Hi all,
Smith has been my dream school ever since I visited two years ago. I’m sure you’ve heard this before, I want to go so badly, but I unfortunately was waitlisted.
For some background, I was accepted to Mount Holyoke with the Leadership Award ($20,000 a year) and also Wellesley. I was shocked, then, when I opened up my bannerweb to find myself on the waitlist. I was also shocked to hear that my good friend, with similar stats and extra curriculars but lower scores (I got a 35 on the ACT, she got a 31) was accepted.
As much as Mount Holyoke and Wellesley are great options, Smith has my heart. I’m planning on contacting admissions as soon as I get my package in the mail, but I’m just curious if anyone has recommendations about what to ask them. Are they permitted to give me any indication of where I am on the waitlist? Will showing interest help?
I plan to accept my place on the waitlist and hope for the best. No one from my school will be attending (my friend is going to Union), if that makes any difference. Thank you for any help you are able to give me.
Hi there, I am in the exact same position. I was waitlisted at smith and it is my dream school. I am writing a letter of interest and hoping for the best, but my heart really is attached to Smith. I would say just to express your interest in the most polite way as possible and to keep in touch with admissions. They do not rank their waitlist, so once they hear back from regular decision applicants, they will know how many waitlisted students they can accept and they will start from the beginning, rereading all of our applications. Goodluck to you. It’s sad that so many deserving and qualified applicants are turned away because of space!
Same position here…Smith is my dream school and I am actually super grateful to have gotten waitlisted because I didn’t expect to get accepted after being rejected by Holyoke, and I had received rejections from all but one of the other schools I applied to, plus another waitlist - so I am super happy and grateful for the opportunity.
I received the letter in the mail today and it says in the FAQ that they will accept a letter of interest, an additional teacher recommendation, a writing sample, or new grades. They went to the extent of mentioning that only one or two is sufficient, so I think it might be best not to do all four. They also do not offer interviews to Wait List candidates, and no ranking.
I’m going to submit an additional recommendation letter, but from a teacher who already wrote one of the original letters that I submitted. Do you think that would be a bad idea? I’ve worked closely with the teacher and no teacher that I have this year knows me as well as that teacher, as he left the school last year but has kept in contact with me through email, and knows me and my personal struggles/accomplishments more, etc. I’m kind of torn up on this. ;_; Really appreciate any thoughts/advice!
wow can’t believe you were rejected by Holyoke and waitlisted at Smith. you would think it’d be the other way around.
I got accepted to Holyoke (where I’ll be going) and rejected by smith (not surprising with my academic sitch, stats, overall selectivity, and app increase).
@rach131 I know, right? I had applied to Holyoke ED as well because I was a POSSE semi-finalist and had gotten deferred, then rejected, so I was totally distraught and expecting to get rejected by Smith but was super surprised to see that I was waitlisted. I’m super ecstatic about a normally really dejecting thing (I got wait-listed at Occidental and that royally sucked) because I’d like to think I still have a chance at my dream school. Hopefully they do look at the Wait List this year. Goes to show how the college admissions process can never truly be predicted.
I’ll definitely second the fact that the admissions process can never be predicted/ often seems so wacky. I was accepted to schools more selective than Smith (Wellesley, Brandeis, Conn College), but waitlisted at Smith. A friend of mine was rejected from Olin, MIT, and Harvey Mudd, and waitlisted at UWash and UChicago but ended up being accepted to Yale. Hopefully there will be a push to mend the admissions process in the coming years.