So last night I found out the I was deferred from UW Madison. I am an OOS (MI) male with a 3.76 UW GPA and a 1300 SAT, and I took 4 AP classes and 3 Honors classes. I applied as a biochemistry major in the college of letters and sciences. For my extracurriculars, I was involved with Varsity Tennis for 4 years and was the senior tennis captain, National Honors Society, National Spanish Honors Society, Rotary Interact (a community service club), DOVES (a club that raises money for daughters of veterans educational support, I have a leadership position in this club), I was also a cashier at Panera bread and worked as a tennis camp instructor. I’m not surprised that I got deferred, considering that my stats are on the low end for out of state applicants. However, what can I do to increase my chances of getting admitted regular decision? I’m on track to earn a 4.0 for my first semester grades of senior year. Do you all think I have a chance of being admitted?
@jirachiwish I’m sorry you had such disappointing news. But the good news is it wasn’t a rejection. You are still in the running, and you have time to strengthen your application. Your fall grades will be a big help. Do you have any other testing results to submit? Are there any other other fall activities that you can report?
Get the contact info for the admissions officer who handles your region. Let them know that you are still very interested in attending UW. (If it’s your first choice, tell them that too.) Let them know you will be submitting additional materials for their consideration. Don’t give up! Good luck!
My son was also deferred, and I’m unclear as to what is holding him back from an acceptance:
1540 SAT (800 Math)
4.00 UW, 4.35 Weighted
5/328 Rank
NHS, National Science Honors Society, Mu Alpha Theta
4 year athlete (soccer and track)
Lots of service hours (not much leadership there, though)
Will have 7 AP classes when all is done (4 last year, 3 this year)
Maryland Resident
L&S/Computer Science
They’ve requested his mid-term grades, which at our HS are final grades for the first semester classes. They will be straight A’s, which is what he’s had every semester of HS. Any suggestions on what else they’d be looking for? His EC’s, athletics, honors, and service are consistent for 4+ years. I just can’t imagine what it is they’d be looking for? He’s certainly not going to get a better math SAT score. His AP scores are all 5’s and he won’t get any additional scores until June.
Disappointed!
@HokieCrazy Is Madison his first choice? If so, was it clear in his essays? Other people may have suggestions on if he should contact Admissions to express his continued strong interest in UW.
@Madison85 Thank you. He has very strong interest in Wisconsin, but doesn’t really have a clear first choice in any particular school. We will get in touch with his admissions officer to discuss.
I agree it is well worth your time to reach out to admissions if Wisconsin is a first/high choice school for your student and they are deferred. I do think some of these schools are trying to weed out students who aren’t actually going to attend or applying as a safety. My high stat student had that experience at a couple colleges applying last year. I do also think some high schools/metro areas are definitely more competitive at UW. I believe the top 5 states for UW apps are Illinois, Minnesota, CA, NY, NJ. I’ve heard some odd stories out of our own metro.
@MusakParent I’ve heard the weed-out theory and I don’t fully understand it. I mean what makes a school believe that somebody from Maryland has decided to apply to Wisconsin as a safety school. Wouldn’t UMBC or Maryland make more sense, since both are excellent CS schools at 1/3 the price of Wisconsin OOS? And is Wisconsin suddenly concerned about maintaining their 50+% acceptance rate? We also visited Wisconsin this spring, so we have some skin in the game. Just don’t understand it. Fingers crossed for my son. And thank you all for the kind guidance.
Does anyone know if most applicants that are not accepted are deferred? Do some get rejected and the majority deferred?
I tend to believe there are a fair number of rejected, as well, but most people that get rejected don’t post to a message board to let others know.
That’s what I was think too!
I don’t know HokieCrazy but we found it frustrating last year too. My kid did music admissions as well (he’s a double major music/comp sci student at Wisconsin) and I felt like that did give us a little insight into what they are thinking. He did get directly asked about what other school he was applying to and grilling for info about financials, etc. I do think these large schools have some complex systems that plug in stats, location, etc and it spits likelihood of attendance. There have been a few articles lately about that kind of thing in admissions. Plus the element of possibly having someone really love or hate your essays. And then if you have a high number of apps from a district or area, I think that can throw numbers too. My kid did not have this experience at Wisconsin but did at 2 other large schools that were higher on his list that we had traveled cross country to visit. Who knows!? I also never felt like these larger schools were really tracking visits well?
Anyway - I do definitely think it can make a difference reaching out to express strong interest after a deferral. There was one school my kid was deferred at last year I felt could have been an acceptance with the right play on my son’s end because they reached out to him several times. But he had moved on already and was being woo-ed by the music department at a couple other schools that were going to be WAY more affordable.
Anyway - hoping for good news for you in the new year! Good luck all.
@HokieCrazy I think you can comfortably assume there was some definite yield protection going on with your son’s deferral decision! My own son ran into the same issue when he went through the application process. He was disappointed to be deferred from a few of the schools he considered safeties or close matches. Of course, looking back on this, those schools were entirely correct that my son was unlikely to attend. He got into some of his top choices and never thought of those deferrals again.
But if UW is truly a top choice for your son- and he is genuinely interested in attending- then communicating this to the admissions office may be his best bet. He could contact the admissions office, send them a Letter of Continued Interest, and stay in touch. Maybe even consider going out on another visit in January?
Forbes has a nice article on How to Handle a Deferral. I’m not sure if I can post a link here, but it’s easy to find.
Thank you for sharing that article @LolliCoomassie
My son was also deferred. I checked the Common data Set but it didn’t have any information.
The article said to get in touch with admissions immediately, but I’m thinking my son should wait to talk to his guidance counselor when school starts again. What do you think? Madison is his first choice, and lots of kids around here have been deferred.
He’s in NY, 1470 SAT, 3.6 GPA, plenty of APs, ECs, etc.
Thanks for any input! Not sure what the chances for RD are.
Deferred here and also in NY. Daughter has similar stats too. We are inclined to have her write an email expressing continued interest but it would be helpful to know whether deferrals have a realistic chance of getting in (e.g. Michigan) if are just a polite way of saying no (e.g. Chicago).
I would go with the realistic chance. Remember, students can still apply to UW next month and there will be stellar students who (finally) apply after finding out they may not get into their dream school. Being deferred means being put into the pool of applicants who applied afer the early deadline. UW has to have enough room for those students. There should never be a penalty for not being an early bird but meeting the deadline for applying.
Understood. But if that’s the case (strong RD pool, for which Wisconsin wants and needs to reserve slots), then I would expect Wisconsin’s defer-to-acceptance rate to be relatively modest - unless, of course, their yield is lower than expected.
In the recent past quite a few deferred eventually got admitted. NOT a semi-rejection at all. Fall grades VERY important.
I think there must have been quite a scramble going on in the admissions office this fall! They expected a certain amount of EA applications and found themselves unprepared for the deluge they received.
This presents a two-fold predicament. They were understaffed and unable to review all the applications in a timely manner. And they had no way to understand why there was a surge in EA applications. Did this represent an overall increase of UW applications? Should they expect a similar increase in RD applications? Or…did this merely represent a SHIFT of applications from the RD pool into the EA pool? Because there is no way for them to know what the surge in EA applicants represents, I’m sure they had to err on the side of caution, prepare for a similar increase in the RD pool, and deffer a larger number of applications that they would normally have accepted.
With the guidance my own kids have been receiving from their high school counselors- with a big emphasis on applying EA whenever possible- my personal guess is that the college admissions officers are seeing the latter situation (a shift from RD to the EA pool). So if that turns out to be the situation for UW admissions this year, then I would think anybody differed from EA would have a good chance of getting an RD acceptance.
I just wanted to add Illinois, Minnesota, California, NY are top app states at UW. Admissions has gotten increasingly more difficult from those areas, especially out of the metro areas.
I have heard some really weird admission results out of our metro the last few years. I had a very high stat kid who I do think got some yield defers much like this sitting above the 75%. Not from UW, but from some other similar schools (and he is attending UW). If UW is an actual top pick for your student, I would definitely encourage personal follow up. If your student applied thinking it was a safety and not actually likely to attend or enthusiastic about UW, that was a mistake and I hope they have another safety. There’s a reason UW’s application is a little more onerous than some public flagships. I think in general, you can never assume another state’s flagship can be your safety.
I like the logic of the above two posts (#17 & 18). People need to look at things from the perspective of the specific (UW) admissions standpoint. It is a bonus for so many to have an answer so soon. Sure beats waiting until March for any indication. Those outright rejected and deferred still have time to apply elsewhere.