<p>This is just terrible. I’m very disappointed. I think it’s a significant loss for Harvard as well as for its applicants. I hope that the transfer applicants who retook the SAT and so forth applied to other schools as well so your efforts were put to good use.</p>
<p>That said, the cries for a lawsuit are unproductive. Voice your dismay to Harvard if you want to, as I will, but going to court is not the answer to every problem.</p>
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</p>
<p>Emphasize the word “small,” and you understand why there is no basis for a lawsuit here. It’s regrettable that the announcement came after this year’s applications were filed, but most of those applications would have had just the same result of the applicant not being admitted as a transfer student. Meanwhile, </p>
<p>[The</a> Harvard Crimson :: News :: As Freshmen Move In, Transfers Crowded Out](<a href=“http://www.thecrimson.com/article.aspx?ref=522698]The”>http://www.thecrimson.com/article.aspx?ref=522698) </p>
<p>the admission office has agreed to refund the application fees, so they get stuck doing a lot of work without making anyone happy, because another department of the university didn’t anticipate the interaction between housing availability and the transfer admission process.</p>
<p>While it certainly is regrettable that Harvard made this decision, people should stop complaining about it not being fair. It is a sad fact of life that there is no such thing as fair. Harvard, as a private institution is in no way obligated to accept transfer students. I feel bad for those students who thought they were transferring in to Harvard only to have their hopes dashed very late in the year; however, Harvard’s decision, while very inconsiderate, is not “unfair”.</p>
<p>Oh, I think it’s unfair. That doesn’t make it legally actionable, but it’s unfair to invite people to invest in the process and then pull the rug out from under them due to a completely foreseeable lack of space. It’s never fair for the ref to change the rules in the middle of the game, even though he’s entitled to.</p>
<p>“another department of the university”</p>
<p>I suspect that internal conflict is at the heart of the problem here. Admissions’ job is to recruit, admit, and enroll the best students in the world. It’s NOT their job to provide housing and education to these students, so they have no incentive to shrink the class – the College does. The hardest part of Admissions’ job is rejecting people, and they don’t want to do more of it than they have to. But Admissions will have to be the face of the school to the applicants and take all the (well-deserved) flak the College’s decision is going to bring.</p>
<p>I wrote to Dean Pilbeam about this, since his office actually made the decision. I bet that Admissions is just as mad as we are.</p>
<p>oh wow. i’m sorry for you guys</p>
<p>on the other hand, that means more freshman spot yay!</p>
<p>in reality, very very few transfers are accepted anyway. keep that in mind.</p>
<p>would you rather they have rejected everyone mysteriously?</p>
<p>Quite frankly, most of us think Pilbeam has been doing an awful job this year. This is just one among many of his PR missteps this year. I know he’s in a interim position and he mostly likely means well with all his actions, but he’s been rather incompetent.</p>
<p>What the college did in announcing the transfer situation now was just plain stupid. In 2003, Harvard accepted no transfers. It didn’t, however, announce that plan in March.</p>
<p>It would make sense for the college to make its transfer decision in May after getting responses back from accepted students. Transfer applicants understand that the number of transfers accepted does depend upon space available, and in general, colleges won’t know that until getting acceptances back from students the colleges accepted for freshmen admissions.</p>
<p>Presumably, due to the change in financial aid, Harvard’s yield will be way up, but Harvard won’t know that for sure until May.</p>
<p>The announcement about transfers was cruel and a public relations disaster.</p>
<p>Still, the prospective transfers need to move on despite their justifiable rage. Sit-ins at Harvard, e-mailing admissions, calling admissions, lawsuits aren’t going to make any difference. Time to put their energy into getting acceptances at other colleges where they applied.</p>
<ol>
<li><p>I agree that this is pretty awful for all of you. I’ll bet anything that the Harvard Admissions Department thinks so, too. Given the timing, it had far more integrity to announce a comprehensive change of policy extending for several years and to give refunds than to say “Oh, when it came time to evaluate how many slots we had, it was only two. And there may not be more than that next year.” Which would probably have been perfectly honest, too.</p></li>
<li><p>I suspect the decision had little to do with this year’s freshman admissions, and a lot to do with this year’s room lotteries in the Houses, where they first begin to see who’s planning to be around and who isn’t. And it’s probably also about the not-often-intersecting lines of Admissions and whatever department decides that they may have to take some rooms out of service temporarily for refurbishment. No one would have chosen this timing deliberately. That’s why they nixed the whole thing in advance for next year – to avoid repeating the problem.</p></li>
<li><p>Complaining to the staff of the Transfer Admissions Committee seems a bit ironic, since they may have lost their jobs yesterday. There may just be some people this decision affects even more than it affects you.</p></li>
</ol>
<p>^^concur with Nsm.</p>
<p>But, I also think this is one of the unintended consequences of dropping EA. By dropping EA Harvard (and Princeton) broadcasted its plan to accept more low ses kids, but is likely finding out that they have a gazillion more super-duper highly qualified kids (due to cross apps with Princeton and better finanid). Thus, to make room for the low SES (and/or super-duper) kids, the transfers were eliminated.</p>
<p>Just my $0.02 (cynical world) of college admissions.</p>
<p>Don’t just talk and whine people - write and call! </p>
<p>Especially those who have actual connections and influence at Harvard admissions. </p>
<p>It doesn’t matter whether you are a transfer applicant, or a parent, or a Harvard alum, or a Harvard student.</p>
<p>Write and call. Make our voices heard. Tell them that we have given our full efforts in the transfer applications, and they should respect our efforts and consider our applications. And pray that they would consider the transfer applications at least for this year.</p>
<p>I just wrote. Come on people!</p>
<p>I disagree. I think that it is actionable - the college potentially knows/is aware of this, thats why they are offering to refund the application fee, as a sort of peace offering. But that is not enough.</p>
<p>In response to what Hanna said: No, the rules cannot change substantially in the middle of the game. Although there is no formal contract between the applicant and the admissions office, per se, there is a very strong implicit one that is backed up by several years of established trends. These trends say that recently that the college has accepted somewhere between 40 and 100 applicants a year.</p>
<p>Thus, it is reasonable for applicants to believe that the trend should continue for this year, and that the number of acceptances this year should obey the trends within reason. Completely closing the program without prior warning is not staying within these trends.</p>
<p>Furthermore, there are statements in the public record from senior administrators saying that the level of transfer admits would stay at relatively the same level (I am referring to the Crimson article from last year, when the number of admits was halved).</p>
<p>When taken together, the applicant has a legitimate basis, in both a practical and legal sense, to assume that they were applying for one of approximately 40 spots. In addition, by Harvard making these assertions, in the form of information posted on the web site, interviews with deans in the crimson etc…, the college was implying that it had approximately 40 spots to give out this year. </p>
<p>Harvard did not have the right to discontinue the program without first fulfilling its obligations to the students whose applications were pending - obligations that were established before the decision to discontinue the program was announced. </p>
<p>After all, there are significant costs in terms of time and other intangibles to filling out an application - and when deciding whether to apply one weighs the chances of success against the costs. Thus, the applicant’s decision to apply was made upon assertions made by Harvard that later turned out to be false. Harvard is liable for these misrepresentations of its product.</p>
<p>It is not the applicant’s fault that the Harvard administration faced an unforeseeable shortage of space. Therefore Harvard should not only be responsible for refunding the application fee, but all other costs associated, and any consequential costs that result from this failure to fulfill obligations.</p>
<p>Room lotteries in the houses have not begun yet. The focus has been on Housing Day in which the freshmen are assigned to houses. </p>
<p>A lot of undergraduates do indeed still go abroad.</p>
<p>There is no excuse for this. Not even reading an application (when Harvard says over and over again that every application is read diligently) is unacceptable in my opinion.</p>
<p>That being said, I do agree with Cosar in that now applicants will not feel that they were judged poorly. The timing, however, is way off. And it is certainly not fair to change the rules in the middle of the game.</p>
<p>“3. Complaining to the staff of the Transfer Admissions Committee seems a bit ironic, since they may have lost their jobs yesterday. There may just be some people this decision affects even more than it affects you.”</p>
<p>No one lost their job. Don’t be silly. Every member on the Transfer Admission Committee is also a regular admissions officer.</p>
<p>P.S An edited version of my awfully, ungrammatical sentence from an above post: “I know he’s in an interim position and he most likely means well with all his actions, but he’s been rather incompetent.”</p>
<p>“3. Complaining to the staff of the Transfer Admissions Committee seems a bit ironic, since they may have lost their jobs yesterday. There may just be some people this decision affects even more than it affects you.”</p>
<p>No one lost their job. Don’t be silly. Every member on the Transfer Admission Committee is also a regular admission officer."</p>
<p>Touche.</p>
<p>Furthermore, I find it immensely hypocritical that early decision was discontinued with a year’s advance notice.</p>
<p>Agree with thansferapp07.</p>
<p>when playing a game, you either play it or not, but you can’t change the rules in the middle of a game.</p>
<p>It is the obligation of both applicants and harvard to finish playing the game once applications materials were submitted and accpeted prior to the required deadline.</p>
<p>“when playing a game, you either play it or not, but you can’t change the rules in the middle of a game.”</p>
<p>Unless you’re Hillary Clinton. Then you can change the rules any time you want.</p>
<p>The timing of their email leads me to believe that they are going to be using a “spring-cleaning” “delete all emails with -Transfer- in their subject” software</p>
<p>Everyone really needs to call next week if no one gets a reply</p>
<p>Insufficient accommodation resource is not a reasonable excuse to be announced one month after all applications were submitted.</p>