At last, (nearly) all Early Action, Early Decision, and Priority admissions results have been released. So what have we been seeing so far this admissions cycle, and what are we looking for over the next few months?
Defer, Defer…Deny?
Those who have been following the admissions world for several years now have likely noticed the flood of deferrals that have characterized the process for many students—it’s not unheard of for a student to have seven or eight deferrals they are managing at this time of year . Many in the field critique this practice as unfair to students, though, of course, plenty of deferred students do ultimately get in. This year, though, we noticed some schools going right to denials in the EA round as part of their enrollment management strategy. The schools where we noticed an uptick:
CU Boulder — Lots of deferrals and also some denials, which is new for many students with whom we work. Their internal email to deferred students made it clear they received far more applications than expected and had to make decisions accordingly.
University of Maryland — Admission to UMD has become much more unpredictable in the last few years, and this year, as in the past three years, they handed down a fair dose of denials. It’s important to remember that this is a university where major can be critical; did your neighbor with a 1600 and a 4.9 GPA who didn’t get in apply to a Limited Enrollment Program? Students need to be strategic about choosing which program to apply to.
University of Wisconsin — Continued its trend of releasing some denials along with admits and deferrals. Denied students include those who are absolutely academically qualified to attend. Wisconsin’s changing admissions climate in the last few years has moved it to the “reach” category for many students for whom we might have called it a target just two or three years ago.
Yale – Yale, like several other Ivies, used to defer nearly everyone they didn’t admit in the EA pool; their Dean of Admissions once said they didn’t want to discourage academically qualified students from applying by denying them. But in a post-pandemic, record-high application world, it seems Yale is following Stanford’s model and increasing their denials in the early round to try to let students off the hook earlier.
In the end, though a denial can feel shocking and upsetting, it allows students to move forward with their options and spend their energy where it will be most valuable—including in advocating for themselves at schools from which they were deferred and where their file will truly be read again.
Dartmouth Returns to Testing
This was the biggest news in the higher ed world last week. We encourage everyone to read Dartmouth’s FAQs to understand their thinking and how they arrived at their decision.
The question on so many minds is: will this cause more schools to follow suit?
While we don’t have a crystal ball, we think it’s unlikely that this opens the return to testing floodgates. It’s something of an open secret that many Ivy Plus deans are eager to return to testing, citing pressure from faculty, among other reasons, so a couple more peer schools might follow Dartmouth. That said, several have already extended their test optional policies through 2025 (including Cornell, just this week), 2026, or 2027 (. However, Dartmouth notes that they’re absolutely fine (read: probably relieved) with a subsequent drop in applications. Not all colleges are fine with that—one school’s application volume overwhelm is another school’s ticket to rising in the rankings.
What we expect going forward is an increasingly mixed landscape. Now that the pandemic-era testing requirements are being reevaluated, we will see colleges make their own choices according to their specific institutional priorities, which we have to remember are not the same. Admissions offices are not all alike in their goals, staffing, or way of reviewing applications; we cannot expect unity in testing requirements when there isn’t consensus on much else.
What’s critical in Dartmouth’s statement is the idea of “contextualized testing.” Whether a school is test optional or not, this is important for students to keep in mind as they make decisions about sending scores or applying. Their scores will be viewed in their high school and community contexts. This is why your school’s internal data tracking (Naviance, Scoir, etc.) tends to be more valuable than a college’s school profile in evaluating if you will be a competitive applicant. We will add that, in many cases, the scores will be viewed in the context of a student’s major or program of study. A 32 from one student is not the same as a 32 for another. Dartmouth is naming this directly, which we appreciate.
To that end, we are most excited about Dartmouth’s announcement that they will change how they report testing ranges. It’s an opportunity to genuinely disrupt the largely misleading middle 50% number most colleges report. We’re excited to see what it looks like, and we hope that more schools choose to get more granular with their data reporting.
FAFSA Nightmare
The rollout of the new FAFSA almost couldn’t have gone worse, really. As a result, some colleges (especially those without very deep pockets) won’t be able to get financial aid offers to admitted students until well into the spring. Some schools, like Virginia Tech and the UC and California State university system, are already extending their reply date beyond May 1 to give students more time to compare offers. This delayed timeline might in turn lead to more summer melt (the term for when matriculated students withdraw from a school) and more waitlist activity this year.
Need more personalized guidance on assessing your options moving forward after receiving your EA decisions, navigating the complicated standardized testing landscape, or coping with the consequences of the delayed reply date timeline? Contact our college admissions team
