This unpredictable year, and the Wait List

This year has been unpredictable for us from start to finish.  We didn’t know how the economy would affect the number or quality of applications.  We didn’t know how many students would accept our offer of admission, given the widespread economic uncertainty.  And we didn’t know how many students would change their minds after first saying they’d enroll.

And now, for the first time since I joined the Admissions staff in 1999, May and June will pass without our making an offer of MALD admission to a wait-listed applicant.

So here is where things stand.  Last week, we told some wait-listed applicants that they will not be admitted this year.  The decision on which applicants to let go was made essentially for pragmatic reasons.  A prime example:  If we were to admit students at the end of July, there wouldn’t be enough time to arrange a visa for an international student.  And it may well be late July before we will see the need to admit more students.

If you haven’t yet heard from us, we’d like to hear from you.  Are you really still waiting for Fletcher?  If so, how late into the summer would you be willing to change your plans and accept an offer of admission.  Send a note to FletcherAdmissions and let us know where your plans stand.

As I’ve said, we hate to drag this process out for the applicants who remain on the Wait List.  I don’t think any of us would have guessed that we’d be (ever so slightly) over-enrolled on June 29, but that’s how things have turned out.  From experience, we know that a few more students will change their plans before Orientation, and drawing from the Wait List remains a possibility.  But we want to keep the process transparent, and we can certainly say that there will be no early Wait List activity.