<p>haha parikhs, I definitely agree.</p>
<p>Michigan's deferral letter was pretty bad... the last statement was "we encourage you to explore other educational options". And I haven't even been rejected yet!</p>
<p>DePauw had the worst acceptance letter. </p>
<p>It might as well have said "We don't think you're coming because everyone in the midwest uses us as a safety, but in the unlikely event that you do enroll, please send us a $400 deposit by May 1."</p>
<p>The envelope was razor thin; all that was there was a one page letter & an envelope to enclose the deposit.</p>
<p>Notre Dame had a very nice professional-looking acceptance package. Ribbon on the acceptance letter, folder with gold trim and staggered pages.</p>
<p>Dartmouth's was cool too, in a different way--colorful, and with a cool decal that I've unfortunately since lost.</p>
<p>Fortunately my daughter did not have to see this- but she had friends who did. McGill University does the whole process on-line. After the decisions are reached, the applicant clicks on a decision-link and, if not accepted, gets a message that merely says "REJECTED- Not up to academic standards."</p>
<p>Pretty harsh, as the kids would say.</p>
<p>Chuck</p>
<p>this is such a fun thread! :)</p>
<p>mcgilldad :</p>
<p>I think I would cry. Hard.</p>
<p>Oh, wow, I was mildly considering applying to McGill but if it's so heavy on numbers (as it seems to be from your description), I'll not risk it! Got a few C's peppering my transcript.</p>
<p>Worst "Acceptance" Letter, sent to an extremely wealthy applicant (I just made this one up):</p>
<p>"Dear [applicant's name]</p>
<p>Congradulations! We look forward to having you in our freshman class in the fall of 2006. However, we will accept you on one condition. Send us another check for 10 million to guarantee your spot. Again, congradulations on gaining acceptance, and we hope to see you here next fall!</p>
<p>[Director's name]"</p>
<p>i wouldnt attend that institution for free if they cant even spell congratulations.</p>
<p>haha scarf...A2Wolve...how did you hear from Mich so quickly? Are all the deferall letters the same or what? I'm most likely getting deferred, but I was planning on sending midyr report and ACT score.</p>
<p>When I worked in Admissions, we sent a pretty generic letter. I mean, it was personalized with the person's name (obviously) and it said nice things about the applicant being dandy, but the letters were all the same. We were a small school that wasn't sending tens of thousands of letters out, so we said "Why don't we pull one generic paragraph of the letter out and replaced it with some personalized stuff?" </p>
<p>It made a lot more work for the secretary who handled all the acceptances, but it felt like the right thing to do given the hard work the applicants put into the apps--and our genuine excitement about the people we accepted.</p>
<p>So, whenever we submitted a file for the acceptance letter, admissions counselors would paperclip on a few sentences for that paragraph, like "the admissions committee was exceptionally impressed with your initiative in starting a Habitat for Humanity Chapter at your school" or "We know you were concerned about your math grades, but the admissions committee was satisfied with your explanation and the fine letter of recommendation from your calculus teacher..."</p>
<p>There are probably a lot of smaller schools that do this. Not sure a big school with a lot of volume could handle it, though.</p>
<p>that's a wonderful idea! i would love it if a college sent me something that showed that they had obviously read my application and that im a student, not a file for them</p>
<p>of course, im not applying to any schools with a size that would allow that.. pity</p>
<p>Chem maybe you should just so you can feel good about yourself..you know an ego booster :)</p>
<p>i've gotten three acceptance letters so far and they've all been pretty basic, nothing beside other info inside (no free tee!) but my friend and i were looking at my southern oregon university letter and we think it was actually signed, not just stamped. we were a little shocked.</p>
<p>You can usually tell for sure by licking your finger and running it over the print to see if it smudges. (This only really works with copies, though.) My parents' law office does this when they can't tell an original document from the copy. I did it with some of my college mail; I was always happy when I got truly personalized letters.</p>
<p>A friend of mine got his Georgetown acceptance today... it was super lame. I'm hoping for good news from Swarthmore on Thursday, so the tip about the "FAT" envelope is nice.</p>
<p>megblum...does Georgetown send out acceptances/rejections at the same time? My friend applied and I'm wondering if he got in...we are in NY, where do you live?</p>
<p>nvm he called me...got deferred</p>
<p>yeah i didn't think georgetown's acceptance was that great
it's just like
"hey, you got in, good job, we only take really good people."</p>
<p>plus there's no big package of anything to look at it to make you feel all excited.</p>
<p>
[quote]
A2Wolve...how did you hear from Mich so quickly? Are all the deferall letters the same or what? I'm most likely getting deferred, but I was planning on sending midyr report and ACT score.
[/quote]
</p>
<p>I heard quickly because I applied early October. I don't think the deferral letters are the same, because i've talked to others who have said they've actually had the word "deferred" written on their letter, whereas mine said "delayed". </p>
<p>The mid-year report and ACT score is a good idea. Unfortunately I can't sign up for another ACT. But that's not what the problem with my application is, it's the fact that Michigan screws over my GPA with their UM GPA system, getting rid of all grade boosts and +/-s. And GPA is very important for UM. Also, my application gets reviewed separately, because we have an admissions director solely for our school, because we send the most students to UM out of anywhere in the country.</p>