Should I ED?

Colleges & Universities University of Pennsylvania
1

<p>Hey guys,
I think I’m going to apply to the Jerome Fisher Program for ED, but I don’t know if I’m competitive enough. Please let me know your thoughts! Thanks in advance! </p>

<p>State: CT
School Type: competitive public
Ethnicity: Asian
Gender: Male
Hooks: legacies (grandparents) at UPenn</p>

<p>SAT I - 2120 (730M, 720W, 670CR)
SAT IIs - 760 Math II, 710 Physics, 680 Chem
APs - 4 in AP Lit
GPA - 3.83 (3.92 freshman year, 3.67 soph year, 3.90 jr year)
Class Rank: 17/450 … our school doesn’t officially rank, so colleges won’t be able to see this. (My rank has been going up a lot since freshman year…32>18>4 so I’ve been improving quite a bit.)
Senior course load - AP physics, honors human anatomy, AP Calc BC, AP stats, AP psych, honors world literature, honors modern poetry.
Overall course load - Most rigorous</p>

<p>Extracurriculars:

  • top 16 award swimmer for 5 consecutive years, placed 2nd at state championships (26ish hrs a week)
  • piano: winner of a state piano competition, honorable mention in 2 other separate piano competitions, 3rd place in another state competition, winner of a contemporary piece competition, soloist at school, benefit concerts (6-7 hrs a week)
  • violin: member of an audition-only regional orchestra for 3 years, member for an audition-only state orchestra for 2 years, participated in the CT high school music theater award-winning pit orchestra from Les Miserables, concertmaster in school orchestra (6-7 hrs a week)
  • Founder and president of Odyssey of the Mind [an international creative thinking club, we do mostly engineering projects. Our team won 4th place at the state competition this year]
  • Co-president of Freethinkers club [philosophy, culture, politics, basically a discussion club for any and everything]
  • Co-president/reviver of Future Business Leaders of America
  • Co-captain and founder of school Water Polo club
  • Composer
  • Photoshop artist, graphic designer
  • Winner of Excellence in Music award and Society of Women Engineers award for excellence in natural sciences and mathematics at school (I’m not sure these matter, but they might)
  • 250+ hours community service at a nursing home</p>

<p>Recommendations should be excellent from both teachers and swim coach (from whom I plan on getting an additional rec from). Not too sure about my counselor, but it should be at least decent. I think my essays should be pretty good as well.</p>

2

<p>You should! if you really really really wanna go.</p>

<p>UPenn ED has a pretty good acceptance rate.</p>

3

<p>I do really want to go, but I also know the Jerome Fisher Program is extremely selective and I don’t know if my scores and GPA are up to par.</p>

4

<p>Your SAT scores seem lacking, but think about it–what can you do about it now??
Obviously you can retake it in time for RD (which is risky in some ways), but you have UPenn legacy applying for ED–I don’t think you can get any better chances than that.</p>

<p>Obviously those are my 2 cents. Bump around later to see other posters’ opinions.</p>

5

<p>With those stats and a legacy, I would say that your chances of admission are reasonable. Since you want Penn, apply ED. That is where your legacy advantage will be maximized.</p>

6

<p>Bump…</p>