why do so many kids like Penn?

[Anonymous]

To make money

[Anonymous]

Because once accepted it nothing but an easy A or A-, everyone accepted is awesome so no Bs or lower for them.

[Anonymous]

Nice size. Easy access to the city. One of the most diverse universities in the country. Very wide range of classes. Good distance from home.

[Anonymous]

As a reader of DCM, I am going with the weather. Everyone is fearful of cold weather and the snow.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Closest Ivy to DMV

It’s this. No need to overcomplicate things.

[Anonymous]

It’s the second biggest ivy undergrad student body after Cornell so there are more seats to fill.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:It’s the second biggest ivy undergrad student body after Cornell so there are more seats to fill.

This. It’s a target for accomplished students for whom HYPSM seem completely out of reach.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:All I can gather is people love it because they think it is an attainable Ivy.

My DC hated. They don't like city schools so it was a non-starter, but they also didn't like the culture. There was nothing about it to make DC think twice about city location (and this wasn't true at other schools).

So why did you and your DC spend any time even considering it? My kid wanted an urban campus...so guess what, we didn't visit or consider Dartmouth (along with the hundreds of other rural schools). Why would we?

As parents, we like the proximity but that didn't matter to much for my kid. Ours was sold when an email was sent to the department in which my kid was interested, and the Chair of the department (for undergrad) emailed back, invited our kid to campus and spent 1/2 a day giving them a tour of the department and facilities. I am sure it was probably dumb, blind luck this happened...but the other schools of particular interest certainly didn't respond this way.

It is going well...kid is entrepreneurial and taking full advantage of what the school offers as well as alumni visitors who are in senior positions at large VCs, Tech companies, prominent start-ups, etc.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:All I can gather is people love it because they think it is an attainable Ivy.

My DC hated. They don't like city schools so it was a non-starter, but they also didn't like the culture. There was nothing about it to make DC think twice about city location (and this wasn't true at other schools).

A lot of kids get there and hate it. Very competitive, rich kids, not very kind.

Well most top schools are full of ‘Rich kids’ so that’s not the problem with Penn. The issue is the hyper-competitiveness and the unkind atmosphere. And the administration also does minimal for students’ mental health issues resulting in a high suicide rate for the school.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Many ambitious kids want to do business and make $$, and it’s hard to find an option better than Wharton for that.

Agree. Plus, U Penn is strong across most disciplines.

Also, close to DMV & not impossible to get into.

[Anonymous]

No idea. Visited a few years back. Didn’t like even one thing about it.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:No idea. Visited a few years back. Didn’t like even one thing about it.

Everyone’s different. When I visited as a high school junior in the late 80s I fell in love with Penn the moment I stepped foot on campus. To me at least, College Green was an oasis in the city. Applied ED and got in (it was easier back then), and spent four great years there.

[Anonymous]

It has the best alumni. The best. No other alumni like it. You’d be amazed.

[Anonymous]

My son and many of his friends want to work in finance or on Wall Street. Wharton is how they think they can get there.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:All I can gather is people love it because they think it is an attainable Ivy.

My DC hated. They don't like city schools so it was a non-starter, but they also didn't like the culture. There was nothing about it to make DC think twice about city location (and this wasn't true at other schools).

So why did you and your DC spend any time even considering it? My kid wanted an urban campus...so guess what, we didn't visit or consider Dartmouth (along with the hundreds of other rural schools). Why would we?

As parents, we like the proximity but that didn't matter to much for my kid. Ours was sold when an email was sent to the department in which my kid was interested, and the Chair of the department (for undergrad) emailed back, invited our kid to campus and spent 1/2 a day giving them a tour of the department and facilities. I am sure it was probably dumb, blind luck this happened...but the other schools of particular interest certainly didn't respond this way.

It is going well...kid is entrepreneurial and taking full advantage of what the school offers as well as alumni visitors who are in senior positions at large VCs, Tech companies, prominent start-ups, etc.

Congrats to your kid - glad they like it and sounds like it's going well.

To answer your question (which feels unnecessarily judgmental), early in the college search process we visited a variety of types of schools and this was how they learned they didn't like urban schools. Penn was an early batch of the Philly area schools. But also, DC was open minded enough and ended up at what they consider a school that is more urban than they want...but they looked past that because there were other plusses. So it's not as black and white obvious as you suggest. There are many different facets to a college and DC realized that to fully discount a university for being urban is short sighted, and that some schools were still worth applying to. Would they have preferred to go to the less urban one at the top of their list - sure - but they didn't get accepted.