This was posted on the NYU Admissions Blog:
"Back in December, the admission committee determined that we would defer a larger than typical cohort of candidates (roughly 400) to our Early Decision II and Regular Decision rounds for admission. In previous years, we would defer relatively few students who applied for Early Decision admission. Our rationale then was that applicants applied to receive an early decision on their application and we aimed to provide them with closure on their application with NYU.
The release of the new SAT in March 2016, however, suggests that we needed to act more conservatively and review a larger cohort of Early Decision candidates along with our Regular Decision applicant pool. If you were among the 400 or so deferred, here is some information that may be helpful to you:
The only items you need to send from this point forward are your current year grades/marks showing your first semester (if applicable to your school) and any new test scores you received since filing your application. These items cannot be self-reported and instead must come from your school or testing agency.
We are not looking to review new letters of recommendation or additional materials in our Regular Decision process. Please do not send such materials.
Given the limited number of students we have deferred in previous years, we do not have any meaningful or accurate data on how previous deferred candidates have fared in the past or how many deferred students will be admitted later this winter/spring.
All students deferred to Early Decision II will receive a final decision on February 15. Students deferred to Early Decision II who no longer want to be considered for Early Decision admission can self-elect to change their application to Regular Decision by sending us an email with this request. All students deferred to Regular Decision will receive a final decision on April 1.
Please know that if you were deferred, you are a viable candidate for admission. We would not have enabled you to compete with our Regular Decision candidates if we didn’t think you were deserving or had the potential to be a strong contender."
tl;dr- NYU deferred a lot more kids this year because of the new SAT, but all of you still have a good chance so do not despair!