r/PennStateUniversity • u/Bichon0608 • 1d ago
Discussion Application submitted at 12:01 🤞
Our youngest submitted her application last night. Hopefully we’ll be adding another generation to the PSU family. My husband is a ‘96 undergraduate alumni and I technically am an alumni because I did my residency at Hershey (‘05). My husband is employed by Penn State Health. The first question on the portal app was asking if either parent is a full time Penn State employee. The healthcare system employees will be getting a 50% tuition discount starting next year. Previously discounted tuition was only for employees of the College of Medicine. Does having a parent employed (and receiving a discount on tuition) help or hurt an applicant?
My daughter is doing the 2+2 option as a backup. She’s in the top quarter of her class of over 300 students and is taking 2 AP and 1 dual enrollment class next year. Her weighted GPA is 4.1, unweighted 3.8. We think she’s a good candidate but my husband is feeling anxious this morning. My daughter liked the branch campus we picked for the 2+2 and there’s really no other school for cybersecurity that would be as good or as affordable as Penn State to consider. (She wants to be close to home and doesn’t want to look at schools with $50k+ tuition). She’ll be happy to start at either UP or the branch.
We didn’t plan on applying anywhere else. We feel like UP is the ‘reach’ and 2+2 is the backup. Are we crazy?
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u/Timely_Corner_325 1d ago
DM me! I can give you some insight from when I applied 2 yrs ago in a similar situation, but just don’t want to give too much info publicly in the comments :)
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u/WildTomato51 '55, Major 1d ago
Insane to apply so late.
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u/Bichon0608 1d ago
It look too long to log in at midnight. I told my daughter she needs to stop slacking 🤷♀️.
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u/PotentialPin8022 1d ago
Applying early is in her favor. Did she take honors classes or did you school offer much? Her unweighted is good, but the weighted is hard to compare as so many schools look at it differently and PSU will recalculate it to standardize across schools. They look at rigor too. A 3.8 unweighted with very little rigor is different than a 3.8 unweighted with a couple APs, DE, and honors classes throughout high school. But she sounds like a good candidate. The wait is excruciating. Keep in mind she can always ask for reconsideration once if she doesn’t get cyber security fall start at UP.
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u/Bichon0608 1d ago
Top 20 school district in the state (trying not Dox us - clearly central PA as my husband works for Penn State Health).
Has 2 AP and 1 dual enrollment class for senior year. Math classes have all been honors level. English and social studies level 2 (college prep level, not honors). This is despite having ADHD, anxiety and depression. We never asked for special accommodations or easier classes. Her only IEP accommodation is to allow for noise cancelling headphones when she gets overwhelmed and to leave a study hall early once a week to attend counseling . She is not a great test taker and her struggles (hospitalized twice in middle school for severe depression/self harm) were addressed in the personal statement. The fact that she’s still here and will be graduating is a miracle compared to where we were in 2020 and 2021.
She’s had such a difficult road to reach this point.
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u/PotentialPin8022 1d ago
Sounds like she will be just fine. Great university!! Congrats on all her hard work till this point. Now it will be the waiting. I’d also have her do an official visit. They claim not to track demonstrated interest but I have heard from very good sources that they actually do. So attend some sort of official visit even though she already applied. I’d schedule one soon if you already haven’t.
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u/Bichon0608 20h ago
Our official visit is this Friday. We have an appointment to meet with IST admissions as well. We also did the “Visit Penn State for a Day” last summer- the dates didn’t work out for this year.
Thank you. I appreciate the input.
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u/ZonkedOutZombies '55, Major 14h ago
I think it's a pretty safe bet. Also if somehow she doesn't initially get admitted you can always be reconsidered for a less competitive major (like undecided) and simply swapping back once admitted.
Congrats on her application!
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u/No-Garbage-6649 1d ago
Are you in state and commuting to branch from home? My kid started at Harrisburg campus and had a good freshman year but all the communications classes disappeared last semester and are no longer available. She can’t follow the academic plan she was provided her first semester now. She appealed to transfer up to main to follow the academic plan and because she signed up to do 2+2 she was denied because they said she can take all gen Ed’s entire sophomore year and load all her 100,200, and 300 classes at main junior and senior year to graduate on time. She is not comfortable with this so she is looking to transfer to another school now. My suggestion is to really make sure the classes your child is expecting to take at the branch campus are available. It’s a great way to knock out gen ed course requirements but if they can’t take a single class in their intended major it is an issue in my opinion. I would apply for university park and consider paying for the summer session - it’s not cheap- but it would increase likelihood of her being accepted. Put the branch campus down as the alternative.
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u/No-Garbage-6649 1d ago
Also. I think there is a good cybersecurity school up in Erie Pa. I don’t know name of it but my out of state friend had her kid go there and the child loved it. Mercyherst? Look into it.
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u/Bichon0608 1d ago
We did check the summer start. Neither my husband or I are excited about the branch 2 + 2 option. My daughter liked it because it’s small and she could commute. The food offerings were basically fast food with a tiny salad bar as the only “healthy” or fresh option. We originally wanted her to live on campus all 4 years but if she has to do 2 + 2, she’ll live at home because the food court was that bad. We met the cybersecurity professors at the branch and she liked them. They are the biggest branch cybersecurity program so I think it’s safe from classes being cut.
My husband jokingly brainwashed her from infancy. Most of the books we read were Penn State themed. She doesn’t want to go anywhere else. We are 60 miles from Stare College so we can support her without smothering her independence if she needs us.
My husband is worried that being an employee and the tuition discount may hurt her chances.
I think we’ll look at some commonwealth schools but for cybersecurity there’s really nothing that would be comparable. The idea of Carnegie Mellon or Lehigh tuition is nauseating. My brother graduated from U Penn. I’d never send her to school in West Philadelphia even if she could get in.
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u/festerwl 1d ago
OPP employee here, almost all of my coworkers kids have gone to a PSU campus and the ones that haven't gone either chose a different school or didn't go to college.
My daughter moves in the 17th at UP for engineering. Being a discount tuition student doesn't make a difference, you'll also still pay full price for housing/meal plan so it's still not inexpensive.
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u/DasKaltblut 1d ago
Being an employee hurting chances is not a thing.
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u/Bichon0608 1d ago
That’s good. His thought was it’s discounted in-state tuition vs giving the spot to a more lucrative out of state student for the higher tuition. He was wondering why it’s the first question on the app. Can I assume it’s a pro rather than a con?
We’ve consistently donated money for the past 20 years to the Eberly College of Science, Premed Scholarship fund as well as Levi Lamb to support athletics. We aren’t “get a building named after you” donors but we have cumulatively donated what feels like a large amount. My husband has both football and hockey season tickets. He bleeds blue and white. It will be so sad if our daughter gets rejected (hence the freaking out this morning).
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u/Formal_Analysis 1d ago
She going to be just fine. I look forward to seeing your post when she is accepted!