Undergrad admissions isn’t the same as law school admissions philosophy. Any college counselor will tell you that applying earlier is better at any rolling undergrad program, whether it’s Pitt or Alabama or Arizona State. The earlier you apply, the more spots available, the more merit, and the more likelihood of other benefits.
The students who are admitted are academically qualified. Pitt wasn’t admitting unqualified students at the expense of qualified ones. The local CS student who didn’t get in was incredibly qualified and it’s a surprise and a shame, but his seat was not taken by an unqualified applicant.
I don’t think she said undergrad was the same as law school. She just said rolling admissions doesn’t necessarily mean first-come, first-served. And Arizona State has an 88% acceptance rate so it isn’t really first come first serve there, either. Very few qualified applicants are getting squeezed out at ASU and Alabama like they are at Pitt, so in that sense, Pitt probably should have a philosophy closer to a law school than a massive flagship public. How many other USN Top 60 schools have rolling admissions with no priority tiering?
I agree with you about Pitt still admitting students who are academically qualified. That’s the bottom line to me. They are going to have a great CS class, either way. But in the end, I do hear Shilington Mom on the transparency issue. I took the tour during the summer and no one said to apply early to improve admission chances. They said to apply early to hear back in 2 weeks and increase your chances for merit. To her point, I don’t see anything on the website, either. So I think everything can be made more explicit.
If you go to Pitt’s website and click on First Year Student Admissions Process it says in the second sentence that it is to your advantage to apply early, then goes on to explain why.
The last two years have been frustrating for all students and maybe Pitt will include some deadlines in its rolling admissions in the future, aside from the December 1st one it explains in the First Year Student section.
If Pitt were going to change from its rolling model, it would not adopt the kind of law school model where it allocated seats throughout the year.
Competitive applicants are tending to decide much earlier with an increase in ED applications, and Pitt would lose a ton of students with a model that distributes acceptances later. Kids would be ED committed or start to be enamored with EA acceptances.
If Pitt were to make any change, they would likely change to a November 1 EA deadline like their Top 60 peer institutions (Ohio State, Penn State, and similar) and more selective publics like Michigan, UVA, UNC. The December 1 honors deadline would probably get pushed a month earlier.
Right, but that “why” doesn’t include what we are talking about lol. This is what it says: “We review and make admissions decisions throughout the year, so it’s to your advantage to apply early—it’ll help you stay ahead of deadlines for scholarships, Pitt Honors, and our Graduate School Guaranteed Admissions Programs.” So, it doesn’t say a word about improved admission odds for applying early or that you might be out of luck if you apply December 9. And that’s the previous poster’s point (I think?). That this should be made more clear. And I agree.
I think in general we forget that a lot of what we take for granted in terms of knowledge about the college admission process is a foreign language to most kids, especially those who have to navigate this as first-gen college students or whose parents aren’t as engaged as we are. I’ve done alumni interviews for 21 years and even I am still learning about how Pitt does things as it’s so different than anything else with which I’ve ever dealt.
Fair point about law schools. Obviously, undergrad AOs can’t take the time to review each applicant at such a detailed level. I meant “closer to law school” more in the sense that as Pitt increasingly becomes more selective they should also move toward a more selective college admissions system. What worked when they accepted 75% of applicants won’t work when they might be at what, 35% this year? I think they are most likely to try to position themselves in the UNC, UVA, U Michigan tier.
Just waitlisted from Dietrich! After about 2 days of my app status changing from pending to complete. I was notified via email with a link to the document center that had my wait list letter.
OOS
4.03 W GPA
Test-optional
And I have chosen to cancel my application. Good luck to everyone still waiting!
Pitt could not have placed more emphasis on applying early in every communication they share, my daughter applied mid September. Pitt doesn’t take essays so it is a pretty easy app to send off (honors part can be done later). I tell anyone interested to get it in early, for both acceptance and merit.
In every communication (website, tour, phone call etc), Pitt suggests applying early. Yes, they say it’s for scholarships, knowing your decision early etc - they don’t explicitly say that the chances of admission are higher if applying early - but, how hard is it to reach that conclusion? They have certain number of students to enroll, and if all schools are getting more applications, they have to manage yield and adjust number of admissions dynamically. They are dealing with multiple random variables and are working hard to do justice to each application in the holistic review process! Pitt is the school that cares for applicants the most in our experience (and I am saying that on the day my son withdrew his application). After all the challenges they are facing, they are still not asking any “rolling” admissions to commit on a rolling basis!
@Thorsmom66 - Have you checked the document center? There may be a letter waiting there for you. I feel like Pitt, unlike most other schools we are waiting on, has several places you need to look. My son got accepted in January and the letter is in his document center (https://ermpitt.force.com/OAFA/s/), but in the Student Center dashboard ( pi.tt/studentcenter), it still just says his application is complete, not that he was admitted.
I guess my question is, where did the status go to complete? Because there are two different places it said pending for my D. One went to complete about 4 weeks ago and still says complete. The other, on the dashboard under admissions, application status, it still says pending. So, is that the place your son’s status changed to complete? The other is under self-service, student admission, application status.