Yet Another One (Chance Me)

jlhpsu
Fri, 02 Dec 2016 16:31:03 +0000

I will say that while you should get in, I’d call and add summer session to your application. There are plenty of Smeal applicants with a 4.0 + that didn’t get in because there are SO many applicants with the same stats. Several on this board with 4.0 did start in the summer. You can ask to be reconsidered for DUS if you are denied, but that is also a crap shoot because they don’t let everyone do that. My daughter started summer 2 years ago and loved it.

Your stats are very good, and you are definitely in the ballpark for Smeal- but be aware that only 11% of Smeal applicants got in direct admit last year. And also, GPA is very hard to chance because of how differently schools weight their classes. 2 years ago there was a girl who was denied with a 4.0 and high stats and she was stunned. It turned out that her school weighted classes very heavily - so her high GPA was not equivalent to other’s high GPA. GPA’s are very dependent on grading scale and weighting difficulty which vary at every school. Penn State will take all of that into consideration.

None of this is to scare you - only to let you plan accordingly. Only you know how your school weights your grades. If they have an easier grading scale and easier weighting scale, I’d make sure to at least have summer session on there.