<p>@ninadasiy Yup, and there’s no interim screens, so the decision pops up as soon as you log in.</p>
<p>Thank you @erik1125e that is very helpful to know! </p>
<p>Well I’m going to cancel me join request to that facebook page then. Not worth it.</p>
<p>I just received an e-mail from my interviewer even though I contacted Princeton earlier today and they told me that the deadline for interviews for early action has already passed. Could this be indicative of deferral? </p>
<p>@erik1125e In response to your question, I definitely feel like my extracurriculars are the shining part of my application! They align heavily with my intended major, and are quite unique. My essays could have been more polished, but overall I’m satisfied with them.</p>
<p>I feel ambivalent about my stats. I’m really really happy about my SAT and AP scores. My main concern is my unweighted GPA, which isn’t bad, but it’s slightly lower than the GPAs of people who’ve gotten in from my school. Oh and also the fact that I’ve never taken physics in high school will probably count against me (but I have taken AP Chem and AP Calc and I’m not majoring in anything even remotely related to STEM so hopefully they’ll overlook this fact??) Sometimes I’m a tense ball of stress and nervousness, reflecting on everything I’ve done “wrong” in high school!</p>
<p>@LukeBK I didn’t get a confirmation of tax either, just a return fax confirmation</p>
<p>@darkandrasberry You might get deferred – but likely it has nothing to do w/the interviewer contacting you. You were probably missed or on someone’s list who couldn’t/wouldn’t contact you and you were re-assigned. Late reports are better than no reports. Just relax – there’s nothing to be deciphered about this. I just finished two last minute interviews that were handed to me b/c others couldn’t finish them. My school’s deadline was Dec 1 as well. But we all got a friendly email saying to get the last ones in even though the deadline has passed.</p>
<p>So committee has already convened and started discussing applicants by now? I’m like dying to know what’s going on in there right now! D: Sigh. Two weeks, guys. </p>
<p>@darkandrasberry just finished my interview a few minutes ago, he said that the interview report would be on time to be considered for early action. </p>
<p>@emenya Return fax confirmation? Does that mean you send your tax forms by fax, and after they received it, they confirmed receipt for you?</p>
<p>Does anyone one know what the readers look for in the first round? Is it simply a quantitative filter?</p>
<p>I don’t think so…there was a post a few pages back, I think by @Ambitious19 (she knows a lot more about this than I do) that said that readers look at quantitative stats, rec letters, and essays and give a score. The highest-scoring apps are then passed on to committee.</p>
<p>@ambitious19 where did you gain all of your insight on the process?</p>
<p>I am new to this thread but as an SCEA candidate am very interested in several of the topics raised. The most consistent threads seem to be about the significance of the interview, the deeper meaning of a request for additional financial information, and the selection criteria to make it into committee. </p>
<p>I submitted my early app on 10/15. I was contacted by my interviewer a couple of weeks later and interviewed via Skype about a month after I submitted my app. The interview was engaging, reciprocal and very pleasant. I don’t get the feeling the interview means all that much, at least not as a positive factor (if you blow it, I think it counts against you), but I would rather have had one than not. The one thing that struck me, however, is that my interviewer is based several hundred miles from me; hence the Skype interview. If there were no readily available alums in my geographic area, why set me up with someone several States away?</p>
<p>I sent in Princeton’s financial aid form (and doubled-down with a CSS Profile) with my app. I don’t recall seeing an upload link or request for my parents’ 2013 returns. I received a request from Princeton via personal email about a week ago requesting my parents’ 2013 returns as well as W2s. Considering that this was just prior to when applications are presumably going into committee, I am taking this as a good sign. Even trusting (as has turned out to be misplaced with several Midwestern universities) Princeton’s need blind policy, I think all ethical bets are (naturally) off once an applicant is stamped for rejection. I think it would be grossly inefficient and wasteful of resources for Princeton or any other major undergraduate institution to have its financial aid division review every single of upwards of 20,000 applications for financial aid despite the fact that many of these have already been marked for rejection. As I note, there is no ethical reason to maintain the Chinese Wall between finance and admissions once a student is marked for rejection.</p>
<p>As for criteria, I think it is naive to believe admissions go far outside the classic GPA-Boards-Rigorous Curriculum triumvirate in the early rounds. This after all is their bread and butter, their consistent go-to, and the PR they trot out to prospective students and donors. While there may be exceptions, I think you really have to make the first cut, perhaps even into committee, before the more ‘human’ elements of your application, e.g., personal essay, extra-curriculars, and personal traits come into play. This said, I actually believe that the personal essay has much greater wait at PU than at most schools. While almost every elite college now requires a freshman writing seminar, Princeton touts the Senior Thesis which requires writing at the highest skill levels. I think the personal essay gives them an indication of the potential a prospective student has to swing this heavy project which I understand can dominate in upperclassmen years.</p>
<p>Otherwise, I sit at my desk, glancing longingly at my PC, knowing it offers me nothing for the next couple of weeks but desperately wishing time to move faster and for good news to follow. Good luck all!</p>
<p>For the weeding out process, see <a href=“http://www.collegeconfidential.com/academic_index_calculator/”>http://www.collegeconfidential.com/academic_index_calculator/</a></p>
<p>Thanks @jacknophat. Think this confirms what I wrote in my criteria paragraph, no?</p>
<p>@BrooklynRye: That was a very thoughtful post. I agree with you a lot because ultimately these are academic institutions and they need you to be able to handle their classes when you get there. For normal applicants the stats matter the most. When the stats are identical, essays, ECs, leadership, awards etc will be used as tie breakers. They like to say that the admissions is holistic simply to avoid lawsuits. Also this allows them to admit athletes and developmental admits with not so stellar stats.</p>
<p>My other question was, if you come from a school that regularly sends at least one to maximum 8 students to Princeton every year, will they change that policy and not admit anyone this year. </p>
<p>I come from a fairly average-rated high school. Through Naviance, I am able to track annual admissions rates for the past decade. The pattern seems to be that where our high school has tended to be strong, it remains so over an extended period of time. Leaving aside State and local colleges, and focusing on elite private schools, where our school is ‘strong’ it tends to get in 1-2 students/year. We have no track record worth speaking about when it comes to the elite Ivies – Princeton, Harvard and Yale. We do well at Cornell in particular (I applied there RD). We have had little success at Columbia, but do passing well at Penn, Dartmouth and Brown; depends on the year.</p>
<p>As can be seen with elite private schools, relationships between school administrators and guidance staff with admissions officers is often key. I’m sure that there are slots for students from Dalton, Choate and the like. Not so for lesser-known public high schools. But relationships do change and recent breakthroughs by guidance at our high school came to fruition in new admissions at Washington U in St. Louis, Vanderbilt and Emory. Baby steps…</p>
<p>Official notification December 15th! </p>
<p>Dec 15 at 3 est! I can’t wait that long</p>