I posted something about this before. I’ve updated it some.
This all based on my observations over the past 6 years. I have NO inside information.
Once the applications are in, what actually happens to them?
As you know, UMD uses one application for everything.(Honors College, Scholars Program, and All Merit Scholarships). There are No additional applications or essays required for any of that.
Here what they do, as I understand it.
- Review by the University of Maryland College Park Admissions Committee
UMD will get a lot of priority application this year. (I don’t know how many Priority ones, but probably 35,000 total applications, Priority and RD). This first admissions committee reviews them and makes one of 3 decisions
a. Denied Admission
b. Admitted for Fall 2019
c, Admitted for Spring 2020
They do NOT make any decisions about Honors College admission, Scholars Program admission, or admission to Limited Enrollment Program (LEP) majors.
They will end up accepting maybe half of the students who applied (I have not been able to find good numbers on this). This is Priority applicants only, not RD applicants
2A. Review by the Honors College Admissions Committee
This committee will do a Holistic Evaluation of the applications admitted for Fall 2019 and reach one of 2 decisions.
a. Admitted into the Honors College.
b. Not Admitted into the Honors College.
High STATs alone are NOT sufficient for admission (although Honors College students do tend to have high STATS). Essays, LORs. Short Answers, ECs, and course rigor are all a part of this decision. Desired Major is NOT a factor in the decision.
I don’t know if All “Admitted for Fall 2019” applications are reviewed, or if there is some screening process to reduce the number.
Students will only be informed of accepted decisions, when the decisions are released.
3 (I’ll get to 2B further on) Review by the Scholars Program Admissions Committee
This committee will do a Holistic Evaluation of the applications reviewed by the Honors College AdComms, but NOT admitted into the Honors College and reach one of 2 decisions.
a. Admitted into the Scholars Program.
b. Not Admitted into the Scholars Program.
High STATs alone are NOT sufficient for admission (sometime a given student will actually have higher STATS than someone else admitted into Honors). Essays, LORs. Short Answers, ECs, and course rigor are all a part of this decision. Desired Major is NOT a factor in the decision.
2B. Review by the appropriate Limited Enrollment Program Admissions Committee
There is actually a separate admission committee for each LEP. There are currently 9 LEP majors: Business, Biological Sciences, Biochemistry, Chemistry and Environmental Sciences and Policy-Biodiversity and Conservation (counts as 1), Communication, Criminology and Criminal Justice (1), Engineering, Government and Politics (1), Journalism, Psychology and Computer Science (for the first time). I think these reviews are done in parallel with Honors/Scholars reviews. I could be wrong.
They are LEPs because UMD literally does NOT have the resources (classroom, labs, professors) to teach all of the students that want that particular major. For example, consider the following FAQ from the Clark School of Engineering:
“Why would I be listed as a “Letters and Sciences” student if I applied to be an Engineering major?
The Clark School of Engineering receives approximately 3,000 applications each year from talented students who have been admitted to the University of Maryland. Engineering is a Limited Enrollment Program (LEP), and due to class size restrictions and other resource limitations, is not able to admit every student who applies to be an Engineering major as a freshman. As such, the Clark School will typically only admit between 1,700 and 1,800 students each year as direct freshmen admits.”
That is 3,000 who selected Engineering as a major out of those admitted to UMD (Review #1).
It’s the same with all the other LEPs. The numbers will be different, but the same concept applies. X number apply for the LEP. Y spaces are available. X is ALWAYS greater than Y. There are always some who are not admitted.
What do the LEP AdComs look for? Each one is probably different. I suspect that Engineering looks for engineering potential, motivation, ECs, but I don’t really know. I do know that every year about 1,200 applicants who get into UMD do NOT get into Engineering as their desired major. The other LEP decisions have similar outcomes.
I also know that the LEP AdComs do NOT consider the decisions made by the Honors College and Scholars Program AdComs.
The LEP AdComms reach one of 2 decisions
a. Admitted into the LEP.
b. Not Admitted into the LEP (in this case, the applicant is put in Letters and Sciences)
So the possible combination of all results are:
- Denied Admission
- Admitted to UMD Spring 2020
- Admitted to UMD Fall 2019
- Admitted to UMD Fall 2019 + admitted to Scholars
- Admitted to UMD Fall 2019+ admitted to Honors
- Admitted to UMD Fall 2019 + admitted to LEP
- Admitted to UMD Fall 2019 + admitted to Scholars + admitted to LEP
- Admitted to UMD Fall 2019 + admitted to Honors + admitted to LEP.
The Scholarship Committee is also reviewing the applications of those who were admitted to UMD during this time frame, but scholarship decisions are not released until about mid-February.
Here is the link to last year’s Priority decision thread. The decisions start showing up on page 55 of this thread. Decisions are released via the Coalition Portal.
I hope this helps. Good Luck, all!