The changing face of the Mayor's Scholarship

When Collegefreshman Lenny DeMalto finally got his acceptance letter to Penn, the flurry of applications was not quite over.

DeMalto was applying for a Mayor's Scholarship, a special financial aid program for Penn undergraduates from Philadelphia. The program honors the best incoming freshmen from the city with grants for Penn tuition.

"It was a little bit stressful because I just finished all these other applications," he said. But after receiving the award, "it was so exciting ... to be recognized as one of the top scholars in Philadelphia."

DeMalto belongs to a select group. Only about 40 to 50 freshmen are selected to be Mayor's Scholars every year. A committee appointed by the mayor of Philadelphia chooses the recipients based on their academic records and a short application essay.

"I was so honored to be thought of that way by the University and the city," DeMalto said.

But it was not so long ago that the Mayor's Scholarships were an embarrassment to the University and threatened its relationship with the city of Philadelphia.

Commitment to Education

The Mayor's Scholarship program was created in 1882, when the University bartered with the city government to acquire the land now occupied by the Lower Quadrangle and buildings in the Hospital of the University of Pennsylvania complex.

In exchange for the land, Penn promised to indefinitely fund the tuition of 50 Philadelphia public high school graduates for all four years of their education. The grants became known as "Board of Education Scholarships."

A committee appointed by the city's Board of Education chose the recipients each year, and Penn paid their tuition.

Seventy-five more permanent scholarships for the city's Penn-bound were added in 1910 through an additional deal for the land now occupied by the Penn Tower and the University Museum. Recipients became known as "Mayor's Scholars."

However, all the scholarships changed in the 1960s when the University -- along with its Ivy League counterparts -- changed its financial aid system to grant money based on need.

In 1977, all the grants were finally consolidated as Mayor's Scholarships. When the University wanted to mortgage the land it had acquired from the city, Frank Rizzo -- Philadelphia's mayor at the time -- demanded that the mayor personally appoint the committee that chooses the recipients.

Penn got its mortgage, and the Mayor's Scholarships as they are today, 125 in all, were born. However, in 1991, things got complicated for both the city and the University.

Different Interpretations

The Public Interest Law Center of Philadelphia -- a lobbying group that advocates Philadelphia issues -- sued the University on behalf of 11 Philadelphia public school students and 12 local organizations. The suit claimed that language in the city ordinance that called for the scholarships actually obligated Penn to provide 125 scholarships to each incoming class, not 125 at any one time.

"It would mean that the need-blind [admissions] policy would go out the door," said Sheldon Hackney, the University president at the time. "We would be less of a national university. We're better off if Penn is able to attract students from all over the country."

Were the University obligated to provide 500 Mayor's Scholarships, approximately 20 percent of the $70 million institutional financial aid budget would go to Philadelphia students.

The suit, however, said Penn ignored qualified inner-city students.

"As Penn was trying to raise its academic profile, it had the strange belief that it needed to turn its back on Philadelphia," said Michael Churchill, a lawyer for PILCOP who worked on the case. "I never believed that doing what was right by Philadelphia was incompatible with [Penn's] desire to upgrade its academic status."

Penn has "systematically acted to reduce the number of students at the university from schools in Philadelphia, including particularly its public schools virtually to the vanishing point, while dramatically increasing the number of students from elsewhere in the nation," the suit read.

According to a 1994 Philadelphia Inquirer article, the percentage of incoming freshmen from Philadelphia had declined from about 15 percent in the 1960s to approximately 2 percent in the early 1990s.

Meanwhile, Penn officials maintained that the University only owed 125 Mayor's Scholarships, not 500.

Hackney said the city had considered supporting PILCOP in the suit and that some City Council members were concerned that the University appeared to be cheating local students.

But then-Mayor Wilson Goode agreed that the University was only legally bound to fund 125 scholars at once.

"Having the city on our side clearly helped," Hackney said. "It also undercut PILCOP's rationale that we're cheating the public."

While the suit was eventually thrown out, a slew of negative publicity for Penn followed, criticizing the University for bad relations with the local community.

"It was immensely important to the entire Philadelphia community that its students can have access to a high-quality university like the University of Pennsylvania," Churchill said.

Hackney said that the University's policy was in compliance with the city ordinance, however.

"We simply had to do what was right," Hackney said.

Black Eye to Recruiting Tool

In the wake of the bad press of the early 1990s, Penn has worked hard to attract Philadelphia students through the Mayor's Scholarship program.

"We had a serious public relations problem," Hackney said. "We needed to do something with the Mayor's Scholarships that would indicate that we were responding to the needs of the city."

The University hired Bruce Crawley -- a politically-connected public relations consultant -- to help improve its image.

Penn would take an "approach to the Mayor's Scholarships that would be new and different but would not depart fundamentally from the original principle," Hackney said. "It wouldn't bankrupt us, either."

The Mayor's Scholarships themselves are now integral to Penn's aggressive campaign to improve its connection to the local community. Providing financial aid specifically for residents is one way the University rewards the city.

"Penn rises and falls on the fate of Philadelphia," Hackney said. "It is in our long-term interest to see Philadelphia thrive."

Penn's ascent in the U.S. News and World Report rankings over the last 10 years has also paralleled the skyrocketing of housing prices and decrease in crime over the same period in West Philadelphia.

Kirk Daulerio, Penn's regional undergraduate admissions director for Philadelphia County, said he discusses the Mayor's Scholarships at every information session at Philadelphia high schools. All Philadelphia applicants are mailed a copy of the scholarship brochure, which stresses Penn's affordability.

"You see Penn really reaching out to a lot of students in the city who wouldn't ordinarily consider Penn," Daulerio said. "We want more Philadelphians on campus."

Many Mayor's Scholars choose Penn specifically because of the scholarship.

"The Mayor's Scholarship provided almost full tuition, so I decided to come here," said Engineering freshman Nicholas Dang, another Mayor's Scholar. "That was a huge deciding factor."

Daulerio added that being from Philadelphia even affects admissions decisions.

"If you are from Philadelphia, we might give you an extra look," Daulerio said. Mayor's Scholarships are "a specific financial commitment to the city."

Nick Fiolo -- a College freshman and Mayor's Scholar -- said Daulerio spent several hours visiting his high school despite the fact that only a handful of his classmates applied.

"To take the time to come to the school, just to come down and speak with us personally ... shows that they're committed" to Philadelphia students, Fiolo said.

Local high schools are some of Penn's largest feeder schools. James Widerman, a college counselor at the J.R. Masterman School -- a public magnet high school in Philadelphia -- said Penn was one of the most popular destinations for Masterman graduates. The attractive financial aid package available through the Mayor's Scholarship program convinced several of his students to choose Penn over other universities.

"The only thing that would improve [Masterman's relationship with Penn] is if we had one of these conveyor belts on the sidewalk to move our students from the one school to the other," Widerman said. "The kids here don't have any idea of how spoiled they are by Penn."

And Penn has worked hard to make this commitment clear to the Philadelphia community.

Since the lawsuit, Mayor's Scholars have been honored at press conferences with city and University officials.

"As a returning Philadelphian, Penn alumna and graduate of a Philadelphia high school, I understand fully how important these scholarships are," then-University President Judith Rodin said in 1994. That year's Mayor's Scholars were given a reception at City Hall with Rodin and Mayor Ed Rendell.

"Having a great university such as Penn accessible to local students is critical to the well-being of the city and the intellectual life at the University," Rodin added.

A Better Aid Package

Today, the University offers more than $4 million in aid to Mayor's Scholars.

Scholarships are available only to Philadelphia residents who have already been accepted to Penn. Mayor's Scholars must attend school in the city or in one of its contiguous counties. If they need financial aid, they automatically become eligible for Mayor's Scholarships.

"You can't recruit the class you want if they can't pay for it," Director of Student Financial Aid Bill Schilling said.

Since all aid at Penn is need-based, the money for 125 full-tuition scholarships is divided among all Mayor's Scholars according to their families' calculated ability to pay. There were 179 Mayor's Scholars enrolled at Penn in the 2003-2004 academic year.

The Mayor's Scholarship Committee -- whose members are appointed by the Mayor -- chooses recipients based on a short application that asks students why they should receive the funds. Approximately 40 percent of students who apply for Mayor's Scholarships receive them each year.

"I put time and effort into" the application, said Wharton sophomore and Mayor's Scholar Angela Bianco, "but it wasn't anything super-strenuous."

Mayor's Scholarships are unlike many other forms of financial aid in that students do not have to pay back any loans after college.

Most regular financial aid recipients receive a combination of grant money, student loans and work-study options.

"It's a more attractive aid package than they would ordinarily receive," Schilling said.

While PILCOP's suit failed to generate more Mayor's Scholarships, Churchill sees the no-loan feature as one of its victories.

"I think it was very important and one of the benefits that came out of the lawsuit," Churchill said.

Fiolo said the scholarship was especially appealing because he is considering graduate school after Penn.

"To not have to pay any student loans after college, it's great because if you want to go on to graduate school, I wouldn't have the burden of having to pay it back," Fiolo said.

Mayor's Scholarships also help those who already love Philadelphia to spend another four years here.

"I decided to stay in the city because there was an Ivy League school half an hour away from where I live," DeMalto said. "I've always loved the city environment."

Churchill agreed that funding the education of Philadelphia natives was vital to the region's success.

"It's important that people who already are here have a chance to get that education and stay here with it," Churchill said.

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