The waiting is so stressful… still haven’t seen any nursing students accepted here
I’m sure people mentioned in the thread but I don’t have time to re-read all comments, are decisions sent by email with an update to the student application page? Or are they sent by mail? Is there a pattern to the time when things are being sent if by email? BTW, my S is in-state applied to Isenberg…waiting!
@mytwobuoys Sent through email when accepted/denied, no mail is sent. No pattern but keep your email open after like 4 because that seems to be when people find out
Thanks @lacobus, that’s helpful info.
I called yesterday and they said a decision has been made but I have yet to find out I applied to comp sci major
Has anyone heard back yet today?
@Irivkid Wait they already made a decision and haven’t sent it out yet?
@lacobus the engineering college is quite competitive. I think it is the fourth competitive school after nursing, business, and comp sci (in that order). The acceptance rate is somewhere in the 30-35% and I think on their website it had their stats saying that the avg SAT score is 1320 and GPA is 4.0 and they admitted a little under 400 kids last year
So nothing today?
@leapyearG Nope- not yet, really hoping they are coming out though
they normally come out 430ish… still a window…
I can’t be the only one who’s on edge around 4:30 every day, right?! I’ll be refreshing the portal like crazy until I get a decision LOL
Same!!! So nervous
UMass-Amherst admissions demystified a bit.
I toured UMass today with my son today and was able to talk with one of the admissions people at some length and got some insight into the process.
They have about 19,000 this year applying via early admissions.
Unweighted GPA for admission will be 3.9 for most majors and the competitive ones (C.S., engineering, business) is a 4.0 Nursing of course is a 4.0+ since they have about 2,000 applicants for 64 spots.
Avg SAT 1280 for most majors, 1320 for the most competitive majors.
They have a surprisingly small staff to process this huge number, about a baker’s dozen full-time admissions people with five additional staff brought in to help. So 18 people have to go through 19,000 applications. Each person goes through about 40 per day. Quick math means it takes about 5-6 weeks to go through them all. You get about ten minutes to impress. That’s why good essays are important, if you’re on the bubble it can make or break you. Of course they also look at your extracurriculars as well in deciding. It’s holistic, but pretty competitive.
They process them in batches in no particular order. Probably so there’s no “How come engineering always go first?” complaints. There’s probably other rationale too, for example perhaps some Dean’s are a little slower than others in determining the guidelines for admission to their schools for this year’s incoming class. But for whatever reason that’s how they do it. So don’t read anything into how the notifications come out. Because someone else got notified at this point and you didn’t means nothing.
The only thing they purposely do is wait to release the bad news until after Christmas so they don’t rain on the holiday.
The same process is repeated for the normal deadline.
So that’s it. They are hard at work going through the applications and by mid-January you’ll know if you made it. So be patient and good luck!
Thanks for the info. Although waiting on the bad news doesnt sound great as my son applied on Oct 8 and has not heard although he is above the average for Nursing
Not sure how you can get about a 4.0 unweighted in Nursing - must be a mistake?? Schools are all on a 4.0 scale and then one goes to the weighting. At least that is what we were told by UMass rep and were given their “cheat” sheet on figuring out how they look at your unweighted GPA and weight it to their criteria.
Is anyone else finding that EA is really competitive this year? Three years ago it was the way to go - I think the new “In” thing to do is to have your child apply EA as everyone is getting deferred and all the schools are saying its their “biggest” year yet for applicants in their EA pool!! (UMass and also Villanova etc)
@UMLalum Thanks for the information!!! 
Just wondering if they told you how many batches come out or the spacing between them- really hoping for a few more batches to come out before Christmas.
Oh - and they are not doing anyone a favor for waiting til after Christmas for the bad news - please let the kids know beforehand so they can then spend their vacation regrouping and perhaps applying to some other schools while they have the free vacation time!!!
People from my school (in state) started getting acceptances at 5pm today. Still haven’t gotten mine, but keep refreshing those emails!
Accepted!
1340 SAT
3.6 GPA (I have no idea what that is on UMass’s scale lol it’s prob around a 3.9)
Chancellor’s Award w/ $10,000 a year