Penn Previews is upon us. Hill residents are frantically cleaning their rooms — hoards of “specs” (and their skillfully discerning parents) will descend on our campus this weekend and into next week., April 1st marks the official date for college admissions decisions. Students have one month to make their final choice. All applicants have one benchmark and one final question to answer, making up one more class of students united by the hyper-competitive college admissions process.
But Penn’s seniors are different than the high school specs in many respects — more experience, less disposable cash, and more spare time (which may or may not be just procrastination). But the differences go deeper– Penn seniors can enjoy their last weeks together in a culture relatively free from competition. Whereas high school seniors are competing over the same universities, Penn seniors pursue post-college plans at wildly different times and along widely different paths.
Sure, senior life is not free from stress– there are elite schools, elite companies, elite fellowships, and even elite cities for new grads. But it’s not like picking an undergraduate school. Comparatively, graduate schools are defined by individual departments, not by a ranking or the likelihood their basketball team makes it to the Big Dance.
As some of the high school students that roll through here in the next few weeks cram onto College Green for Convocation next fall, Penn’s seniors will begin fanning out across the country, and across the world. I’m excited that these too-close-for-comfort seminars, grueling upper-level courses, and professors who never quit pushing have developed my unique, specialized career interest. This culture of diverse pursuits affords an egalitarian sprint to the finish, where our own personal finish lines have little impact on friends running next to us.
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