I am not an admission officer, so take this with a grain of salt…
Decisions are done - this is not a time when AOs re-read applications. If someone declines their offer - AOs will go to the waitlist and look for a similar match to the person who declined (gender, major, geographic location, etc.). I don’t believe they reread all applications, particularly since there are so few offered spots off of the waitlist.
Cornell has built into their offers a cushion as they know some will not accept. The waitlist is there on the off chance they misread their yield.
Again, I could be way off but this was how it was described to us by our college office.
This makes much sense. I guess those two fortunate kids hit the profiles who declined offers, which is why they got offers so fast. However, if so, they didn’t follow the process they laid out: making decision by taking consideration of initial review and the topical paragraph, which is a bit concerning.
I realize that they can just read materials from applicants who hit the profile and then choose the one they would like the most. This way they didn’t go against the rules that they set. This is it. Still, what made those two fortunate kids chosen so quickly? Is it because their profile is hard to find?
Not necessarily. It’s very late in the game as everyone has to commit by May 1 so it’s possible that all of their acceptances and declines were in, in a timely manner.
Cornell accepted students/revisit day was last weekend and most students are timely when accepting their offers. It’s possible Cornell‘s college of engineering recognized that the yield they thought they were going to have wasn’t going in the direction that they anticipated so they were able to start offering spots off of the waitlist earlier.
I do believe that some would accept/decline in the last minutes. It is not possible that all acceptance/declination were set. Visiting campus doesn’t mean that they made the decision.
Understand. Each college is slightly different. But it makes sense that they look for kids whose profile is similar to the one who declined the offer. Thanks for sharing.
A loci isn’t necessarily required but it is HIGHLY recommended. It could make all the difference but I heard somewhere from an admissions officer that they don’t even read the full loci. They stated that apparently because they believe their isn’t gonna be a change in your application over the time you submitted. I hope that made sense. Obviously still submit a strong loci if u haven’t already just saying what I heard.
Again, not an AO and only sharing what our college office told us (we have 9 waitlisted students at our school)… I think Cornell, as all schools, care about their yield. So, the LOCI is just another “guarantee” that the student is still interested and would attend. But again, no idea. Our LOCI was a simple letter stating our applicant was still interested in being on the waitlist.
** We were also told that they (our college office) do not anticipate the WL moving much this year so not holding our breath
Each school is slightly different. For CoE at Cornell, I don’t think Loci makes much impact. What would work is updated award since the university specifically asks for award update, your profile similar to the kid who declined the offer, and the topical para.
To clarify, it’s not my logic - this is what our high school college office told all 9 families whose applicants were waitlisted at Cornell (all very high stats kids, some legacy, and one child of an adjunct professor at Cornell).
We didn’t contact anyone (we followed Cornell’s rules/directions) - we were told this by our high school college counseling office post Ivy Day decisions.