Fall 2016 Admissions

Yeah exactly. I certainly hope in my case it’s for a good reason haha

Hey there. I’ve been heavily lurking this forum but it seems like the right time to finally comment.

I applied early action and had my application submitted before January 15th, and everything else by the next couple weeks. I know a few people who are at Columbia and a few who have gone through General Studies, and I thought my application was weak and strong at the same time- I had exactly the makings of what they wanted to see, but my track record of newfound success was very short.

I received a request for a phone interview earlier this week and conducted the interview a few days later. Like you guys were saying, it appears that the reasoning for the interview was “Well, you’re certainly someone we’re intrigued by, but we still have questions, enough to see what you have to say, but not enough to give you a strong decision one way or another.” If you guys have looked back at the past interview threads, this was similar to that, asking about what happened with certain experiences in my past, what and why is different now, why I’d fit in at the university, and my thoughts and how I’d fit in with the liberal arts curriculum. Overall, I’m cautiously optimistic, and browsing this forum and some others, it appears that all of the early action decisions will be released in a batch, as I haven’t seen anyone receive any decision of any sorts quite yet.

Best of luck, and I’m happy to share some more information from my journey and application if anyone is interested.

@OutboundTrain thank you so much for sharing great info. Would you mind sharing your stats too? I want to know where I stand. Best of luck too.

@yesorno0101 I don’t want to get too specific but I’ll share a bit. I was very immature in high school, had a gpa around 3.0-3.1. High ACT- 33-35 range. Went to a local state school, was still horribly immature, didn’t cut it, low 2s-high 1s GPA. Took a year off and turned my life around in a number of ways. I moved to a big city and enrolled in a local school where I have a 4.0 over 25 credits. My recommendations were very good I believe (I didnt see them), from teachers that saw how hard I worked, and I’m sure spoke about how I had knowledge, commitment, curiosity, and questions that went far beyond and above the scope of the classes. I wrote a very personal essay, one that really went deep into who I was, why I performed the way I did, and why I really changed. Spoke about what really interests me, my love of what I’m going to study, and how all my interests really tie together, and why the liberal arts curriculum and city would be perfect for me. I felt quite strongly about all of it.

@OutboundTrain thanks again. From previous threads, I assume that the committee like applicants who have turned things around, so your academic improvement is definitely a great factor. But I wonder how bad the past academic history can be. My high school grade is terrible and right after graduation I went to a university where I was doing horribly.
And dropped out and worked some years and going back to community college in 2014, and since then my GPA is 4.0 (about 90 quarter credits) and SAT score is 2170. But what I’m concerned about is how much my high school and university history play a role. I’m pretty confident about the current academic performance and I explained what changed me in the essay. I hope the committee favorably look at the recent academic performance.

Our stories sound extremely similar. From what I understand the poor previous performance is understood to be almost necessary. Hopefully we both get the news were looking for… Speaking of which, I’ve exhausted myself refreshing my damn email every 30 minutes. Tuesday seems forever away…

Also this year is a leap year so it gives us one more additional day to wait. I update my email quite frequently too. I also hope that applying for the January 15th deadline will favorably work for us.

@OutboundTrain Did your interviewer mention anything specifically that led them to reach out to you? Also, did you receive the email about two weeks ago that your Fall early action application was complete?

Regarding high school grades, I think it is safe to presume that most GS applicants did not perform to the best of their ability in high school, or at least finish with a GPA that meets the standard held by the university. It is because of this that GS focuses mainly on a student’s most recent academic performance. This is the case for most transfer applicants in general, assuming the applicant has been in college long enough to demonstrate a clear shift in attitude and motivation. That’s what is beneficial about the required essay–it gives students an opportunity to address such changes. If high school grades were weighted heavily in the transfer application process, especially with a school like GS, I would have a difficult time matriculating at most universities.

Thanks to everyone for sharing your background.
Like the rest of you, my interests were elsewhere in high school and college. I just finished my 4 years in the Navy and spent 75% of that in Japan. I’ve been told my military background will be a good boost to admissions.

I’ve also been refreshing my email everyday for the last week, but it looks like Tuesday will be the day.

@nickdrake My interviewer said they were quite intrigued by my story and my interests and wanted to get to know me a bit later. I’d imagine that’s code for were 50/50 about you. They wanted to clarify some things, like why my grades very suddenly dipped from mid 3-s my first two years of high school to the low 2s, and to ask some more specific questions about my interests. It seemed more centred around what I’m planning and wanting to do and why, and why I think Columbia and its specific curriculum would be a good place to accomplish that. There were very little questions inquiring about my year off, or more specifically about my previous school experiences. They just wanted to hear me explain it in spoken words.

I received the same email Tuesday 10 days ago while doing laundry and almost went into cardiac arrest thinking it was the decision.

@OutboundTrain Hopefully it works out for you then. I would take the interview as a good sign–they wouldn’t have requested it if they weren’t seriously considering you for admission. @MASailor9360 Your military background will most definitely increase your chances for admission.

Thanks for sharing your info @OutboundTrain and definitely sounds like the interview was a good sign for you. Best of luck and keep us updated on how it all goes!

I wanted to reach out to this thread and the guys who have been active in it; I got a call Friday saying I was accepted! Apparently they have a list of applicants they deem strong enough to admit earlier than the deadline of March 1st that they like to call up and personally congratulate. I figured I’d post something so that future applicants understand just a tad better the system by which GS operates. I had essentially accepted the fact I would spend this weekend worrying, so knowing a bit earlier was a massive relief. To whoever else was accepted already, congrats! To you guys who will be, also congrats! Good luck everyone, I hope we all make it.

@Fooleh Congratulations! Thanks for sharing this. Did they provide you with any feedback on why they felt you were such a strong applicant? Also, did they make it seem as if all the phone calls for these specific applicants were made on Friday?

Yes to the first question, and I’m not sure about the second. They said that my desire to pursue a holistic education, being passionate in both the arts and sciences, was essentially what they were trying to create at Columbia with their Core Curriculum. This emphasis in curriculum meant they wanted students who recognized the importance of a well-rounded education, so I made sure to emphasize that particular quality of myself and the school in both my essay and my interview. As to other phone calls, I didn’t ask directly. It was near the end of the day, so we can infer he was pretty much done making his calls. But it wouldn’t exactly surprise me if they contacted more people on Monday.

Congratulations again @Fooleh . Did they mention any other aspects of your application that made you a strong applicant? I’m just starting to get a bit nervous now so I’m trying to get a sense of which areas I may have been stronger or weaker in. But yeah, there is the possibility that they continue making phone calls on Monday.

congrats!! @Fooleh

Wow. That’s literally exactly what I was talking about. I spoke about wanting to understand everything at a deeper level, hence my desire to study statistics and foreign languages. And that I felt like the Columbia curriculum was the perfect way to do that. No call for me on Friday obviously. Losing my mind waiting but hopefully Monday (I’ll even take Tuesday

Have you guys checked if you can login to the financial aid page? Some of the previous threads mentioned something about that. I guess if you can login it means you’re accepted.

@Systema I have and I am still unable to. In the past some applicants were able to log in the night before and others on the day of acceptance, so I’m not going to stress about it too much.