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Hi guys. I applied to Columbia, estimating I had about a 25% chance of getting in there. Been complete for a while, hadn't heard from them, until I got the following email.

Dear Mr. Thisiswheremynamewas:

We hope this message finds you well.

Last month, our office released a letter to you, but this letter was returned to us as "undeliverable." In response, we sent an email to the thisiswheremyemailwas@email.com address that you provided, but we received no reply.

If you could, please update your contact information with us so that we may attempt to send this letter to you again.

Best wishes,

Columbia Law School
Office of Admissions
Mail Code 4004
435 West 116th Street
New York, NY 10027
Telephone: (212) 854-2670
Fax: (212) 854-1109
Website: http://www.law.columbia.edu/admissions

My apartment's mailbox is fairly small, and a larger envelope wouldn't fit. That's the only reason I can think of that would prevent the mail from getting to me. And I've never had any problems with my email getting to me (I mean, this one got to me.) I called the office of admissions today and spoke to a kid who knew my name immediately, as if he had personally dealt with this inconvenience himself. He asked me if he could send whatever it was they tried to send to my parent's house, and I said sure. He ended the conversation quickly.

Is this weird? A part of me thinks if they're making such a fuss over it maybe it's good news, but then I remember what a jerk I was on the LSAT and realize it's probably not. Maybe a waitlist?

Check your application to see whether you entered your contact information incorrectly. Regardless, send them a reply email with your current email address and mailing address as well as your name and LSAC number.

It's basically impossible to say what the decision was, but I think it's more likely that they have an incorrect address and email address for you than that a lazy postman didn't stuff a VCE into a small mailbox. Postmen can and do stuff things a little bigger than VCEs into tiny mailboxes.

Not trying to be overly optimistic but it sounds to me like you're in or WL or they want something from you. I don't know why they would want you to contact them if you got dinged. They may want you to update your LSAC transcripts or something (I have heard Columbia does do this more than other schools).

HJO wrote:Not trying to be overly optimistic but it sounds to me like you're in or WL or they want something from you. I don't know why they would want you to contact them if you got dinged. They may want you to update your LSAC transcripts or something (I have heard Columbia does do this more than other schools).

Yeah, there's like a 99% chance it's not ding/wl/in because those don't require responses (at least by now). They probably need updated grades or are missing something.

disco_barred wrote:

HJO wrote:Not trying to be overly optimistic but it sounds to me like you're in or WL or they want something from you. I don't know why they would want you to contact them if you got dinged. They may want you to update your LSAC transcripts or something (I have heard Columbia does do this more than other schools).

Yeah, there's like a 99% chance it's not ding/wl/in because those don't require responses (at least by now). They probably need updated grades or are missing something.

The reason they emailed him was because the letter was returned to them, not because they need information from him. If you were a law school, and your decision letter was returned to you as "undeliverable", you'd try to contact the applicant, too, even if only to tell him/her of a rejection.

Also, I think Columbia's grade requests and missing info requests come by email rather than snail mail.

BenJ wrote:

disco_barred wrote:

HJO wrote:Not trying to be overly optimistic but it sounds to me like you're in or WL or they want something from you. I don't know why they would want you to contact them if you got dinged. They may want you to update your LSAC transcripts or something (I have heard Columbia does do this more than other schools).

Yeah, there's like a 99% chance it's not ding/wl/in because those don't require responses (at least by now). They probably need updated grades or are missing something.

The reason they emailed him was because the letter was returned to them, not because they need information from him. If you were a law school, and your decision letter was returned to you as "undeliverable", you'd try to contact the applicant, too, even if only to tell him/her of a rejection.

Also, I think Columbia's grade requests and missing info requests come by email rather than snail mail.

Yeah, you could be right. They may just have wanted him to contact them with a correct address and that is what the e-mail was about and why they needed to hear back from him. Also, it sort of seems like if you got in they would have been a little more enthusiastic on the phone.

The reason I thought it might not be a rejection is that they said "In response, we sent an email to the thisiswheremyemailwas@email.com address that you provided, but we received no reply. "

If it was a rejection, what would there be to respond to? Unless they were emailing me to update my address so they could ding me, which would suck haha. I sent updated transcripts after fall semester, so I think it's probably a waitlist. I don't really know a lot about the waitlist process (I realize I could read about this), though I'm already wait listed at UPenn, so I'm not sure what to make of the entire situation.

Anyway, thanks for your input guys.

on edit: The guy on the phone was just some kid, he definitely wasn'y enthusiastic, but it was also 9:01 and Columbia makes it a point not to tell people stuff on the phone, I think. Again, don't think I got in.

I would assume that the original email was a request for an address correction so they could re-mail the decision, not a notification of the decision. No decision of any sort would require a response by now.

BenJ wrote: Postmen can and do stuff things a little bigger than VCEs into tiny mailboxes.

Hahaha loled at this. So true.

Just to update in case anyone was curious, turns out I was "reserved" which from what I can gather is an unranked wait list.