Never Fear, Committee Is Here!
We Admit It! It’s been a little while since you’ve heard from us. A lot has happened since we last posted. Kendrick Lamar and the cast of Hamilton set the stage on fire at the Grammys. Peyton Manning Omaha’d his way to a Super Bowl championship. And Leonardo DiCaprio finally won an Oscar (which, coincidentally, is the same number of Oscars won by Nicolas Cage).
What have we been up to over the past month? The answer, in a word, is reading. February and March are two of our busiest months of the year. By now we have received, sorted and thoroughly enjoyed reviewing all of our roughly 15,000 undergraduate applications. You’ll remember that all of the applications we receive are read by at least two members of our admission committee. Your application is first read by a member of our admission committee other than your regional dean. Your application is then read by your regional dean, who uses the first reader’s notes, their own personal impression of your application, as well as their knowledge of your high school and state/region in order to formulate their own thoughts about your file. Once both of these reads are complete, it’s then time to discuss your application in a new setting: committee.
While staff meetings and other gatherings in our office grant us opportunities to talk about some of the great applications we’ve read, it is not until committee begins that we are able to, in a group, formally discuss each applicant and officially build the freshman class one individual at a time. Our committee meetings will take place each and every day for the next few weeks. During these meetings we’ll intently examine our applicants’ academic records, pay close attention to the letters written to us by teachers and other mentors, discuss our applicants’ wonderful essays and consistently become humbled by our applicants’ many accomplishments. Committee takes a lot of time and a lot of hard work, but it is one of the most rewarding parts of our job. Your stories and talents never cease to impress us.
To help sustain us through these long meetings, we of course stick to the four main food groups: candy, chips, chocolate and sugar. They
say a picture is worth a thousand words, and, well, we’ll let this picture do all the talking. Anyone who says dreams don’t come true has clearly never seen our Admission Committee snack cart. In fact, rumor has it that our snack cart was the inspiration for Maroon 5’s hit single Sugar. While this hasn’t officially been confirmed, we like to think it’s true.
So hang in there over the next few weeks, and rest assured that your application is getting our utmost attention and care. We’ll begin posting our popular Overheard in Committee series in the near future in order to keep you updated on how things are going here in Williamsburg.
Brad Harlan
Assistant Dean of Admission
Comments are closed on posts older than one year, but we still want to hear from you. If you have a comment or question for us, please email admission@wm.edu.
I love reading these blog posts! Can’t wait for the next one.
Would you happen to know the approximate release date for decisions? I know committee has just begun, but do you think it might be before April 1st (late-March?) like it has been in previous years?
Thanks so much!
@Eric all we are able to say is that we will release admission decisions by April 1. While it is possible that decisions could be released before that date, we cannot guarantee that this will be the case. Hang in there!
For applicants who received a postcard, are their applications also discussed in committee?
If you have many applications from a single high school, are those read and discussed as a group? Thanks.
@Greenbeans, we, as regional deans, assess which cases are best suited to bring to committee. Some decisions are fairly clear-cut after the two reads that each application receives are completed (before committee). Individuals who receive postcards tend to fall in this category. To answer your second question, yes, we find it useful to discuss each application from a single school before moving on to a new school.
Is it too late to submit a statement of continued interest if I was deferred early decision? I was waiting until the semester and winter sports season finished so I could update the admissions staff on my accomplishments. I would really like to send a statement but I realize it is very late in the admissions process. Thanks!
@Carla, you are still welcome to submit a statement of continued interest if you wish. You can either email this statement to your regional dean (http://www.wm.edu/admission/undergraduateadmission/contactus/meetthecommittee/index.php) or our general admission account (admission@wm.edu).
Aproximately when is the latest/earliest students hear about financial aid?
@Karla, the Financial Aid Office typically begins sending out financial aid notifications approximately one week after admission notifications are sent. Since we are planning to send out admission notifications by April 1, you can expect to hear from the financial aid office by mid-April or so.
Will transfer applications be heard this coming month as well? Or are they discussed later on, after the freshman applications? Thanks for your help!
@L, right now we are primarily focusing on freshman applications. Once the freshman application review process has been completed we will turn our full attention to our transfer applicants. We are still on track to send out transfer admission notifications by early May!
I saw on CC that several students had received Monroe Scholar emails last Friday. Have all of the Monroe Scholars been notified? Thank You.
@PBJ, there is a chance that there will be additional Monroe Scholars selected between now and April 1, however the majority of our Monroe Scholars have already been identified.
When will ED students who received an e-mail in early January that they had been identified as Monroe Scholars receive official confirmation of their status? It doesn’t appear they received an email last Friday when the RD applicants were officially notified.
@ED Mom you are welcome to send Dean Harlan (bjharlan@wm.edu) a direct email with your student’s full legal name and W&M 930 number. Dean Harlan will then look into this issue for you and respond to your email.
I was wondering the same thing. If you find out anything, would you mind responding?
Same boat too.
@ED Mom, @Amy & @ Tott, thank you all for checking in regarding this matter. The emails that were sent out to Monroe Scholars this past weekend were only sent to those Monroe Scholars selected through the Regular Decision process. Any Monroe Scholars who were selected through the Early Decision process will be receiving their official letter/notification in the mail within the next few weeks. We hope this helps to clear up any confusion. Please let us know if we can provide any further assistance.
Hi there! I received my acceptance and my Monroe Scholars notification a few days ago. Are Monroe Scholars the only applicants who have been sent their decisions so far? I have some friends who are concerned now that I have gotten my letter.
@Bridget, last weekend notification emails were sent out to Monroe and William & Mary Scholars. All admission notifications will be sent out by April 1 (just a few weeks away!).