Location/Person:
State or Country:
School Type:
Ethnicity:
Gender:
Other Factors:
General Comments: Try to include your college in the title too!
Example:
Accepted-Smeal College of Business
Stats:
SAT: 2400 800CR 800M 800W
SAT IIs: 800 Chem, 800 Math IIC, 800 Global History
GPA: 4.0
Rank: 1/250
Other stats: 5’s on every AP available
Subjective:
Essays: perfect
Teacher Recs: outstanding
Counselor Rec: superb
Hook (if any): triple legacy, recruited athlete, nobel laureate
Location/Person:
State or Country: Arkansas
School Type: Private
Ethnicity/Race: Eskimo
Gender: male
Other Factors: Elected mayor of a small town
General Comments: I’m so psyched to major in under water basket weaving!
Stats:
ACT: 25
SAT IIs: N/A
GPA: 95.69/100% (basically a 3.8/4.0)
Rank: My school doesn’t do ranks
Other stats:
Subjective:
Essays: Very strong
Teacher Recs: Most likely strong
Counselor Rec: Most likely strong
Hook (if any): Used to have a learning disability, overcame it by working hard and challenging myself (topic of my essay).
Location/Person:
State or Country: New York
School Type: Public
Ethnicity: White (European)
Gender: Female
My son and I were just at University Park last week for an Admissions event. The counselors said they will not begin reviewing applications until the middle to end of October, so no one will hear back until Mid-November or later.
Daughter sent application in a few weeks ago, and just yesterday it finally read “complete”. Was hoping rolling started sooner, but guess will have to wait until November or so. Hoping for direct admit to Smeal. 3.75 GPA, 28 ACT, all honors/AP’s in jr and sr year. Fingers crossed.
@monjmom I have the exact same stats, but I went with DUS instead since Smeal only accepts about 11% of their applicant pool. Good luck to your daughter!!
Lupa123, I heard that too, so my daughter called admissions. They advised her that if she does not get the direct admit initially, she can immediately call and they will switch her major to DUS without issue so felt it was worth a shot to try. We’ll see - good luck to you as well!
Stats:
ACT: 34
SAT IIs: Not sending
GPA: 98 UW, 100 W
Rank: 2/100
Other stats: 7 APs throughout high school(2 4s and 1 5 so far) and 9 honors classes
Subjective:
Essays: Didn’t spend much time on it tbh, good but not great
Teacher Recs: Is this necessary for normal Penn State? Thought recs were only for honors
Counselor Rec: Should be solid
Hook (if any): In state? idk
Location/Person:
State or Country: PA
School Type: Public
Ethnicity: Asian
Gender: Male
Applying to Smeal! May try for honors college too. Good luck to all!
@hasannadeem47 Haha I thought it was a safe bet until I saw Smeal’s acceptance rate was 11%. I heard higher stats people got decisions earlier last year so hopefully I can get accepted in the next two months.
@monjmom I’d set your expectation that decisions won’t be released until January. Most of the decisions are released after Christmas. Some very high stat applications hear earlier sometimes, but in general, January is when the majority come out.
Two years ago we were checking daily from September on. My daughters application was complete on September 8th 2 years ago, and she did not hear until January 26th. Most decisions came out after January 1.
Hopefully you will be earlier, but I’d set expectations that it won’t be. Penn State is “modified” rolling. Meaning, they do not go in order of application or anything. If your application is in and complete by November 30, you will hear BY January 31st. That’s all they promise. You will likely see people who applied way after your child getting notifications earlier. Notifications are completely random.
@skid1218 I mean high GPA and high test scores. It makes absolutely no difference when you apply as long as it’s before November 30. They evaluate the same prior to Nov 30. After, it gets more competitive. You will see people who apply the last week in November get a decision before someone who applied in the first week in September. It’s very frustrating for those waiting, which is why it’s good to set expectations early…something we did not do and it was extremely frustrating for us. We were flipping out in mid January If you apply after November 30, then you won’t hear until February and after everyone who applied by the deadline.
The ONLY thing Penn State promises with application timelines is if you apply by November 30, you hear by January 31. That’s it. You might hear earlier, or more likely, it will be later.
Based on the decision thread from last year that I was reading through, I’d say you’re in for sure. Your GPA is above average and your SAT is right where it needs to be. Also, DUS is the easiest to get accepted to.
This is probably my #1 school. I plan to major in something related to business/finance, so I have applied DUS and will try to transfer into Smeal if I get in. Also, my mom is pushing me to do the summer LEAP program to further increase my chance of acceptance. Please let me know what you think!
Also, I’ve heard rumors of the people who are “locks” to get into the school hearing back earlier. For example, a girl from my school with similar stats to me heard back mid-October last year. Any idea if this is true, and if so, the likelihood of me hearing back this month? I submitted my application on September 3rd, if that makes any difference.
hi all! It’s my first time actually coming onto a thread like this so I’m fairly nervous about this as a whole. I just applied to University Park, as Penn State is my #1 choice school apart from Yale being my second, NYU my third, UGA fourth and my safety school being Augusta University. I’m hoping to major in biology, or in other schools cell & molecular biology. I have a big interest in medicine and aim to further my education further down the line to be involved with research or anything I find a passion for. I do wish everyone in the application pool this year the greatest of luck, and I just thought I’d share my part and get some input on this whole process.
My stats currently:
SAT: (taken twice) Junior year I scored a 2000 on the old SAT not sure how that’s converted to the new SAT, but I just got my new scores after taking them again recently and got a 1540. 760 Reading and Writing and a 780 Math.
ACT: (taken twice) junior year I scored a 31 the first time, which I was happy about because it was my first time taking a standardized test before and I was getting a gist of what both tests felt like, and my test from September a 33, but with writing this time.
GPA: 3.935 weighed // 3.753 unweighted
Rank: 11 of 287
Other stats:
I took 5 subject tests. Biology M with a 780 and E with a 740. Spanish with a 790. Math level 1 with a 750 and chemistry with a 670.
I took 8 AP classes and only 2 honors courses.
I scored a 3 on the AP Chem test. A 4 in Calculus, English & Comp and British lit, and a 5 in biology, Spanish, US history and stats. Which I’m sure I’ll be able to send to these schools as well if I’m correct?.
Location/Person: Atlanta, Ga
State or Country: Georgia
School Type: Public, fairly small.
Ethnicity: Hispanic/Latina
Gender: Female.
If you apply after November 30, then you won’t hear until February and after everyone who applied by the deadline.