<p>I foresee a trend in some schools starting classes earlier and earlier to avoid summer melt.</p>
<p>The school I work at just had an “Instant Decision Day.” So, these are kids that are just applying now. For a lot of people, college applying and acceptance is not something that happens the spring before, or at least is settled then.</p>
<p>Son was wait listed at two schools and he just threw those letters away, despite one being his top choice. He said it was just time to move on and make the decision from the ones where he was accepted and the $$ were right. Personally I think that is the healthy way to go.</p>
<p>This last minute change is expensive and stressful and in the long run probably not worth it regardless of the school involved.</p>
<p>If a school was clearly a first choice and a kid was waitlisted, I would at least stay on that waitlist for a little while. We had several kids who were waitlisted (this year particularly) but almost all got into their top choice shortly after May 1. Yes, it may have been a deposit loss, but in the grand scheme of tuition payments, losing a deposit is not the worst that can happen. Let’s say you’re first choice was (not like HYP as the waitlist probably doesn’t move much), but something up the tiers. How many kids who applied to your first choice would that school possibly be their safety or something (as they are hoping for HYP but you certainly wouldn’t JUST apply to those three.</p>
<p>In any event, excuse the ramble, but I see a world of difference between staying on a waitlist for a month and seeing where it goes than just throwing in the towel at the first road block.</p>
<p>We know someone whose cousin just got into MIT off the waitlist. It’s melting in Boston, too.</p>
<p>Let’s just say that if you’re full pay or need very little aid, you have a better chance of that phone call any month than if you are looking for a full ride. So I guess there would be some bigger puddles of melt at schools who don’t have a lot of aid (merit or otherwise) or who calculate need in a way that doesn’t meet the gap.</p>
<p>I wonder how the cascade of bright middle class and formerly middle class students to state schools is going to effect graduate and professional school admissions. That first tuition bill from a pricey college is a blowtorch to recession strapped families!</p>
<p>Is a college education from a mid-level state school adequate or do you learn more at more highly ranked schools? Can the success of “top” schools be attributed to the quality of their students rather than the pricey classes? If you aren’t already “well connected”, how much can a top 20 education help relative to a mid-level education?</p>
<p>Standardized test score analysis might tell the tale. For students with +2300 SAT’s at top 20 schools vs. students with +2300 SAT’s at mid-level schools, how much better did the students with the high priced education do on the MCAT? Similar analysis of GRE, MCAT and LSAT data might be interesting.</p>
<p>Will the private graduate and professonal schools band together in a program to “defend the franchise” by dis-ing capable public college students with high GPA’s and standardized test scores???</p>
<p>Stay tuned to CC for stories, facts, opinions and BS regarding these and other matters.</p>
<p>big g: there should be some interesting studies out of this anyway!</p>
<p>Will be interesting to see impact on transfers next year.</p>
<p>My D has already had a couple of solicitations to apply for transfer to schools where she was waitlisted and then denied.</p>
<p>Is this usual?</p>
<p>Big G == I suspect schools are being extra careful to make certain all spots filled. As to better school, research I have seen (which dealt with race, not exclusively socioeconomic class) seemed to indicate better school MORE important for kids without connections.</p>
<p>my Ds school had nore kids accept than they anticipated, apparently alot more, so lots of forced triples…going to be an interesting year</p>
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<p>Interesting. I suspect it means the schools making the transfer pitches really need the extra tuition revenue, but don’t want to have expansion affect their freshman stats. US News doesn’t measure transfer stats. Consequently, transfers go “under the radar” in the US News rankings; the only stat they affect is S/F ratio and since that’s expressed in whole numbers and doesn’t count for much of the school’s total in any event, it can easily be jockeyed to a point where it won’t adversely affect the school’s overall ranking. If the school were to admit those very same students as freshmen it would affect not only S/F ratio but also SAT/ACT 25th-75th percentile medians, class ranks, and admit rate. </p>
<p>Some schools have been playing the transfer game for years. Others are just catching on now as they scheme to increase tuition revenue without adversely affecting their US News ranking. Just another example of how the so-called “objective” US News stats are easily manipulable and frequently manipulated.</p>
<p>I wouldn’t hold it against the particular school, though. It’s just part of the game. If this gives your kid an opportunity to attend a school s/he really wants, go for it.</p>
<p>wow…i don’t know whether i would be offended or not but i guess it’s just business…</p>
<p>Anecdotal: A friend of mine’s D who had really wanted to go to Colgate (applied ED, Deferred, waitlisted and then denied) ended up at Syracuse (or was it Ithaca?). In any event, halfway through her freshman year, Colgate wrote her a letter asking her to consider transferring to what had been her first choice. But by this point, she felt at home and loved the school (which only confirms the adage that everyone is at their first choice come October) and did not apply for transfer.</p>
<p>^^Thanks for passing that on, and thanks for telling us the name of the college. It’s a very good data point to have. I wonder if others have had similar experiences.</p>
<p>The President of Villanova said their summer melt was not happening as expected, more forced triples. He attributed to them having such a hot basketball team. :)</p>
<p>I have mixed feelings about all this. It is perversely enjoyable that some adcoms are “sweating”. It is sad that significant numbers of young people are being jerked around.</p>
<p>Incidentally my D’s SAT’s would shift the 25% to 50% range of any school upward (very slightly in some cases LOL).</p>
<p>In today’s economy people have adjusted their spending habits and are just being more frugal all around. I think it is NEXT years private school enrollment that is going to see the bigger hit. If I were in charge of a college the first thing I would do is to put a big red “accepted” stamp on all the apps that come in early this fall requesting zero financial aid.</p>
<p>My friend’s daughter, a sophomore at a fairly expensive private school (just under $40k COA) , got an email offering to pay her and her room mate to relinquish their contract for their dorm and move off campus. Sounds like they must have more coming in than expected. They decided against it as they had to make a quick decision that did not give them time to actually find an off campus apartment. Doesn’t sound like they are hurting to much.</p>