<p>Hello! Student received waitlist letter from small, private college today. </p>
<p>Student had been sent a fee waiver to apply to said college and was encouraged to apply by said college, so we are a bit puzzled by this development. Also, on the "stat" boards, student shows as much higher than average candidate for admission. We also know that the references were good.</p>
<p>Also, can colleges see what other schools student has applied to when you submit FAFSA? </p>
<p>You don’t appeal a waitlist decision. You write to express your interest in the school. However, there will be little action until May 1st rolls around and people start turning the school down. Then they’ll accept people off the waitlist who will enroll. If it’s the student’s first choice, then writing a letter of interest and intent is advisable.</p>
<p>Thanks for the clarification. It is one of the student’s top choices. With stats, invitation from college to apply, other factors, still unsure why school would waitlist the student. Will counsel student to write letter.</p>
<p>Invitations to apply go out in mass quantities, and scores aren’t everything in an applicant.</p>
<p>Still, some schools choose to waitlist applicants that are far above average (thinking that they are not likely to enroll), only letting them in if they express serious interest. So most definitely write a letter.</p>
<p>Many schools do reject or waitlist applicants that they don’t think are likely to attend. Some even do this if they don’t think they’re one of the applicant’s first choices.</p>
<p>Most of the invitations and fee waivers are sent to students based on test scores, so they don’t know what the rest of the application looks like when they’re sending those. The school may not have seen what it was looking for in terms of the student’s extracurriculars.</p>
<p>Thank you for your responses. I did tell student that it seems many colleges are getting larger number of applicants this year, so maybe that played a role. Based on a review of previous acceptance data, student seemed like a likely candidate for admission. Student does also have strong ECs. </p>
<p>Does anyone know if colleges can see (via FAFSA) exactly which other schools an applicant has applied to?</p>