5 05, 2023

What Are My Chances of Getting Off An Ivy League Waitlist like Harvard?

By |2023-05-05T11:41:58-04:00May 5th, 2023|College Admissions, Harvard, Ivy League, Ivy League Advice, Ivy League College, Transfer, Transferring, Waitlisted|3 Comments

What Are My Chances of Getting Off An Ivy League Waitlist like Harvard?

The Ivy League colleges are among the most selective institutions in the United States. With an acceptance rate of less than 10%, it’s no surprise that many qualified candidates are placed on a waitlist rather than receiving a definitive acceptance or rejection. If you are one of these students, it’s natural to wonder what are your chances of getting off an Ivy League waitlist like Harvard’s — or, if it’s even possible.

In this article, we’ll take a closer look at the waitlist process and provide some insights into your chances of getting off an Ivy League waitlist, using Harvard University as a prime example.

First, what is a waitlist?

Let’s start with the basics:  a waitlist is a pool of qualified applicants who have not been offered admission to a specific college but are still being considered for acceptance. Being waitlisted means that you have not been rejected, but you have also not been accepted.  You are in limbo, waiting for a decision.

So, what are your chances of getting off a waitlist, particularly at an Ivy League college like Harvard?

Unfortunately, there’s no straightforward answer to this question. It varies from year to year and depends on many factors, including the number of spots available, the strength of the applicant pool, and the yield rate (the percentage of admitted students who choose to attend). Generally speaking, Ivy League waitlists are incredibly competitive, and the odds of being admitted off the waitlist are extremely low.

Let’s take Harvard as an example.

In 2022, Harvard waitlisted 1,128 students, but only 12 were eventually offered admission. Keep in mind that Harvard is just one of eight Ivy League colleges though, and the acceptance rates at other institutions vary. The University of Pennsylvania, for example, pulled 55 students off their waitlist last year in comparison to Harvard’s 12.  Big difference!

So, what can you do to increase your chances of getting off the waitlist at Harvard or anywhere else?

Here are a few things to keep in mind:

  1. Follow the school’s instructions: If you’ve been waitlisted, be sure to carefully read and follow any instructions provided by the college. This might include filling out a form, submitting additional materials, or writing a letter of continued interest.
  2. Show continued interest: Speaking of letters of continued interest, this is one of the best ways to demonstrate your continued interest in attending the school. If you choose to write a letter, be sure to highlight any new achievements or accolades since you applied and explain why you would be an asset to the institution. Keep it short, though! Less is more in these letters and your letter should be AT MOST only 1-2 paragraphs top.
  3. Stay positive: Getting waitlisted can be disheartening, but it’s important to stay positive and keep your options open. Consider accepting an offer from another institution, but don’t be afraid to keep in touch with the waitlisted school and express your continued interest.  The worst thing that could happen if you accept another school and then get off your desired school’s waitlist is that you lose your deposit from the other school.  In the scheme of your life and your goals this may not be so horrible.
  4. Be realistic: While it’s important to stay positive, it’s also important to be realistic about your chances of getting off the waitlist. Ivy League waitlists are incredibly competitive, and the odds of being admitted off the waitlist are low. Extremely low when we are talking about the most competitive schools.  That doesn’t mean it’s impossible though, just don’t pin all your hopes on one school, especially when we are talking about the most competitive Ivy League colleges and be prepared to accept an offer from another institution if necessary.
  5. Consider other options: If you’re not admitted off the waitlist, don’t despair. There are plenty of excellent colleges and universities out there, and many students go on to have successful lives and careers regardless of where they went to college.

It’s also worth noting that being waitlisted is not necessarily a reflection of your qualifications or potential as a student.

Admissions decisions are complex and take into account a wide range of factors, including academic achievement, extracurricular involvement, essays, letters of recommendation, and more. Being waitlisted simply means that the college was unable to offer you a spot in the incoming class due to the high number of qualified applicants in your specific year.

Furthermore, it’s important to keep in mind that colleges and universities want to build a diverse and well-rounded student body. So, even if your qualifications are excellent, you may not be admitted if the admissions committee feels that your profile is too similar to other admitted students. This is why it’s important to highlight what makes you unique and what you can contribute to the college community.

If you are admitted off the waitlist, congratulations!

You should feel proud of your accomplishment, as it is a testament to your perseverance and dedication. However, it’s important to keep in mind that being admitted off the waitlist can come with some challenges. For example, you may have less time to make a decision, as the enrollment deadline may be closer than if you had been accepted outright. Additionally, you may have missed out on some of the opportunities available to accepted students, such as early registration or access to certain programs or resources.

In conclusion, if you’ve been waitlisted at an Ivy League college like Harvard, Princeton, Columbia, or Yale it’s important to be realistic about your chances of getting off the waitlist.

While, again, it’s totally possible to be admitted off the waitlist, and it happens to my students every year, the selection is incredibly competitive. If you do choose to stay on the waitlist, be sure to follow any instructions provided by the college, express your continued interest, and keep your options open. And remember, there are plenty of excellent colleges and universities out there, and your future success does not depend solely on where you attend college. Whatever happens, keep working hard and pursuing your goals, and you will undoubtedly achieve great things.

Want more advice about transferring your freshman year and trying again for the Ivy League? 

Contact me today for a free consultation and get into the school of your dreams!  www.IvyCollegeEssay.com 

Check out these other articles too for great Ivy League waitlist advice:

  1. Waitlisted At An Ivy League College?
  2. Want to Transfer to An Ivy League School?

 

2 10, 2014

Common App College Essay Prompts and How to Master Them for Your Ivy League Application!

By |2022-10-04T09:29:09-04:00October 2nd, 2014|Brown, College Admissions, Columbia, Common App, Dartmouth, Duke, Harvard, Ivy League|1 Comment

So, it’s official.  You’ve decided it’s time to start working on your Common App. Good for you!  Great even.  You’re not procrastinating!  That is, until you looked at the prompts and thought, “I have absolutely NO IDEA what to say, let alone guess what the colleges are even looking for.”  This thought perhaps made you panicked, sick, ill, malaised (i.e. good SAT word, write it down), and forced you to have visions of working at a donut shop for the rest of your life, (not that there’s anything wrong with that). Get more information on How to Master the Common App Essay!

Perhaps you had plans though of potentially setting off for Harvard, Princeton, Yale, or some other picturesque U.S. school to watch football games, meet great life-long friends, STUDY and get an excellent education, and just do something incredibly solid and interesting with your life…but then messed it all up with the Common App and destroyed the dream.  Done.  OVER.  Donut?

Well, stop worrying.  We’re going to go through the prompts one by one, and if you take away my key points from each of the questions, you’re going to do more than fine.

Prompt #1Some students have a background or story that is so central to their identity that they believe their application would be incomplete without it. If this sounds like you, then please share your story.

This essay is a great chance to show your uniqueness, your individuality, what makes you different, and college admissions officers LOVE different.  Did you hear that? They read so many applications, that they truly gravitate towards those students who are unique and stand out.  So, do you have something unique in your background?  Have you done something unusual?  Is there something different about your family that makes you interesting?  Here is where you write about what makes you different from others in your school. What does make you different from your friends.   Remember, different = interesting.

PROMPT #2: Recount an incident or time when you experienced failure. How did it affect you, and what lessons did you learn?

Make sure you answer each of the questions stated in this prompt and you’ll do fine.  Mostly though, you want to pick a negative experience (a “failure”) that then has a positive spin — that shows your self-reflection and ability to pick yourself up and move forward stronger than before!  This essay is a good choice if STRENGTH and FORTITUDE are two of your major traits.

PROMPT #3: Reflect on a time when you challenged a belief or idea. What prompted you to act? Would you make the same decision again?

This essay is here to show your character.  What are you passionate about?  What are you willing to stand up for, even in the face of adversity? As with prompt #2, make sure you address all of the questions within the question – that is part of what you are being tested on.  This essay is a good choice if you have very strong morals and values and are willing to make a public stand.  Always be aware of your audience though, and take into consideration how things will be perceived by the admissions committee.  In other words, choose your battles wisely.

PROMPT #4: Describe a place or environment where you are perfectly content. What do you do or experience there, and why is it meaningful to you?

I like this essay, as it is the most creative.  Again, make sure you address all three points, and focus equally on description as well as self-reflection: why this is meaningful to YOU.  I’ve read very lyrical essays that describe a place, only to not understand its significance for the student.  Similarly, I’ve read very factual essays for this prompt that have no description or emotional feeling or language. Balance both, and do it in a creative way, and you’ll win by giving your reader insight into your world.

PROMPT #5: Discuss an accomplishment or event, formal or informal, that marked your transition from childhood to adulthood within your culture, community, or family.

What the admissions committee is looking for here, is growth. Your growth.  That moment when your world changed.  Pick an event that clearly shows how you were before, and then how you were different after.  Again, as with the other essays, they are looking for self-reflection.  This essay also allows for a lot of creativity and I have found sometimes the smaller, less formal and more personal events or moments in life make for the best, most moving essays – and that advice goes for all of the prompts, above. I hope, these amazing tips on How to Master the Common App Essay will help you the most.

[I’m a former Harvard interviewer and a Harvard graduate, and currently run the college admissions firm IVY COLLEGE ESSAY.com.  Like more help on your Common App or college applications? Contact me for a free consultation today!  www.IvyCollegeEssay.com ]

10 06, 2013

3 Expert Tips to Get Into an Ivy League College!

By |2023-06-11T07:50:10-04:00June 10th, 2013|College Admissions|1 Comment

It’s that time of year again, when high school seniors hoping to get into an Ivy League college stare desperately at the Common App and supplemental college admission essay questions and ask themselves:

1. What are the Ivy League colleges really looking for?

2. How can I make my Ivy League application stand out?

3. Do I even have a chance of getting in to the Ivy League?

Let’s address these questions one-by-one, but first of all, for those of you who don’t know (or maybe aren’t sure) the Ivy League is made up of 8 colleges and universities including Harvard, Yale and Princeton (which are considered the “Top 3”) and then Columbia, Dartmouth, Cornell, Brown, and the University of Pennsylvania.

One shouldn’t forget though, that there are also a handful of other extremely competitive schools that are considered to be on par with the Ivy League, such as Stanford, MIT and Duke University, just to name a few.  So…

  1. What is it that the schools are really looking for (especially when talking about Ivy League colleges)?

I believe that the answer can be found in two words: confidence and individuality.

In other words, yes, your grades are important, yes, your test scores need to be as high as possible, yes, you need to have a strong assortment of as many AP courses as you can fit in your arsenal,  but once you have all of that (because why would you be applying to an Ivy League college if you didn’t think you could compete at that academic level with your peers) the next important thing is: YOUR UNIQUE EXPERIENCE.

By this I mean things in your background that make you different, that are going to make you stand out to an Ivy League college admissions committee. Things that are going to make you different than simply being “another suburban high school student from New Jersey,” or “just” another kid from a private school in Massachusetts or New York.

Not to say that the top schools don’t accept A LOT of students who fall into these two categories (believe me, they do)… but your competition if you’re coming from these categories is going to be stronger because of that highly competitive applicant pool and because college admissions officers like to diversify.

  • The answer to question #2 then is that, no matter what your background, you should always, always, always ask yourself, HOW ARE YOU DIFFERENT and then try to highlight that

In other words, what is it in your background that makes you unique? That’s what Ivy League college admissions officers want to see as they paint a picture of you in their mind. You will increase your chances astronomically, if you give them something to paint with.

So, were you raised in a poor village in India before immigrating to the U.S.? Did your family move here from Russia? Is your family in politics?  Are you training for the Olympics in ice skating, or skiing? Or do you compete at a very high level in equestrian sports? Have you built your own guitar?  Have you studied ballet in NYC since the age of 8? Did you grow up in a fishing community in Alaska? Or was yours the only Jewish family in a Southern Baptist community in the deep South? Have you served in the U.S. Army?

Is anyone in your family famous, or extremely well-known in their field?  Is anyone a legacy at the Ivy League college you’re applying to? Do you own any patents? Or, are you a budding biotech or real estate entrepreneur even though you’re still in high school who started their own company from the ground up (regardless if it failed).

All the above are true stories from admission essays in the past. All are very interesting and obviously make the student STAND OUT.

And, that is what an Ivy League college admissions committee is looking for. And this is the big secret that will give you an edge:  tell them something interesting. Everyone in my opinion, has done something of interest in their life, even if they are too close to it perhaps to really see it for themselves.  Think about what makes you different from your peers.

So, should you even apply to an Ivy League college if you don’t have these things, or is it just a waste of time? Will you even have a chance? Yes, you have a chance, a good chance — if you have the grades, and the test scores. And the academic background and some interesting academic or life experience. You are then, as they put it, a “contender.”

  • So now question #3, –  will you get in? That’s the wrong question. Change the question instead to, “can I paint an interesting picture of who I am and where I want to go in life?”

Then craft that into a properly formed college admissions essay. And make sure you speak with clarity, insight into your own experience, truth, emotion, and confidence.

All these together become the first step to getting you into the Ivy League college of your dreams!

[Need help on your own college applications or Ivy League admission essays? I’m a former Harvard admissions interviewer and Harvard graduate, and currently run the firm: www.IvyCollegeEssay.com Request more information or schedule a free consultation today!]

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