SAT scores

Colleges & Universities A-Z University of Pennsylvania
1

<p>Going through the ED acceptance thread, obviously U penn does put less weight on SAT scores than other schools in similar tier? Is this right?</p>

2

<p>i have heard of that before…</p>

3

<p>No, I don’t think so. There may be some sampling bias, but in fact Penn is very numbers-oriented, and has the same SAT averages of its peer schools.</p>

<p>Here are last year’s 25%-75% SAT scores for the Ivy League:
Brown Reading - 660 760 Math - 670 770
Columbia Reading - 660 760 Math - 670 780
Cornell R - 630 730 M - 660 770
Dartmouth R - 670 770 M- 680 780
Harvard R - 700 800 M - 700 790<br>
Princeton R - 690 790 M - 700 790<br>
Penn R - 650 750 M - 680 770<br>
Yale R - 700 790 M - 690 790</p>

<p>So, roughly the same as Columbia/Dart/Brown, slightly higher than Cornell, slightly lower than HYP</p>

4

<p>Like its peers, Penn is holistic.
There are students with 2300+'s getting denied, and scores <2000 getting accepted.</p>

5

<p>As I was going through the ED acceptance thread, I also noticed the wide range of SAT scores being admitted…</p>

<p>do you think that also applies to GPA’s?</p>

6

<p>No. You should note two things:

  1. Penn does accept a wide range of SATs, but they absolutely intend to maintain a very high average SAT score from all admitted students.
  2. Penn does not cast as wide a net when it comes to GPA. This is partially because GPA is far more indicative of academic effort than SAT so it is more highly valued, but also simply because Penn likes to admit most of its class from the top of its applicants high school class rank - if you look at the US News and World Report ranking, you’ll find that 99% of admits with reported class rank were from their top decile.</p>
7

<p>I’ve heard that GPA all depends on your school. I have heard at some schools there are like twenty kids tied for valedictorian who all have 4.0s or the highest possible GPA. At some schools, mine is an example, there are no kids who have taken all honors and APs and have a perfect GPA.</p>

8

<p>@Poeme</p>

<p>In my county, there are some schools with ~330 people per grade with 50-60 4.0 GPAs at the end of junior year. Grade inflation much?</p>