Just saw on the UC waitlist thread that one student states s/he was offered a spot off the waitlist.
I’ve been going through this thread and I would just like to add my story. darth1289, your son sounds fantastic, and I wish him the best. I was wait listed at the University of Chicago, and a couple other schools.
I must first apologize for my terrible writing. I didn’t learn how to write an essay until 10th grade, when I took my first AP class.
I come from the shitty public school system. I also come from a military family (all 3 parents - I’ll get to that in a second) with a war legacy: the Middle East and Vietnam. I identified as white on my application, but in the additional info section I mentioned that my biological family is half-Puerto Rican, and I was adopted into an Asian-American family when I was a toddler.
These were my stats: 2240 SAT, 33 ACT, 4.3 GPA, Valedictorian, etc.
I have been a GS for 10yrs and I have dozens of medals from international karate tournaments (Blackbelt). I also have a whole bunch of ECs and honor societies and titles, some of which I care about and some of which I don’t.
I’m the oldest in my family. I have had to take care of half-siblings after school and other times. I’ve held various babysitting and tutoring jobs to pick up a little cash for college.
I also have something weird: Back in middle school, I started this tradition of reading one new novel everyday. I put that aside as I got busier, but since I graduated HS early, I’ve come back to it. Today, my pick is Emma, by Jane Austen.
Anyways, earlier arguments talked about intellectuals and their environments. My environment was this: a family of people who hate each other, a half-brother who got picked up by the police more times than I care to admit (thankfully, the Judge was forgiving and juvi was avoided), abusive legal father who liked to scream and throw things, a dying grandmother who lived with us, and two children with diseases. Mine was asthma, and it still lords over me. My youngest brother’s was congenital GHD, and it still rules his life.
None of my parents (real, step, adoptive) had a college education, but my mom went back to school, earned a Master’s, and got a government job. She works crazy hours and takes cases far away, but she did all that so that we could finally move out of that house and (Finally!) be happy. When she’s gone, I’m in charge and I still have to take care of that shitty, no-good half-brother (even though he’s a teenager, and can make his own damn dinner and pick up his own damn trash and do his own damn homework). I make sure everything gets done and he gets to school. The other half-brother (poor thing!) is still with his dad in the old house, but he’s leaving soon, too.
The point is, I had to create my own intellectual environment. I went to under-funded public schools (try taking a standardized test in a room of 40 kids when it’s 100+ degrees and there’s no air conditioning!) I had teachers and administrators tell me not to apply to these places because I didn’t have a shot in hell. They were right, of course, but sue me for dreaming. I went to two high schools, and it’s the same story at each: no one ever leaves. Not many will apply out of state, and I’m the only one who applied to some of the most selective schools in the country. I just wanted out, okay? After all that hard work, nothing to show for it, except for one school five hours from home.
This reminds me of an incident in the seventh grade. I really loved my grandmother. In a hostile situation, I could turn to her. She was actually related to me, and one of the few relatives I was allowed to know about. She had green eyes and pale skin, just like me. Everyone else is tan with black hair and brown eyes. She was a smoker, and she died of cancer. I watched the whole thing. She didn’t want to die in the hospital, so we kept her at home. I stayed home from school that day. She died in so much pain. She was unconscious, but crying out. It went on for hours. In the end, there was nothing I could do or say that would fix it.
That’s the kind of feeling I’ve been having recently. I was the good kid. I was responsible, I was exactly where I said I would be at exactly the right time. I never got arrested, I never drank, I never smoked. I had good grades and test scores. I won tons of awards. I was the best at everything, but none of it mattered. I was rejected by my top-picks, and wait listed at a few others. This feeling of helplessness is hard to process. It’s like everything I did was all for nothing. My dreams of finally going somewhere and being somebody great were completely shattered.
In case anyone is wondering, I should not that I wrote my essays about my passions for human rights, history, and leadership. I talked about the women around me who told me that maybe it was better if I sat still, looked the part, and attempted to settle into a nice family with Prince Charming. While everyone else is getting married, I’m planning on having a career. “Sit Still, Look Pretty” by Daya is now my favorite song. I also wrote my essays about how I was bullied for most of my life for having asthma and for struggling with the weight that came with all of my medications.
So, that’s it, then. I’ll be going to a local college (on full-tuition scholarship) with the other stupid girls. My ambition came back to bite me in the ass.
*note
It ain’t over yet, honey. Stay the course despite this disappointment. Grad school’s a lot more meritocratic than college. And you’re building a better you, even if no one else recognizes it yet. Your life already is (and will continue to be) better than it would have been if you hadn’t been ambitious and just caved to the pressures of your environment. There’s a lot of room (and time) to grow. Don’t give up!
I say all this NOT because I think that the world is a fair place and everything comes out right in the end. I say this because everything that you’ve written and described convinces me that the character and skills that you have are crucial ones that can make the difference between a great life and a miserable one. And so many people lack them. Ultimately, if you trust and nurture those strengths, they’ll matter a helluva lot more than where you went to college.
Thank you!
Almosttheremulan: You say full scholarship to “local” college. That is a tremendous achievement! Most of these full scholarships come with assignment / membership in an “honors” college. A college within a college. Is this the case for you? If so, this will be very good for you.
Have you notified UChicago you are still interested? I’ve noticed on this forum that a couple of people are already being accepted off the wait list. With your story and objective stats it must have been a very close call to wait list you and not straight accept, an acceptance off of the waitlist seems like a possibility if you are still interested.
But in any event, I’m with exacademic. You are on your way. If you do go to the local college you will meet smart people who will recognize your potential and who will work with you and help you. Continue to make the most of it. It is a long road and you’re just starting. Best of luck to you.
Thank you! It’s actually out of state, just nearby. (I wanted to go somewhere “far far away” for college). The college is really small, so no honors college, but I can tell you that only one other person got the same scholarship, and a few students were awarded other scholarships to go there.
I’m not really sure how to notify them. I tried looking up my regional admissions counselor but could not contact her. Also, would it be better to call or write?
You may have already looked up this site
https://collegeadmissions.uchicago.edu/contact/map
Do not know if it is possible your school counselor can make a call to UChicago AO on behave of you. If the counselor knows your story well and somehow she/he can get AO’s attention then you will have a much better chance than others.
It is only April 6th and seems that waitlist has already been used (LOL). I think this year’s waitlist opportunity is dozens if not hundreds. You should act promptly (at least accept the waitlist position) and hopefully find some your advocates.
At least you can email your regional counselor to tell her/his your story, and also CC James Nondorf (jnondorf@uchicago.edu). You have nothing to lose at this point.
Good luck!
Forgot to mention. You can follow up a call to your regional counselor after a couple of days after your email. In this way you can make sure she/he indeed reads your email and knows your story. At least you have tried. Maybe the AO likes ambitious and aggressive applicants.
You got spunk kid. Continue using it. Call all those who wait listed you and tell them why the school should want you. Not because you were poor or had a lot of challenges but because you were a success despite them.
Everyone loves a winner.
Thank you eddi137 and FStratford. I contacted my regional rep. I will follow up again in a few days.
I agree. Winning is awesome.
^Read some of your other threads- you got accepted at Carnegie Mellon University, a pretty prestigious college.
That’s quite an accomplishment.
Thank you.
Unfortunately, they expect me to pay $31,000/yr. When my mom saw that, she flipped out.
Seriously, she told me I can forget about going there - even if I could negotiate that cost in half.
A STEM degree from CMU at $15,000 a year would be a bargain, even if much of the cost is covered by loans. This will of course depend on the alternatives (Is $10,000 a year for a highly ranked state flagship a viable alternative? Yes. $5,000 a year for Western Montana University or Lansing State? Debatable).
@almosttheremulan @NotVerySmart
While everything cannot be distilled down to money and financial outcomes these findings are something to keep in mind.
Good luck with your decision!!
For those who care about acceptance rate for the Class of 2020, it is another record year. A reliable source indicates the record low acceptance rate for the class of 2020 is 7.6% which is slightly lower than that of last year, 7.8%
My daughter and I just returned from U Chicago for the two day orientation for her Class of 2020. The general acceptance stats were revealed to us in brief and I just filled in some of the blanks. These numbers are broad and are not precise, but it gives some sort of indication of where they would lie with some assumptions of figures I gathered:
Here is how I see it with some rough numbers:
- In total, about 31,200 applied with about 11,850 in the Early Application (EA) round. You can round these numbers out as they are not precise.
- About ~10% were accepted in the EA round, or approximately 1,185.
- The rest of the EA applicants (10,665) were either rejected outright (I know for a fact that there were outright rejections in the EA) or deferred to the Regular Round (RD).
- Of those deferred to the RD, about ~2.4% of the EA were reconsidered and eventually accepted, that would be around 284.
- Others who were not rejected, and not accepted to EA were moved to the RD, of which about ~3% where eventually accepted, that would be around 900.
So in total, I believe about 2,370 were accepted or 7.6% of 31,200 applicants. Using the yield of 61%, I estimate about 1,445 would matriculate.
Disclaimer:
These numbers are estimates based on my own calculations after gathering bits and pieces of information from the University and people who know people in the University. I gain nothing from calculating all these but I just want to give everyone a ball park of the ratios.
-x-x-x-x-
And to those U Chicago alum parents (Grant) whose son got rejected from U Chicago after a lifetime hoping to get in – let your son create his own legacy and carve his own path. My mother and I graduated from the same Ivy League school (a Top 3 Ivy) and we both hoped that my daughter would get accepted there too using the Legacy angle.
Her credentials are stellar: she has straight As from a top gifted Public School, 35 on all her ACTs, did volunteer summer work in Asia, worked in Brain surgery research in top hospitals while at school, played in the Varsity, and mastered the piano and the saxophone – yet she was outright rejected by my Ivy. Not even deferred. She was devastated but I told her to make here own legacy at U Chicago as mine will end with me.
I know of a father and mother and son and daughter who all graduated from the same Ivy school (top 3 Ivy) and was almost sure their youngest son / brother would get in too. He finished top in his class, straight A’s and all. Yet he got deferred and outright rejected.
Let your son create his own legacy where he gets accepted. There is so much more that can be achieved in life than getting into UChicago or an Ivy. Good luck.
From your data one thing seems consistent - the number of EA admits is almost the same as RD’s.
I remember they admitted the same (almost) number of people from EA and RD for class of 2017. The same thing happened for class of 2019.
@paxfobiscum What metrics and numbers did the University actually disclose? What did you discover from talking to others and what did you deduce. Right now it is hard to tell from your post. A few people have reported stats and they are all off slightly, so would be nice to know what the University officially told the students
I was at the same orientation event and the numbers cited are the numbers discussed publicly by the Dean of Admissions.