<p>If you did ****ty in high school are you basically out at Penn? It seems every transfer applicant has a 4.0 from high school, 1500+ on SAT (not including writing), and something extremely unique about themselves.</p>
<p>How heavy is high school GPA weighted? Is there any factors besides the softs people present (race cards, etc.)? I’m an honors student at CC with a 4.0, work full-time (for the past 5 years), and if anything my high school results were affected by my living situation. I was raised by a single mom working three jobs and had a brother living at home just doing drugs (both hindered my ability to focus, have an opp. to play sports, and other things). Also, not everyone thinks about going to college or obtaining an Ivy league degree when they first enter high school. Does this even matter to adcoms? Is applying to Ivy league colleges the same thing as law school (Numbers are everything basically)? My high school GPA was a 2.7, and I have nothing but four years of full time work experience in terms of extracurriculars. </p>
<p>I would just like a straight forward response because I don’t want to waste Upenn’s time or mine own for that matter. Most of the candidates on this website seem to have something WAY more compelling to tell when applying to this school. If not, I’ll be heading to UGA’s Terry School of Business with scholarships for an accounting undergrad.</p>
<p>Edit ** My future goal is to attend law school and possibly undergo a JD / MBA program. I realize UGA and Penn can open this opportunity for me and as a URM (I know for law school this will help, does this play a role in UG admissions?) in law school does the same apply here too?</p>
<p>I’m going to assume this forum is filled with student’s in HS who don’t know much about admissions or current Penn students who would rather not share input. Either way, these forums are inactive and seemingly useless. I’ll stick with the 38k salary / UGA offer.</p>
<p>Not really, the college-specific subforums are going to get less traffic than the larger subforums like College Admissions and College Search & Selection. (TIP: REPOST THIS IN SEARCH & SELECTION? OR THE ONE FOR TRANSFER STUDENTS)</p>
<p>Honestly, if you want to go to Penn, apply and see what happens. Terry is a good school though, and you will have a lot of good connections in Georgia by going to UGA. So it may be a better call to just take the UGA offer</p>
<p>It is true that most transfers have solid HS backgrounds. The few transfers I do know that came from very underprivileged backgrounds are in their twenties and transferred into the College of Liberal and Professional Studies. I’m pretty sure their HS performances were not as stellar, but their personal strength and persistence to overcome their circumstances got them in. One of my good friends has done everything from attending a CC to doing construction work to being a club bouncer.</p>
<p>These challenging circumstances and impressive personal qualities, clearly, can only be expressed through well-written and thought-out essays. I think if you can, as you noted, compellingly speak about your work experiences and your struggles at home and demonstrate how they’ve shaped you as an ambitious, inquisitive, and persevering individual, you’ve got a chance. </p>
<p>But those essays… they need to be stupendous.</p>