<p>Does anyone know how many prospective students were actually placed on the select waitlist?</p>
<p>I am wondering why the chances are slim for getting in Fall 2008 off the SWL. I am sure many students apply and then decide to other schools especially if they get in one of the Ivies. Unless admissions has it down to an exact science (maybe they do), there has to be some vacancies, I would think. </p>
<p>Those return postcards were pretty small - what of they get lost in the mail?</p>
<p>The reason so few get in off the waitlist is because they have already over accepted students to consider the fact that not all attend. They will accept say around 4000 students to enroll 1000. So if more than 3000 decline, then they take from the waitlist.</p>
<p>admissions offices are usually very good at knowing how many to admit in order to get their desired class size -- its part of their job. sometimes they mess up and then you hear horror stories about a huge freshman class with overcrowding (i think a couple of years ago syracuse ended up with a few hundred too many freshman) but that is the exception. the wait list is their protection against having too small a freshman class.</p>
<p>here's link to 2006-07 common data set <a href="http://www.geneseo.edu/%7Eiresearch/CommonDataSet2005-2006.pdf%5B/url%5D">http://www.geneseo.edu/~iresearch/CommonDataSet2005-2006.pdf</a>
(the 2007-08 doesn't seem to be online yet; the link name says 2005-06, but the document you link to says 2006-07)..</p>
<p>Look at section C2 of the common data set -- over 2400 students were offered spots on the waiting list -- 23 were admitted.</p>
<p>Thanks for your replies.</p>
<p>iamhere, that was a great ref link. It explains a lot and the stats are quite revealing. :)</p>
<p>common data sets provide great info -- and since its a standard form, it makes it easy to compare stats among different schools.
many, though not all, schools post them somewhere on their website -- just use their search function and look for "common data set"</p>