Waitlisted! Class of 2016

<p>Nope, but hopefully we’ll hear from them this week.</p>

<p>Based on posts in the Dartmouth and Questbridge groups on Facebook, it seems like a few more people have gotten off the waitlist.</p>

<p>I called them and they said that they might or might not be taking more people. The waitlist will probably close on July 1st though.</p>

<p>^Thanks for the update!! It’s time to keep our fingers crossed. Good luck to you :D</p>

<p>Anything new? Are people still being accepted?</p>

<p>Hello, I am just wondering if anyone else still on the waitlist heard from Dartmouth today. My daughter heard today that “we will not be able to offer you a place,” I just wondered if only she received this letter, or if everyone on the list heard today. We are pretty sad about this – as far as what is visible, more I than she. She tried to protect herself from wanting to be admitted too much, but I know she really would have been thrilled if they had taken her off the list. She did not rush to send them her year-end grades, though I nagged her, or to call, or to tell them the fact she won a prize however, though I urged her to do so. I think she felt: if they want me, they want me. I know it doesn’t work that way, but I couldn’t convey it. I don’t think we worked hard enough to “sell” her candidacy. My daughter is an incredible student and a great girl,but I guess these days there are so many candidates like this. She did not really understand how much one needs to “promote oneself” in this college business.<br>
In any case, it doesn’t matter much, but just out of curiosity, it would be interesting to know if today is the day that everyone heard, or only she heard.<br>
And – another question, in case anyone can help. I wonder if anything ever changes over the summer, if suddenly a group of unexpected people cannot come, do they ever make an offer to someone on the WL when it was presumed closed? Thanks.</p>

<p>Yes, I also received that e-mail this afternoon. I was thinking the same thing about the summer but doubt that they would notify candidates of a wait list close-out if there was a (albeit minor) possibility of admission. The subject of the email was “Final Wait List Update”.</p>

<p>Yeah I received the e-mail as well. @glimmering once they’ve sent out the e-mail, there’s no taking it back. Dartmouth has more than enough people entering their freshman class. If a few were to turn it down, there would still be enough people in the class. I know your daughter will be happy wherever she’s going next year. Everything happens for a reason. :)</p>

<p>If a WL student is notified that “we will not be able to offer you a place,” then he is permanently being removed off the WL. As summer comes to an end, a school either keeps a few students lingering on the WL, or overaccepts enough students off the WL to cover the summer meltdown and completely closes the list. There is always a meltdown of accepted students as some realize that finances did not work out, they got in another school, had personal reasons, or whatever. However, once the school has notified a student that he has been removed from the WL pool, then he will not be in the pool of students that might be accepted if spots open.</p>

<p>Sigh. Yes, that is what I was thinking about, Ana1, and what I figured. I know they will still lose a few over the summer, but they’ve probably planned for that some other way. This would suggest that they do, somehow, rank the WL. I think my daughter was hoping for Dartmouth but not liking the “twisting in the wind” sensation. Therefore I don’t think she/we really did enough to reach out to them. And of course, I know that the odds of getting in off a wait list are a lot lower than the odds of getting in at the beginning, so it’s a dangerous game to be too invested in it. I don’t know if she’d be up for it, but do you think it’s worth talking to them about re-applying next year, as a transfer, or after a gap year? Obviously she had something they liked, but not everything they needed to pull her off the WL.</p>

<p>^ Unfortunately, if your daughter was not admitted the first time, it’s unlikely she’ll be admitted after a gap year, even if a few more activities are tacked on to her application. The chances will still be the same, if not lower. She might get a slight boost by applying ED (unless she applied ED the first time), but it’s not much. As for transferring, admission rates are much lower. Last year’s rate was about 3.2%, and the year prior was 3.7%.</p>

<p>Thanks so much for your kind words, Stephanie H. I hope you’re right. And iabass (now attending Dartmouth?) don’t you think that having been waitlisted once would be helpful to someone reapplying as a first-year or transfer? It means they liked something about my daughter, though perhaps her application was wanting in some other areas. Should she improve the way she presents as a candidate, wouldn’t they keep in mind that she had wanted to attend Dartmouth before and had received some encouragement? This year was crazy for our family, with a serious car accident for my husband and two deaths of grandparents for whom my husband and I were caregivers. So it wasn’t the best year for our daughter to put her best foot forward with college applications. We were busy all year tending to emergencies. It’s amazing, in light of that, that she got into an excellent college and got waitlisted at Dartmouth. But she is really a brilliant student, and she may not have reflected this in her application this year. She doesn’t like apologizing for herself or explaining things, but perhaps if she has a great year next year as a freshman, she could also explain that this year did not necessarily allow her to present herself in the best possible light…P.S. iabass, hope you enjoy Dartmouth if you attend. I have been reading up on it and I am really impressed at how (despite that hazing scandal) so many original thinkers in our society graduated from there.</p>

<p>I’m not saying that she shouldn’t apply, but she shouldn’t get too attached to Dartmouth. It’s just too competitive these days, and even the best applicants may get rejected.</p>

<p>If she does apply again, your daughter should definitely divulge those unfortunate circumstances. I myself had to undergo surgery on a vital organ in late November (right in the middle of application season), and I related this in my waitlist letter. I believe this was a major reason why I ended up getting accepted.</p>

<p>Good luck to her!</p>

<p>Thanks iabass, I hope she will. She thinks “there’s always an excuse” but some years really are worse than others. I guess at this point it will be up to her. Previous posts here have shown me that the waitlist is now closed to her, and that it was closed at the same time for some other folks. (That made me feel better – it wasn’t a personal note to my daughter!) But I am now wondering, is anyone still left on the waitlist? Did anyone get a note asking if they wanted to hang on through July and August?
BTW, I have to realize that in a way it is better for my daughter to be able to know the situation and move on, and let go, but I just wish she had gone “all-out” once she knew she was on the waitlist. Of course I did not call, because I understood it is much better for the applicant to do this. She is shy. She did call once in May, but I kept nagging her to to call again to follow up. She thought: “if they want me, they’ll call.” This is true sometimes but from what I’ve seen here, not always, no matter how great the school. It often makes a difference to show them that you’re really interested. Anyway, congrats, iabass, for getting in, and best of luck. I hope my daughter will apply again next year.</p>