In early April, we start taking "decision calls" in our office. Those are calls from parents asking why we made the decision we did for a certain student. For the first two weeks of the month, the calls are almost non-stop. The most popular question: "Why was my child waitlisted?"
Now, I've always worked in the private college sector where we didn't entertain these conversations at all (and not many people called to question our decisions). However, at a state school, we try to be responsive to our constituents and respond to each and every call.
There's a reason this is titled "Part 1". I'll continue this tomorrow. I'll be on retreat with the office for the rest of the day, discussing how we'll change strategies for next year's admission cycle.
For now, take a look at my colleague's blog at Johns Hopkins. He wrote a great entry about the waitlist a few weeks ago. Interestingly, they have a waitlist similar in size to ours at a school that doesn't have state and individual school ratios to maintain.
