coffeebean13

It happened to everyone! Someone f'ed up. Ha! Luckily the explanation email saying they had made a mistake had already been sent out by the time I saw it...

Will do! Though I'm not expecting anything from YSE and am 99% sure I'll go to Duke.

Fascinating! I imagine that that could happen if the school has a particularly high yield rate (a higher than expected percentage of folks admitted that are accepting offers). If they admitted 15 so that 12 enroll, but all 15 enroll, then they may not see a need to keep a waitlist given that they can lose 3 students (20% of their enrolled students) and still be where they wanted to be. Best of luck, @yeeeeeeee!

If there are extra seats, they may offer spots off the waitlist. But I don't think they're going to release a decision for everyone on the WL. Because people have until the 15h (or 14th) to decide, most people (especially those on the fence) will make it at the end. So admissions is unlikely to know if they have extra stops for the WL until the day of the deadline. However, they're likely to match the number of spots offered for WL to spots available (i.e. if they had 2 open spots, they'll pull 2 people from WL )and give them a short time frame to respond. They'll still keep everyone else on the WL (unless you pull yourself off), because there's still the possibility of someone pulling out who had accepted/put down a deposit. They'd want to fill that seat, and they need people on the WL for that. Ultimately, some of us may hear back if there are seats, but not everyone will hear today or tomorrow. Though if anyone hears back, that is good for those on the WL because it means that any student declining from then on would likely result in someone getting pulled from the WL.

Thanks so much for this insight! And, my partner went to HKS and that sounds about right...

For those folks who were accepted to YSE...what's the vibe amongst the admits? Are most people accepting, undecided, or declining? And any major themes?

That sounds terrible. Sorry to hear that. I haven't heard of this before. Did they say "you haven't met the minimum GPA requirement, and therefore are no longer granting you admission"? My first question for them would be if there's a way to mitigate this. Like, depending on how far you are from the minimum, you can take a class over the summer (or defer for a year to take a few classes). Or, they can make an exception to only count classes in the last two years of undergrad (when people generally do better). If this is something that is barring you from getting admitted, I'd work with them to get creative on how you can get over it.

nice. I'm assuming you got an email or did it just show up in your portal?

Congrats on the acceptances! Where are you leaning??

I was surprised at first, too. Duke was also the first one I got back, so I had high hopes for the others. But a some reflections: duke had the essays+resume+the 15 random things, and I think the 15 random things really allowed me to share the context in which I was approaching this program and tie it all together. YSE had a longer essay (but the other areas to write were shorter - 300 essay + short answers). Getting the same message across (as strongly) as in Duke was more difficult given that I wanted to provide context, but did not have the space to do it effectively. If i had more direct environmental experience, I expect the essays would have been stronger because I wouldn't need to spend so much time framing the essays. I also wonder how many students were allowed to defer in some of these programs, and how many they had apply to this specific tracts. It may have been competitive (above and beyond the usual). At this point, it looks like Duke may be my only real option. So I'll likely go with that. (still haven't heard from SEAS though)...

Finally heard back from Bren yesterday night and got waitlisted there, too. Note for those reading this thread in preparation for their application in a future year --- it seems like the schools are paying close attention to experience in the field (both undergrad and professional work experience). In my case, I am an older applicant with limited direct experience in environmental stuff. I do have 6+ years of management experience and high-level roles, but they are all in higher education administration. My app centered on making a case for transferring my skills into the environmental (I've been involved in some green initiatives on campus), but it wasn't enough. Good luck!

Still waiting on both of these. Got into Duke & waitlisted at Yale, but haven't heard a thing from SEAS (sustainable systems) or Bren. Hope we all find out soon!

Yes! so annoying! Also waiting on SEAS (and a few others, but no one has heard back from the others, so that's not a problem!)...ugh.

Still have not heard from SEAS...

Congrats to everyone who got into Duke! Hopefully some more good news from SEAS today!

Yes! And, it's weird. I wouldn't have assumed that the number of applicants for SEAS would increase dramatically. I've assumed that the schools who waved their GRE this year (and didn't last year) would see a bigger change, but the number of applicants for a school like SEAS who waived it last year wouldn't change too much. Also, not to be that guy... but I looked at the 'admitted student' page at SEAS and saw that they have a facebook group for Fall 2021 cohort (with 10 people on it - though only 1 was added this week, so likely admin?). and an admitted student day scheduled for March 19. Can't imagine they release decisions too close to that day, otherwise people wouldn't have put it on their calendar.

It looks like all bets are off for when they are going to release decisions. Both Duke and SEAS already passed the dates they've sent out decisions in the previous cycles. So.. there could be a systematic delay that would drastically impact/delay the release date OR it's coming any minute now...

Yes! Both Duke and SEAS seem to have started to release their decisions on the second Wednesday of Feb with many folks hearing by the second Friday. But this goes out the window if your contact is correct and they are in fact going to release decisions next week...

Hi @tiaki - Do you mind sharing where you got that information? They've been fairly consistent about releasing the first batches of decisions the second Wednesday of February for the past few years. I imagine more people applied (and they may have had some deferrals from last year, reducing the number of seats for those applying this round). Hope their established processes allows them to still release decisions on the same timeline.

Just got mine in the mail...

I have not received mine. I got an email the first week of May stating that it should be out in 2-3 weeks. So I'm expecting it by the end of this month.

I will be pursuing a joint MPP at HKS and Master in Urban Planning at the Harvard Graduate School of Design. It was a better fit. If it was just the MPP at HKS vs Goldman or MPA at WWS, I would've gone to Berkeley - The program, faculty, and students were phenomenal.

I declined the offer today. I had a generous package with full tuition + stipend. Hopefully that gets reallocated to you guys!

I really like the program and the students seem to be super smart and down to earth. However, I work and want to keep working in affordable housing and the other schools have great programs. I'm deciding between a joint MPP/urban planning degree at HKS/GSD (which would give me solid policy skills and stronger technical skills because of the urban planning degree) and a MPA at Woodrow Wilson. I want to work in DC after finishing my degree, so I think those two schools would be great to get connected. Also, WWS' financial package is amazing.

Are you going to admit day at the Woo, too? And I know, I'll probably be going to the East coast. I looked up the weather in both Boston and Princeton, and it's below 32 degrees. I'm from San Diego, so I'm definitely going to miss the sun.