UPenn deferral

My DS got his ED deferral last night from the University of Penn. So many questions and feels. I am at a loss. He is acting ok, but I know he is disappointed. He really pinned all his hopes onto Penn. It seems like such a great fit for what he wants to accomplish. Can’t understand what went wrong. I want to contact the University, but I’m sure they would hate that won’t be able to answer my questions. Was it his essays?, EC?, interview?, Rec.? what could it have been? I saw they accepted 1 in 4 legacies. Is this common? I guess I didn’t do enough research, because if I knew that, never would I have driven across the country with my 79 year old mother and son in tow to visit Penn. (That is a whole other story). He is top notch academically. Maybe they are looking to fill the URM slots? He attends a public high school in central IL. They don’t offer a lot of programs/ opportunities that I see other kids from the bigger cities have, such as IB classes, etc. Maybe he was the first in his school to apply to Penn, at least this year for sure. Not too many apply to the Ivies. Does that make a difference? I just don’t know what to do now. Does he even have a shot in the regular round? If so, anything he can do to make himself more appealing? Sorry for rambling, I didn’t get a lot of sleep last night.

I am sorry he didn’t get in; there is little point in analyzing the mysteries of this opaque process. Penn has a very low admission rate and not enough room for the many qualified applicants. Realistically your time is better spent coming up with good alternatives he will be happy at and likely admitted to, as the odds of admission to Penn after deferral are not good either.

The ivies have far more qualified applicants than they can accept. That fact that your son got deferred and not rejected outright is an indication that he is qualified, but the school can’t fill up all its spots with ED applicants. He has a shot at RD but the applicant pool is much larger so it’s best not to get his hopes up too much. This kind of disappointment is part of the process (and part of growing up). Send in his mid year grades, and look for overlaps to find some other places he might be happy. You sound extremely disappointed yourself. Remember that this is not a reflection on him, you, or anything either of you did or didn’t do. Try to avoid over analyzing or second guessing, it’s not helpful. It’s just the process. Try to support your son and don’t dwell too much on the why’s and what ifs. Move forward.

The fact that the outcome was not an acceptance does not imply that anything went wrong. They get so many applications and such a large percentage are just stellar. They cannot accept each one of those astonishingly accomplished students. Please don’t look for an explanation and please, please do not regret the cross country trip! At that stage of the college application process, it is great to dream, particularly for a student who is so accomplished. Keep the dream, both for Penn and for other equally wonderful schools, and help your son move on quickly to polishing other applications and getting them submitted quickly. And then, perhaps one or two other great school visits. I know it sounds trite, but there really is no single perfect fit. Best of luck to you and your son. Such a long, tough process but a year from now, he will be thriving in college, in love with his new home.

Yes, i obsess too much. Just can’t help thinking “What if he did this or that”. Whatever happens, I will never forget seeing my tiny mom on a Wharton couch, trying to catch her breath and cool down from the August heat. That was priceless! Or touring Philly with both son and mom. Thank you for the responses and have a Happy Holiday Season.

Hi @Annie12 - my daughter was just deferred from her dream Ivy, and I’ve got many of the feels you do. Know you are not alone in this process of processing it all - and managing our own disappointment, along with that of our children.

@Annie12

You need to let this go. The vast majority of applicants to UPenn are very well qualified applicants. The school accepts only a very very small %age of those who apply. There is no way to know what did or didn’t stand out in your son’s applications.

At this point, I’m hoping he has all of his regular decision applications all sent…or that they are ready to send…now.

And I also hope his application list casts a broad net…including schools where he will have a far higher chance of acceptance than Penn has.

He will grow where he is planted.

It doesn’t help anyone (especially your son) to run “why” or “what if” scenarios endlessly. The fact is Penn received a record number of ED applicants and accepted a record low percentage of ED applicants and it is safe to assume that many outstanding applicants did not get an ED acceptance. http://www.thedp.com/article/2017/12/early-decision-upenn-ivy-league-philadelphia-admissions-rate

I’m sorry and I know a deferral can be jarring (my S was deferred from his early school when he applied) but you need to take a few days to regroup and then move on with a list of schools that appear affordable and that he would be happy to attend. Your S sounds very accomplished and will find a great landing spot be it Penn or elsewhere. I think the biggest issue is that you all set up one super-competitive lottery school as the “dream school” when the fact is that there are so many wonderful “dream” colleges and universities out there where your son can get a great education, have a wonderful experience, and get where he wants to go in life.

@Annie12 I understand. My son applied to Penn (Wharton undergrad) last year. Double legacy. Grades/scores were slightly low. But hugely compelling backstory. Unfortunately he hates to make decisions so he waited to regular decision where the legacy thing does not matter. Through the process I made sure he had lots of good options other than Penn. He ended up at McGill which, I have to admit, was the best fit for him. (I knew this through the process but yeah, four years of visiting my alma mater was appealing.) Fast forward and he couldn’t be happier at McGill. He even said to me in the last month that he’s glad Penn rejected him because if it had accepted him he would have felt compelled to attend and he wouldn’t be at McGill. (I hope that convoluted sentence makes sense.)

My point is just make sure he has other options he is excited about and kill those applications. Much of what you said about the background, etc. is compelling. Make sure it comes out in his application.

Good luck. The process is tough but in the end it will work out just fine.

I agree with everyone else, but I’ll also say that Penn is known for really liking legacies. All the kids from my son’s high school who just got accepted ED were legacies. Two very strong non-legacy candidates were deferred and two not as strong non-legacies were rejected.

Yes, he has a shot in the RD round. If they didn’t want to consider him, they would have rejected him. But remember, admit rates RD are insanely low. Statistically, he’s highly unlikely to be admitted. Be sad for a couple of days, then take a deep breath and focus on all the other great places he’s applying.

More anecdata: A friend of my son’s is a college freshman. He applied ED to his first choice, got rejected, took a couple of days to mope and then focused on other places he could be happy. He’s very happy where he is. And his twin sister got into his first choice on the RD round and is a freshman there. So that had to really sting!

:slight_smile: This process is just, I really don’t have words yet. With my older daughter, it was so easy. When she decided to focus on school, and not run track, her dream Division 1 school was it. My son has has worked hard to see how far his accomplishments could take him. He is regrouping and starting over. It will be fine, just raw emotions. Thanks for replying and I’m grateful for the opportunity to vent here! You all are a great support.

Did he apply to Wharton? That is, I believe, even more competitive.

I have written before about this: the external motivator of “getting in” is a false motivator. The loss of the “dream school” can cause motivation to collapse for some. For others, it is an opportunity to transition to more authentic motivation for work and plans. I know this is hard to hear right now, but this might, in the end, be a good thing.

Of course there are many other schools where he can pursue what he wants to do. So it really isn’t about that. Somehow he got fixed on one school as a measure of all he has accomplished so far. You can help him with that. Good luck with all those wonderful colleges and universities out there!

I think a lot of us have felt the sting of watching our child not get the acceptance they had hoped for from their “dream” school. It doesn’t feel good and questioning everything that led up to this decision is normal. But like others have said, it’s futile.

My DD applied ED to UPenn and was deferred. It really threw her for a loop.It was hard not to think of the deferral as a rejection, and she ended up revising her list of schools she was applying to slightly as a result. We would go on to visit two schools with EA/rolling admission that she’d been accepted to and she fell in love with one of them. Fast forward several months, I hear her come running down the stairs all excited - she got in RD. And decided not to go. She was feeling the love from another school and I can tell you without a doubt that the deferral was a blessing in disguise!

My kids are in their 30’s now (don’t ask, why am I still here?) and I want to give you a big hug and tell you that what you are feeling is totally normal- but get used to it. Kids don’t get the fellowship they apply for. They don’t get into a selective summer travel program with the coolest professor on campus (all expenses paid). They don’t get the summer internship, or the dream job after graduating, or into the “dream” graduate program (which takes 3 kids a year), or the clerkship, editor of law review, or they don’t get the dream residency but need to move to Kansas if they want to become an orthopedic surgeon.

Hugs to you. Your role as a parent is going to shift dramatically over the next year from being your kids primary source of wisdom and love and support to being something else. What? Everyone figures it out differently. You don’t want to be the buzz kill parent who says “Don’t move to Kansas to become an orthopedic surgeon. Stay close to home and do radiology”, and you don’t want to be the pollyanna who just says “it’s all for the best” and moves on.

So your kid is going to model HIS feelings on how he watches YOU handle this rejection. If you are matter of fact, sympathetic, but pragmatic “Let’s find you a NEW college to love” he will take your lead. If you are a basket case- then he will be too (or at least will see that falling to pieces when you don’t get something you want is an adult response).

Heck, I’ve got adults who work for me who fall apart when they don’t get promoted, even when the message is “this next job is in Germany and you don’t speak German but your colleague Joanne does, which is why SHE got promoted and you didn’t” which is logical and factual- but they still fall to pieces.

You can model appropriate disappointment. Sad- but not too sad to focus on the other colleges. Mad- but not so mad that a pint of mint chip ice cream can’t help. Aggravated- but not too aggravated to take the dog for a walk and come back amused by the antics of a living creature who has never heard of U Penn.

And remind your son- there is no dream school, dream job, dream spouse, dream anything. HE is the dream, not some external marker of success. And he’s going to do amazing things at (fill in the blank college). And by the way- do you mind walking the dog?

Hugs to you. You can do this for him!

@Annie12 This is always a good read when you start asking yourself what happened: http://gawker.com/ivy-league-admissions-are-a-sham-confessions-of-a-harv-1690402410

It really could have just been a flip of the coin — there are too many highly qualified applicants for the number of spots available. I wouldn’t bother trying to call and ask what happened; only grad schools offer that information, and even then, only to military applicants.

Millie, what happened in one hs with a handful of appliants is no indication of policy and preferences.

They accepted about 1 in 4. Lots of super finalists didn’t make it. Realize what is beyond your control. Versus, what is.

This whole process should be approached rationally, not emotionally. Go look at the Stanford or Brown details about how many vals and perfect scorers got rejected. There can be intense competition among kids from certain areas where lots apply. Some meet instutional needs (he plays tuba it it so happens the last tuba player graduated.) All sorts of things.

And RD means they liked him enough to keep him in the later pool. They likely want to compare him with others from his area and nationally. Fresh start.

ED is a way they pick up athletes and a few other types, as well as unhooked kids. It helps not to go in with a dream but eyes wide open. His application is still in the funnel. The end is not nigh.

Now, you go back to understanding how they review holistically and if there’s something he didn’t include before that matters, if he has won some recent award or accomplished something relevant to them in the past 2 months, etc, he can add that to his file.

aoeuidhtns, that article by the 2006 Harvard grad who quit working as an alumni interviewer doesn’t reflect what I know of Harvard students, and I also think it overinflates the role of interviewers. There are as many views of a college as there are students and parents :slight_smile:

I also disagree with his (her?)statement that the worst thing an applicant can do is follow the guideline to “be yourself.” At the same time he complains about interviewing coached automatons. By all means, candidates to all schools should attempt to “be themselves” in all aspects of the application.

I really don’t understand this argument. First, “There are too many bright kids, we don’t need that many, we won’t accommodate them”. Next, “We don’t have enough engineers / scientists / programmers / CEOs, thus we need to import them from China/India.” Why academia is against academically bright kids? Why? Ivys are looking far and wide for URMs, athletes, piano players, ballet dancers, VIPs, etc. but refuse even to acknowledge the importance of academic achievements.

Sometimes, I feel like top students are treated like pests, in USA. “There are too many of you, we don’t need you” - attitude.

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Yes, it is. Because the same experience is reported again, and again, and again. By different parents.

Realistically, I am waiting for some lawsuit against these snobby colleges. I am positively mad about Ivy’s attitude towards academically gifted kids.