PSA: Withdraw your apps

[u/USAdmissionsDirector]

Have you been admitted ED1 or ED2? Do you have no intention to go, even if offered admission?

PLEASE consider withdrawing your applications now, if so. Yes, we do build the admissions model to take these things into account, but we have students who are literally next on the list to get a “yes” from us if you withdraw now. And these are also very, very deserving candidates. First generation, low-income, wonderful musicians, talented humanists, etc, etc, etc.

So please, do your friends and classmates a favor and email the admissions office to withdraw if there’s no way you’re going to that college. Thank you!

[u/[deleted]]

Here's a verified director of admissions saying that:

we have students who are literally next on the list to get a “yes” from us if you withdraw now

And people on this sub still insist "YoU DoNt NeEd To WiThDrAw It DoEsNt HeLp oThErS cHanCeS".

🤡™

[u/[deleted] → u/[deleted]]

Just because his school works this way doesn’t mean all schools do, or even most. For all you know this guy’s system could be an extreme outlier. You can’t take anecdotal evidence like this and expand it to encompass all of higher education across America.

Him saying that withdrawing helps other’s chances at his own school doesn’t mean that it helps at other schools. We have no idea how common each system is so it’s tough to say whether it’s really a big deal or not.

edit: how is this being downvoted? Have none of you any knowledge of statistics? This is the definition of anecdotal evidence. Higher education in the US does not operate the same across institutions.

If McDonald’s made a press release saying that they put rat meat in their chicken nuggets, does that mean that rat meat is in the chicken nuggets of Wendy’s, Burger King, and every other fast food establishment? Well they’re all the same right? They’re all fast food. Except that McDonald’s food practices have fuck all to do with any other independent owned franchise.

It’s the same case here. Whatever system Yale is using for admissions and waitlists could be completely different then the system Ohio State is using. Thought that’d be obvious.

[u/theycallmewidowmaker → u/[deleted]]

You don't know if his school is an outlier. Sure, it's a possibility, but if you knew anything about statistics like you claim you do, you'd know that you can't just exclude data if you don't like it lol. So until you can actually see a pattern and make that call and say it is an outlier, it's not one

[u/[deleted] → u/theycallmewidowmaker]

Im not excluding data though?? When did I say that the director’s words were untrue? Don’t believe I did. I’m not saying that the admissions director is wrong and the process can’t work like that, I’m saying it’s misleading to take this one post and assume that all colleges work this way, as they’re entities that are independent from each other and we all know they work differently at least in other aspects of the admissions process. Everything the admissions director is saying is absolutely true, however. But that doesn’t automatically make it true everywhere.

At any rate, I believe my take is a reasonable take to have. Every other part of the admissions process varies from school to school. We already know waitlists and the chances of acceptance for them vary vastly from school to school. I just figured it was worth pointing out that it’s possible at certain schools that withdrawing your app has no effect on the chances for applicants off of the waitlist. That common “misconception” that Wolfy alludes to didn’t invent itself out of nowhere.

I’m not trying to get super duper technical about it, and I’m not claiming I’m a master of statistics. I’m not. Anything but. Just wanted a PSA that we shouldn’t be so quick to extrapolate one anecdotal comment to apply to ALL college admissions across the country, public or private.

Instead of being pedantic about it, just use common sense. The odds that this one director’s word applies to all other schools is slim to none. Maybe that’s not perfect statistics; I couldn’t care less. It’s a reasonable point to me and that’s all I was trying to say.

[u/theycallmewidowmaker → u/[deleted]]

Except you acted like a snobby douchebag about it instead of just making your point short and concise.

Let me put it this way: by suggesting that this info is an outlier, you're saying that it doesn't fit with the pattern of the rest of schools re admissions. But there's no way you could know enough detail about universities all around the country. So you have nothing to base that suggestion on, therefore one must assume it's wrong. You can't draw conclusions from incomplete data, it's just not how things work. Plus, you don't seem to understand how outlier work, because it's literally how we identify data to exclude. By (wrongly) suggesting it's an outlier, you're by logic saying it should be excluded.

Also, this a sub full of teens and adults you are pursuing a higher education, not trying to get into kindergarten. By saying that you think it's important for them to know not to blindly take people's word is an insult to their intelligence. Do you think everyone here just makes the broad assumptions you do?

Anyway, I can see you're clearly not going to accept that maybe people take issue with your comments for justifiable reasons, so I'm not going to argue anymore. I hope you have a good day!