University of Pennsylvania Class of 2025 Early Decision Admissions Statistics

Last year, every single one of Ivy Coach’s students who completed applications with us and applied Early Decision earned admission. This included a perfect sweep of the eight Ivy League schools, Stanford, MIT, Duke, Northwestern, and more. This year, unlike last year, we cannot report a streak of perfection across all highly selective universities — although we are perfect at multiple Ivy League schools (also of note, Princeton University did not have an Early round this year due to the pandemic). And where did our streak snap this year? It snapped at the University of Pennsylvania. While we congratulate our Ivy Coach students who earned admission to UPenn this Early cycle, we did have a deferral. So what happened this Early Decision cycle at UPenn? Well, consistent with the trend at the vast majority of our nation’s elite universities, applications skyrocketed. In fact, applications soared by 23% from this time last year, which isn’t quite as high as Dartmouth College’s 29% jump but it’s pretty significant nonetheless.

ED Applications to UPenn Surge 23%, Admit Rate Drops 4.71%

In all, 7,962 students made binding commitments this Early Decision cycle to UPenn. Of these applicants, 1,194 earned admission. This marks an admit rate of 14.99%. And how do these figures stack up against figures from last year’s Early Decision round? Wonder no more! Last year, 6,453 students applied Early Decision to UPenn’s Class of 2024. Of these students, 1,269 earned admission. And the Early Decision admit rate stood at 19.7%. So, by our arithmetic, UPenn’s acceptance rate plunged 4.71%. Wow oh wow is right. Yes, we’ve never seen a year like it in elite college admissions. But, hey, has anyone seen a year like 2020?

A Breakdown of UPenn’s Early Decision Admits to the Class of 2025

And just who earned admission to UPenn’s Class of 2025 this Early Decision cycle? As UPenn’s admissions office reports, “Nationally, 43 states, Washington, D.C., Puerto Rico and Guam are represented in the class with the highest concentration of admitted students from Pennsylvania (198), New York (152), California (122), New Jersey (113) and Florida (48). Fifty-six students reside in the city of Philadelphia. 13% of the class are international students based on their citizenship, hailing from 56 countries from Australia to Zimbabwe. 54% percent of the admitted students are female, 50% of the admitted students are U.S. Citizens/Permanent Residents self-identifying as a person of color, and 12% are first-generation college students.  22% of the admitted students had a parent or grandparent attend Penn in prior generations. 13% are estimated to qualify for a Federal Pell Grant.”

A Salute to UPenn’s Outgoing Dean of Admissions

This marks the final cycle for outgoing longtime UPenn Dean of Admissions Eric Furda. Dean Furda has, throughout his tenure, been one of the most forthright deans of admission at any university in this nation. In a sea of admissions czars who tell people what they want to hear, sugarcoating the truth, Dean Furda is a longtime hero of Ivy Coach’s college admissions blog for his tell it like it is, no nonsense approach to admissions and we hereby salute him for all that he has done for UPenn and for the greater college admissions community. Thank you, Dean Furda! Thank you, thank you, and thank you. We wish you well. In any case, congratulations to our students at Ivy Coach who earned admission to UPenn this Early Decision cycle.