I am considering between REA Harvard and ED Wharton. I’m leaning ED to Wharton, but i want to kno if i have any shot at REA at H since if i rlly dont i probs won’t do it due to the large ed advantage at penn.
Here are my stats and stuff, plz give honest opinion!
GPA
3.80/4
GPA Weighted
4.66/5
I’ve taken the hardest possible curriculum at my school and every available honors/AP course that my school offers and I am within the top 10% of my class.
SAT
2380
Math: 800, Reading: 780, Writing: 800
SAT Subject
Chemistry (800), Biology E/M (800), Math Level 2 (800)
Clubs
Debate team (President), Academic Decathalon (President), Math/Programming Club (President), School Newspaper (Vice President), Science Olympiad (President and Co-Founder), Rotary Club (Other Officer), Student Government/Council (Vice President), Business Club (President), Robotics Club (member), Student Senate (Other Officer), Class Advisor, NHS (member) and Mock Trial (Quarterfinalist)
Awards:
I have won a business plan competition and been on the high honor roll for three years. I have taken several online courses taught my MOOC’s and got verified certificates. Most importantly, I compete on the national level for Speech and Debate and am a state finalist (won’t give state or rank as it will reveal identify). I compete seriously nationally and I have placed in quarterfinals, semi finals and finals at several national tournaments and have been invited to the TOC.
i certainly see where you are coming from @ZBlue17. The thing im struggling with tho is the fact that the early and regular admit rates are so wildly different, I feel like losing that ED advantage could be huge. Also i def kno one person is gonna apply to rea and they have a higher gpa
When Harvard went back to SCEA several years ago, their early admit rate was pretty comparable to YPS – and it was easy to accept their explanation that your chances in the SCEA round were no different than the RD round.
However, for the class of 2018, Harvard took more than half their class (895 students) early – that’s 246 more students than Yale took SCEA, 198 more students than Princeton took SCEA and 170 more students than Stanford took SCEA.
And, for the class of 2019, Harvard again took more than half their class SCEA (997 students).
By taking so many more applicants in the SCEA round than their peers – both in sheer numbers and percentage wise – Harvard is letting student’s know that if you really want Harvard, your chances are better by applying in the early round.
Keep in mind, HYP recruit athletes in the early round, which is one reason why their SCEA acceptance rates are higher than Stanford.
If you have the stats – and your test scores indicate that you do have the test scores – then your chances are better applying SCEA. However, if your GPA is not in the top 1% to 3% of your class, there is a good chance Admissions might defer you to the RD round to compare you with a broader range of applicants. Keep in mind that the SCEA applicant pool is self-selective, so you will be competing with many 4.0 GPA’s with perfect test scores, and it’s impossible to predict how you will do.
What do you want to study? Which school is a better choice then EA that school!
You grades and scores do meet the acceptance avg so you do have a chance with any school of your choice.
Now, it is up to your essays! Just need to be yourself with your essays!!
Good Luck!
@CollegeEducation I want to study business, which is the reason why I’m heavily considering Wharton. And at @gibby i know that my GPA is not int he top 1-3% since i come from a pretty comp. school. However, my school only reports deciles, and i am in the top decile. So would the 1-3% GPA not matter if they only report deciles, atleast when compared to my school?
@IvyWin: Because most high schools no longer provide ranking to colleges, or are reporting ranking only in deciles, Admissions Officers are putting all applications they receive from a high school in GPA rank order, so they can understand the pecking order at each school. If a lot kids from your high school are applying to Harvard – or UPenn or any other college – Admissions Officers will understand your ranking relative to other students from your school. They may not know your exact ranking from the decile, but will certainly be able to make a guess to your ranking, especially when other students from your high school apply to their college and have higher GPA’s with the same course rigor than you. In addition, students applying from your high school who have higher GPA’s may also have stronger teacher recommendations relative to yours. Speak with your guidance counselor and ask them how many students from your high school with your GPA have been admitted to Harvard in the SCEA round. That should give you a better idea of whether applying SCEA is worth it for you.
Also: FWIW: Harvard does not offer an undergraduate concentration in business.
So @gibby the stats you cite are interesting. Recently I went to one of these road shows where admissions reps from Harvard, Penn, Georgetown, Duke and Stanford spoke. The reps from Duke and Penn both said that for this year’s class, they admitted at least 50% of the class through ED and that there was an advantage to applying early to their schools. The reps from Harvard and Stanford said that they did not fill half their classes through EA and that there was no advantage to applying early. But your stats basically refute that. On the other hand, I think 9 or 10 kids from my kids’ school were admitted to Harvard early this year but they were ALL legacies.
Harvard has space for about 1660 incoming freshman every year. With an 81% yield, they need to offer admission to 2050 students to get to their 1660 matriculation number. So, I guess technically when Harvard admits 997 students SCEA they don’t actually take 50% of students SCEA, but it’s pretty close to it. In addition, the yield rate for SCEA admitted students is thought to be higher than RD applicants, so I think the Harvard Admissions road show is not being totally honest with their numbers.
Notice that Harvard defers more students in the SCEA round than they could possibly accept in the RD round – and that doesn’t include the other 25,000 applications they receive for the RD round. So, I don’t know how the road show can say you have an equal chance of being admitted in RD as you do in SCEA.
Both my sons (2016 and 2018) applied RD and were accepted. I’m pretty sure my older son would have been accepted SCEA. I doubt my younger son would have. From my perspective, I’m not sure that SCEA isn’t a bit of a double-edged sword.
@IvyWin -If you are set on a business major, Wharton is the way to go. By graduation, you will have the finance, accounting, and management classes completed, and be a prime candidate from the top finance and banking recruiters. Harvard students must cross-enroll at MIT for accounting, on a term schedule which does not match H’s.
If consulting or banking is your goal, Wharton will prepare you to climb the corporate ladder from the start,
@fauve Thats the reason that I’m leaning on Wharton since i want to do i-banking. I guess from a post-grad perspective Wharton is superior to Harvard, and its also easier to get into! The problem is that im pretty sure that REA Harv will get me deffered cuz my GPA is a 3.80, and even though my school is pretty hard and my W Gpa is good, it won’t be enough to get me acceptance. So I’ll probably go ED to Wharton and EA to UChicago and MIT. Thank you so much @Gibby for your research and advice! It was incredibly helpful!
@ Jealebgirl really? I thought you could ED at a private college and ea wherever you wanted but you would just have to withdraw the applications if u got in ED?
@IvyWin: YOU are correct. If you apply Early Decision (ED) to UPenn, you cannot apply ED elsewhere, or Single Choice Early Action (SCEA) to Harvard, Yale, Princeton or Stanford, but you could apply Early Action (EA) to UChicago, MIT and other private and public colleges, but must agree to withdraw your acceptance to all of them if accepted ED to UPenn: http://www.admissions.upenn.edu/apply/freshman-admission/early-and-regular-decision
@gibby Ah I see! This clarifies things! Given my stats I think I’l ED at Wharton. Tremendous thanks to everyone on this post for all of the help and feedback!
Harvard SCEA is as big if not a bigger boost than Wharton ED. Both are roughly as tough unless you have legacy to one of them (a TON of Wharton admits are either d1 or legacy).
I think your interests better fit Wharton tho, for the general goal of money making, Wharton is #1 in the country, or maybe #2 behind stanford.
Depends upon your school. Check your school’s naviance/book of past results and what GPA seems to be needed for colleges on the level of Wharton. From my school, no one has ever gotten a top 10 college with less than a 3.94. So even my 3.92 was too low to get into any top 10 college despite the rest of myapplication being stellar.
My schools pretty comp. so the UW average is actually a 3.8, and even then my W will be above the W average. So maybe that means im ok, but i still feel like it does not…