<p>As many of you know, I applied ED to Columbia last year and was deferred. Columbia remained my top choice and I was subsequently accepted in April. Quite a number of you have expressed desire to know what I did in the interim that helped me get accepted. Hence I will detail my experience from last year.</p>
<p>At the time of my Early Decision application, my stats were as follow:
SAT I: 1580 (800v/780m)
SAT II: 740/740/740
GPA: 4.81 Weighted
Rank: 8/395</p>
<p>I assumed that the reasons for my deferral are not academic, and therefore I needed to focus on my essay/EC/recs. </p>
<p>This is a timeline of what I did:</p>
<p>Late December: sent a letter to Columbia admissions stating my continued desire to attend Columbia. I mentioned a few more of my motivations for wanting to attend, and how I feel a Columbia education would benefit me.</p>
<p>Mid February: I wrote a new 500 word essay to replace my ED essay. Along with the essay, I also sent in copies of a few short articles that I wrote for my school newspaper (I was at that time a prospective English/history major).</p>
<p>Late February: a alumnus of Teachers College, who is a friend of mine and has known me since childhood, wrote a recommendation on my behalf.</p>
<p>Early March: I emailed my regional admissions officer with information on new elected positions, and an update on my AIME qualifier.</p>
<p>It is extremely important to keep up your senior year grades. No matter how strong your academics were at the time of ED decisions, any drop in performance will be looked up with the utmost of negativity. My mid-year report showed that my gpa rose from 4.81 to 4.89 and my class rank climbed 2 spots to 6/395. </p>
<p>Please keep in mind that each of you were deferred for different reasons, during the few months before April, you must seek to prove that your perceived weakness (whatever it may be) during ED is being rectified. </p>
<p>Good luck.</p>