If you see students searching for buildings and trading phone numbers, do not assume they’re freshmen.
Every year, around 2,000 students apply to transfer to Penn, and approximately 175 enter the four undergraduate schools, according to the Office of Undergraduate Admissions. This year, 195 transfer applicants were admitted and 154 chose to enter the sophomore and junior classes. From universities and hometowns across the world, the transfers arrived in Philadelphia for a fresh start.
As College sophomore Lizzie Sivitz said after just two weeks here, “I already know I’m going to be sad to leave, something I’ve never felt about college before.”
Sivitz, who spent her freshman year at Middlebury College in Vermont, is happy to be living in an urban setting.
“I wanted to live somewhere with a lot of excitement,” Sivitz said. “I wanted the ability to buy food and socks, instead of having to order them on the internet.”
Along with the influence of several family members with Penn ties, Sivitz was influenced to apply to Penn because of the reputation of the gay community. At Middlebury, there was only a small contingent of openly gay students, no gay center and several homophobic incidences, according to Sivitz.
“I heard ‘faggot’ and ‘that’s so gay’ all the time,” Sivitz remembered. She also recalled a time when someone wrote “burn in hell dyke” on a lesbian’s dorm room door.
“The gay community here has already been very welcoming,” she said.
College sophomore Line Stensland is joining another community — Penn international students.
Stensland, who was born and raised in Norway, could only receive scholarship money from her country starting sophomore year. Stensland attended Kennesaw University last year because Georgia’s Rotary International Scholarship Program provided a full-ride scholarship.
She always planned to transfer to a prestigious school so the Norwegian government would provide her with more scholarship money.
“Since I’m attending one of the best schools in the country, they probably give me about $15,000 more a year than if I was going to a lesser college,” she explained.
While most sophomores no longer have to worry about making first impressions and meeting new people again, College sophomore Nellie Catzen faced the same issues during Penn’s New Student Orientation as she did during the beginning of her freshman year at Fordham University.
“I think it’s just as uncomfortable as being a freshman,” she said. “Walking up to people and saying ‘Hi, I’m Nellie, this is my number, let’s hang out’ is a big leap.”
However, Catzen emphasized that the transfer Peers Helping Incoming New Students have worked hard to make the process as easy as possible.
Tim Suzor, a sophomore transfer in the College, said that NSO “was really incredible.” At his previous college, the University of Virginia, orientation occurred during a couple of days in July. Having an entire week to acclimate to campus was a much better experience, according to Suzor.
Although he refers to the University of Virginia as a “cool environment” and a “beautiful campus,” Suzor was disappointed with the lack of classroom enthusiasm and undergraduate research. So far, Suzor is happy with his classes at Penn — especially the student participation in recitations. He has also spent some time surfing the Center for Undergraduate Research website.
“The only issue is that I just have three years here,” Suzor said. “I’m trying to get involved as quickly as I possibly can.”
As far as transferring credits, College senior Brady Lonergan — who transferred to Penn from Emory University last year — said that “unlike most schools, Penn makes you go through a lot of hoops to make your credits transfer.”
Of all the schools to which he applied to transfer, including other Ivy League universities, Penn was the only university that did not guarantee transfer of credits. The University does not tell transfers what credits count toward a Penn undergraduate degree until after matriculation, according to Lonergan.
He added, however, that the credit-transfer process was worth it for Penn’s strong sense of community and academics, as well as Philadelphia’s ethnic food.
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