Hi. I’ve been accepted at UW-Madison. I am a U.S citizen who has lived abroad all his life. i’ve thought about taking deferral from the university. One of the primary reasons is that i just want to live in US for one year before going to college, so as to better acclimatize myself with the environment and be better prepared for attending college. Cost is also another factor. My financial aid package at UW covers only about 50% of my COA.
So my question is that what if i request deferral for one year, and during that period, improve myself academically, do community service and apply to other schools. If i get accepted to a better school, do i just decline my admission to UW? Should I even be applying to other schools? Or do i just decline my admission to UW, take a normal gap year and then reapply to other schools, in the hope of getting an acceptance and a better aid package? (then again if i apply during my deferment and don’t get accepted to other schools, i’ll at least have UW as a safe option). What’s right? What’s wrong? In need of guidance.
From your above posting it does not become clear whether you actually accepted the UW-Madison admission offer on or before May 1st? Just in case you have not, this question would be academic - no need to decline admission, you would be looking at a gap year.
Did you actually apply for a deferral? The deadline to accept an offer or apply for deferral was May 1st.
You can acclimate to the USA, work, and do community service, but there is little you can do to improve yourself academically in a gap year. You can’t reenroll in high school after you graduate and the deferral agreement prevents you from enrolling in another college. You can provide a list of books you read for independent study, perhaps find a job working in a lab, or take an SAT subject test. However, you won’t have any new AP scores to report.
Because applications are due in November to January, you don’t even really have a year. It’s more like seven to nine months. That’s not really a lot of time to accomplish much, especially factoring in the work to move to a new country and establish yourself first. Do you have extended family to move in with or do you have to find a job and a place to rent? That takes time. One advantage of starting school is you can sign up for student housing your first year which simplifies the move.
@hpcsa @AroundHere i have been accepted at UW-Madison and yes, i had already applied for deferral before May 1. In the morning today, i received an email that they had rejected my request for deferral due to financial reasons (it is another issue. i had corresponded extensively with them on in-state tuition, that how can i use my deferral period to become a state resident and qualify for in state tuition when i enroll.) However, i’ll be emailing them again to assure that i wont be seeking in-state tuition and that they reconsider my request.
I also want to clarify that i already have a good GPA (3.7). By improving academically, i meant to retake the SAT and take SAT subject tests (i have a 1340 on SAT-1 with no subject tests), improve my essays some how and add some more extra-curricular activities. I do have some relatives who can help me settle during my deferment but yes i would have to work to be able to support myself. I believe that working won’t put the kind of pressure that the normal high school academics have on you. the good side is that as my high school would be complete, i wont have to worry about my academics while preparing for SAT and so it would be less of a mental pressure.
However, my question was directed more towards the ethicality and morality of the issue. that is it even right to apply to other schools while being on deferment from another school?
Better school? You were deferred from a school you initially to which you initially applied. Unless there was some major problem with the credentials you submitted, there is no reason to believe you would be admitted to a better school.
You may not be prepared for the rigors of college. Read recommended books with your brain such thinking about what you read, why it is considered special, how it relates to what you already know, etc. Practice time management, study and learning skills, attention and concentration, organization, etc. The when during the day are you most and least alert. Know yourself and know information.
No, it is not ethical to ask for a deferral and use the deferral period to apply to other schools.
In the vast majority of cases, students choose to go to the college they deferred from, but in some cases a gap year graduate will choose a different college as a result of what they experienced on their gap year. Reconsidering ones choices would not be considered unethical in any way.
However, based on the above, this is not the dilemma the OP is currently facing: his/her gap year application has been rejected by UW-Madison and OP is correct to state that this issue has to be addressed first and foremost, with the highest priority.
@zannah i haven’t been deferred yet. Hopefully,yes, i might be deferred. However, i am sorry i don’t understand the second para of your comment. “not ready for the rigors of college…” i know i am not ready, hence asking for a year off. On being accepted to better schools, my case was that what if i improve my testing scores (i have a 1340 and say i move into 1400’s or pray 1500’s, i would have a better chance of getting accepted into those ‘better’ schools who rejected me this time around for my relatively low score.
Fully supporting yourself as a high school graduate can be pretty stressful - finding s low cost place to live and a job to pay the bills (perhaps more than one job, depending on the local cost of living) is not always easy. Were you planning to move to Madison or somewhere else? That would be the town to get acclimated to, but there are a lot of young workers to compete with.
If you’re denied the official deferral, you’ll have to reapply everywhere anyway so no worries about applying to multiple places.
@hpcsa what i am talking about is that there’s a difference between taking a gap year and getting your enrollment deferred. Both give you 1 year breaks but applying to other schools during the deferment period has that morality issue. In a gap year, i can do whatever i want, first and foremost that i decline my admission to my current university and then go on reapplying wherever i want.
You don’t know why schools rejected you. A 1500 is not a magic ticket.
Schools keep records for a year or two and many will hold previous rejections against you. If you reapply, the majority of your list should be places you haven’t tried before. The list needs to be balanced with likely and reach schools as well.
If finances for UW Madison are difficult, check out the scholarship thread
http://talk.qa.collegeconfidential.com/financial-aid-scholarships/2006094-2017-automatic-full-tuition-full-ride-scholarships-p4.html
@AroundHere i have been denied the deferral but i am still very much admitted to the university. it means that i would have to go to the university this fall. However, as i stated earlier, i’ll be requesting them to reconsider my deferral request on the assurance that i wont be seeking in-state tuition (which in my opinion is the main reason they rejected my request). Before, yes i was planning on moving to Wisconsin (but then it had the lure that i’d become a state resident and qualify for in state tuition). However with the in state thing out of the way (because now i know that i’ll be considered out of state for tuition purposes whether i live in Wisconsin or not), i have thought of going to NJ (my state of birth) if i get deferred. i have a lot of relatives in NJ, who’ll help me settle and would give me work. i have a twin brother as well (who also was accepted at UW-Madison), and has basically requested/done the exact same things as i have. so, he’ll be moving to NJ as well and we’ll share the living costs. i guess it would save some money so we can both contribute to the costs when we enroll at UW in 2019
@AroundHere i agree that academics is not the sole reason one gets rejected and there are many other and equally important reasons. But don’t you think that improving academically (and improving my application throughout) would be held in good stead by the universities i re-apply to? like it would show my determination etc etc?
Having a brother to share expenses with is great! Some of the NJ campuses have lower out of state costs than UW-Madison, too. Good luck!
@AroundHere thank you for your help and guidance!
@MTK007 Re: Gap Year/Deferral, I believe you are looking for an issue which in reality does not exist. You might want to review the information provided by the Gap Year Association, which posts specific advice for enrollment deferral:
https://gapyearassociation.org/gap-year-college.php
Unfortunately, unlike other UW universities, Madison does not provide official guidance, one of the possible reasons they might have declined your application:
https://gapyearassociation.org/fav-colleges.php
In response to that last question, sorry, no. You really do need a mostly new college list if you do another round of applications.
@AroundHere thank you for the information about the new college list. About the gap year/deferral thing, i read somewhere that if you apply to a new school during your deferment from another college, and then get accepted and want to go to the new college, the right thing would be to forfeit my remaining deferral period of the ‘old’ university so i can go to the new university. but what i read was that if the universities find this out, my admissions would be cancelled to bot the universities (both old and new)… whereas gap year means that i just decline my admission now and then go on reapplying where ever i want (or a new college list)
@hpcsa ^
@hpcsa maybe my wording is not right. like i am saying that gap year and period of deferral are two different things. i know they are not. i was just using them to differentiate between applying to new colleges while in the deferral period (deferral) and applying anew after declining your admission first (gap year)