Appealing to Colleges

College and Career Center

Appealing to Colleges

Appealing to a College

The process of accepting and declining applicant students is an arduous one for admissions departments. Many schools receive far more qualified applicants than they have room for and difficult decisions must be made. If you have received a rejection notice but think that you are qualified, you probably want to argue your case. But first, do some research and think about your specific situation.

Check out the school’s admission department webpage or call to get information on appeals. Some schools do not accept them at all, some outline a very specific process and some give no information on the subject at all.

If your school does not accept appeals, then your best option is to start looking at their transfer requirements and plan to apply again in a few years as a transfer student. Of course you could take a gap year and apply again as a freshman next year, but if your application wouldn’t change in that period of time, your chances of getting in likely wouldn’t either.

If your school outlines a specific process for appeals and you feel that you fit the requirements, then go for it, but stick to their guidelines. If they only allow appeals for very specific circumstances that do not apply to you, don’t waste everyone’s time trying to fit a round peg in a square hole.

If the school does not give much in the way of guidelines, here are some things to consider:

Good Reasons to Appeal

You have new and compelling information that was not included on your application. Perhaps you have retaken the SAT or ACT since your application and now have a significantly higher score. Maybe you have been granted an important award or honor since your application was submitted.

There was a mistake on your application that needs to be corrected. Was a score or grade reported incorrectly?

Reasons That Might Work For an Appeal

Your grades the first semester of your senior year show a significant improvement from the transcript that you submitted with your application. Some schools may consider this as new and compelling information while others may not. In either case, your current grades would need to be considerably better than the past grades that you submitted in your application and you should include some reason for the improvement as evidence that you would be able to sustain those higher grades in college. If your grades have always been good and you have kept them up again in the fall of your senior year, this is not new information.

You have overcome a significant hardship of which you did not make the admission department aware in your application. If you had a major health issue your sophomore year that led to missing many days resulting in lowered grades, you may want to explain that. Reasons need to be significant though, such as illness, death in the family, etc. “I was just not motivated, but now I am” is not a significant reason.

Inappropriate Reasons to Appeal

You don’t think the decision is fair. College admission doesn’t have to be fair and you likely do not have all of the information that went into this decision. This is your opinion and appeals need to be made based on facts.

You got accepted to more competitive schools. Every school evaluates applicants in their own unique way. What other schools have decided has no bearing on your admission.

Students with lower GPA and/or test scores were admitted but you were not. There are often MANY factors other than GPA and test scores that go into admissions decisions. It is not uncommon for this to happen.

This is your first choice school and it has always been your dream to attend. This does not add anything to your application and tells the admission department nothing new about you. They assume you want to attend because you submitted your application in the first place. Schools do not admit students based on their desire alone.

If you have a reason to appeal that you feel is worthy and your school allows for appeals, here are some tips:

Address your letter to the correct person/department. Your school may have specific instructions for this. If not, addressing the letter to your local admissions representative is an excellent choice. You may be able to find that information on the college website or from the College and Career Center at your high school. If that information is not available, look for an address for a dean of admissions or a generic address for the admissions department.

Do it right away. Some schools will list deadlines for appeals and some will not. In either case, for the best chance of getting your decision reversed, get it in as early as possible.

Be sure and thank the reader for the time already spent reviewing your initial application and the opportunity to present more information. Never tell them that they have made a mistake or that you disagree with their decision.

Read your rejection letter carefully for clues as to why you were not accepted. Some schools use the same general letter for everyone, but some will individualize these. If you know the reasons, be sure to address them in your appeal if you have new evidence that better supports you as a candidate.

Always present your appeal as additional information that may show you as a stronger candidate than your original application alone. Things like your desire, statistics that show you are within their range of accepted students, the fact that your best friend got in, or that Stanford accepted you do not show that you are a stronger candidate than perceived by your application. Remember that your original application was thoroughly considered, so do not repeat information that was included there.

Keep it brief (unlike this document). With the ease of online applications, the number of students applying to nearly all schools continues to rise. With that means more rejections and more appeals. Admissions reps have just spent a significant amount of time pouring over applications, and now they are being asked to do it again with the appeals. Make sure your letter is personal, but also brief and to the point. If it is too long, begging, or presenting irrelevant information, it is unlikely to help your situation.

Obtain and include a letter of recommendation from someone (not a family member) who can confirm the new information that you are presenting and attest to the likelihood of your success at the college level.

Accept an offer at a school that has accepted you and move on before deadlines pass. Expect a “no” answer from your appeal and prepare to go elsewhere. Start arranging housing and attend admitted student events at the school from which you have accepted an offer. If you get your decision changed, it will be a nice surprise, but if not (which is far more likely) you will be ready and excited to attend the next best college for you!

Hopefully you built a great list of colleges to apply to that included safety schools that you would be happy to attend. If not, all is not lost. It is not too late to apply to community college or schools with rolling admission.