A likely is issued to a kid who is considered one of the top or desirable applicants to the school for whatever reason. The school has determined that they are really interested in having that person attend their school but don’t believe sending a letter with all others does not show enough interest in recruiting that person.
I am not entirely certain what parameters Penn uses. I have seen Columbia send them to their named scholars (they suggest the letters are issued to those they deem top 5% or so of their expected admittees as deemed by their reviewers).
I remember there was a kid who won the Intel 100k prize in March in 2012 who received a likely from every school where his application was pending.
No, I understand what the letter is. I just don’t see how getting a letter would convince someone to want to go to the school. Ultimately, you are getting the same acceptance as everyone else, you are getting no benefits. So why would this persuade you to go to the school…?
It’s supposed to let the applicant know that the school thinks he or she is really special (i.e., appreciated), and to get him or her used to the idea of being accepted to–and therefore possibly attending–the school a few weeks before the rest of the acceptance letters are received. Personally, I think it’s kind of silly, but the Ivies and other selective schools have been sending them out for decades.
@JamesJunkers “I just don’t see how getting a letter would convince someone to want to go to the school. Ultimately, you are getting the same acceptance as everyone else, you are getting no benefits. So why would this persuade you to go to the school…?”
For cross admits, there is a big scramble to attend multiple admitted student days events in a very limited amount of time before they have to choose a school. I my DD’s case, she was only able to attend two of them and had to take a week off from school to do that. When a school sends a likely letter, often they also send and invitation to their admitted student days and as the student to sign up and book their flight. If the student does that and only has time to attend two of these events, then the school has improved the chance that you will choose them because they know that most students choose one of the schools whose admitted student days they attend.
@jamesjunkers: you also have to remember that LLs were originally used by the Ivies + MIT (and some other LACs) to keep themselves in the running for highly recruited athletes. Just this past week, was the “national signing day” (it’s a fiasco, IMHO). Athletes and their families could better resist committing to a school that was showering them with attention and scholarship money if they had a commitment from Penn or Yale or Harvard that a spot was awaiting them once April 1st rolled around.
By joint Ivy agreement, formal “accepts” could only happen in the EA/ED round and on “Ivy Day” (end of March). The LLs were invented as a way to abide by the joint-Ivy agreement yet not lose out coveted athletes to rival colleges, not bound by the agreement.
@T26E4, yep. I originally thought likely letters were only for athletes, for that reason. That’s why news of some non athletes getting letters originally confused me
Has anyone been contacted by KWH? I have been sent a vague email for “prospective students” last fall, but have not been contacted since.
Did they send this email to everyone? How do they choose who to email? Do they get to review the actual common application?
@Lanie49: last fall? Did you apply ED? Anyway, it KWH recommends you, you’ll get an email stating you’re candidate of significant interest. My friend got it last year. Idk, it seems like the email you got was promotional
@BetterThanBest I applied RD. It was just a very impersonal email to “prospective students”
I can show you a screen shot of the email but I don’t know how to upload pics.
And yeah I’m sure it was promotional, but I’m just wondering why they chose to email me. (Like obviously this email isn’t speical but I never contacted them before so why am I even on their list?)
@Lanie49: Have you been on their mailing list? you may have expressed an interest in Writing there. If not, maybe you participated in a writing competiton and they got your email from there. @DL43516: some time around feb 6-7
@BetterThanBest I did not contact them, express interest, or participate in anything writing related. I didn’t even know they existed prior to them emailing me. I did visit penn(tour) and sent my SAT score to them. Maybe that’s it?
Here’s the email I got in October 2014:
Hello from the Kelly Writers House!
If you are receiving this message, you are on our list of prospective students for Penn’s class of 2019. As you know, we at the Kelly Writers House care a great deal about recruiting strong writers to the Penn community. I’m writing now to ask you to complete a brief survey which will help us understand your interest in Penn as it relates to our program.
@collegeapps2k14 no, lol, in October I didn’t even start my common app. The only times when I have ever “contacted” or “showed interest” in Penn is when I sent them my sat scores in 2013 and visited summer 2014.
@BetterThanBest yeah that’s what I’m guessing, but penn only had my first SAT score (at that time in October) and that was from my 2013 test when my CR score was a 670(lol- I doubt they would have found this appealing ) and my friends that have sent them scores (with the same writing score as me and better CR scores ) didn’t get the email.
@Tiberium Hey again… do you mean that this page: http://www.admissions.upenn.edu/likely/ had a likely video for the class of 2019 on February 6th? If that is what you mean it was most likely a test or something