The two are not mutually exclusive at nearly all colleges. Postponing matriculation before starting is not the same as taking a leave of absence during enrollment. Nearly all schools do not count postponing matriculation towards your leave of absence limits, so one does not need to “save” it – you could still do both if time permitted.
Sorry I’m not saying they’re mutually exclusive. I was trying to say that personally, I think it’s only worth it to take at most 1 year out of college and I’d rather take a year out during college than now as I feel like it’d just be a waste of a year.
As a parent of H’22, here are my 2 cents.
Being a donut hole family, it is a blessing for us to be able to save money with online learning.
With my Harvard junior being (looks like) 100% online this entire year, and freshman Yalie only being on campus for 12 weeks in the fall, instead of paying around $85k this school year, I will end up paying around $60k. Of course you have to have a junior who is OK with online classes. And this past year’s online experience was awesome. Lectures, sections, office hours - he did not miss anything. The only drawback is labs. But trust me, except for the labs, Harvard figured out this whole online learning a lot better than I expected.
Princeton just closed their waitlist today. This could mean bad news for us too. However on the optimistic side, Princeton historically uses their waitlist way less than Harvard (they usually never use it) and yet this year they did take some kids off. Hopefully, we’ll all get final decisions next week!
Just to add on, Yale just closed their waitlist too. This really isn’t looking good. Does anyone know what Yale and Princeton’s gap year request deadline was?
Also just checked, the Harvard 2024 FB group dropped again today to 1286.
It’ll be interesting to see what happens now.
I am all for optimism, but I objectively wouldn’t put the probability of any one of us getting off above %5. They already accepted a wave of kids before, and I also heard from someone I know that they received a call (I shared that on this group about 1-2 weeks ago) and were admitted. Maybe the people who are getting pulled off just aren’t in this waitlist thread, and maybe they are really admitting some kids and we just don’t know it…
Either way, this will all be resolved within the next 2-3 weeks hopefully. This is a stressful time for a lot of us (especially those who are not particularly happy with the school they will end up going to if they are not admitted off of the H waitlist). I wish all of you the best. You are all clearly very accomplished and “admissible,” given that you have made it this far…
I wonder if this option is available to freshmen As well;
“Harvard Will Allow International Students to Study at Universities in Their Home Countries This Fall”
www.thecrimson.com/article/2020/7/18/international-students-enroll-local-universities/
I double checked on the H website and the study abroad option is only for returning students.
do we think there may be a wave tomorrow? I need to find somewhere to live for my current college if I don’t get into H, this is really stressful and I just want to know
@hwaitlist2024 - I really hope so! However, based on the above post by @waitlistedsenior it does not look good considering that Princeton and Yale both closed its waitlist. This is stressful! Let’s pray that there is a wave tomorrow and that we get off this roller coaster and into Cambridge.
Correct me if I am wrong. Princeton and Yale had gap year deadline of 15th of July or earlier and they closed their waitlist just yesterday so for H i think there is still time…may be
I heard that Dartmouth just closed its waitlist today.
Anyone hear anything?
International freshmen won’t be able to come to Boston in the fall because of visa issues. Insane!
www.thecrimson.com/article/2020/7/22/international-freshmen-fall/
Anyone heard back? Or are we in for another couple of weeks?
@myrfog Do you think this will affect waitlist movement? Or would Harvard (like what Yale said) use this to de-densify the campus even further?
@wait2024listh - Nothing (CA) 
Harvard might follow Yale’s plan to de-density campus but they also might not. Yale’s plans allowed for 60% of undergraduate students to come back whereas Harvard’s is more restrictive at 40%. Yale is welcoming more people to campus so they’re also more likely to lower the density than Harvard.
Harvard’s gap year deadline has been pushed to July 31st because of the issue with the international students. Looks like we won’t be hearing from them for a while.
Has the gap year deadline been pushed back to July 31st for all students or just for international?
Not entirely sure. Also, Cornell closed their waitlist today.