<p>Thank you so much, ChoatieMom 
Wow have I missed how supportive everyone on CC is. :D</p>
<p>Kinda late, but congrats, aaralyn⊠even though you said youâre going to Lawrenceville. Best of luck wherever you end up! :)</p>
<p>Haha thank you so much I will be attending Lawrenceville but it feels nice to feel wanted by another school. Donât worry, everyone whoâs still on the waitlist, I will be letting Milton know of my decision ASAP to open up that spot :D</p>
<p>Bump!!! New waitlistees (like myself) need this thread for motivation!!! Good luck everyone!!!</p>
<p>I hope I get a happy story to come back here and share sometime between April 10th and August 31st!</p>
<p>I do, too! :)</p>
<p>We all do. :)</p>
<p>Every year there are kids off the wait listâat almost all schools-- heck, even Harvard took nearly 100 kids of its wait list and it has a 78% yield. </p>
<p>It is a weird danceâplease be in love with the school(s) that have accepted you, yet work like a bandit to try to get off the wait list. </p>
<p>So I suppose the way to make it work in oneâs head is no matter what, if you have been accepted somewhere you like, you already have good newsâyou maybe will have some more good news later.</p>
<p>I went back to April 10th of last year to maybe gauge if any students had gotten off the WL around the cut-off date for people who need to let a school know theyâre attending. I donât know if thatâs just St. Paulâs, but no one posted about getting off the WLâŠOr maybe they just didnât want to brag?? Any thoughts on this?</p>
<p>I only remember one or two people posting that they got off the waitlist last year. A friend of ours got off Miltonâs waitlist the year prior to that (some FA). Four years ago a neighbor got of SPSâs waitlist (no financial aid). Our C has a friend that was taken off Choateâs Waitlist last summer (no FA and she declined the offer sticking with the school that loved her first). So getting off the waitlist does happen but itâs not entirely commonâŠ</p>
<p>I think there might be some misconceptions about how waitlists work. Iâm reposting a post I made on another thread - hopefully, this will be helpful information:</p>
<p>
</p>
<p>Some students will know right away upon receiving their decisions which school they want to attend, and quickly notify schools that theyâre declining their offer. Many other students wait until after revisits to decide. And some students wait until the very last minute, and donât let schools know until the deadline of April 10. Usually, if a school is going to go to their waitlist, it will be after April 10.</p>
<p>A friend of mine in college got in to Dartmouth Medical School off the wait list a few weeks before school was to start. She had been wait listed or rejected from all 10-12 schools to which she applied, but let the wait list schools know she was still interested, and kept in touch with admissions offices all summer, even as she made other plans. Granted, this was a couple of decades ago, but Dartmouth Med was highly competitive even way back then. It does happen.</p>
<p>If you are an athlete or in the arts contact a coach or instructor. Iâve seen a kid put on WL because of miscommunication. They didnât believe they were high on kids list so they WL them. Once they found out school was #1 choice kid admitted with aid. </p>
<p>A personal reference was to my DS. He was WL to school where he was contacted by coach. The school wasnât in his top choices so he was WL. Monday after decisions were sent out I was called by the coach to find out if there was anything he could do to change help get him there. Schools that lose a lot of kids to HADES schools often go to WL like Loomis. If you donât have a specific hook or if they donât have an ethnic need; chances are slim.</p>
<p>@mountainhiker:</p>
<p>I agree with your example and that schools are very good at estimating their yield (taking into account factors like legacy and sibling applicants who are more likely to come, specifically recruitied athletes who coaches have created relationships with, etc.). So, they are not going to be off by much. But if a school is off on its estimate of yield, it would much rather be short a few students than be overenrolled by a few students, particularly with boarding students. Why? Because they need a bed to put them in every night! A school would also rather not be overenrolled with its day students, but an extra few day students isnât as big a problem, of course. Therefore, if (as in your example) as school expects an 85% yield (which is a very, very high yield - even Harvard doesnât get that!) and they need 50 boys, they probably wonât admit 59 boys which would lead to an expected 50 boy yield. By admitting 59 boys there would be about a 50% chance that theyâd be overenrolled. My gut hunch (and of course they have better stats available to help with their decisions) is that theyâd admit something like something like 56 boys. So, if everything goes according to expectation, theyâd need to take 3 boys off the wait list. If their yield is a little higher than normal (or someone calls their close friend the chairman of the board of trustees and âforcesâ the school to take a kid off the wait list), they wonât go to the wait list. And if the yield is a little low, theyâll take 5 or 6 boys.</p>
<p>My point is simply that it makes sense for the school to aim a little low so that they are less likely to be overenrolled. But they donât want to aim too low, because then they might lose some students that they really wanted to other schools which admitted them directly. Itâs a tough balancing act. They play the game as well as they can and in some years it works well and in other years theyâll be a bit off.</p>
<p>All of this advice is incredibly helpful, but also makes me a bit wary. I think Iâve read the same scenario 5 or 6 times, but Iâm not sure if it would apply to everyone. The scenario Iâm referring to is the act of continuously updating the school(s) of your achievements, grades, etc., calling to ask if there is anything they can do to bump up their chances and so on. But does this really work? Iâm not desperate, but Iâm 100& in love with boarding school and willing to do 60% because I donât want to tamper my chances. I also have an ethnic hook and play a sport, so should I appeal to the coach?</p>
<p>I have been waitlisted at Deerfield, Andover, and Choate. I am an athlete but not varsity level in my sport. Would it still help to contact athletic coaches to let them know that I exist and I participate in this sport?</p>
<p>bsroxmysox, I donât think you need to call them often and it doesnât need to take much time. I would just write a letter now, explaining that you are still very interested in attending, then send them your grades for the next quarter, and notify them of any awards and notable accomplishments as they come up. If nothing other than your next report card comes up, call again in a month just to remind them youâre still interested. You never know, so why not try.</p>
<p>Not sure about appealing to the coach, since they presumably already know about your sport, unless you have some new accomplishment in your sport to reportâŠthen def. notify them. In the meantime, make peace with your default, whatever that is - local public school or private day school or whatever.</p>
<p>But please do whatever you think is best for yourself. If itâs gonna make you crazy to hope to come off the waitlist, then forget about it and focus on the things you love to do.</p>
<p>I was waitlisted at 9 schools:
Deerfeild
Andover
Groton
Governorâs Academy
Lawrenceville
Loomis Chaffee
Mercersburg
Northfeild Mount Hermon
Avon Old Farms</p>
<p>Do you think I have a good chance of getting off one of them? Iâm a full financial aid student and Iâm applying for 10th grade. But, I thought about notifying the schools and telling them that Iâm willing to accept a 9th-grade-repeat position. Do you think this would increase my chances?</p>
<p>For what it is worth, I know of at least two CC families who were offered full FA after being waitlisted, one got the call in the summer. Itâs rare, but it has happened. So donât lose hope.</p>
<p><a href=âhttp://talk.collegeconfidential.com/prep-school-admissions/1472385-waitlist-people.html?highlight=boarding+school+waitlist[/url]â>http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/prep-school-admissions/1472385-waitlist-people.html?highlight=boarding+school+waitlist</a></p>
<p>^this is my story</p>