My daughter received notification today in the Common App for direct admission to Denison (among other schools). This surprised us, as Denison is a pretty selective school and we have not heard of them offering direct admission in the Common App before. The other schools that offered direct admission to her are schools that accept most of their applicants.
Is this legit? She went ahead and completed and submitted the application.
Is your daughter First Gen or Low Income?
Denison does not have rolling admissions.
Yes, she is first generation
Many schools have direct admission for high achieving first gen and/or low income students. It’s entirely possible that Denison has identified your daughter as such and sent the direct admission offer. Congrats and good luck with the rest of her college applications.
Yes. Denison joined this year
Joined what?
The Common App direct admissions program. I found this after additional searching and it looks like Denison started participating this admissions cycle. My daughter is thrilled to have an admission to a school she is excited about!
I wanted to update - Denison is no longer participating in the direct admissions. Yesterday they were listed and as of today they are no longer listed. Students have also reported that they saw Denison yesterday and today no longer.
I thought it was crazy that Denison was participating in this direct admissions group - for the sole reason that Denison prides itself on a holistic review of applications and offering students admission based on AI doesn’t scream holistic.
Yes, as of yesterday it still said “direct admissions offer” in her common app under Denison. Today it has disappeared. Really bummed about this, as my daughter was super excited. I know there are worse things, but it’s pretty crappy to get kids excited about an admission and then remove it without any communication from them at all.
Well the bright side it is super easy to apply - no supplemental essays or application fee. I would strongly encourage her to apply - we are thrilled with the school (and they give fantastic aid). My guess is Denison planned on offering x (i.e. small) number of admits, then the AI system went bonkers and over sent. The one student who said that a large number of kids in his high school got offers is a clear indication that something went wrong.
Well, if your daughter has a record of that notification of acceptance, aren’t they bound by that?
I’m not discounting your point, but the direct admission offers are conditional. As I theorized above, my guess is that something went amiss with the Common App system, causing offers to be sent to way too many students. This is not unlike colleges that have mistakenly sent letters of acceptance to seniors but then had to withdraw those offers. It can be lousy for the student, but mistakes/errors happen. Denison is a small school with about 640 kids in each class. The last thing that should happen is thousands of kids (with great financial need) are mistakenly guaranteed admission before the ED and RD cycle even begins. Can you imagine if it was supposed to be 50 kids and some Common App AI intern typed in 5000?
Not the first time colleges have accidentally notified people of acceptance and then withdrawn those.