Deferred from umich-Ann Arbor

Hello all,
I got the email saying that I got deferred from the university of michigan in Ann Arbor. Does this mean I still have a chance of getting in? I was really disappointed because I had an amazing application and I’m usually not one to brag about myself at all but I really thought that I would get in. They also offered me a full tuition scholarship called the Hail Scholarship and apparently that was supposed to “separate” me from the general pool of applicants. The only “bad thing” on my application was that I got a 26 on my act, other than that everything was very well done. I would list all of my achievements but take my word for it that I worked extremely hard and was very confident for once about myself lol. This just really shocked me:( I heard a ton of rumors though about umich deferring a huggeeee amount of qualified applicants for no known reason and then later accepting them? What even is the percentage of applicants admitted after being deferred? I also heard about a “good/medium/bad” deferred letter? I got the good one and it asks for a mid year transcript so I will definitely be doing that but I’m a little worried because I have a C- in AP calculus BC. It’s not like I’m slacking off either, that class is actual hell. I didn’t take calc AB last year so will the admissions team notice that and grant even the slightest bit of mercy? Lol. I’m taking other AP and advanced classes as well and I’m still maintaining all of my leadership positions (section leader in marching band, charity committee president in NHS, president of Spanish club, historian of band executive board). Can someone help me understand this a little more? Especially about the scholarship because why would they offer me that and then later defer me?
Thanks!!

I was also offered the Hail Scholarship and got deferred. I was really hoping to be accepted - U of M is my dream school.

Hopefully they will accept us in the coming months!

They started this Hail Scholarship program this year to attract some under-privilege and otherwise unlikely applicants. There are certainly some advantage given to those selected students. However, it is not likely that they will accept all the 1000+ invited applicants as the yield rate from these applicant would be really high due to the scholarship. Try to bring your score/GPA closer to the 25th percentile for a better chance.

Should I take the ACT again?:confused:

Try to bring up your grades and send a letter of continued interest.

If you have time on the ACT, yes. Even a few more points will help! If not, then do ^ and think positively:)

How do you get offerred a scholarship before you are admitted?

@brantly The Hail Scholarship program basically guaranteed a full tuition scholarship IF ADMITTED. UMich handpicked over 1000 students from 259 public schools around Michigan that are underperformed and under-privilege to encourage them to apply.

@billcsho How many people with the scholarship do you think they’ll admit? I’m assuming not that many because it’s a full tuition scholarship?

It is new this year, so I have no idea. My guess would be a small fraction like 10%. The whole idea is to encourage those unlikely applicants based on past record to apply. I don’t think they will lower the standard substantiallly though.

That seems unusual-- almost like a bait and switch. Encourage students to apply with the potential of a full scholarship, and then defer.

“That seems unusual-- almost like a bait and switch. Encourage students to apply with the potential of a full scholarship, and then defer.”

My take would be that if the kids are too stupid to differentiate between a non-contingent offer and a contingent offer, they won’t be terribly missed in Ann Arbor. Nearly 100% of all events in life are probabilistic based on some condition precedent (or multiple conditions). Kids who look both ways before they cross the street and who don’t put their hands on a red-hot stove should be able to navigate the sort of “if X&Y then Z” sort of logic that probably (its been a few years) literally shows up on the SAT. Besides, there is nothing to suggest (data sufficiency analogy plugged in here) that kids who qualify are deferred…given the prior “information” in the thread, the probability of deferral after academic qualification is speculation, not fact.

Ouch! I’m not sure it would be outrageous to think if Mich felt stongly enough about you to invite you to apply with full scholarship, then you probably might have a better chance of admittance than a random app.

While it is contingent, one would think if you qualified for the $, surely you would qualify for admittance using simple common sense and experience of how it usually works, (e.g., in most colleges, not everyone who gets accepted gets a scholarship, but everyone who gets a scholarship has generally already been admitted).

Note that this is not a pure merit scholarship as the recipients are not expected to have spectacular stat compared to other admitted students. It is for the top students of under privilege schools that typically would not even apply to UMich. They picked 1000+ students from 259 selected Michigan public high schools for a “diversity” reason. I guess this is part of the effort to overcome the ban of Affirmative Act. By no mean they have the intention to accept all of them, as that would be around 10% of total admitted students and likely over 20% of enrolled freshmen next year that would lower the admission stat significant. Note that in the same news article, it mentioned again the Summer Bridge Program which is for those admitted students that need some help academically and that program has around 230-250 students enrolled each year.

That seemed like an unnecessarily rude post, blue.

It’s not unrealistic for kids in disadvantaged settings to not understand this brand new program. Even if they had the means, googling wouldn’t help because this is the first year that this program has been in existence. Telling kids that they were actively sought out would signal to many, especially low-income, first-gen kids, that they are very likely to be admitted.

It has nothing to do with their level of intelligence.

I agree @romanigypsyeyes … I don’t think my ACT was the issue because from what my counselor told me, the reason why they got my information to send me this scholarship was through the ACT companies that send out scores to colleges (I just so happened to have umich as my list to send scores to).

I’m just confused on their goal for this scholarship. I know they want “diversity” but so far all the people I know that have been admitted with this scholarship are white. In my application I noted that I was middle eastern and I even dedicated an entire essay to how culturally diverse I am bring that I’ve been a translator at my school for foreign students AND that I’ve been taking Spanish for three years now. I also made sure to sound dedicated to umich since this is my number one school. Idk I’m just really confused on what they’re trying to do

I hope I didn’t come off as racist in anyway in that last comment @-) lol

Also does anyone know how much information they might have received about each student that they sent this to? As far as I know it was just ACT score but what other information did they require from the schools about each kid?

I emailed them about it and they said it was targeted to low income students in underperforming schools in Michigan. They also said that it didn’t really make a difference because they already meet the full need for instate students. So, the students would have gotten an almost equal amount from grants either way.

@AcceptabeName Not really. They will offset the amount of loan by scholarship first before reducing grant.