time between decision and your reply

[pietjekanarie]

Does anyone has some insights into the time you have between the final decision and the day you have to reply to the universities? I know April 15 is the day in the US, but how does it work in the UK and Canada? I just had a phone interview with Cambridge (UK) and the person I talked to was really positive and although she didn't say I was in, she said that "she didn't see any problems". However, I applied to 8 schools in the US, UK and Canada and I would like to see were (if) I get in and compare. On the other hand, if Cambridge is making an offer next week or something, it seems like I cannot wait till April 15... (maybe they aren't going to accept me in the end, but let's stay positive)

Anyone who knows if the UK also has some kind of deadline or how much time they give you after making an offer? I can't find it on their website.

(my first post on this forum, yay!)

[JustChill]

I don't know about Cambridge, but I was accepted to Oxford back in early December and they gave me until June 30th to respond.

[pietjekanarie]

Thanks for the reply Rockchalk. That sounds great, I hope Cambridge has a similar deadline. It will allow me to wait out some other decisions of top schools before I reply

[pkchatty]

University of Leeds game me till July to respond. I think the UK does things much differently than the US. I don't know about Canada though... I am waiting on McGill.

[someDay]

McGill: I think this depends on the department, although I'm not sure. I know that in some departments people were accepted/rejected off the waitlist as late as July.

UK: This is completely different. Usually you'd get a conditional offer (e.g. a achieving a certain GPA), in which case you might not find out until a few weeks before the course starts. Even if you get an unconditional offer (hardly ever happens unless you already completed your course) you'll have A LOT of time to reply. I reckon at least until early June, definitely after 15th of April.

sD.

[pietjekanarie]

I applied for the University of Toronto. However, since their application deadline was a bit later, I suppose the decision will be send later as well. It's not my first choice, although I would love to live in Canada again (I've been studying at McGill).

Does anyone how it works for US universities with really late deadlines? I applied to an NYU program that had the application deadline set on April 1. Don't they work with the April 15 final decision then? I applied in January for this program, so I hope to hear the decision earlier somehow.

Cambridge asked me some questions about the TOEFL. They prefer the IELTS, but I already wrote the TOEFL a while ago and submitted those scores. Their website says that they only accept TOEFL when it goes together with the Test of Written English. TWE is not part of the TOEFL anymore (for more than 2 years, woops, I didn't see that). So the director was going to try to exempt me from any further testing, because I scored 117 on the TOEFL already. I hope that works out, because I don't want to spend another 180 Euros on a test. I don't really see their problems with the TOEFL. Every other university accepts TOEFL scores.

Good thing about Cambridge is that they can make you a conditional offer anyway if you don't meet the language requirements yet.

[yehk]

UK unis have late reply deadlines, definitely later than the states. I would not worry.

[pietjekanarie]

I just got an official offer from Oxford and I have till June 30 to respond. I suppose Cambridge's working with the same kind of deadlines. That's nice, no need to worry anymore if I'll get in somewhere and I can wait out all other decisions