Thank you.
Some of you will be moving on after tonight and so I think it's a good time to express my gratitude for having you spend a few moments from your busy days on the blog. My work in social media is successful because of you. When I'm bleary eyed from staring at forms and transcripts, your comments help me feel connected to the students who are behind the applications. I'm thankful for the opportunity to interact with you here, on Twitter, Instagram, the Facebook page, and the blog. I am not thankful for SnapChat yet. I'm not sure I ever will be.
For an admission officer, a dream moment would be to be able to see a student open their admission letter. During the EA release, students were tagging their happy pictures and videos with #UVA2018, so that dream came true for me. I love thinking about how happy some of you are going to be this evening. That excitement is tempered by the fact that we're going to make many of you sad or upset. I console myself with the knowledge that you will all have other attractive offers, some from our 14 public sisters in the Commonwealth of Virginia.
Regardless of what SIS shows you tonight, you are going to be just fine. You are going to attend a great school and you are going to grow tremendously while there. You're going to have "ah ha" moments like you've never had before. You're going to learn from amazing, inspirational professors, administrators, and peers. You're going to meet people with whom you will stay friends for the rest of your lives. You're going to pull all nighters studying. You're going to pull all nighters not studying. You are going to have highs and lows, you're going to have great successes and you're going to fail miserably at a few things. What's going to make or break those experiences is your response and your openness to learning from them, not necessarily your location when they happen.
Remember that your decision is not a statement about your value. Most of our applicants are qualified. The vast majority of the applicant pool is perfectly capable of doing the work at UVa. Our first-year class just isn't large enough to accommodate everyone.
Best wishes to those who won't be back to the blog after this (if you're reading this by email, you can unsubscribe yourself at the bottom of the email). To the rest, I hope you'll continue to chime in to help the next group of applicants.
It's a big night and I'll be thinking about you all. Good luck! Go Hoos!
Seriously, use the #UVA2018 and #UVA hashtags tonight.
Our entire community is so excited to welcome the new class!