A thread to see which kids from Philadelphia public/private/charter schools are applying to Penn, either ED or RD.
Anyone know how big of an advantage we have from being in Philly?
Someone here knows a lot about Penn and Philly and the history of geographic preference. @JHS maybe?
It’s probably impossible to tell, exactly. A few years ago, I saw data suggesting that there were about 140 kids from Philadelphia in the Penn freshman class that year, which is actually quite a lot, but we don’t know how many high-quality Philadelphia kids applied, or how many are accepted and choose not to attend, so it’s hard to tell whether that number reflects easier or tighter admissions policies. And there are a number of complicating factors:
– Penn has an obligation dating back to establishment of its current campus to provide the equivalent of at least 125 full scholarships to Philadelphia students at all times (an average of 31 per class). Over the years, that obligation has been reinterpreted for consistency with Ivy League financial aid policies, but it definitely gives Penn an incentive to recruit the best low-income students it can from Philadelphia. And it often means that for any Philadelphia student Penn’s financial aid package will be better than those offered by peer universities elsewhere, even those whose financial aid is generally better than Penn’s.
– All elite universities of which I am aware have some kind of special local recruitment effort as a matter of maintaining good community relations.
– Apart from low-income students Penn is effectively obligated to admit, Philadelphia is rich in two other favored groups: Penn alumni, whose offspring get special consideration if they apply ED (and many, many do), and children of Penn faculty and administrators, who tend to be admitted at a rate topped only by recruited athletes and movie stars. If you strip out those people, the Philadelphia numbers may not look so high.
– Lots of non-legacy, non-facbrat high school students are involved in scientific research with labs at Penn, and presumably the best of those get faculty support for their Penn applications. They have an incentive to go to Penn, too, so they can continue to work on the same research. A friend of my children was the lead author of an article in Science when he was a Penn sophomore, based on things he had been working on continuously since 9th grade. He was a strong candidate for any college, and he applied to Penn ED so he could stay in the same lab.
– Unsurprisingly, Philadelphia is a hot spot for some sports that are important at Penn, like crew or squash, that don’t have big recruiting budgets. So local kids may be disproportionately recruited for those sports. (Also because the parents may be more supportive of Penn because it means they can see their kids compete.)
– Fashions in admissions ebb and flow. In 1990, supposedly, there were only 60 freshmen at Penn who had gone to high school in Philadelphia. Sixteen years (and one litigation settlement) later, Penn accepted 30 kids from my daughter’s high school alone, and 27 enrolled. (Granted, this was one of the largest high schools in the city, and probably Penn’s #1 feeder historically, but it was far from the only school in Philadelphia that sent a lot of kids to Penn.) Two years (and one administration change) after that, Penn only accepted 17 kids from the same school, and other traditional local feeders also saw declines. Counselors at my kids’ school stopped telling top students they could use Penn as a safety. But there was clearly stepped-up recruiting of low income students who weren’t at the usual high schools.
So, bottom line, if you are “merely” a top student at Masterman or the Prep, but not a URM or low-income or a crew star, and with no significant pre-existing ties to Penn, I don’t think anyone can tell whether you will get a boost. Probably some, probably not a giant amount.
Thanks!
The easiest way to tell is to look at Naviance if you have it. It will clearly demonstrate any advantage that might be conveyed by attending your high school. Like JHS mentioned there is an obligation to maintain a certain number and depending on yield to these offers from year to year you may see ups and downs for your high school that might not be only reflective of the quality of the applicant pool for that year. My D attends a Special Admission Public and seeing the stats of the Penn admits in Naviance there appears to be a significant advantage and I’d say the same anecdotally.
Are you taking advantage of the Penn High School Honors program? Them seeing you excel in actual Penn classes would seem to be a boost to your application.
yeah, I’m in the high school program. thanks!
Also in regards to JHS’s comment about being a top student at Masterman or the Prep - anecdotally from last year it was much better to be a top student at Masterman or any public than at the Prep.
I’d offer that the reason for the Prep (or La Salle or Holy Ghost, for that matter) would have a harder time getting kids into Penn is that much of its class comes from out of the city, where there is (from what I understand) no arrangement or special consideration. I’d be curious to see admit rates for city residents, broken out by public vs. parochial vs. private school, as well as the same breakout of admit rates for residents of Bucks, Chester, Delaware and Montgomery Counties.
My anecdotal info comes from kids residents of Philly - but that’s limited data.