Denied. No photo in the portal beforehand. Phhhtttbbbtttt.
And with that, our home ends its long trudge toward decisions from admissions teams, and we move on to D23’s own final decision Thunderdome.
Congrats to everyone who got great news today. To everyone else, best of luck in choosing from the schools that saw you or your kid and said: Yes. You are what we want.
S23 Accepted
accepted!! my fin aid portal disappeared
D23 Waitlist
DD waitlisted. This one was disappointing.
accepted! for future applicants - photo conspiracy doesnt mean anything (I had no photo).
My D was waitlisted. This was a top school for her so she accepted a place on their waitlist.
Edited to add stats. Applied test optional. 3.99 unweighted/4.3 weighted GPA. Top 5% Applied for English. ECs - dance/theatre/music - several years sustained activity & leadership in all. Also leadership in community service and student government. State-level awards in writing.
She did not have a picture and her FA checklist did not disappear.
rejected, 1480 sat, top 10% of class, 4s and 5s on APs 
d23 denied - also, no pic in portal and finaid checklist was there to the very end 
These figures indicate an acceptance rate for this year that would settle at ~17.7%
Congrats and welcome RD crew! To those that were rejected I am so sorry. Definitely some competitive stats. Given the emotional roller coaster we went on with our son I can only imagine the disappointment you must be feeling. I hope you all find your place to thrive and enjoy your college years.
Looking forward to seeing some of you April 21st. I am excited to see the campus again and catching a couple broadway shows 
S23 Waitlisted. SAT 1550 GPA 3.8 AP 6 . Decent EC. I wonder if it is worth waiting or should move on with what we got. That’s the biggest question. We didn’t get a picture and still has a FA checklist.
you have great stats! i’m sure you have (or will have) many other good options. apparently 15 percent got off last year so it might be worth writing a LOCI if its one of your top choices.
Thank you for offering to share from your experience so far.
It feels a lot easier to dig into the curriculum, departments, majors, study abroad, etc. on the website than to get a true read on reslife - housing, dining, social. Would you be able to share any positives and also negatives related to these aspects of Vassar given what your D has experienced? I think I read that if you get bad luck as a first year in housing, you’re sort of stuck with it for the future, too, because changing houses for sophomore year puts you at the bottom of the list for room choice, for example. Dining hall has been renovated and new provider brought in - how is the food? Does your D travel via airline and, if so, how does she get from airport to campus? Thanks so much!
Sure, I’m happy to answer what I can!
Res life - yes, they are expected to stay with the same dorm at least the first two years. They can change, but they do go to the bottom of the list for choosing, so most people don’t is my understanding. But they do a great job of building house loyalty, esp. during orientation, so that my impression is hardly anyone wants to change - they are invested in their house being the best house pretty quickly (it’s all fun & games, nothing too serious and they certainly socialize across houses). My daughter is definitely in one of the less desirable houses but within a couple weeks she could not imagine living elsewhere and is already happily set up for her room for next year in the same house. Juniors and Seniors often live in the college-owned townhouses & apartments which are on the outskirts of campus, so it’s really only those first two years, and I know my D has gone to parties at off-campus houses, so there are at least a few kids who live off-campus in non-college housing. Overall the dorms are nothing special/fancy, and in many cases way worse than that. The buildings are old, and while they are renovating many of the dorms/bathrooms, it obviously hasn’t been a top priority. The communal bathroom on my daughter’s hall is atrocious, but it doesn’t seem to bother her or the other kids at all. Overall I haven’t heard complaints about the housing or the bathrooms except from other parents - the students seem perfectly ok with it. My D does feel very lucky to be in a good-sized double this year; several of her friends are in triples & I think that can be hard, but getting stuck in a triple can happen anywhere. My impression is that many sophomores get singles, and that those who stay in doubles get nice ones for the most part, but not sure about that (mine has a single for sophomore year, room choice was a couple weeks ago). I will say that my D quickly developed friendships with her hall mates during orientation week and then branched out from there, and has been very happy with her social life. Maybe she just got lucky, but orientation week builds a nice sense of community. She’s pretty quiet so I was pleased she made friends & had a group to hang out with so quickly. The Deece (dining hall) is one of my D’s favorite places, she will hang out there, do homework, socialize, etc. - she will facetime me from there - she complains about the food a little, but the one time I ate there I was impressed with the amount of choices as well as with the food itself. I gather they try a little harder when the parents are there, but it was a good meal. She certainly doesn’t seem to be going hungry and there are multiple options at all meals. You can see the menu online if you look - in addition to the Deece there are a couple grab & go places, a cafe & a food truck I believe. Plenty of vegetarian, vegan, etc., as well as typical burgers/pizza. She complains about the lack of fresh fruit mainly, but it is the northeast in the winter. I do think it’s improved a lot in the last decade and it’s generally good/plentiful if not gourmet (and they have unlimited food swipes from very early to very late so no one should go hungry). She does not travel by plane, so I can’t speak personally to that, but several of her friends do & I think they take the Amtrak or MetroWest from Poughkeepsie to NYC (the college runs vans to the train station all day the day breaks start & the day they end) and then the kids take various trains/buses/ubers to the airports. Amtrak goes directly to Newark Airport I believe so it’s preferable to fly from there if you can. There are also some smaller regional airports that are closer if those work for you - I think they usually don’t though. There are always parents trying to share rides from or to the airports on the parent page if your kid doesn’t want to take the train. There is also sometimes a shuttle van to the airports and also to the Boston area at the start of a break (for a charge) but they don’t seem to run them on the way back since everyone comes back at different times. I’m not really on top of that since we live within driving distance, only what I see on the parent FB page (which is not super active, but pretty supportive for the most part). Anyway, my D is very happy at Vassar, and regularly says how glad she is that she ended up there - it’s only been less than a year, but very few complaints from our family so far!
Thank you! I had no idea about the Amtrak to Newark airport option, so that’s helpful (as is all the rest of the info).
Make sure you check me on the Newark/Amtrak thing as I’m basing it on what I’ve seen on the parent page not personal experience!
Accepted - not sure if anyone else had this but my portal had view status update right next to view financial aid letter… or something like that. took the surprise out of opening the letter which I thought was funny
does anyone know anything ab vassar’s college town?