<p>What is the ED appeals process like? My family is upper middle class, with a high income but some economic issues that may not be apparent on the income tax forms (i.e. my father’s job is being moved out of state, I have a twin that will in all likelihood attending a competitive private university at the same time), and while I’d really like to take advantage of the ED acceptance rate at Penn, I don’t want to cause a huge hardship on my family.</p>
<p>bandgeek24601–When you apply to college (whether it’s to Penn via ED or anywhere else at any point), you and your family should also compose and submit a supplementary letter that explains any anomalies in your situation. If you and your twin will be in school concurrently, the financial aid formulas will take this into consideration. But if there are other issues that may not be obvious from the generic questions on the FAFSA and CSS Profile form, your letter can explain them. Typically, some colleges are more responsive than others to such letters. </p>
<p>If you are considering an ED application to Penn, you should first try an online EFC calculator. This should give you at least a ballpark idea of what your family should expect to pay for your college each year. (When asked by the calculator to choose either the “Federal Methodology” or “Institutional Methodology,” note that Penn and its peer institutions, go with “Institutional.” You can also try “Both.”)</p>
<p>Once you get a rough idea of your Expected Family Contribution, you and your parents need to discuss whether or not it seems feasible. You can also discuss whether it might be MORE feasible if Penn were to make adjustments for your father’s job situation. If the figure you get from the aid calculator is WAY OFF from what your family feels is affordable, then the chances are not good that you will get the assistance you require from Penn, even if they cut you some slack for your anomalies.</p>
<p>If you do decide to forge ahead with your ED application, you will apply for financial aid at the same time. If admitted to Penn via ED, you will receive a tentative aid package when you receive your verdict. </p>
<p>If this aid package makes Penn affordable, you are all set. If not, you can negotiate with the financial aid office (make an appointment to meet in person or via phone) and try to reach a compromise. You will have to this promptly. You can’t wait until spring when you have other admission offers (and scholarship offers) to compare. Should the negotiation be unsuccessful, you can withdraw from your “binding” ED commitment without penalty.</p>
<p>Whenever you are appealing an aid award, be sure to provide as much documentation as possible to confirm income, assets, changes in employment status, etc.</p>
<p>It is very thoughtful of you to be concerned with causing your family undue hardship, and there may be some tough decisions ahead. Good luck to you as you make them.</p>
<p>Sally, will you weigh in on a related topic? Some people feel that Penn requires submission of all SAT AND ACT test scores, whereas others - and the Penn website - suggest is one or the other but all scores of the one type. Your opinion?</p>
<p>Why would anyone not believe the website?</p>
<p><a href=“http://www.upenn.edu/ir/Common%20Data%20Set/UPenn%20Common%20Data%20Set%202009-10.pdf[/url]”>http://www.upenn.edu/ir/Common%20Data%20Set/UPenn%20Common%20Data%20Set%202009-10.pdf</a> section C8: “SAT and SAT Subject Tests or ACT”</p>
<p>I’m planning on applying to UPenn ED since I’m really interested in Wharton and the fantastic education I can get there. I wouldn’t apply ED anywhere just on the basis of prestige, though I know lots of people that would. As important as prestige can be, fit is way more important to me. And the prospect of getting a world class education and a business institution like Wharton, learning from great professors, and having good job prospects after is the principle reason why I’m applying ED.</p>
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<p>My “opinion” is an opinion, indeed, and nothing official. Here’s what the Penn Web site says:</p>
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<p>This is in distinct contrast to what you’ll find on the Yale site: </p>
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<p>Thus, my own interpretation is that Penn says, “Send us all scores from every test you took. If you took BOTH the SAT’s and the ACT’s, we need to see everything. If you took just one or the other, we want the results from each administration of whatever test you chose, if you took this test more than once.”</p>
<p>Yale, on the other hand, allows applicants to use ONLY their SAT scores or ONLY their ACT scores --even if the applicant took both tests–as long as the student sends results from each sitting from the test they chose.</p>
<p>Again, this is just my own take, and it makes me nuts to even be having this conversation. I hate that this process–already stressful and confusing–has become even more so as each institution creates their own guidelines for test submission.</p>
<p>Regardless of its Ivy-status, I loved Penn ever since I visited it during my freshmen year when I participated in the PENN Relays.
I didnt even really know about the school (i was young and everyone kept forcing Harvard down my throat), but I loved Penn since then. The people were so nice, the town was so welcoming, etc etc.
I visited Columbia and other schools but I still love Penn
And I will apply ED</p>
<p>Sally-- Thank you very much for all your advice. I think I’m going to forgo the ED route and just apply regular decision and cross my fingers. Although Penn is my first choice if admitted, I don’t want to spend the rest of my life wondering if I would have gotten into the other schools that are on my list. Including Penn, there are about five wonderful schools that I’d really consider going to if I get in, so I’m going to apply to all five regular decision (and three safeties), see which one will offer me the best educational opportunities when I factor in the financial aid offered, and then take it from there.</p>
<p>I know I’ve probably jeopardized my opportunity to get into an Ivy League school that way, but if I can’t get in regular decision, I don’t think I’d be able to keep up with the coursework anyway. There’s always grad school anyway :/</p>
<p>Unless your dad is Obama, no one can count on admission at those schools. They turn down many candidates that have perfect SAT’s, are first in their class and have stellar achievements. Telling someone they are a sure thing only sets them up to fees worse if they don’t get in.</p>
<p>My experience suggests you are right Sally. If Penn really wanted students with a passion and committment to the school, they would institute a EA program. As one former member of their admissions team put it to me, they know they would lose their stronger candidates to Harvard, Yale, Princeton, Columbia, Stanford, etc. if their program was not binding. So while I have known candidates for whom Penn was a clear first choice due to Wharton or the Huntsman program, I’ve known many more whose motives were more in line with those you mention.</p>
<p>“if I can’t get in regular decision, I don’t think I’d be able to keep up with the coursework anyway”</p>
<p>No selective school will admit someone ED or RD who hasn’t shown (via the application) that they can handle the load. Don’t worry about that issue; schools are sensitive about their graduation rates. The challenge is to be noticed among all the applicants who are fully qualified.</p>
<p>@ so cal 5: I disagree with your thesis, namely:</p>
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<p>EA programs still promise prospective students higher chances of admission, and afford colleges higher yield rates than RD. They would “fix” very little (since they maintain the incentive of eased admission).</p>
<p>At Penn, and at its peer programs that still utilize ED (Dartmouth, Brown and Columbia), early decision allows schools to vie for border-line lock candidates that <em>might</em> otherwise be snatched up by HYP during RD. There is, of course, an ancillary benefit: ED acceptees are often, even if only by virtue prolonged exposure, more passionate and committed to Penn than the RD applicant who applied to 13 other universities.</p>
<p>Finally, I take issue with your list of colleges to which Penn loses stronger candidates. I take it, by your username, that you hail from California. My Western counterparts tell me that Penn’s prestige there is nascent. While I appreciate this, I assure you that in the East, it is equivalent (if not better than) Columbia - I, for one, was accepted to both for the class of 2011 and chose Penn (on the strength of its English and Bio-med programs) AND I’m from the New York area (where Columbia arguably enjoys high levels of influence and according eminence).</p>
<p>I would check out the preference rankings available at mychances . net for a decent representation of which colleges students pick over others.</p>
<p>Why would one student care what others have done (unless that student thought s/he were a composite of those other students)?</p>
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<p>That’s incorrect. Tippy top schools with EA very rarely (never?) offer any benefit in admissions to those who apply EA, just because I think the pool is more self-selective. For example, at Georgetown, Notre Dame, Yale, and MIT–there is no actual benefit to applying by that Nov 1/Nov 15 deadline.</p>
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<p>Not to formulate your own decision, but to understand the contemporary landscape of institutional prestige. Why would a student choose Columbia over Vanderbilt? Surely not because of the greater education available at one over the other (for most undergraduate curricula, the two are comparable). It’s because, let’s face it, Columbia is more prestigious. And the foundation of prestige is preference: where do the top students, the ones accepted to most/all programs, choose to matriculate? THAT is what defines prestige, and that is what mychances . net measures.</p>
<p>Your own decision, of course, should be made based on fit (although it rarely is based purely on that variable).</p>
<p>“It’s because, let’s face it, Columbia is more prestigious.”</p>
<p>Clearly, those who value prestige respond to it.</p>
<p>Exactly; but I would argue further that prestige and related factors (alumni network, graduate school placement, and so forth) are the primary motives behind choice of matriculation.</p>
<p>As always, if you can choose between like institutions, fit comes into play. But at a level of parity, “fit” would likely not account for the vast majority of preferred cross-admits to one school over another. So, for example, when Harvard wins 85% of those admitted to both Harvard and UCLA, it’s not a case of 85% of the cross-admits “fitting” better at Harvard. Harvard and UCLA house vastly different cultures - many among those 85% would “fit” better at UCLA than they will at Harvard. But they would rather take a chance for Harvard’s significantly superior prestige, placement, etc.</p>
<p>By the same token, when Penn wins 53% of cross admits with Columbia, it clearly does so from a position of prestige equality. Neither school appeals significantly more than the other <em>as far as prestige is concerned</em>. Consequently, students choose between the two based on fit, and the pool of matriculants is more evenly distributed.</p>
<p>I totally understand where some users are coming from. Personally, I too believe that a lot of students apply to Penn (even though Penn isn’t their first choice) early decision because of the higher ED acceptance rate. When it comes down to it, the dream of an Ivy League education can only become a reality for some students if they do everything that can potentially raise their chances (e.g. paying thousands of dollars for SAT prep, or applying early decision to school that they don’t feel would accept them during the more-competitive regular decision process). I don’t see anything wrong with that attitude.</p>
<p>I’m going to use myself as an example.</p>
<p>I was a Questbridge National Collegematch Scholarship Finalist, and I had to rank colleges that I would like to attend (see [QuestBridge</a> Home Page](<a href=“http://questbridge.org%5DQuestBridge”>http://questbridge.org) for more information and explanations). If one one of the schools accepted me as a Questbridge student, the admissions decision would be binding, and I had trouble deciding which schools to rank. Completely lacking confidence, I ranked Penn, Columbia, Princeton, Stanford and Yale because I thought I had no chance at the super-competitive regular decision. Secondly, if accepted through Questbridge, I would be on a full scholarship, so I ranked a total of 7 schools to higher my chances at getting the scholarship. In the end, I ended up being “matched” to Penn through Questbridge, and even though it wasn’t my first choice, I’m still extremely happy with the outcome (I mean, who wouldn’t be?!).</p>
<p>Im so in love with Penn, especially Wharton…It has always been my dream sch since I heard about it a few years ago. At first I was kinda hesitant to apply since many of my seniors said it was kinda impossible for us to get into Penn (btw im an international student studying junior college in Singapore). However, after reading so much about it I feel Penn is certainly where I wanna go to.
I heard from my friend that the pool for Wharton is about 500, and admission rat about 10%? That certainly sounds really competitive.</p>