This is a thread for all of those waitlisted at Pomona college. Please share your thoughts, whether or not you will accept a position on the waitlist, and so on.
Meh. I accepted it, but after some soul-searching, I realized I’m not too keen on Pomona anyways.
Should I ask to be taken off of it?
It’s your decision. To be honest, it probably doesnt matter either way since last year they didn’t take anyone from the waitlist. I’m treating mine as a rejection.
Ah alright. I was worried that, on the really REALLY low chance they accepted me, I would be taking a spot from somebody that really wants to go there.
Any thoughts as to why you’ve been waitlisted?
It was my first interview, so maybe it didn’t go so well. To be honest I think their admissions was just so selective, i was just unlucky. I’ve had success at other similar schools so I don’t know. Yourself?
I didn’t get an interview, unfortunately.
When I checked the portal, they only had the first ACT I sent. My second ACT was much better but they never updated the portal. I still don’t know if they ever saw it. Besides that, it could be anything.
I’m sad because Pomona was such a neat school. I really enjoyed my visit. Oh well.
After reading this article quoting the Pomona dean of admissions, I wonder why they waitlist: http://www.washingtonpost.com/local/education/pomona-admissions-dean-wait-list-standards-needed/2013/05/10/f819e048-b98b-11e2-aa9e-a02b765ff0ea_story.html
My daughter was wait-listed. Don’t know why. Super duper competitive – one alumn in our town said it’s harder to get in than Stanford. Very sad but oh well…onward!
I would encourage staying in the waitlist this year. It will definitely be used.
If the yield holds from last year (45%, which is honestly unlikely since it’s usually 40%), then 356 students will enroll (out of the 790 admitted). 8 deferred, so that still leaves 41 empty slots in the freshman class (they listed target class size of 405). I don’t think the class will jump to a 51% yield.
If you don’t plan on staying on the waitlist, then in the off chance that they do go to it, you may be taking someone’s spot. But honestly, it’s totally your choice. Being waitlisted was very crushing but I guess it was somewhat offset by the fact that I got into Ucla an hour or so later.
@EndOfTheWorld
Hopefully, but by that reasoning, why didn’t they go to the waitlist last year?
Honestly, I would have preferred to be rejected than be some charity case for Pomona.
Edit: DP
“Hopefully, but by that reasoning, why didn’t they go to the waitlist last year?”
Because last year’s class overenrolled by 50 students, having an unprecedented 450 students (more than the normal class size of 400)
That’s unlikely to happen this year.
Reading around on articles about waitlists, I’ve come across a few quotes from (former?) admissions (vice?) president from Pomona (sorry, can’t be bothered to look up the name, or the sources [some NYTimes article] insert girl with hand emoji) expressing how he believes it’s absurd that some colleges waitlist more applicants than they accept, and so I would hope he isn’t a hypocrite and that Pomona’s waitlist isn’t so large.
“But over the years, at many schools, the wait-list has become a “boneyard, a political de facto place for students that schools don’t want to admit” but don’t have the guts to deny”
Trust me, Pomona doesn’t see you like this. Every year they get way more qualified applicants than they can admit. Extraordinary people have to be waitlisted/rejected simply because of resources- Pomona doesn’t have the space for a class of more than 410 people this year. I know the admissions officers become extremely close with each applicant and do experience considerable stress for their favorites not getting through the process.
If you’re waitlisted you should be proud. Pomona doesn’t waitlist just anyone (only about 5-10% of the admit pool). You have to be someone who they would be proud to enroll in their class, but you weren’t the absolute strongest applicant in the pool at the time of decisions. Whether or not the waitlist is used only depends on one factor: class size. Valedictorians (including the one from my school, who had a 2400 SAT and was accepted to HYPS) have been outright rejected.
OH i’m so dumb, the article is right here in this post…
5-10% of admit pool, or applicant pool? Estimate in numbers?
Of the admit pool.
~8100 applicants, so anywhere from 405-810 people got waitlisted this year.
If the waitlist is Unranked, what do they go by?
Is it like if an Asian male majoring in Linguistics is waitlisted, they find another Asian male majoring in linguistics to replace him?
^ I don’t think major has much to do with it, but yeah, something like that I’m pretty sure.
I think you mean an Asian male majoring in Linguistics is GRADUATING, then maybe something like that, but the sentence you wrote just makes no sense to me.