<p>My best friend applied EA to Stanford. She got two letters from Stanford (Accepted and Deferred). When she called to which one the decision was, they said deferred. They said that they had her under both letters because she was in between due to her financial situation. If they take her, they would've had to given her a full ride. So they deferred her on that basis.</p>
<p>Now this is from the Collegeboard website quoting Stanford:</p>
<p>"We are committed to providing a comprehensive, need-based financial aid program that makes it financially possible for admitted students to attend Stanford. Our admission program is need-blind for all, but some international applicants. Our financial aid program is need-based; aid is awarded based on demonstrated financial need.</p>
<p>How does a top school like Stanford expect integrity out of its applicants when the school itself is lying?</p>
<p>Stanford was one of my top choices but this is Ridiculous. Comment? I kinda want to take the admission office down in a bulldozer right now.</p>
<p>Is your friend an international? If not, I don’t believe this. </p>
<p>First of all, I doubt that Stanford would be so careless as to send out two different decisions, much less so tactless that they refused to honor the better one in such a marginal case. Why would they put borderline cases on both lists, anyway? Even temporarily, that doesn’t make much sense.</p>
<p>Second of all, Stanford wouldn’t violate their own policy, especially since they have no reason to; financial aid is a small part of their overall budget, and the money they have allocated for it hasn’t been lessened with the endowment drop. Plus, their FA office has no connection to their admissions office, and packages aren’t calculated until after the decision is made anyway, so the admissions officers wouldn’t even know your friend’s income. Even if, by some strange conspiracy, your friend really was deferred for financial reasons, they wouldn’t be stupid enough to tell him/her outright.</p>
<p>Finally… Well, to be honest, you really don’t have any credibility, since you just joined to post this. And even if you are sincere, you have to consider the possibility that your friend misinterpreted the situation.</p>
<p>No, she is not international. She turned all her financial information on time. But she is an independent child (ward of the court) so a lot of court papers to deal with.</p>
<p>@Starmie I can’t believe they did that either. Even if they did defer her on that basis they should have at least done a better job covering up. All the information came from the person at the admissions office on her call. She’s my best friend and wouldn’t lie to me. I was on the phone with her when she was opening the email. I’m just mad right now because she was So happy when she got the acceptance email then called me again and told me she got a second one that says Deferred… Then all that other mess.</p>
<p>About the credibility deal, I’ve been on this site for three years with around 300 posts. If you want I can PM you from the other account. I created this because some people at my school know me with the other account and they can guess her identity.</p>
<p>(Sorry for the long post)</p>
<p>@Adrenaline I’ve considered that but I wouldn’t do it if your parents can’t pay for it (think about it for your parents who would have the burden of paying the ridiculous tuition for 4 years when they can’t.). However I did notice that for the schools I applied early, there’s two deadlines for financial forms, one for early and one for regular. There’s no reason for them to have two (MIT is the only one that has one FA deadline). Besides, enough people do get in who also applied to FA. (I’m not sure on the Internationals though =\ ).</p>
<p>I’m going to have to agree with Starmie on this one. If you are sure that is the situation, so be it, but I highly doubt Stanford would be so careless. Decision emails are sent out in an automated system all at one time, so I have no idea how your friend would receive two emails back to back.</p>
<p>This is a good example of why I recommend young people don’t look at the discussion section of CC. You simply can not believe anything on it. I don’t believe this story for a second. There is no way an admissions officer would say something like this. Either the OP is full of it or he is not getting a true story from the person he is talking about. No way this happened.</p>
<p>Cardfan–you don’t have to believe it. If you don’t recommend people be on the discussion, then you should also avoid it and stop going on.
It really about how the OP and the friend feels. It wasn’t an email so technical error can’t be the one to blame. Most likely its due to human error when they sent out the packages. Unless the OP really has no life and decides to waste his/her time writing so much just to be a ■■■■■, there must be some truth to the story (note: it might not all be true).</p>
<p>no one at stanford would be so careless to say that over the phone. quite honestly, the employee would probably be fired if his/her boss found out.</p>
<p>if this did actually happen, im pretty sure she could make it a legal case for violating their own policies (but i would def not recommend it).</p>
<p>They gave me a full-ride. I’m just skeptical. If the OP insists the story is true, which is fine, I think there was probably a misunderstanding - especially if fueled by confusion or emotion.</p>
<p>General Obwanxo; you are another great example of why I recommend young people not read (or at least not believe everything they read) in the discussion section of CC.</p>
<p>It is unfortunate there are youngsters like gunit5 who want to believe every post by anonymous sources on an Internet message board where nothing can be verified.</p>
<p>I mean, I wouldn’t recommend against partaking in discussion boards, but it can take a keen eye, excellent reasoning skills, and the understanding that you will be fooled from time to time.</p>
<p>I think a solution is a rather obvious one. If this story is true, then your friend can simply call the admissions office, and ask why “They said that they had her under both letters because she was in between due to her financial situation.” provided that website states they are need-blind.</p>
<p>In retrospect I’m not sure why I posted. I know how ridiculous this sounds because it sounded ridiculous to me something like this happened or I wouldn’t be so angry I spilled it all to complete strangers.</p>
<p>@Alone She received two emails (this I can confirm). Called the office and that’s the reason they give (She had to push a little asking them why they sent the acceptance email as well). She did bring up the contradiction with Standford’s needblind policy but her financial need was hard to miss and she got deferred.</p>
<p>Obviously it’s possible to get in and get a full ride from financial aid. The thing was she isn’t the top of the top best students, just good enough. Almost quoting: she was on the verge of being accepted but they were hesitant because of her financial difficulties.</p>