My daughter got was waitlisted at UC Davis and Occidental. She has lots of other choices, so we’re happy. But I did have a question: If they waitlist you, does that mean there will be no merit aid package offered? Thanks for your insights.
I would not count on merit aid as it is most likely not be coming. Hope this does not sound mean but if D was being considered for a merit award, it would be highly unlikely that the school would have waitlisted her.
Not likely.
My D was also waitlisted at Oxy. My bet is that if admitted and offered aid, it would still ‘cover 100% of need’, but the percentages of how that would be accomplished might include less merit. Just a guess though.
Yeah, that was kind of my best guess too. Thanks! And best of luck to your daughter!
I would search for those particular colleges to see if that is the case, but there are some colleges (e.g., Case Western) that will give you merit even if you are on the waitlist.
My D was waitlisted, then admitted, to a school that meets 100% full financial need. When she was offered admission, she was offered 100% full need. School did not offer merit, though.
I agree that it depends on each school’s policy.
It depends on school. If a school has a large endowment then they most likely would not take ability to pay into consideration when it comes to WL, but many schools have limited amount of money for FA, therefore when it comes to WL they will more likely take students off who do not need FA. This is a fairly known fact. Few years back, some schools even came right out to state that.
WL is a different process than regular admission. It is much faster and in most cases students will have very short time frame to make a decision. My kid got off 2 WL a while back. She had few days to decide. Prior to their decisions, I wrote an email to the schools to let them know that we wouldn’t be applying for FA.
A few years ago my son was waitlisted at UCLA and eventually got in. His financial aid package was similar to the financial aid packets from the other UC’s he was accepted to. So for UC Davis I would imagine his financial aid package would be similar to other UC’s (did she get into any other UC’s?).
Did you know you can look at the Common Data Set to find out the odds of getting off a waitlist in the first place?
For Occidental, the numbers for 2015/2016 are:
Number of qualified applicants offered a place on waiting list 705
Number accepting a place on the waiting list 359
Number of wait-listed students admitted 26
Is your waiting list ranked? no
For UC Davis 2014 (2015 report in progress) the numbers are:
Number of qualified applicants offered a place on waiting list 6,352
Number accepting a place on the waiting list 2,177
Number of wait-listed students admitted 12
Is your waiting list ranked? yes
Those numbers do not look too encouraging. I am surprised by the Davis numbers and wonder if there is an error there.
(My son did get off a waitlist, but the numbers at his school were more encouraging.)
The problem with the WL info is it is very different from year to year. One year a school may admit too many students and another year not enough. It is also affected by other higher tier schools. If a higher ranking school should admit more students off their WL then there could be domino effect on other schools. It is hard to predict based on what’s shown on the Common Data Set.
Yes, you are right oldfort. My other son is waitlisted at a school where they have taken between 0 and 90% off the waitlist in recent years (and that 90% can be like 200 students!) So it is important to look at historical numbers. But some schools take very few year after year (one of my son’s other hopefuls he hasn’t heard from).
LBowie – I’m struggling figuring out the Common Data Set. Would you be so kind to pull the data for UC Irvine and Pitzer (we are in waitlist hell, clearly). Thanks!
she got into Riverside and Santa Cruz, waitlisted at Irvine and Davis
To find the Common Data Set, search for the name of the college or university and the words Common Data Set. They usually list several years. The information on the acceptance numbers and percentages and waiting lists is in section C.
http://www.oir.uci.edu/campus-data.html
http://pitweb.pitzer.edu/institutional-research/
(UC Santa Cruz is great – used to work there!)
Both my kids were offered some merit when accepted off the waitlist. Perhaps less than they would have been otherwise. Probably depend show much merit the school gives in general and how much of it is left at that point in the cycle.