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So at some point I think we all are wondering if no news, is good news. So I thought I would ask and see if anyone has any theories on this. So here is the question: if you apply to a semi-reach or reach school (aka you are not auto-admit), is it good that it is taking them a "long" time to review your application? Basically, if you are not rejected within a month, could the school be taking you more seriously?

Just interested to see what people think!

WMCowgirl wrote:So at some point I think we all are wondering if no news, is good news. So I thought I would ask and see if anyone has any theories on this. So here is the question: if you apply to a semi-reach or reach school (aka you are not auto-admit), is it good that it is taking them a "long" time to review your application? Basically, if you are not rejected within a month, could the school be taking you more seriously?

Just interested to see what people think!

This is a very good question that I would like to know the answer to. I have applied to a lot of schools like that back in October and am still waiting.. tick tock

WMCowgirl wrote:So at some point I think we all are wondering if no news, is good news. So I thought I would ask and see if anyone has any theories on this. So here is the question: if you apply to a semi-reach or reach school (aka you are not auto-admit), is it good that it is taking them a "long" time to review your application? Basically, if you are not rejected within a month, could the school be taking you more seriously?

Just interested to see what people think!

quite the opposite actually.

WMCowgirl wrote:So at some point I think we all are wondering if no news, is good news. So I thought I would ask and see if anyone has any theories on this. So here is the question: if you apply to a semi-reach or reach school (aka you are not auto-admit), is it good that it is taking them a "long" time to review your application? Basically, if you are not rejected within a month, could the school be taking you more seriously?

Just interested to see what people think!

in my humble opinion it is not. If it is a reach school, and you're not an URM/auto admit then i believe it is a bad sign.

reason: most schools wait to reject a bunch of applicants at once and do not so for a few months. there are always exceptions though. EA/ED rejections are of course early, but other than that, they usually come in giant waves and later on in the cycle.

WMCowgirl wrote:So at some point I think we all are wondering if no news, is good news. So I thought I would ask and see if anyone has any theories on this. So here is the question: if you apply to a semi-reach or reach school (aka you are not auto-admit), is it good that it is taking them a "long" time to review your application? Basically, if you are not rejected within a month, could the school be taking you more seriously?

Just interested to see what people think!

I think the obvious answer here is not yes, or no, but "it depends." If you look at the different threads for each school in this forum, you will find that for some schools, longer waits are not cause for concerns, while at others, it might be midly alarming, especially if other people are getting in with similar numbers.

But for a general answer to your question, perhaps a longer wait may signal the school's desire to retain a number of applications until they are sure they have reached "critical mass" in terms of a candidate pool. Once the critical mass is reached, they will start making decisions.

So final answer? yes, no, maybe so!

Walfredo47 wrote:

WMCowgirl wrote:So at some point I think we all are wondering if no news, is good news. So I thought I would ask and see if anyone has any theories on this. So here is the question: if you apply to a semi-reach or reach school (aka you are not auto-admit), is it good that it is taking them a "long" time to review your application? Basically, if you are not rejected within a month, could the school be taking you more seriously?

Just interested to see what people think!

I think the obvious answer here is not yes, or no, but "it depends." If you look at the different threads for each school in this forum, you will find that for some schools, longer waits are not cause for concerns, while at others, it might be midly alarming, especially if other people are getting in with similar numbers.

But for a general answer to your question, perhaps a longer wait may signal the school's desire to retain a number of applications until they are sure they have reached "critical mass" in terms of a candidate pool. Once the critical mass is reached, they will start making decisions.

So final answer? yes, no, maybe so!

I think this is my favorite answer so far...because it is the only one that hasn't made me panic Looking at LSN, I see that I survived one wave of denials at American and one waves of denials at GMU. HOPEFULLY, that means they are looking past my sad LSAT to see that I have a little more to offer...at least that is what I keep praying when I can't sleep at night!

WMCowgirl wrote: I think this is my favorite answer so far...because it is the only one that hasn't made me panic Looking at LSN, I see that I survived one wave of denials at American and one waves of denials at GMU. HOPEFULLY, that means they are looking past my sad LSAT to see that I have a little more to offer...at least that is what I keep praying when I can't sleep at night!

This will be a good sign, if and only if, those rejected were completed after you were completed. If they were complete before you, then yea.....

I applied to 17 schools in late October. In order of ranking:

1-5 = yet to respond
6 = decision in the mail yesterday (probably WL)
7-17 = I'm in at 9. The remaining 2 have yet to respond, but I expect to get into both.

I wouldn't get overly optimistic about not hearing from reach schools. It's better than getting bad news, but the odds of getting in are still very low.

From Washington & Lee's Complete E-mail, regarding "Timing of a Decision":

Though we realize it may be of little comfort as you wait for a decision, we assure you that no news is indeed good news - as long as you have not received a decision, you are being actively considered for a seat at W&L Law.

Check out Chiashu's Decision Dates graphs, though. You can get a better idea when your schools will send out acceptances/rejections. Most of the ones to which I applied send out more acceptances January & February, then send mass rejections starting in March. This is early January, so not time to panic yet...

Neil wrote:This is early January, so not time to panic yet...

+1

finalaspects wrote:

WMCowgirl wrote: I think this is my favorite answer so far...because it is the only one that hasn't made me panic Looking at LSN, I see that I survived one wave of denials at American and one waves of denials at GMU. HOPEFULLY, that means they are looking past my sad LSAT to see that I have a little more to offer...at least that is what I keep praying when I can't sleep at night!

This will be a good sign, if and only if, those rejected were completed after you were completed. If they were complete before you, then yea.....

Hmm, I see your point...and unfortunately, it makes sense!

I tend to agree that no news is not generally good news. Right now, it's only what, Jan 13? So many schools are probably waiting until "critical mass," as it was previously posted, or are starting to weed through there applications. I know this probably isn't so for the T 14 and high ranked schools, who look for the best and continually accept or reject people from November on because they already know the criteria they are looking for, regardless of the # of applications. From what it seems like on here, most of the 50-100 ranked schools, give or take, extend their scholarship offers first, so they can possibly sway a candidate from going to a high ranked/better school and then look at everyone else.

I still have some hope for schools where my LSAT is in the 75th and my GPA is in the 25th. I think once mid February rolls around we can expect more of those waves, of both acceptances and rejections.

Look at the threads on TLS and LSN for the schools you care about, while it's just a sampling of the people who applied, if everyone who's been accepted got thousands in scholarship money and you know you aren't scholarship material, then don't panic. yet.

There is a group waiting on georgetown who went under review in december and then went under review again in january. Would anyone assume that means we survived the rejection round from the first review...

I'm not exactly on the edge of me seat to get accepted into a school I probably wont be able to pay for, but i'm still curious.

i feel like schools also can't automatically just dismiss all the reachy people because they might get stuck in a position where students turn down their acceptance offers so they keep some questionable people around for a while til they find out they don't need them in the mix..in my mind, no response is an unwritten WL..

There's also the theory, which I quite like, that splitters are more likely to be held longer before acceptance. I won't vouch for its authority because I haven't had experience with waiting out an Admit, but I have seen it mentioned a number of times.

Lermontov wrote:There's also the theory, which I quite like, that splitters are more likely to be held longer before acceptance. I won't vouch for its authority because I haven't had experience with waiting out an Admit, but I have seen it mentioned a number of times.

as an splitter i think this is true.

example: BU has accepted a lot of people, and just started to accept auto-accepts (those who will most likely withdraw). Most of the splitters who applied very early in the cycle have not heard a peep. although they have not rejected people yet either...

edit: nm they have rejected people

UFMatt wrote:I applied to 17 schools in late October. In order of ranking:

1-5 = yet to respond
6 = decision in the mail yesterday (probably WL)
7-17 = I'm in at 9. The remaining 2 have yet to respond, but I expect to get into both.

I wouldn't get overly optimistic about not hearing from reach schools. It's better than getting bad news, but the odds of getting in are still very low.

Ooo... I like this.

Here's me

1-3 (all T14s): 1 nothing, 1 reject, 1 deferred to RD
4-8 (T20): 1 WL, 3 Nothings
9-16 (21 on down): 4 Accepts, 4 Nothings

finalaspects wrote:

Lermontov wrote:There's also the theory, which I quite like, that splitters are more likely to be held longer before acceptance. I won't vouch for its authority because I haven't had experience with waiting out an Admit, but I have seen it mentioned a number of times.

as an splitter i think this is true.

example: BU has accepted a lot of people, and just started to accept auto-accepts (those who will most likely withdraw). Most of the splitters who applied very early in the cycle have not heard a peep. although they have not rejected people yet either...

edit: nm they have rejected people

I agree that splitters probably get held longer than others, but BU accepted me back in December, and I'm a splitter.

UFMatt wrote: I agree that splitters probably get held longer than others, but BU accepted me back in December, and I'm a splitter.

was your gpa 3.2 or lower? and LSAT 167 or higher?

If not... that is in range of BU.

T14- 6 applied to, none heard from
15-30- 9 applied to, one acceptance, eight nothings
Rest of T1- 4 applied to, nothing
T2- 5 applied to, 2 acceptances, 3 nothings

finalaspects wrote:

WMCowgirl wrote: I think this is my favorite answer so far...because it is the only one that hasn't made me panic Looking at LSN, I see that I survived one wave of denials at American and one waves of denials at GMU. HOPEFULLY, that means they are looking past my sad LSAT to see that I have a little more to offer...at least that is what I keep praying when I can't sleep at night!

This will be a good sign, if and only if, those rejected were completed after you were completed. If they were complete before you, then yea.....

valid point here. And as mentioned elsewhere, one of the benefits of this forum is that people's cycles can be compared against a viable (debatable, I know) number of applicants who are applying to the same or similar schools. So, find the thread, see what other people are saying, and you should be able to have a pretty good idea of what your prospects are for admission.

To the OP: no one here knows the answer to your question, they are just speculating. You should not assume that you know anything more after having read their responses. Just hope you realize that.

What really confuses me is that I've been in review at more than 3 schools since November but haven't heard a word one way or the other. At this point, I'm assuming that they're waiting to reject/WL me either this month or in February. Some schools I've been complete at for over 2 months and haven't gone into the review process yet. I'm also assuming that these schools will most likely reject me to. However, all of these schools have already rejected other applicants so why would they wait to reject me also.

It really really depends. From what I can tell, they are admitting the auto-admits, rejecting the very auto-rejects, and keeping a hold of the in-betweens and the splitters. Certain schools (like W&M) don't make the majority of their decisions until February/March, so most people will hear then.

clwilson6 wrote:What really confuses me is that I've been in review at more than 3 schools since November but haven't heard a word one way or the other. At this point, I'm assuming that they're waiting to reject/WL me either this month or in February. Some schools I've been complete at for over 2 months and haven't gone into the review process yet. I'm also assuming that these schools will most likely reject me to. However, all of these schools have already rejected other applicants so why would they wait to reject me also.

What on earth makes you think you're definitely going to be WLed or rejected at those schools? Why would they wait until later this month or Feb?