Penn has almost 10K undergrads so it seems like anyone could find their place. Is this true? What kind of person might not like it there? Let’s assume they could get admitted in the first place.
A very competitive person would have trouble at Penn. And what I mean by that is someone who is truly competitive. the type of person who by definition only competes at things they can win. The reason I say this is because all the students at Penn are impressive and when it comes time to join activities, research or internships the competition is fierce and it is all the students talk about. When you are the student who doesn’t get selected and are “competitive” it is very difficult to deal with that. Now I am NOT saying that it is a cut throat kind of place because it is very far from that. The students are all friendly, kind, inclusive and always willing to help, work cooperatively etc. There is just only so many spaces for each of the above type activities so someone has to lose out understand? And you have to be able to deal with “losing or not getting the position”. Good luck!
Yeah, I was going to say somebody who has a genuine attitude of “I’m better than so much of the population because I’m here at an Ivy.” Like Mamalumper said, everyone is very helpful and friendly. My cohort was insanely chill and any sort of boasting or superiority was received really poorly.
Penn is all about hustling. Hustling to cope with the intense coursework, the often punishing curve ( in many but not all classes), hustling to get leadership positions on campus, to get that research position you want, that great summer internship. The idea of sitting on your laurels and basking in the glory if being in thr ivy league seems to not exist much at Penn. People are all about the grind and most are surprisingly quite humble. I feel the person who wants the whole ivory tower, super preppy, more traditional ivy league experience that you prob get at a place like Yale or Princeton, would have a hard time fitting in at Penn.
@teddad123 Someone who would only feel comfortable at a small, rural, liberal arts college.
I don’t think it would be a very competitive person, it would be more someone who can’t deal with failures. There are national team members, state athletes, and Intel winners at Penn. I have been to Intel as well and people there are pretty competitive. However, they are able to deal with failures since everybody wants to get an award. But some people from my state who didn’t get awards while disappointed, they are not super depressed. So while they are competitive, they can deal with rejections. It is only a problem when you are competitive and cannot deal with failures.
I agree with you @Desiree2 I guess we disagree on the description of a competitive person. I have always been taught that just because people compete/participate and are talented and successful at it doesn’t mean they are “competitive”. Someone who has a “competitive” personality typically will only compete/participate at things they think they can win because they don’t like to fail or better put as you say they don’t deal well with failure. I think if you reread my post above you will see that is the way I described it. Of course all the students at Penn try to succeed in as many areas as they can; if they didn’t they probably would not have even been accepted. I would describe them as loving a challenge or enjoying success or desiring success not “competitive”. Tomato/Tom ato
Say you were going to some type of competition where they have people grouped by various ability levels from beginner through advanced. If you are the type of person who could finish in the middle of the advanced group, but would rather win the beginner group instead of competing with peers, then Penn may not be for you.