<p>Two of my senior friends have recently been taken off the waitlist. One of them goes to my school, another a neighboring school. The one that goes to my school was accepted into Duke and is going there for biomedical engineering. He thinks it's because the only senior accepted to Duke this year from my school chose UChicago over Duke, but hey, he's off the waiting list!</p>
<p>My other friend recently got off the waitlist for WashU and Chapel Hill.</p>
<p>My question is, as a clueless sophomore, why did they call them back so late? The latter friend had already committed to the Ohio State University before WashU and Chapel Hill called him up. Wouldn't it just be more of a hassle for the now-acceptee?</p>
<p>Most schools required deposits for admission on May 1. I guess it’s not until then that they really have a solid idea of what their Freshman class numbers are going to look like.</p>
<p>Those students haven’t really “committed” much unless they applied early decision.</p>
<p>If you apply early decision and you are accepted, you’re expected to withdraw all your applications to other colleges and universities, so there couldn’t be a wait-list issue.</p>
<p>Here’s the timetable for most of college admissions. Regular decision applications are due some time between Jan. 1 and early Feb. Colleges make their decisions and notify applicants (“accepted,” “denied” or “wait list” ) by April 1. Students then have until May 1 to accept a college’s offer of admission and send a non-refundable deposit, and also to accept a spot on other colleges’ wait lists. After May 1, when all of the accepted students have notified colleges whether they will or won’t attend, many colleges turn to their wait lists to fill remaining spots in their freshman class. But notice that this can’t happen until May. </p>
<p>Then, sometimes there’s kind of a cascade effect. Say you’ve accepted an offer from My Back Yard State U. You really wanted to go to State Flagship U., but you got wait listed there. Your friend wanted to go to Prestigious Private U., but she got wait listed there, so she accepted an offer of admission from State Flagship and simultaneously accepted a place on PPU’s wait list. After May 1, it turns out that Prestigious Private didn’t admit enough students to fill its freshman class, so they accept your friend off their wait list. That creates an opening at Flagship, when there didn’t used to be one, so they invite you to join their freshman class. You accept that invitation, and now there’s a new vacancy at My Back Yard State. And so on… It can take weeks before everything settles down.</p>
<p>As for the “commitment” these students make when they send their deposits: it’s a few hundred dollars. But that’s it. Colleges know that they may lose some students who’ve deposited when those students are accepted elsewhere from wait lists. Colleges call that “melt,” and it happens every year. As for the students, the only commitment they’ve made is that they agree to forfeit the deposit they’ve paid if they don’t enroll for any reason–including getting into another university or college off its wait list.</p>
<p>As Sikorsky correctly described above, it is a bit like a game of musical chairs. Pretty much every student places a deposit to make sure they have a “chair” by May 1. Then the schools take a look and see if all of their spots are filled. Prior to that they are guessing at how many students will accept their offers of admissions. If too few students accepted them and they have some extra slots, then they offer those to waitlist students. Not everyone on the waitlist will choose to attend if offered, though… maybe the student changed their mind, or never did intend to go anyway, or the financial aid offer is not good enough. That can take a week or two for a decision, then the school would still have an open slot to offer someone else if they are turned down by the waitlist candidate. And as Sikorski also pointed out, there is a cascade effect. A student who takes an offered waitlist spot may then open up a spot at the school where they originally deposited, assuming that school is not overenrolled.</p>
<p>And sometimes students back out of their original commitment for other reasons. Cold feet, change in financial situation, health issues. So that can also open up spots. Usually colleges will let everyone on the waitlist know when they are “done” with the waitlist and won’t be accepting more students.</p>