Student with 1090 SAT score gets into University of Pennsylvania

[Yaowsers]

http://www.philly.com%2fmld%2fphilly...f11748736.htm/

Malik Smith heard the talk two years ago when he enrolled at Martin Luther King High in West Oak Lane: It was a large neighborhood high school, known more for violence and failure than educational promise.

Undaunted, he became student government president and school mascot, made the varsity tennis team, posted straight A's more than once, and took two college-level classes at the University of Pennsylvania.

The 17-year-old's efforts have paid off.

Big time.

Smith was accepted to two Ivy League colleges - Penn and Cornell University - a rare accomplishment for a neighborhood high school kid in the city.

Of the Philadelphia School District's 11,800 seniors, 107 this year so far have been accepted to the elite eight: Penn, Cornell, Brown, Harvard, Yale, Columbia, Dartmouth and Princeton, district and school officials say.

Only 16 are from neighborhood high schools, 12 of them from schools in Northeast Philadelphia, where achievement has been generally higher. The others hail from academic magnet schools.

The experience of Smith and the rest of these students shows that some teenagers can find ways to thrive even in schools where more than half their peers perform below basic skill levels on tests.

"If I can do it, anybody can do it," said Smith, a Germantown resident who plans to major in international relations and marketing at Penn. "It's just a matter of taking advantage of every single opportunity you can, and looking for them where you don't expect to find them."

Other high-achieving students had similar philosophies.

Tuongvi Pham, 18, a senior at Lamberton School in Overbrook Park, knew little English when her family moved here from Vietnam four years ago. But she said she took advantage of "great teachers" by asking questions before and after class.

"Because I am an immigrant, I value education in America," explained Pham, who will study biochemistry/premed at Penn. "In my country, education is hard to get."

At Furness High in South Philadelphia, Mark Wilson, 17, benefited from the Philadelphia Futures program, which pairs students with mentors and helps them go to college. It opened the door to Dartmouth, where he will major in sociology.

"I knew I wanted to go to school and do good things, do more than my parents were able to do in their lifetime," said Wilson, whose mother is a waitress and whose father manages a small warehouse.

Such standout performances catch the eye of Ivy League admissions officers.

"We're always looking for those diamonds in the rough at the neighborhood high schools," said Kirk Daulerio, regional director of admissions for the University of Pennsylvania.

To ease the transition, Daulerio said, Penn offers tutoring and special advising for students who come from high schools with fewer advantages.

Smith, who received an almost-fully funded financial-aid package to Penn, initially was worried that his SAT score - 1090 out of 1600 - would keep him out of Penn. (Smith took the test before March, when the top score became 2400.) The average SAT score for the 2004-05 freshman class was 1431.

Daulerio said Penn liked Smith's classroom record and his work in two Penn courses that he took this year. He also cited teacher recommendations and Smith's ability to thrive even though he attended three high schools in two states over the last four years. He moved here from North Carolina three years ago, attended a charter school his sophomore year, then transferred to King.

Smith earlier this year wowed a Penn audience at a multicultural orientation program for freshmen. He won the talent competition by playing on the piano and singing a song he wrote called "Dreams Come True."

"I thought the song was fitting to the occasion," he said.

From the moment he visited Penn's campus last school year for a field trip, Smith knew he wanted to go there.

He got a summer job on campus in food service. He found information on the university's Web site on how promising Philadelphia district high school students could take classes for free, and enrolled in cultural anthropology and sociology this year. He loved having students from other states and countries in his classes.

Smith said he got a good education at King, now being run by Foundations Inc., a New Jersey-based nonprofit. His teachers supported and challenged him, and one, Muhammad Abdul-Aleem, inspired him with stories of how his daughter graduated from Yale University and Harvard Law.

"From the minute I met Malik, I told him he had to strive big," Abdul-Aleem said. "Even though he didn't get support from some of the other students here, it didn't matter. I told him the leader is the one who has the most knives in his back."

Earlier this year, a classmate who thought Smith had tattled on him punched him in the face, breaking a tooth. Smith said he was upset that some students were pulling pranks on a teacher, including sticking a contraceptive in his coffee mug and stealing his cell phone. He didn't tell on the students, he said, but confessed his concerns to another classmate.

"The reason why it struck a chord with me is my mom's a teacher," he said. "I wouldn't want people doing that to her at her school."

Smith's mother, Linda Lassiter, who teaches at Simon Gratz High in Philadelphia, said she had strived to teach him to keep a positive attitude and believe anything was possible.

She continues to be impressed by how well he has lived up to that lesson: "I couldn't have asked for a better child."


Affirmative action ...

[eliteblaze]

that's pretty fked up. I was rejected in the 1300s quite handily

but I did only apply at Wharton :p

[tharsan]

This doesn't seem particulary special to me - if the teachers are competent and reliable, and all the other kids in your school are busy doing weed and each other, leaving more time for you to nag your teacher, then i think a smart person will do just fine on their SAT. I don't think this is exceptional or news-worthy =P

[Roninvancouver]

he became student government president and school mascot...

he became the "mascot"??

isn't usually some guy in a cougar suit? or an animal?

[derevaun]

affirmative action... it happens... oh america. even with a 1600, i was waitlisted at a top ivy (hah, guess which one), but got in a couple of weeks after the waitlist notice with a ton of pressure. one of my residents (i was a prefect for a freshman dorm, a year later) was a guy with an 1150 SAT, but he was one of the country's best squash players. and he was also latino, hah. that might have helped him. it's all about diversity, rather than scores... unfortunately.

penn will chew him apart, though, if he doesnt work hard. the most brilliant people i know at my school and other ivies is that success is directly proportional to the amount of hard work you put in AT college... natural intelligence only takes people so far.

[Hulkster]

What pure bs. I'm a minority also. Why can't I get special treatment?

[CSR]

Good for the kid..

[Hulkster]

Good for the kid..

But it's not good for the many applicants more qualified and more deserving than this stroker simply because he's black.

[Nicotine]

Bullcrap.


Y'all can take your whiney cry-baby reverse-rascism bullcrap and shove it up your arses.


By the way, nowhere in the article does it mention he is black. Dumbass.

[purple_rabbit]

Bullcrap.


Y'all can take your whiney cry-baby reverse-rascism bullcrap and shove it up your arses.


By the way, nowhere in the article does it mention he is black. Dumbass.

LOL, good point. I guess everyone assumed that when the article started like this:

http://www.philly.com%2fmld%2fphilly...f11748736.htm/

Malik Smith heard the talk two years ago when he enrolled at Martin Luther King High in West Oak Lane: It was a large neighborhood high school, known more for violence and failure than educational promise.

[discumax]

linky no worky

[ForthEarlingas]

Bullcrap.
Y'all can take your whiney cry-baby reverse-rascism bullcrap and shove it up your arses.

By the way, nowhere in the article does it mention he is black. Dumbass.

I believe the term is african american sooo .......
anyways he looks more of a mix of 75% african and 25% caucasian.

http://www.macon.com/mld/inquirer/ne...a/11748736.htm

(this link should work as its not from a pay site)

[RastaManMax]

Mad props to that guy. I'm sure with heart, anybody can succeed at those schools, it just takes hard work and determination.

I hope to make it into one of those schools for MBA (if that is the path i choose in the end), after i'm done here at UW when i hopefully have my BAFM, Math minor, Macc and CA. I wonder if i stand a chance at Harvard, Wharton, Chicago, etc. My grades are definately not that high anymore because of the courses i'm taking and the competition