<p>shifu, I would say that CALS has other great intls applying, and they said, "swim team and research" V "founded a business and was a track star" and they went for the other guy. I still think you have a great shot for RD. I would suggest you do something to further differentiat your app from other applicants.</p>
<p>i cried after being deferred too but then i realized how grateful i should be that i am still in the race. a lot of stuff people have mentioned on this thread have encouraged me</p>
<p>i know it was mentioned that ILR does not reject, and only defers. does anyone know what a deferral means from hotel school? could it mean that i still have a strong chance, or just that they deferred me by default?</p>
<p>i finished all the apps for my other colleges over thanksgiving break and am trying to fill in this gap between now and RD by taking classes at a local community college and focusing on my first semester finals next week</p>
<p>Keep your chins up guys - despite what some of you think, a deferral IS better than a rejection. By applying ED you showed Cornell that you were willing to commit to the school, which is something the AdComs love. It'll give you an edge over the other RD candidates, which ups the acceptance rate for deferrals. Honestly, if they kept you instead of outright rejecting you, they at least saw something they liked! So keep some hope, you still have a chance! As for you guys asking us what was wrong with your app, give Cornell a call and ask to speak to an admissions counselor. They can pull up your file and find out what comments were made on your application. You can also get your high school counselor to do this if you don't have the guts to call yourself (I didn't, so I made my counselor do so last year). For me, they wanted to give me an extra semester to take a look at my grades (i'd had a gpa around 3.9 up until junior year when it dropped to a 3.6). Whatever it is, work hard the rest of this semester and the beginning of next to fix it. You guys can also get more involved in some activities that demonstrate the passions you told Cornell about. Then, in a month or two, write a letter telling Cornell about how you've grown and what you've accomplished since you sent in your ED application. Send them an updated resume (but only if you actually had some meaningful additions, not just one or two things that don't relate to your application much at all). Find some teachers willing to write you good recommendations and mail them into Cornell, preferably teachers that teach subjects related to the major you wanted, that can talk about your passion for that subject (and if you haven't demonstrated this in the past, spend the next few months working hard to come across as if you were obsessed to your teacher so that she'll really say you love it!). These are all the things I could think of off the top of my head, but I'm sure there are plenty of other things you could do to demonstrate growth and continued interest to Cornell. Just by doing one of these things you'll help your application immensely, and it might just be the difference between rejection and acceptance in the fall! Also, if you guys search the forums for threads on deferral, there were a lot of helpful things posted last year and in the years before. Anyway.. Good luck to you guys! I'm pulling for all of you :) Also, don't forget that you might also be offered a guaranteed transfer (CALS and another school does this) or a preferred transfer - this isn't a verified statistic, but it seemed to me that last year that a LOT of ED deferrals received the GT offer (I was one of them).</p>
<p>wow cindywc! thank you so much
i'm definitely going to call cornell admissions office and ask how i can strengthen my application</p>
<p>and when you mentioned asking teachers for rec letters, did you mean in addition to the 2 teachers we asked already? are we allowed to send additional rec letters?</p>
<p>i've really got to find some additional ECs that will demonstrate my passion for hospitality management..perhaps i'll get a rec letter from my other employer at my hotel</p>
<p>Yep, I meant a recommendation in addition to the 2 you sent in already. And definitely from a different teacher than the two you already got - you could also try asking a teacher from a subject you were weaker in or got worse grades in. However.. in your case (I'm guessing your a hotelie from the comment about hospitality management) a rec letter from an employer at your hotel would be even better than a teacher rec, as I've heard the Hotel school really values work experience.</p>
<p>Isn't the GT only available for New York residents?</p>
<p>Nope, I live in Northern Virginia and I got one. I think a large amount GT recipients are NY residents, but it's certainly not limited to them.</p>
<p>My daughter, Cornell '11, was deferred, then accepted. Happy PAM major. Suggest you or your guidance counselor call and find out the reason for the deferral. In her case Cornell wanted to see the January grades. Also - if Cornell is still first choice, make sure guidance counselor lets them know, or send a note yourself.
I'll add, that having had three kids go through this process in recent years - all of them deferred from ED - April was very exciting. You'll have great choices and will feel pursued rather than oppressed. I always felt the kids who did get in ED were a little left out of the fun in the spring.</p>
<p>dgobble: Do you know some deferred applicant RD acceptance statistics?
I'm frankly extremely disappointed with my deferral... but do you think it could be true that HumEc deferred a ton of instate applicants because of the whole budget cut/NY-state thing?</p>
<p>Had not heard, and have no inside information. Sorry and good luck!</p>
<p>It's alright, thank you.
I can only hope for the best.
It seems like numbers had almost no role in the Cornell ED admissions process: mine were a lot higher than most of the applicants accepted. Oh well :(</p>
<p>is waitlisted the same as deferred?? If no, what is the difference?</p>
<p>I must say I think I was pretty far off the mark for both Chandler and Shifu, who I both thought were excellent candidates and the type that would add a lot to the Cornell campus. Apologies, guys.</p>
<p>My only guess is that you guys somehow got targeted as pre-meds, and pre-med admissions is really vicious for the contract colleges. And I guess it just goes to show you that applying ED to Cornell with a 1450+ and graduating in the top 5% of your class is far from a sure thing.</p>
<p>Again, I would be very surprised if you both don't ultimately end up getting accepted regular decision. My only concern now is that Cornell will lose you and you will end up matriculating elsewhere!</p>
<p>Cayuga: Thank you so much for saying that... it really, really helps. I was extremely disappointed with the decision... after seeing YOU say I had an 85% chance ED (you being a consistently good predictor of Cornell admissions) my confidence went up, and now I don't know what to think.</p>
<p>Do you think that there actually is a good chance of me getting admitted RD? I haven't received any new honors this year and probably won't (since my school gives them out in June and there's no time left to really add much to my resume which I thought was pretty full already), so would writing a letter of interest in January actually help?</p>
<p>Yeah, I guess my 1500/2300, etc. didn't cut it...</p>
<p>Thanks Cayuga :)
Do you think I have a decent shot at other Ivies/Williams? Cornell is still my first choice, but if I don't get in RD Williams would be my second, though I'm really doubtful of my ability to get in now...</p>
<p>Do a decent amount of deferred ED applicants actually get accepted RD, or is that just reckless optimism?</p>
<p>I think writing a letter of interest, as well a discussion of what you have been up to, would help a fair amount. A lot of students think that numbers are everything, when at this level it is really more of trying to get a holistic gauge of who the applicant is. So re-committing your interest in Cornell (and the reason for your interest), combined with a couple of interesting paragraphs about a book you have recently read (outside of the classroom, of course) or an activity that you have recently done that you enjoyed would be a definite help. Also, be sure in your letter to make like nothing is wrong: an adcom doesn't want to read about sour grapes.</p>
<p>As for Williams, I haven't really been privy to much in the LAC admissions environment over the last couple of years, so I don't know what to say. A couple of friends of mine attended Williams; it is a great school, but worlds apart from Cornell. For starters, you could fit the entire Williams campus in the Martha Van building. You have a decent shot at a lot of schools.</p>
<p>P.S. Chandler -- The thing that kills me about your deferral was that you are a guy applying to HumEc, which needs more males! I don't know all of you obviously, so maybe your recs or essays were less than golden. But you seem pretty stand up on these boards.</p>
<p>Thanks for the advice! I will definitely do that some time in January, since December would be impetuous. Numbers aren't everything, but I was shocked at some of the numbers accepted by Cornell and deferred/rejected by Cornel.</p>
<p>Alright. I'm applying to a large amount of Ivies/similary selective schools so it would be nice to get into ONE of them.</p>
<p>I know, right?? My essays were written in a unique style and on unique topics such as the Weather Channel, placemats, and the tangled webs we weave (the last one being my HumEc essay)... and I know for sure that one rec should have been amazing, while the other one I really don't know. </p>
<p>Haha, thanks for having faith :)
I wonder if I really have a chance of getting accepted RD... this is going to kill me for the next 3 1/2 months.</p>
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I wonder if I really have a chance of getting accepted RD... this is going to kill me for the next 3 1/2 months.
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</p>
<p>If you didn't they would have rejected you.</p>
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Weather Channel, placemats, and the tangled webs we weave (the last one being my HumEc essay)...
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<p>Maybe this was the problem? You applied for HBHS, right? Shouldn't you have written something about public health? This is the best way for the state schools to measure "fit". Your essays sound more like essays for Arts.</p>
<p>That's true, but it seems like standard Ivy practice to defer a lot of applicants.</p>
<p>Maybe it was. My common app essay was about how I loved geography/languages/gaining knowledge but my HumEc essay was about my experiences in the healthcare field: dealing with patients, learning that a doctor must take a patient's culture, background, and personal characteristics into account when treating them (essentially, one cannot treat patients as the same blank canvas, they're all individual human beings who are different), etc.
Do you mind if I PM you my common app essay and my HumEc essay? Maybe these are the reason I was deferred.</p>
<p>No problem.</p>
<p>Awesome, I'll PM them over.</p>