I live in Austin and received my acceptance letter on Thursday
@pswillia I was actually drawing my conclusion from CC over the past 3 years, plus Naviance at my son’s school. My son might just be the highest stats person from his school to get into American in the past 3 years from his school… there is a very clear pattern of dropping the top on the Naviance chart.
Yep. Waitlisted. 3.9 UW 4.55 W 34 ACT. NHRP. I’m disappointed but looking at everyone else with my statistics, I am not surprised.
Waitlisted with a 4.3 W gpa, 3.8 UW, 1490 SAT, tons of leadership positions, lots of community service, killer teacher recs, and a good common app essay. Shame because I was hoping to go to American with maybe some merit money. But see everyone else with similar stats was also waitlisted, and no one from my school with above a 4.0 has gotten in in several years due to their yield protection… really a shame.
Got offered the WMP and spring admission with a 4.3 GPA, 1320 SAT, really good ECs and essay. I don’t think they’re waitlisting every qualified candidate though that does seem to be a trend.
I’m the mom of another high stats kid who got waitlisted. Based on what we’ve read here, we weren’t surprised. But certainly disappointed. Like others, I do feel like they’re shooting themselves in the foot on this one. For what she’s interested in, American is one of the best fits for her and I think she would have been really happy there. Their assumption that high stats students will chose elsewhere is a self-fulfilling prophecy in that they’re waitlisting them, not giving aid, etc. and so naturally, they aren’t going to attend. Then the admissions staff can say, “told you they weren’t going to attend.” Whereas with Honors merit scholarships, I bet a lof ot these high stats kids would have attended. American’s loss!
Accepted to fall admission w/ 32 ACT. Had access to portal early, received e-mail and snail mail.
I am finally glad a good college in this case American University is giving a chance to people with lower stats.
@shs2k17ys Did you get any financial aid though? Sounds like they did not give out much scholarship money.
Accepted
4.4 weighted, 4.0 unweighted
34 ACT
Significant merit aid
Numerous EC with tons of leadership and volunteer
Work and internship in my field
Not all high stat applicants were waitlisted (posting for next year’s applicants)
@AlwaysLearning21 Curious: what major did you apply to? Congrats on your acceptance. Did you get merit?
@psycholing Poli sci/CLEG. Yes my DD received merit aid. Fall admit.
Sorry for the stupid question, but how do you accept/decline your position on the waitlist?
@gmac0899 it gives you instructions and a link in your letter
Just as an FYI for those on the wait list: I looked at the 2015-2016 Common Data Set. 8 out of the 2778 students put on the waitlist that year got in. What’s crazy is that they put more students on the wait list than they have spots in their freshman class.
waitlisted with a 3.7/4.5 GPA, 28 ACT.
IBDP Candidate + other ECs and 4 leadership positions. A little sad I got waitlisted, but it wasn’t my top choice so I don’t feel too bad, congrats to everyone who got in though!
@lulu7575 thanks, but I don’t have my letter anymore 
it got thrown out by accident
Hello all,
How likely is it for someone to get off the waitlist? Realistically? And would they offer a good amount of financial aid?
guys if you haven’t joined yet, join the facebook group if admitted. It’s called “American University Class of 2021 (OFFICIAL)”
I feel like something has to be said here. Yes, of course, American University uses yield protection - anyone who has researched the admission rates would be able to see that. The reason is simple and can be seen by some of the responses on here - you never actually intended to attend AU. It’s fair that for some this was a safety school, I understand that.
But AU has a responsibility to ensure the long-term success of the University. Decreasing the admission rate (which is being done in a variety of shady ways like offering the “mentorship program” or waitlisting competitive applicants) has the eventual goal of having AU increase in ranks and more competitive students applying, we are not at that point yet, however.
If you actually want to come to AU, email your admission representatives. Be blunt and be clear, it cannot hurt you now. But don’t scream foul when the University is just trying to make itself better.