Freshman Spring Admits

Colleges and Universities A-Z University of Southern California
21

If a spring admit is offended or does not like the offer for any reason (and I think SeattleTW has valid reasons for disliking the spring admit situation), then the student is free to reject the offer. If the spring admit wants to attend USC (or any other “spring admit” school; USC isn’t the only college that does this, I believe Berkeley does this too), then the student has a nice option that would not otherwise be available if the practice were eliminated.

I know a few spring admits at USC who are quite happy. Doesn’t make it a good practice, but if you ask them, they would rather be there than not.

@gmbern-warning: excanuck99 is correct. Without the big merit scholarships that your student obviously did not get, USC FA is certain to disappoint. Factor that into your decision.

22

Hey SeattleTW, does it ever occur to you, now that USC acceptance rate is 17%, that many alums such as yourself , were you to apply today with whatever stats you had at the time, likely would have been spring admits - or denied?!

23

Many of us might not have gotten in, including me. But that’s irrelevant. We all are to thank for making USC a better place. The more relevant question is what is the cumulative admit rate for Fall and Spring admits. Is it 18 or 20%? We cannot answer that question until we know the number of Spring admits. OTOH, if we know the number of Spring matriculates, and, assuming a 33% yield, we should be able to figure out the answer easily. Does anyone know the number of Spring matriculates?

24

S3 is a spring admit to Cornell. First time they have offered spring admit. He/we are thrilled, a spring admit is better then deny or wait list.

25

when will be hearing back if we got bumped into fall or not??

26

It was July last year. Literally a handful of students were bumped.

27

OK, I’m late to the conversation but here’s my take. My son was a spring admit this year (just finished freshman year). He was ecstatic to go to USC, it was his first choice and had been for several years. Here are the pros: (1) once you start in the spring, it takes about, oh, 1 hour, to become “just” a Trojan. Nobody knows you’re a spring admit, unless you want to tell them.

(2) He took fall classes at Santa Monica college, met quite a few other spring admits, all of whom became very good friends, shared a social life during the fall, and helped each other to acclimate to the college atmosphere.

(3) He’ll graduate at the same time as fall admits, thus saving a semester of tuition (go ahead, figure that one out – at a yearly cost of almost $65,000, that’s a savings of $32.500 (yeah, I’m good at math), so either he saves it or I do, in either case, money in our bank, not USC’s.

(4) He went to all the football games, any spring admit can go, you get a pass for the entire home games.

(5) He had a chance to relax after the hectic and stifling atmosphere of senior high school, even though taking 3 classes at SM College (and by the way, that knocked out 3 of his GE’s, so he could focus on the courses he really wanted to study at USC).

(6) He met plenty of spring admits from earlier years and to a person, all of them were very happy at being spring admits. Not a one said anything negative about the experience.

(7) Yes, maybe some kids have trouble adjusting to being at college (yeah, go ahead tell me the freedom from the hovering, helicoptering Mom and Dad provides a major boost to getting on the campus and suddenly being “free”), so show me how many kids really have that much trouble adjusting to the school of their dreams.

(8) Waitlisting is a waste, if you don’t already know, your chances of getting accepted are slim and none with none holding the Ace card.

(9) Look around, more and more colleges are taking the spring admit approach, from Ivy League schools to small liberal arts colleges. When you start lowering your acceptance rates below 20% and as an applicant, you really really really want to go to that school, spring admit status is like being nominated for the Oscar – even if you don’t win (ie be a fall admit), you’re in rarified company just to be nominated (spring admit).

Sorry to go on. My son is ecstatic over the moon and would galdly do spring admit again and again as long as he got here.

28

My son was a spring admit. He had many other solid choices, including Emory, Tulane, Michigan, UIUC-Business and more. He chose Tulane. We did visit USC for several days in late April before making the decision. Good luck to those attending USC.