I got WL at Villanova, which is kind of saddening because its one of my top schools. I got into Northeastern despite that it has higher academic requirements and a lower admission rate
32 ACT
3.6 UW/3.95 W
Top 20% class rank
5 AP’s and all honors classes for 4 years
Distinguished Scholar Award (12)
Spanish NHS (11)
Varsity Swimmer (11,12)
4 year Jazz Band member
Outdoorsmen Club (9,10,11)
Lifeguard
Counselor at various summer camps
Certainly some massaging of stats is certainly involved, but also impacting waitlist numbers is the dramatic increase in the number of applications submitted by students, including those with very high stats. A few decades ago, a typical student might have 2-4 acceptances. Now, applying is much easier (common app) and with holistic review it is difficult to have confidence in acceptance, even if a student’s stats are on the high side for a particular school. Some students apply to a very high number of schools.
As a result, schools have a much more difficult time predicting how many accepted students will accept the offer. I know one student who basically applied to every school in their state and now has about 16 acceptances. Obviously that’s a lot of schools who are going to get a message that that student has declined their offer. It seems to me, anecdotally, that the numbers accepted off waitlist are now higher, though they can fluctuate pretty dramatically year-to-year at a given school.
But it is still disappointing to receive a WL answer. In some ways, it’s more frustrating than a decline. Anyway, good luck to everyone. My take away, from visiting numerous schools over the last half dozen years, is that there are lots and lots of fantastic schools out there, with amazing people–professors, students, and staff–where one can get a great education. It’s much more important HOW one goes to school than WHERE one goes to school. That’s the good news.
“My educated guess on the WL epidemic (at least it’s an epidemic in our household LOL) is the following:…”
I think that you are correct. Schools have aggressively advertised to teenagers so that they can get more applicants and accept a smaller percentage (and be considered “more selective”), but appear to be concerned that there will be a corresponding smaller number of accepted students actually attending. Also, the aid issue that you brought up is also going to be a factor in where students go, which means that a student might not go to their first choice if the financial aspects are better elsewhere. There might also be an uncertainty factor on the part of admissions staff: If they don’t know what percentage of admitted students will actually attend, then how can they know how many students to send acceptances to?
It is hard to know to what extent being put on a waitlist means “no, but we are trying to be nice”, or “probably no, but we want to keep our options open just in case”, or “maybe, tell us whether you really want to come here, so that we can decide whether to let you in”.
Unfortunately this takes a long and stressful process and extends it longer.
“…who knows what goes on in the admissions process.”
Well said.
I think one thing that contributes to the rise in applications is Common App allows you apply to several schools at once, so many kids think “why not go for all these schools?” so instead of applying to 5-10 they would have before, some go to as high as 20 schools! I have seen so many new threads about schools people have applied to, and the list are humongous!
@Cressidy, agree that the ease of the Common App has changed the process, along with the increased emphasis on First Generation students - which I think is great even though it hurts my twin DD’s chances.
That said, they’ve had some great acceptances - not the 5-6 tippy top LAC’s and Ivy’s are still TBD, but great choices nevertheless.
My daughter applied for 14 schools.
2 waitlist
4 reject
3 accept
5 to go
In today’s climate, I wouldn’t feel comfortable if she had only applied to 10 schools.
I am just so thankful for the 3 accepts so far.
@Jliu32472 – On the one hand, we perpetuate the madness by applying to more than 8-10 schools, but on the other, only applying to 5 solid match schools is just too risky in this climate…
My son applied to 14 schools also.
3 acceptances – 2 EAs & 1 rolling (safety, but good school)
2 rejections
4 WL
5 to go – all of which were tougher schools to get into than the 4 WLs (including 1 ED deferral from a top 10).
So, I’m thinking he will max out at 3. But, at the end of the day, it’s all good, one of his EAs was at the top of his list from the start, so he won’t end up at his “safety”.
I limited my son to five schools only. He only applied to four. One was a safety, two were matches, and one was a financial reach. I told him if he cannot pick the top five schools that he would like to attend given the constraints, then he really does not know what he wants in a school. Was it limiting for him? sure. But life is all about limits. One has to learn to deal with them and learn to live within them.
So far the list we put together is one I’m happy with. But honestly if my child was male, this list would not have cut it.
UCs that were considered safe no longer are. If I had know how bad it was getting I would of had her add UCI and UCSC to the list.
I have said this before and will say it again:
If you apply to an appropriate range of schools based on your stats, your child WILL have multiple acceptances. Applying to more reach schools is NOT a strategy. It’s just a way to get more rejections or WL if lucky. Your child IS going to be accepted to schools if they are doing it the right way. Yes, that includes schools with holistic admissions.
My D applied to 12 last year. It was at least two too many. She definitely applied to a very appropriate range of schools. Result: admitted to two safeties, admitted to five matches (one was from waitlist), admitted to two low-reaches (one from waitlist), denied from three reaches (one waitlist, two high-reaches.) By the time she had all acceptances in, there were definitely two schools she shouldn’t have bothered to apply to becasue she really wasn’t interested.
This is vicious cycle caused by people worrying they won’t get in, so they apply to too many schools without doing the homework to see if they are applying to the right types of schools for their stats. There are plenty of students who are not applying to 20 colleges and getting accepted. My D is the “average” excellent student. She isn’t special. She did well in the acceptance game, but like all other kids, she can only go to one college. Everyone should do their homework and be sure that if you only do get into one college, it’s one you like. Do it right, and there should be a few choices at least.
My S has had 6 acceptances (2 rolling, 1 early) and 2 WL’s, no hard rejects, yet. Waiting on 3. He also put an application in to a school with no admission fee and then didn’t do the optional (not really optional) essays. I am not counting that one. He applied to 4 UC’s and as it is as easy as checking the box and paying, it is hard to not just apply to more to be safe. As an OOS male engineering student with 50-75% stats applying to state schools like UT, CA and GA, we felt like he needed to apply to that many to be sure of a good choice. Luckily, dollars are not a factor. If they were, I could see wanting to up the number by another 5. All that does increase the WL problem. As others have said, you can only go to one school. I am happy with our strategy and he got in to the school we all felt was the best fit after visiting. Going to visit two of his acceptances that surprised us and may also be a good fit.
Google the Common Data set for previous year info on the waitlist. It will give you a sense of how many people may be on it and how many have gotten off in the past few years.
My DS has been waitlisted at 3 schools, and denied by some safeties. It’s insane this year.
My twin DD’s have done better with acceptance at 4/4 safer schools and 2/2 target schools with 2 more to go, but only waitlisted at 1/3 reaches with 3 more to go. They do have friends that have literally been waitlisted or denied everywhere - crazy
And low- and high-reaches are going to cost you more, right? So, if you have a high EFC (or higher than you can afford) and you aren’t comfortable with the COA, it shouldn’t be on your list to begin with. Too many people on CC this time of year are surprised that these schools aren’t affordable, but they’re “so happy” to be accepted. Explain that!?!
@snorkelmom that I also don’t understand. Perhaps they are waiting to see if they get some kind of merit aid?
I think that there are definitely kids who end up on the waitlist who were soft rejects (i.e, legacy) or the school wanted to communicate to the CC that this was the type of student that they would like to see apply in the future but that there was no space this year. I think the bigger thing that happens, though, is that a school will see a surge in applications (even if they solicited them) and not be sure how this will translate into yield. Does this mean that their school is suddenly hot and that many of the kids who have been accepted will attend ? Or does this mean that many kids applied who really had very little interest in attending but did so because they uncertain of their chances at the schools that they preferred? The schools are not sure if they should expect their yield to be the same higher or lower than it has been in the past. To avoid over enrolling, they lowball acceptances and go back to the waitlist to accept the rest of the class in May. Keep in mind that at most schools, it is very difficult to deal with more students than they have beds.
As for numbers, it probably is too many, but many kids will not take WL positions. These are the ones who would not have attended if admitted. From those that do, the school will complete it’s class, maintaining the balance it was aiming for. So if 400 students join a WL for a class of 500, it seems ridiculous. But again, the school doesn’t know how that list will break down in terms of gender, ability to pay, potential activities on campus and the spots that still need to be filled.
It feels lousy to be in that pool with so little control, but I don’t think the schools have set out to be devious. It’s really think this ends up an enrollment management issue.
Regarding soft rejects, I would say that the new soft reject is actually acceptance to a school like a UC but not for the major requested. It is so hard to get into these impacted majors that you might as well cross it off your list.
@Jliu32472 If it was just “some kind” of merit aid, that would be obvious on their website. It appears to be the BIG merit they’re chasing which is highly competitive, so yes, it’s “wait and see” and without it, not a feasible option. They are comparing results, but it puts so much pressure on these kids!
We are full pay and the 2 waitlist schools were UCSD and UCSB I thought for sure she’d get in to one of them. So it has nothign to do with applying to too many schools or schools that were financially out of reach hoping for merit. I thought she’d get in to UCSB, and we’d pay the ~35K a year if she chose it. (It was one of her two top state schools, she got in to the other, SLO)