<p>Could anyone, (the best would be a current student), comment on Penn’s reputation for being extremely cut-throat competitive? Is it really that stressful? Or is really just the same as most top schools, just a stereotype it’s gotten?</p>
<p>From what I've heard looking over this forum, it isn't bad for the most part. SOME Wharton students are like that, but the majority of them are pretty low-keyed and normal.</p>
<p>i talked to a girl @wharton when i visited. she said that wharton was definitely competitive in a friendly way, but not cut throat. otherwise penn is usually pretty laid back.</p>
<p>Ivy League Jokes:
"how many penn kids does it take to change a light bulb?"
"Just one. but he gets 6 credits for it."</p>
<p>that should tell u wat penn is like. unless of course, ur a science major/engineering/premed - those tend to work a bit harder than everyone else.</p>
<p>It's nothing on the Johns Hopkins level (premeds ripping pages out of books in the library and stealing each other's homework), but its a kind of motivating, friendly competition</p>
<p>I hope its not John Hopkin's level! Nice friendly competition helps you perform better but too much makes you want to pull your hair out.</p>
<p>no such thing as too much competition</p>
<p>i didn't know Johns Hopkins students rip out book pages... how many other schools do that?</p>
<p>It's not cut throat competition, but you need to work pretty damn hard if you want to get top grades and even then, it's not easy to do. The curve in pre-med and intro Wharton courses is pretty steep (keep in mind what the average SAT and GPA is here). It ain't high school, that's for sure.</p>
<p>Yea, I think I'm going to end up going for grad school so a little competition is healthy, but too much could screw me over. It's not that I'm not willling to work, but in a school like Penn, that's one hell of a student body to be competing with...</p>
<p>I have heard that it's the most "party school" of all the ivies, so it can't be that bad, right? unless they are all super-stressed and drink to drown their sorrows, lol.</p>
<p>woah Johns Hopkins sounds intense, I'd never heard about that before..</p>
<p>I doubt it's more of a party school than Dartmouth.</p>
<p>I hear that wharton and the college students are pretty dumb, and that there are a few percent in each that are actually bright. Also, I hear that everyone in the joint enrollment programs are basically very intelligent. I guess money+legacy > intelligence+character</p>
<p>Most of the folks I meet here are passionate & smart, so I don't know where you got that from. There are a bunch of tools here who like to act like they don't care, but really do. Lots of parties from Thursday night on, not so much on weeknights or during finals last week.</p>
<p>legacy students still need to be very intelligent to gain acceptance...it's not like "oh, he has a 2.3 and a 1620, but he's a legacy!"...that was probably the most ridiculous comment I've ever heard. </p>
<p>And no, I'm not a legacy student.</p>
<p>I sure hope he meant to write the students in wharton and the college are very bright, but theres a small percentage in each that are quite dumb....</p>
<p>JyankeesSS2, what you wrote was a hyperbole, I didn't mean that low. That's just ridiculous. But I spend the summer there, and I had counselors that were students there, and they flat out said that a lot of people here are dumb, and some people from wharton are dumb. If you dig around CC, you'll find someone else who's a student there who validates my claim. I'm sure there are a lot of bright people, but there are people who really don't care and end up failling classes, but Penn doesn't kick 'em out cuz then they have a high drop out rate and that make them look bad, so they're basically stuck with the not so bright people. I'm not saying everyone's stupid, there are some of the brightest students you're ever gonna meet, but don't expect anything much different from your high school. You have smart people and dumb people.</p>
<p>"but don't expect anything much different from your high school"</p>
<p>I went to a competitive high school in NJ. Unless you went to Exeter or Harvard Westlake (there are a lot of people here from both), you can expect the average kid to be a lot different than your high school. Keep in mind, just about everyone here was top 5% of their high school and understand why what you just wrote was nonsense.</p>
<p>It doesn't make sense that somebody would work insanely hard to gain acceptance and then totally slack off and start failing classes. </p>
<p>Yes, there may be some developmental candidates who aren't that intelligent, but even legacies and minority students are going to be very smart. They still had to work hard in HS; why would they stop once they hit college?</p>
<p>"It doesn't make sense that somebody would work insanely hard to gain acceptance and then totally slack off and start failing classes."</p>
<p>Welcome to my world</p>
<p>It's called energy burnout and lack of motivation</p>
<p>"I hear that wharton and the college students are pretty dumb, and that there are a few percent in each that are actually bright."</p>
<p>Yea, fool. They are all real dumb. That's why the average SAT at Wharton is like 1460 (out of 1600). The 1/2 the class that got above 730 on each subtest (and the 1 out of 4 that got above 760) are a few percent. A few as in 50. If you figure that the 760+ people are roughly speaking the ones that get As in their classes (about the same # of each) , that means that the typical A student at Wharton has SAT's in the 760+/ each subtest range. Yeah, these people are really dumb. No need to worry about them.</p>
<p>There are a few (bottom 25%) that are under 660 - recruited athletes, URM, special legacy (as in building named for your family) (660 is still like 90th percentile and good enough to get you into anything but a top 30 school) but they don't set the tone. Then there are the posers who pretend to be dumb as a way of being cool but most nights they are studying like everyone else . </p>
<p>Almost NOBODY goes to a high school where the average student is as smart as the average Wharton or Penn student. Even the very top magnet or private schools like Stuyvesant or Exeter have average SATs around 1400, which is still like 60 points short of the Wharton avg. Avg. Penn student is top 10% of his class. Imagine a school where almost all the kids are the top 10% of your high school. If you are super smart you're gonna feel like you have lots of equals and if you are average smart (for Penn) you're gonna be shocked because you're gonna meet a whole bunch of people who are a lot smarter than you. Like 1/2 your class, which you never had before. So prepare to feel humble IF you got in. I'm betting Hunta didn't.</p>