How to get off the waiting list?

ksanyee
Fri, 01 Apr 2011 13:07:23 +0000

A way to get the attention of the Admission officers is to send emails. Daily. Or at least a couple every week. Spend lot of time by carefully composing these flawless emails. Summarize what happened to you recently. Draw conclusions and connect it to the school. Go online, find out what is going on at the university and write about it. E.g. if there is a speaker, you can talk about whether you like them and why/why not (if you know them). Or if someone is talking about an issue (which is usually the case) just tell them what you think about that issue. I think these emails must not be longer than one or two paragraph. The point here is to remind them constantly that you are out there. By sending them emails regularly they will know for 100% that you want to go there (even if you send one to every school you are waitlisted at). If you are informed about what’s going on on campus it is also impressive. Being on a waitlist means that they want you. Not even the admissions officers know why some people do and some do not get into their schools-due to the large number of perfectly qualified applicants. By placing you on the waitlist, they expressed that they think you are an especially qualified applicant who could easily be attending. So how do you think they do the selection among these students? This is sheer luck. Unless you make them remember your name. So when it comes to decisions, they will say stop when they are about to throw away your folder. I know the admissions officers here and they are just like everyone else here-they love the community and personal contact. So this shall amuse them.

This advice might seem silly. But it worked for some (here on CC). Some may say this is too much and you will only upset the admissions officers. But come on, they don’t HAVE TO read these emails. Even if they read your first email and then they delete the following ones without reading (unlikely), they will see your name. You will stand out. I do not see any way this could influence your chances negatively, unless you just write bs in those emails (I mean bad bs. They won’t say: “This guy sent so many emails to us. Who does he think he is? He’s wasting out time. Don’t accept him!”

There is nothing worse than getting off the waitlist and thinking: “I should have done more. I should have sent in more than one additional essay, even though they only asked for one.” If following this advice and still get rejected, at least you’ll know you did everything you can.