Today is sorta the end of the month. Didn’t they say end of the month?
Sorry to keep asking, but if its today or tomorrow what time do you think it would be?
It’s anybody’s guess at this point. Uncharted territory.
So, to be a little wonky, “by January 31”, which is in fact what it says on their site, means by 11:59 tonight. In this context, without a qualifying time on the 31st- like if the site said “by noon on the 31st” or “by end of business day on the 31st” or even “by the end of the day on January 31st” the “by” means before. So technically we should get notifications before January 31.
Now I realize that that is a close and technical reading of their statement, but I went to Madison and I studied English and then I went to law school, so I feel qualified to take their words absolutely literally in the most concrete fashion. And if that seems ridiculous, well, this is the type of behavior they deserve for causing me to refresh the notification section one thousand times. If I am crazy, they made me this way.
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Actually, tomorrow is the end of the month 
So, now the student center won’t load at all. They are shameless teases.
That has been happening a bunch for my son
Yes, and I think there is a caveat that if the 31st falls on a weekend, it’s the next business day.
This is a pretty dumb question, but how do I actually check my decision/status on the portal? The UW Madison portal is just so different compared to the other schools I applied to.
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I think if that were the case they would have told the people who called their office. It seems the common reply was “by the 31st”. I would like to believe they were honest about that.
I believe that is only for applications. It’s not for notifications. They specifically say “by January 31”. That means tonight at 11:59.
If they wanted to say something else they could have- and they are an institution of higher learning who we are asking to educate our children, so I certainly hope they proofread their website.
If they want to include tomorrow it should say “on or before January 31”. If they want to limit the windows, like so many other schools, they could say “on January 31”, if they want a cushion for weekends they could say “February 1”. They can do this because they have a calendar and they can make these edits easily. These aren’t dates carved in stone that need to remain unchanged from year to year.
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I know but isn’t Sunday the day of Rest… 
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Based on this whole process thus far…I don’t have a lot of faith or hope for release tonight. Too bad you weren’t advising them. I am sure the communication would have been entirely different and much better. My daughter is so fatigued by this process she is giving up on today/tonight and just assuming tomorrow. Approx 40 hours to go 
A previous reply said to check in Notifications
i have nothing in notifications
When decisions come out. No new decisions have come out that we are aware of. He was asking where to look when they do get released. Your almost to the finish line and not alone. My OOS d is completely mentally exhausted by this and a few jerks last night didn’t help.
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I agree with you, but it’s annoying me.
And the other thing annoying me is the December EA releases. Do they do them by states? Is it easier or harder to get in if you are an early state? Or the last state? The whole thing is a big hot mess.
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At this point, I am waiting for the email announcement in which they state that they received an unexpected and unprecedented number of early action applications and will not be able to meet their 1/31 deadline - like what they did last year.
My son is very anxious to join his older brother at UW in the fall, but this year’s process is really off-putting. I already pay full OOS tuition (just about to wire $19,380 for my son’s spring Zoom UW tuition) and am very disappointed that UW felt it was appropriate to prioritize OOS students from NY, NJ and CA and then leave others hanging endlessly to the literal last minute. I know that those states are the source of lots of wealthy full-pay “coasties” and apparently, UW wanted to keep the money happy and flowing. At this point just tweet out when decisions are coming. What’s the need to keep it a secret? If they can’t accurately peg a release time at this point, something is very wrong with their admissions process.
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I’m with you and I am not claiming to be a UW expert or anything but I did live there for 20 years and moved 3 years ago and haven’t ever seen it done like this. My in state daughter applied in 2016 and was accepted two weeks before Christmas and a friend from oos got accepted first week in January. I think that is why this is so difficult because what was expected and what actually happened we were not prepared for. I understand the in state kids and MN kids because MN is counted as in state, but the release of other states I have no clue. My only guess is that those states have the highest number of applicants so they accepted the usual percentage of EA from those states and deferred the rest…similiar to how they handled the MN applicants as explained by the previous MN mom post? But again this is just a guess. I think they take a percentage of applicants from every region so I don’t think it hurts or affects the state wherever it is considered. They want students from all over the country.
I’m thinking they’re waiting as long as they can so that kids who got accepted at Michigan have time to withdraw their apps, improving Wisc’s yield figures.
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