My experience with Tulane’s recruitment strategies (albeit anecdotal, not official) is that the students who are besieged with enticements to apply are students who are actually in the ballpark. Some may be at the lower end of Tulane’s traditional “admit range,” but they are not out of it entirely, and thus a strong senior year could make them even more viable contenders. These students also receive a free Tulane application to go along with the enticements.
Many colleges, on the other hand, pursue students who don’t have a prayer of acceptance and then extract an application fee to boot, once the student acquiesces and applies. (Check out this related CC thread: http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/college-search-selection/1731244-what-are-your-stalker-schools-and-have-you-caved-in-to-them.html ).
As a parent myself, I know how painful it can be (frustrating, too) when a child is waitlisted or denied, yet I do agree with fallenchemist that the Tulane process is fair and, in spite of the avalanche of mailings, more reasonable than most.
Finally, speaking as someone who used to be on the adjudication side of the desk in a college admission office, I can assure all of you that there were times when my favorite applicant was waitlisted or denied. So those of you who got bad news from Tulane–or from anywhere–please know that you may have had big fans in the admission office but, nonetheless, there was something in your file (test scores? GPA? course selection? etc.) that wasn’t quite what the college was seeking. Yet that doesn’t mean that some folks in the admission office weren’t rooting for you.