School: Really competitive public school, but Penn loves it - of a class of ~200-250, 18 people got into Penn last year and that year we also sent almost 20% of the class to around Ivy level+ schools and at least 1 to each and every Ivy, Stanford, and UChicago.
GPA: 4.94/5.00 : Almost perfect, only 1 B+ freshman year in Latin lol, looks like I’ll have straight As again this year too…
SAT: 2300 superscore, 2 sittings (730CR, 770M, 800W) … 780 Chem, 3 on AP Chem (lol)
ECs: Cello stuff: Principal of School Orchestra, Asst. Principal at Districts, going to Regions too this year, did some really competitive outside orchestras too.
Debate Captain (I’ll do some bigger competitions this year)
Started an Investment Club at school that gets actual banks to come and talk to us and help, lots of other random clubs
I’m trying to get a leadership position in like 3 other clubs…
JV tennis, might get into Varisty this year…
Blood Drive Volunteering
Trying to also get into tutoring this year…I found out this year that I love teaching kids.
Summer/Misc.: Aiming for Wharton LBW this year…last 2 years I interned at a legit full scale research lab at Penn
Possible Recs: My teachers like me and I’ve heard very good things through what my parents told me at parent/teacher conferences…
Essay: I need to not look like a cookie-cutter Asian. I’m not hyper objective about school (ironic because I’m posting on CC), and I honestly love just going to school for learning and personal growth. Hopefully that can shine through.
Race: Chinese (yay for affirmative action lol)
I’m also having trouble thinking about which one to apply to early. My dad is a full professor at Penn so I get help with Wharton/Penn admissions…I know of 2 other people specifically who will be applying to Wharton ED ; one is a double legacy and has WAY too many family connections in banking (multiple relatives run various hedge funds) and so he does lots of banking internships, the other one’s dad works at Wharton itself, we are all pretty qualified, and I’m pretty sure Wharton won’t accept all 3 from one school so the competition is even tighter. I want to capitalize on my dad’s faculty tie help but I don’t exactly like UPenn CAS itself as a school so I don’t really want to go to UPenn unless it’s Wharton. Oh and Wharton/UPenn is 75% off tuition.
As for Columbia, I just love the school over anywhere else, but I don’t have any legacy/faculty tie to help me out and if I don’t apply to UPenn/Wharton early I’ll lose the faculty tie weight, and it just seems more practical to shoot for UPenn/Wharton
