Hello, did you get any info on this Fall 2024 option? How does it work ? My son got the same and we can’t really figure the process of this ! Thanks.
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At my sons school - the top kids (on paper - you never know the actual essays etc) with (ACTs 35 & 36) , strong leadership, national prizes, very strong ECs - just like your son - were ALL waitlisted. Chicago accepted two only that were moderately less qualified (on paper at least) - one of them in fact struggling at school (dropped further maths)
Our advisor said that Chicago is paranoid with the yield game - they want to move up the ranks and yield is important - if they believe your son has a shot at other top colleges they dont want to risk loosing yield points…
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Nothing definitive but from reading old threads it looks like UChicago does start accepting students off the waitlist for the current year as well as the next year around the same time – mid April. My son opted not to check the waitlist box for Fall 2024.
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Yes my son was waitlisted. Offered to waitlist or consider the following option whatever this is. How does one even know when you’d receive an offer for class of 2028?
If the University is unable to offer you a place in Class of 2027 (to begin classes in the fall of 2023), would you like to be considered for a place in the Class of 2028 (to begin classes in the fall of 2024) after taking a gap year?
daughter RD waitlisted too. CS major, ACT 35, 12 APs (mostly STEM), 3.96UW/4.55W, swimming team, debate team, college CS research experience, volunteer of teaching girls to code, summer job as a CS tutor. UChicago is her favorite school too. Not sure when UChicago starts accepting students off the waitlist this year.
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I bet you can call them and offer to commit prior to Ivy day?
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daughter has sent LOCI to the regional counselor of UChicago. not sure how they will respond. fingers crossed. by the way, just learned from this board that UChicago is very serious about yield protection. I have younger kids. may consider ED or EA for UChicago when they apply.
Yes, my son is there now and had to do ED2. I hope it works out for you! Not sure how their waitlist moves these days but continuing to show interest likely helps. Good luck.
Privateschool, that is a really good idea …. like a personal ED III.
If any T20 university would consider it, it would be UChicago.
Maybe UChicago would have a way to have AKE8 and their child sign the EDII commitment form.
AKE8, I apologize if you already understand this, but just to clarify for you for your younger children … EA offers virtually no advantage over RD regarding admissions chances at UChicago.
UChicago handles admissions a little differently than most T20 universities. You have to apply EDI or EDII to have a decent chance of acceptance. The acceptance rate for both EA and RD is extremely low … like 2-3%. Combining EA/RD with EDI/II, the acceptance rate is under 6%, so you can see that removing the higher ED acceptance rates from the equation, the EA/RD rate is really, really low.
ED applications are the way UChicago fills the majority of their class each year. Nobody (or at least very few people) knows the exact percentage of each UChicago class that is EDI/II versus EA/RD, but the percentage of the class that is ED is definitely higher than almost any other university. Many T20 universities are now around 50% ED, but I think UChicago is much higher, probably somewhere in the 65-80% range. My daughter was accepted ED this year.
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Chancellor, do you have any speculation as to why UChicago may like ED applicants more than its peers do?
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This is why those of us who don’t qualify for financial aid yet cannot afford UChicago (so-called “donut hole” families) can’t apply. Seems like a neat school, though!
Thanks for your message @eweaver. I am personally disappointed with the waitlist decision as a parent (even though he is unconcerned!). In addition to strong scores/ranks, he has the highest known academic rigor in his school district (per his counselor). He chose not to graduate early, instead focused on taking nearly 18 (DE) college level classes at our flagship college in addition to 7-8 APs. Not a single class with anything less than an A.
He is humble, has decent LoRs, EC, holds a job part time, besides being at top of his academic game. Not at all sure what else he could have done. I could teach him to walk on water, if I could, but I don’t know how! Anyhow, keeping fingers crossed for a better outcome elsewhere.
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I will be very surprised if he does not have better outcomes at similarly-ranked schools later this month…Chicago cares a LOT about yield as evidenced by the three early rounds as well as past results. Previous threads here and elsewhere seem to support it repeatedly . It is a top school and they take very top candidates, but there is a certain sliver of top candidates they Waitlist especially RD.
Unfortunately in the climate of holistic admissions, pure academic brilliance is simply lost in T20 schools. There’s simply not a place for super bright students, who does not stand out in other soft factors (leadership, essays and such). Why wouldn’t Chicago or other T20 school risk yield to offer admission to these standouts? I fully expect similar results from other 3 schools he has applied, likely will go to the flagship school and graduate early.
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Not that it is any consolation but we know quite a few students with similar profiles to your son - super bright (perfect stats) applicants, who were rejected during EA (could be seen as yield protection) and ED2 (binding, so not due to yield protection), so who knows. They were each told that they didn’t “fill the bucket” UChicago was hoping to fill when creating this class. I think there are just too many qualified candidates and year to year it is unclear what the school is looking for, exactly.
Your son sounds like the kind of student who will make the most out of his college experience and (more importantly) will change the world 
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ChancellorGH, thanks for sharing your thoughts. Given the extremely low acceptance rate of EA and RD, my daughter is so lucky to earn a seat in UChicago’s waitlist as an RD applicant. Congratulations to your daughter!
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Similar profile here but a high high level of ECs. So frustrating.
Institutional priorities shift from year to year. Marching band’s tuba player graduates, and you play tuba in a marching band? It’s your lucky day. When we visited Amherst, the admissions counselor literally asked if anyone in the info session was from North Dakota as that was the one state they did not have representation from. I guess if you applied from North Dakota and were academically in the range, you had a leg up at Amherst this year. Here are some of my best guesses of what they are looking for based on my small, unscientific sample (kids I have taught, plus my own two kids): UChicago emphasizes that their core is important, so if you signal a good fit with the curriculum model, that probably helps. I think they care a lot about the essays, too (not sure about the videos) – I think having a distinct voice is something they respond to, based on what I have gathered from all the kids I have met so far who go there. If you demonstrate that you live the “life of the mind” (whatever that means to you) already, that also probably helps. Most of the kids we know at UChi really geek out about learning. As a teacher, my students who have gone there have been the kids who actually parse whether a hot dog is a sandwich, just for the fun of it. They have a “type” at UChicago, and it is not always the kids with 1600 SAT, 36 ACT, a million APs and a stratospheric GPA - very often it IS, but not always. Sometimes, they want the kid who comes to class with his shirt misbuttoned because he is thinking about the multiverse; that kid may stink at French, but is a prodigy in math (actual kid I taught). Stats are never the whole picture at places like these, not just UChi. I had a student denied at Vassar ED three years ago who was accepted RD at Yale. It won’t ever make sense if you look at stats alone. Signed - been teaching juniors and seniors a very long time (and reading their college essays).
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Edited to add: kids with great stats almost always land someplace wonderful and do really well. I have no doubt they could have accepted anyone on this thread and they would thrive at UChicago. They always say at many of these highly selective schools that they could fill the class many times over, many different ways. So, it is ultimately a bit of a mystery. Whatever fillng the bucket means in this cycle, it may mean something different the next cycle or something different in a comparably selective school. The bucket itself is not evaluative of intellect, worth or promise. As I tell all of my students, you are no more nor less amazing no matter what the letter says. And I don’t just tell them that, I mean it. 
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