Deferrals: Action and Attitude to take

Email your regional rep/officer in charge of your file/reader to say, “If accepted, I will attend.” (ED1 seems to indicate that, but additional courting in other cases may help.)

I wouldn’t pester anyone, but also ask admissions if there is anything more you can do?: Interview by Skype? Visit? (If you are able.) They’ll probably say no, they’re busy, but give it a try. (Nothing ventured, nothing gained.)

Are you looking for lots of financial help? As ED1, maybe you aren’t. If you are, they may have allocated for a different kind of candidate, meaning no slight of your own strong qualities: They’re building an entire class.

What about your file? Could there be a problem with a recommendation, or some other issue? How was your essay? Too late for ED, but fixable for ED2 and RD apps.

Holistic admissions can be a mysterious process.

Every college is practically a lab experiment. And the smaller the school, the more crucial every element is to the overall synthesis. Students work into a class or not, based on both academic and community considerations.

Take heart: If not your ED or “dream school,” another school will turn out to be the better fit–and somehow, complete strangers in admissions knew that better than you. That’s what admissions people do, very well, on the whole: Figure out where you belong.

Good luck! Upward and onward!