I’m wondering because 80% get deferred. If they’re not bothering to even reject most people in the early round, are they seriously considering most applications? If that’s the case, what determines if they’ll read your app front to back inside out? Awards? SAT/ACT scores?
Do Harvard AOs read your app seriously during the early round?
Same answer as I gave when you posted on Reddit - yes.
And I’ll add, one can criticize Harvard for not rejecting 80% of REA applicants like Stanford does, or for putting thousands on the waitlist when they’ll only admit 0-30. But that’s been their long-standing strategy. It doesn’t mean they didn’t read the applications in time
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Why are you asking this? Send in your application understanding that MOST of the applicants to Harvard are eventually rejected, and it’s not because the adcoms don’t read their applications.
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Yes, a deferral just means that after reviewing the application, Harvard Admissions has decided not to decide at this time, instead decided to wait to decide until they have the full RD pool in front of them as well.
It is sort of obvious why they might decide to defer a lot of people, even if most had only a small chance of eventually being admitted. Why eliminate an option before you have to, if there is even a small chance you might want to use it?
Yale’s Admissions Office actually discussed that logic pretty openly, in the course of explaining why they ultimately decided to adopt a policy of deferring a lot less people. They were persuaded it would be good for more of those applicants to get an earlier rejection, and apparently decided they were willing to give up whatever marginal option value was remaining in those applications.
But if Harvard Admissions doesn’t see it the same way–oh well.
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