that she didn’t have anyone available in the area for me, sorry, and that she couldn’t do much for me. So after having an extensive chat with the Penn rep on the tour after the Q&A, I asked if him how much longer he would be in town for, and asked if it would be possible to have an interview? He agreed and so I got that one. </p>
<p>I had one with the Penn professor. Doing the supplement, I noticed they made a note that contacting the professor was by no means a necessity and I basically shrugged my shoulders, asked “why not?” and went ahead with that. E-mailed him, he was nice, and asked him if I could talk to him in person: the family vacation was in NYC so it wasn’t a chore.</p>
<p>I play volleyball and made an audition tape of a sort with my application. I also sent it to the coaches and what not, and booked a try-out/interview with them, this would be in January.</p>