Hello!
Can someone confirm if recommendation letters are required when applying to Smeal? Or are they only required if you are applying to an honors college/program?
Thank you!
Only required for Schreyer and other honors programs.
No recommendation need for PSU as a whole, including Smeal.
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Just checking back in- finished my application and sent in my STARS as well. Just had a quick question- Will my senior year courses be taken into consideration? I saw that their website said they look at 9-11 grades, and most of my rigor comes from senior year with AP Calculus BC, AP Stats, AP Physics, AP Lit, and AP Euro History. I also saw that they look at first semester grades, but for my school only one quarter will be done so is that what is looked at?
Itās my understanding that they donāt take senior year grades into account at all. But they will take into account the courses you are taking this year for purposes of assessing rigor. Did you have honors classes in grades 9-11? It appears that honors/AP/DE are all taken into account when assessing GPA and rigor.
Good luck!
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Yes, 2 honors in 9th and then all honors from then on with 3 APs my junior year. So they look at my course schedule but not the actual grades themselves?
And thank you! Very nervous!
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Yes, theyāll look at your senior year course schedule to make sure the rigor is in line with the rest of the schedule and to see if you meet criteria in terms of courses youāre taking for your requested college and/or major.
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My Daughter is applying to the School of Agriculture Animal Science major. She is OOS with a 4.0 unweighted GPA. She took 3 APs last year and she is taking 4 this year. She was going to submit her ACT, she has a 31 composite but that includes a 34 in the science portion. When she was self reporting the ACT they only ask for English, Reading and Math and this brings down her composite to 29 ( she has a 34 in math also). She emailed admissions to see where she could include the science score and they replied that science is not required. She is worried that the 29 will not be enough to get her in UP. Should she still submit scores? Will she have a shot to get in UP? She selected summer if needed. Thank you
Yes, I think sheās good 
- and she can send her full score report anyway.
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Hi Everyone,
Not sure if this has been asked before, but for UP do they evaluate students on the college they are applying to or the intended major within that college?
Thank you
@cv08 historically, the college profile has been similar regardless of the major. (ie. all HHD students fall under a similar criteria whether they are applying Kinesiology or BBH or Nutrition).
At Penn State, for many/most majors, you are not āinā the major until a specific set of criteria have been met. You are considered āpre-majorā until those criteria are fulfilled. Every major has a different set of criteria.
Thank you. I have heard from friends in the past whoās students got routed to 2+2 to appeal with an āeasierā major like Hospitality Management. That falls under HHD, which as a school seems to hold higher stat kids due to Kinesiology and BBH. I also was told by friends their kids applied to an āeasierā school within UP as a back door entry now making that school harder to get into. This was the reason for asking, it seems some people were discussing being admitted under intended major while others said admitted by school of the intended major.
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Thatās actually a good question and I have read/heard conflicting information about it. I may email them.
Indeed, it would make sense for some colleges to look at the college as a whole: Engineering, Smeal, IST all have more or less uniform first year requirements. So it wouldnāt matter what major someone is applying to.
However I canāt believe the same criteria are used for Meteorology and Geography, Hospitality Management and BBH, or for History and Anthropological Sciences - because these majors have almost nothing in common except for the gen eds all majors share across all colleges.
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I would love to know the answer to this too. My guess is (and obviously I know nothing at all) that for reconsideration, they care about the program within the school. I mean, no one is asking for reconsideration TO Smeal or Engineering. Theyād only be asking for reconsideration if they didnāt get in to one of those. But then again, they donāt let you ask for reconsideration to a different major in the same college, so who knows? My daughter applied to DUS, because sheās truly undecided between a few things so we werenāt concerned about major. But if it happens to come down to a reconsideration, it would be nice to know what the best option would be.
I want to share a cautionary tale here.
We know kids who have applied āback doorā majors to get into main campus. And they got in. But they werenāt terribly successful and ended up in majors that didnāt get them where they wanted to go or ended up in majors where they couldnāt get a job. The other scenario that I see is that kids arenāt as well prepared for college as they should have been.
Soā¦ if your student is ultimately admitted to UP, I would sit down and have the tough conversation. You will support them and you will help make a balanced schedule (we can discuss that later if you have questions, but donāt rely upon an advisor), but they need to walk in with a chip on their shoulder that they are going to prove they deserve to be there. They need to attend office hours, study sessions, and sign up for tutoring for some of the weed-out classes if they have not had them in HS or as AP classes. It is too easy to get to November in freshman fall and love school and football (although less this year!) and freedom and academics suffer.
I think you make an excellent point in that you cannot ask for reconsideration in a different major in the same college. You must change something ā¦ college, campus, or semester start.
I donāt know if Admissions has the resources to review 100k+ applications and parse by major. It is a good question to ask though.
This would be great if you can learn anything further 
For example, my child is genuinely interested in a specific major and that major falls under a school that doesnāt necessarily have other programs sheās interested in. Rehabilitation Human Services (all ECās and coursework in HS were geared for this program) Itās housed in the College of Ed but she doesnāt have anything that would be considered education specific coursework, ECās, or activities. So I am curious if they are being evaluated for Education or RHS. And like others have stated this may be similar for other majors within certain schools.
I responded below. They are genuinely interested in a specific major, it just happens to be under a school that others are using as a back door entry so was just curious how they will evaluate (school or intended major)
Iām not in love with the āback doorā entry thing in general. I get why they offer it: because they have some good programs in less āpopularā and well known schools - Agribusiness Management comes to mind - and they may be trying to get people to look at those, but I agree that it can lead to kids getting into UP who may not be the best prepared. As someone with a kid who is truly undecided, I am glad they pretty much closed the DUS to Smeal door because that seemed a little unfair to the legitimately undecided. You then ended up with a bunch of kids who just wanted to be in Smeal taking resources from students who really could take advantage of the advising in DUS. The strength of DUS for helping the undecideds find their path is one of the reasons my daughter likes Penn State so much.
Some of the programs that my child is interested in are actually probably āeasierā to get admitted to than DUS, but sheās not ready to commit to something just yet and I think itās smart and pretty admirable that she knows that.
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