There is good news and bad news about being deferred by an Early Action/Decision college. The good news is that the door to that school has been left slightly ajar – there is still hope. The bad news is that the hope is tenuous.
Colleges defer, rather than deny, students for many reasons:
- Even if the student did not rise to the top of the early pool, the application may nevertheless be sufficiently appealing for the admission committee to want to reevaluate the student within the bigger Regular Decision (RD) applicant pool. And, if that second review confirms a student’s relative strength, it may pull the applicant into the class.
- The admission office may just want to acknowledge a student’s hard work and admirable striving – a gentle, if ultimately futile, pat on the head.
- A college may also want to defer students as a hedge against an uncertain yield, since deferred admits yield at a higher rate than RD admits. This too inflates the number of deferred students.
- No school wants to offend alumni families and donors by flatly saying “no” to a less-than-stellar legacy, for example, or deter other strong students from applying by denying a high school’s valedictorian early.
What should you do if you’re deferred?
- First, assume the worst. That is, while many deferred students will still be admitted, most will end up being denied in RD. (Colleges are very reluctant, and rightly so, to drag deferred students all the way onto the waitlist at the end of RD.)*
- Knowing this, begin to move on, practically and emotionally, by focusing on your RD schools instead (or potentially identifying a well-chosen ED2 school). Indeed, many students do this so successfully that, in the end, they turn down later admission to their ED or EA school in favor of one that admitted them in RD.
- In the short time you might have before RD deadlines pass, reassess your college list and make sure you have enough great target and likely schools.
- Colleges know that admitting a deferred student in RD is no guarantee that he or she will attend. So let your deferring college know that it remains your top choice, if this is true. (But if you describe a college lukewarmly as “one of your top choices,” they are not likely to feel as warmly towards you as you would like, either!) Many colleges, such as Stanford, will give deferred applicants a template – a series of questions or small essays – with which to express their continued interest, but many will not. Send these schools a short email, addressed to either the regional admission officer or to the college’s general admission email address. Be careful though – some schools have explicit prohibitions on sending them anything additional (other than updates to testing and/or citizenship status). Be sure to follow the directions that each school outlines in the deferral letter (and see our article on “Letters of Continued Interest” for more information).
- When you send a note to your deferring college, do not irk them with a repeat of your initial application – they read it the first time! Instead, use the occasion to reflect, very succinctly but warmly, on why the school still interests you. Update the reader with any new developments – awards and prizes, extracurricular success, news of a great first semester, or recent scores.
- Note the emphasis on brevity – the more you waffle on at unnecessary length, the less likely you are to keep the weary reader’s attention. Also, don’t slather on the platitudes and risk sounding fake.
- Some colleges will welcome an additional letter of support from a teacher, coach or alumnus who can speak to your strengths. But don’t blitz the college with supplementary letters from people (no matter how famous) who either do not know you well or who have little of relevance to add. These bits will only obscure what the college does want to know about you!
- And don’t forget to thank the admission officers for their consideration. They are working long hours with good intentions, so give them their due!
*A note about the difference between deferrals and waitlists:
Many students and families understandably confuse these terms as they seem to confer the same delayed timeline. But the timeline is, in fact, an important distinction. Deferrals are given to students who applied early, were not accepted early, but will be reconsidered in the Regular Decision round of admission. Waitlists are given to students who were not admitted to the initial class, but may or may not be reconsidered later in the enrollment period if the institution needs more students to meet their enrollment and/or financial goals. Many waitlisted students are simply “released” from the waitlist once the institution is satisfied that they have secured their incoming class. Both results are disappointing to students and can drag out the process, but only deferred students are guaranteed reconsideration later in the process.