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Waitlisting seemingly overqualified applicants is a factor at some colleges, but being able to pinpoint which ones in particular participate in that ploy is very difficult. One school that has been relatively famous for this in recent years is Washington University in Saint Louis (WUSTL). WUSTL likes to see a sincere expression of interest from its applicants.
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<p>Way to be sketchy, WashU...First you buy prestige and recognition and now you employ under handed tactics to improve yield, rankings etc. Well done!</p>
<p>IM SPREADING THIS TO EVERY QUALIFIED JUNIOR IN MY SCHOOL (we have a small scholl so I'll be able to target all of them). Then I'm gonna sent my fiesty counselor to go "yell" at WASHU, then I'll be a little more satisfied that I have sabotaged their reps just a little bit LOL...</p>
<p>Writing taht malicious note actually makes me feel a little better</p>
<p>they just want to be sure the people they accept will come, thats why they accept so many EDs compared to other schools. no one likes being rejected, not even colleges :-P</p>
<p>wow. that's such pretty crazy tactics, wash u. i am getting really tired and disillusioned by these silly college admissions games though. whatever happened to the pre-affirmative action days when ppl got into schools b/c they deserved to get in and ppl didn't get in b/c they truly didn't deserve to get in?</p>
<p>They are just doing what is in their beest interest...It's kinda hard to go againts the centuries worth of prestige that other competitive universities have. Wash U's tactics have nothing to do with affirmative action...only about 8% of each class even qualifies under affirmative action statuates. If alot of people get waitlisted its due to Wash U and not affirmative action.</p>
<p>Ok, well I wasn't. Just because it "sounded like it" doesn't mean that I meant it. I'm against affirmative action but I have not encountered any affirmative action problems/criticisms at WashU. Basically, you're wrong.</p>
<p>sure, whatever you say...no need for hostility. It was not my intention to assert that you said anything other than what you wrote in your statement. Thanks.</p>
<p>I think we just have to admit that maybe, just maybe, we got played.</p>
<p>Case in point...</p>
<p>My GC, who's been doing this for thirty years, told me I was a "shoo-in" for Wash U, compared to other kids the school had sent. I had a good SAT, top 5%, strong ECs, you know. I'm thinking I can kind of coast. It's my third choice school. I visit casually, read my mailings and don't think to interview (mostly because I can only go to St. Louis on the weekends which have been full recently). </p>
<p>My other two schools are Princeton and Dartmouth. I get deferred early from Dartmouth, but send in grade updates, deferral love letter, the works. I interview with both schools (loved my Princeton interview, even though he was an engineer and I'm into politics). Really pour on the love because, honestly, they're the ones I really love. </p>
<p>I think what happened, too many of us took for granted that we'd get in, and paid a little too much attention to higher-level schools (Ivy, Duke, Stanford, MIT, etc.). We thought we could shag Wash U on the weekends and go home to Harvard and Yale's apple pie. And I think Wash U just called our bluff. Ridiculous, but weirdly admirable.</p>
<p>Wash U, I commend you. And if you come a-calling in May, you can take your acceptance letter and cram it.</p>
<p>You of course know that Top 20 schools have almost no reason to wait-list overqualified applicants, right? That applies mostly to state schools. If a school has an average SAT score over 1400 and is interested in boosting it's rankings (which WashU most certainly is), then it would be almost impossible to find "overqualified" applicants to wait-list. They may wait-list well qualified applicants who don't appear very interested, but that's another ball game. These people get wait-listed because, when they get accepted, they don't enroll, lowering the college's %enrolled and thus it's ranking. PS, ALL PRESTIGIOUS SCHOOLS DO THIS. There is no point in sacrificing a place on the rankings, new applicants, and public interest in order to admit academic stars who won't attend.</p>
<p>As a National Merit Finalist with a 1540 and sterling academic record, I could have easily gotten into an ivy, but I showed interest in Washington (actually visited, interviwed) and I got accepted. My boyfriend, with a 1560, was also accepted. We both go to a top 150 public school. Basically, your argument is crap and whoever posted that in the first place wasn't very well-informed.</p>
<p>Well done hrto...i don't understand how ppl can spend so much time bashing a school that has 21,000 applicants for +-1350 spots...of course some good candidates will be rejected. It basically shows that the school quality is improving. Other schools also reject 1500+ applicants as well.</p>
<p>Ditto! I am also getting irritated because people are saying that waitlisted folks are soo "overqualified" and better than accepted ones.</p>
<p>Accepted folks deserve it because they absolutely love the school and want to go there. Waitlisted folks.. well.. maybe don't deserve to be waitlisted, but since they have other schools in mind, they WILL end up somewhere great too. At the end of the day, we all will be where we will be the most happy, that's all it matters. :) :) Peace out.</p>