Admissions Email: What does this MEAN?

[laurissimo]

Hey guys!

I emailed Penn State at the beginning of March to ask about admissions decisions.. here is the answer I got back.

"No need to apologize for your inquiry. Unfortunately, we have already made our first round offers of admission. At this point, you have not advanced to the final round of applicants. I hope this information helps. "

What does this sound like to y'all? Waitlist? Rejection?

Thoughts?

[anthropologygeek]

I would say rejection but if they already sent some out then i would lean towards wait listed.

[laurissimo]

They've sent out both acceptances and rejections- I wonder if anyone else got an email like this?

[ThaddeusCrane]

I think that means you're on a wait list. It's weird that they called it the "final round", but I bet you're sitting on their shortlist. I've contacted schools where they've told me they have sent out their first round of admissions and did a bunch of cuts and the reason I hadn't heard was because I'm sitting on a wait list more or less (for some reason some schools didnt call it a wait list, the sort of danced around the issue and I just inferred it was a wait list scenario).

If you can, contact your POI and they might give you the lowdown on what's going on. I emailed both the DGA and my POI at one school and the DGA gave me the "we're just moving slow, hang tight" response, whereas my POI gave me a more in-depth response regarding funding limitations/funding being in flux, how they sent out a bunch of rejections already, and are waiting on their first-round admits to decide before they offer positions.

[far_to_go]

Eek! Sounds like purgatory! I would say that you're probably on a waitlist, since you haven't received a straight-up rejection. But if you have other schools that have made you offers, sounds like you might want to plan in that direction.

[HiImAja]

Hey I was just wondering if you've heard anything more from them. I haven't heard anything at all from Penn State.

[laurissimo]

I replied on your other post as well- I haven't received anything officially, but I did talk to Betty Blair at PSU and she says that all offers have been sent at this point, as per Dr. Milner.