<p>My boss’s son was just rejected from Columbia for undergrad, and she wants to know why. I have the honor of having been very politely rejected by Columbia for grad school, and they told me exactly why. I’m curious though, is it possible for my boss to get information as to why her son was rejected. She says she’s called, but she’s just been given the run around. </p>
<p>Do the do this for undergrad?</p>
<p>I wouldn’t be surprised if they didn’t. For one, there’s a lot more applicants to keep track of. For two, the reason a lot of grad programs do this is so that you can reapply next year better prepared if necessary. This doesn’t happen as much in undergrad admissions.</p>
<p>I think mmmcdowe is right. Consider the fact that Columbia has about 21,000 applicants for undergrad. What would happen if all 19000+ that were rejected called admissions to find out why? The undergrad admissions department is already swamped, particularly right now - the last thing they need is something else to take up a lot of time without providing significant benefit to anyone.
Then consider also that undergrad standards are also very different from graduate school. There is probably no one precise, clear reason that your boss’s son was rejected.</p>
<p>They keep all of the applications on file with the reviewer’s comments. There are people who are assigned the job of responding to queries such as you are asking. But I don’t know if it is a service they provide to everyone, or if they only cave in if you whine enough. </p>
<p>Based off of talking to people, I would not recommend calling and asking unless you are completely prepared to be non-confrontational and constructive. I just don’t think that it is possible for someone to talk to a school that rejected them and be completely objective about the matter. there’s nothing to lose, but it will likely just be a bad situation, and both sides of the phone call will be grumpy.</p>
<p>“My boss’s son was just rejected from Columbia for undergrad, and she wants to know why.”</p>
<p>Here’s the answer: because Columbia and the other Ivies have enough highly qualified people to fill their frosh class many times over, so they have to reject a number of otherwise qualified students.</p>
<p>For example, Princeton rejected 3/4ths of applicants with SATs 2300 or above, and<br>
[Princeton</a> University | Admission Statistics](<a href=“http://www.princeton.edu/admission/applyingforadmission/admission_statistics/]Princeton”>http://www.princeton.edu/admission/applyingforadmission/admission_statistics/)</p>
<p>Columbia rejected over 90% of its applicants
[Admission</a> Statistics | Columbia University Office of Undergraduate Admissions](<a href=“http://www.studentaffairs.columbia.edu/admissions/applications/stats.php]Admission”>http://www.studentaffairs.columbia.edu/admissions/applications/stats.php)</p>
<p>Better for mom to work with her kid to make sure that “they” have safety schools that “they” love; the Ivies are a crapshoot for almost anyone</p>
<p>Kei</p>
<p>P.S. Better still if the schools the kid applies to are schools that the kid loves.</p>