@swampyankee
Congratulations! Glad it worked out for your son. Is he considering UMassA now, or has this experience taken it out of consideration?
So the waitlist is NOT an automatic denial after all. Congrats to your son.
And not yield protection for sure. Most wont go now anyway. So perhaps the thread can call it a wrap.
@swampyankee Did your son get CS as his major? Did he respond to the initial waitlist form right away?
Unfortunately my son did not respond to the waitlist form until a week ago (by choice not by accident) so he will probably not so he will likely not get in.
In the end it may have turned out to be a blessing–he was so stuck on going to Umass Amherst based on ‘best program for the price’ (which it really is), but getting the waitlist for EA made him/us really look into and compare other programs. He feels it may not have been the best fit for him–which I kind of felt all along & encouraged him to add to his list. He’s gotten into other schools that have smaller CS classes, which is more appealing to him. He also got a couple of “Likely Letters” & will find out for sure on those by end of month. He’s even considering a Liberal Arts college (shocker because he was not considering any as real choices as a CS major.)
So we shall see.
Sending you all good thoughts & good health.
(My older son is staying at Cornell, pretty much quarantined off campus, until the end of the semester. Ugh. I was really hoping that this next kid would be closer to home or at least in a more easily accessible college location!)
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Yes, accepted as a CS major. As for Waitlist, he only accepted about two weeks ago, after hearing from someone that he should because they may be accepting some students for EA/Waitlist. Kind of crazy when they tell you have until May to decide.
I would not give up hope. “According to a February 2020 study conducted by the Beijing Overseas Study Service Association (BOSSA), approximately 36% of students are changing their plans to study abroad because of the COVID-19 outbreak.” Forbes, 2/26/2020
I suspect that UMassA and many other public universities are recalculating expected yields from International students this year, in turn, making much more attractive some of those In-State applicants shunned in early rounds. In-state students have much higher yields.
I would also expect that they accept far more students of the Waitlist in May, when they ascertain the size of the enrollment hole left by non-enrolling International students.
[of course, I could be completely wrong!]
Thank you for the warm wishes you have expressed for my son.
As for your snarky comment, please allow me to provide you the data on which waitlist=denial statement was made.
In 2017, UMassA offered WL to 6736 applicants, and 44 were accepted (0.6%)
In 2018, UMassA offered WL to 6250 applicants, and 39 were accepted (0.6%)
In 2019, UMassA offered WL to 2188 applicants, and 0 were accepted (0.0000%)
For Contrast:
In 2019, UConn offered WL to 2027 applicants, and 502 were accepted (25.7%)
So, I remain completely comfortable with my original characterization that Waitlist at UMassA~Denial (i.e. >99.4% UMassA applicants who were waitlisted in past three years were ultimately denied admission).
Note: All data cited above come from UMassA and UConn’s Common Data Set publications.
If you think my comment was snarky, you are mistaken.
@swampyankee Bottom line, your son got in. I’m sorry it wasn’t immediate, but he can’t be alone. Sincere congrats to him. Is he going to UMass?
[quote=“NYCDadof2, post:127, topic:2080485”]
[quote=“swampyankee, post:126, topic:2080485”]
Thank you for the warm wishes you have expressed for my son.
As for your snarky comment, please allow me to provide you the data on which waitlist=denial statement was made.
In 2017, UMassA offered WL to 6736 applicants, and 44 were accepted (0.6%)
In 2018, UMassA offered WL to 6250 applicants, and 39 were accepted (0.6%)
In 2019, UMassA offered WL to 2188 applicants, and 0 were accepted (0.0000%)
For Contrast:
In 2019, UConn offered WL to 2027 applicants, and 502 were accepted (25.7%)
So, I remain completely comfortable with my original characterization that Waitlist at UMassA~Denial (i.e. >99.4% UMassA applicants who
I think that your comment was removed speaks for itself.
While incongruent with its recent history, UMassA appears to be in a posture to accept many more from WL THIS year.
I would encourage anyone who was offered WL and still sees UMassA as a great value, if not their dream school, to accept the WL offer.
You have nothing to lose, and you may actually get an affirmative
decision before your other deadlines, whether 5/1 or 6/1.
Good luck!
I didn’t remove any comment, nor were any of my comments removed. I don’t believe further discussion is productive.
Having done a little more research, I offer the following information
2019 (last year) Early Action (only) CICS-Admitted Student Statistics
Admission Offers from CICS
-425 (48% of admitted) from MA [MA]
-169 (19% of admitted) International [INT]
-291 (33% of admitted) US, not MA [OOS]
Mean ACT for Admitted CICS Students
-MA 33.7
-INT 31.0 (-2.7 compared to MA)
-OOS 33.4
Mean SAT of Admitted CICS Students
-MA 1469
-INT 1423 (-46 compared to MA)
-OOS 1461
Mean HS GPA
-MA 4.26
-INT 4.21
-OOS 4.17
Observation 1: Majority of EA-admitted CICS students in 2019 were NOT MA Residents
Observation 2: The “stat” hurdle for OOS and MA residents seem very similar.
Observation 3: The hurdle for INT students is lower (than MA and OOS applicants), especially with respect to standardized tests.
source?
I don’t know whether UMass’ predictive analytic models target certain proportions of in-state/OOS/Int’ls by major…but overall the yield on internationals and OOS students is much lower than for in-state students. So, they must admit a greater proportion of OOS/International students to reach their targeted proportion of these cohorts.
I am sure they look at that at the total university level, but not sure if they do that at the program and/or major level…but based on the numbers in post #131, it seems they do.
Direct request made for this dataset to Admissions.
I simply took the raw data provided and performed the analysis to aggregate and summarize.
It would be awesome if UMass would simply parse all admission and enrollment data by: In-State, Out-of-State, and International so that full transparency to this is offered without need for direct requests. Note, the current reporting practice pools INT and OOS in one category called OOS.
Below are the least quantitatively qualified INT students accepted to CS major. [If you are a MA who had better stats and were rejected from CICS, you have a right to be disappointed.]
Term HS GPA SAT ACT Sex Country UMass Decision
Fall 2019 3.8 1350 F Asia Accepted
Fall 2019 3.8 1250 M Asia Accepted
Fall 2019 4.1 1380 M Asia Accepted
Fall 2019 4.1 1300 M India Accepted
Fall 2019 4.1 1310 F India Accepted
Fall 2019 3.9 1320 M China Accepted
Fall 2019 4 1330 F China Accepted
Fall 2019 4 1330 M India Accepted
Fall 2019 4.1 1350 M India Accepted
Fall 2019 4.1 1360 M India Accepted
Fall 2019 3.9 1390 M China Accepted
Fall 2019 3.9 1390 M China Accepted
Fall 2019 4 1390 M China Accepted
Fall 2019 4.1 1400 M India Accepted
And here are some well qualified MA applicants who were Denied admission to CS. I really feel for people on this list.
Term HS GPA SAT ACT Sex State
Fall 2019 3.7 1500 M MA
Fall 2019 3.7 1490 F MA
Fall 2019 3.8 1450 32 M MA
Fall 2019 3.8 1450 M MA
Fall 2019 4 1430 M MA
Fall 2019 3.8 1430 M MA
Fall 2019 3.7 1430 M MA
Fall 2019 3.9 1420 M MA
Fall 2019 3.8 1420 M MA
Fall 2019 3.9 1400 M MA
Fall 2019 3.8 1400 M MA
Fall 2019 3.7 1400 M MA
Fall 2019 3.7 1400 M MA
Fall 2019 4.1 1390 M MA
Fall 2019 3.8 1390 F MA
Fall 2019 4 1380 M MA
Fall 2019 3.8 1380 M MA
Fall 2019 3.7 1380 M MA
Fall 2019 4.1 1370 F MA
Fall 2019 4.1 1370 29 M MA
Fall 2019 4.1 1370 M MA
Fall 2019 4.1 1370 M MA
Fall 2019 3.8 1370 M MA
Fall 2019 3.7 1370 M MA
Fall 2019 3.9 1360 M MA
Does UMass recalculate GPAs? If so how?
Obviously that would impact this data and any analysis of it. I expect they don’t do any recalculations, and only use what is on transcripts, which is highly variable…not only in the US, but internationally as well.
@Mwfan1921 UMass does recalculate GPA. Described on p12 here…
https://www.mass.edu/shared/documents/admissions/admissionsstandards.pdf
- To calculate a weighted GPA, individuals must convert each final grade earned in college preparatory courses to a 4-point grading scale (where “A”=4.0; “B”=3.0; “C”=2.0; “D”=1.0 and “F”=0.0). A chart is provided with these materials so that letter or numeric grades may be converted. Further, each course must be identified as college preparatory, honors level, or Advanced Placement. Descriptions of these course levels are provided to assist with proper identification of courses. Full-year honors level and Advanced Placement courses will receive an extra .5 and 1.0 points on the 4-point scale, respectively. A dual enrollment course will receive an extra 1.0 point on the 4- point scale.*
Note that it only takes college prep (academic) courses. No music, art, etc.
This is for the entire UMass system.
Thanks. Helpful, but doesn’t address how they recalculate international students’ GPAs, but regardless they must do that somehow based on the above.
What we don’t know is all of the other application components and their details. For example, we don’t know course detail here…maybe the denied US students don’t have AP Calc BC and all the internationals do, just to take one example. All the international students are probably full pay too.
And in any case, the enrolled balance is likely to dramatically shift for the next year or two.