It has begun...

I can't believe it's this time of season again. High school wasn't that long ago!

I still remember opening decisions.mit.edu at 11AM on December 15th to see a deferral letter, haha. Oh boy...round two.

btw...Admissions office is the BOMB!!! GO US! lol ;)

Thank you, Records Office :)
Just a short question: If there are factual updates to our application (due to recent events) - is there a possibility to send them in? If so, what would be the preferred way?

Thanks!
-sg

Hi Matt,

I got a question too! From what I heard, the admissions office started to read the completed applications approximately 2 weeks ago. Since all of the Early Action deferred applicants already have completed applications, do our folders get read first? If so, when we send in updates, will that be read? What if our folder has already been read and reviewed? Will it be looked at again?

I mailed some updates last Wednesday, the 16th. Just wanted to know if it will be reviewed or not.

Thanks!

I'd also like to know when updates need to be sent in by, I'm waiting to finish wiring the electronics board on our FIRST robot because I want to send in a picture... It *has* to be done by February 19th, though, so hopefully I'll be able to send it in soon!

Do our entire files get a re-read if we got deferred, or do the original comments still stand? I'm curious as to how the process exactly works...

Oh boy!!! This is getting beyond nerve wrecking..... :D

Ok, I sent in a supplemental teacher recommendation (as recommended by my interviewer), and we were worried that you may not know how to process it. Everything else was already processed. Is there any way to check if it was received? Or a better way to send in something like this?

Thanks for (attempting) to keep us calm Matt. You know its pure agony on this end of it. "The waiting is the hardest part." Yeah. that's right. I just quoted Tom Petty....

I've got a question about the SATs. I know on the website it says you look at the january tests on a case-by-case basis, so if i choose MIT as a score recipient for my jan SAT but not actually tell the admissions office, will you guys look at it?

......

I've got a question I had sent all my stuff in one package and only the SSR has not been processed yet if I am missing some thing how will I know

Sergey, from what I know (really not much) I'd recommend you to send them in by email or fax.

Yuzhi and Karen, they are only using the summary cards they made during the EA reading sessions - as well as looking at any updates you might have sent them in the meantime.

You should probably throw an email after the Admissions Office, April. Tell them what you've sent in, when you did, and I bet they will make som kind of post-it note on your application saying that it's not complete.

From what I've learned lurking around on this site two years prior to applying, they really aren't out to get us. :)

Hello please I need some guidance. I sent my application part 2 online and except for it everything else has been processed( thank you admission committee) Do I have to go pver the application again ? or is it alright?

Matt, I realise that I can send 15,120 copies of my finaid application and still beat the deadline, but the *one* that I sent isn't showing up on my MyMIT. ;-)

Should I proceed with faxing one?

It has begun...........OMG...Yes, its nerve wrecking. One question: International Applicant won't have a checkmark besides Mid- Year Report right? It was meant for US students and those going in US System based schools, right?

Hey Matt :)
I am international applicant and as far as I could understand, I shouldn't send mid-year grade report. It is still unchecked in my tracking system. Will it eventually disappear od just stay that way?

@ Sanaj and Libin Daniel

The Mid Year report is not required by international applicants if you your highschool was not following the US schools educational system.

So, you can just send a short email to the admissions office saying that the Mid-Year application is not applicable to you, and therefore you did not send it. The records office will simply check it on your tracking system so that your application is marked complete.

I just sent them a mail, but forgot to mention that my school did not follow a US School System.. Should I send them one again?

i just hope... nd hope..

O-H M-Y G-O-D....this is it...It has begun!

*sigh*
Finally it has begun and we will be getting a decision pretty soon. I can't even imagine how competitive it will get for International Students.

hey
i remember reading one of your blogs that mentioned keeping you up to date with our latest achievements. is there an official way to do that? or should i just post it here?
thanks

Hey Matt
All parts of my application have been reviewed and processed. I submitted my CSS profile (for financial aid) a week ago, will that show up on my application tracking as well?

How tough is the admission for International Students? I may not know my chances but what's my probability of getting in?

Thanks a ton

Take care
Shreya

@Shreya: Why not take a look at the stats (Info for Schools - Admissions Statistics)?

International students
Applied: 2,745
Admitted: 119

@shreya
International students need to file International Student Financial Aid Application not CSS Profile.

@Sumaiya
Besides these statistics, for a breakdown of country wise International Students at the university visit http://web.mit.edu/iso/www/, the International Students Office(ISO)

http://web.mit.edu/iso/stats_07-08/asia.shtml

Hey, this was the one I told earlier regarding Indian acceptance. Its 19/4 i.e. on an average 5 per year presuming 3/4 part of a student is not accepted..Lol.
Thanks Anonymous for the link.

Ok, I understood that internationals from a different school system than US are not required to send the mid-year report. What if I choose to send it anyway? Last semester I had some lower grades and I want to show MIT I have recovered. So may I send the Mid-Year report?

Thanks, Eirik :)

Hi,

I just have another question about the teacher recs...one of my teachers sent it early Dec. and another sent it near the deadline. Neither has been processed. Are the recs only processed once both are received?

Thanks

Thanks for the link Libin! I'm quite surprised at the numbers of undergrads of some of the countries..

Sorry but I've got another question, are Mid-Year Reports the same as Interim Reports? International students don't have to send it yeah?

hey matt
can i ask my counsellor to send the missing stuff by email.it would be faster.if yes to which id??

are you aware of the NTSE and JSTS scholarships in India. I didn't describe them in my application, just mentioned that I am a recipient.

Libin, I guess that's 'enrolled'. 'Accepted' would be one or two more, so perhaps that make will make the number an integer. ;)

hi.
I just wanted to know whether MIT accepts SAT Scores that have been certified by the educational advisory unit at the U.S. Embassy in foreign countries like mine(Ghana). Thanx

Good luck to all applicants(especially to internationals)...
hoping Jan SAT scores arrive on time...

For deffered students, can we still send in extra essays? like an update for what has happened since we applied in november?

@Dennis: I'm pretty sure that they get processed once either is received, because my teacher recs came in at different times and number 2 was processed for about a week before number 1 was.

@Eswar: I'm pretty sure that it's suggested that you fax missing materials, as the admissions office can't open attachments. If you want to e-mail something, your counselor will have to paste it directly into the body of the e-mail.

@Anonymous: this blog entry from Matt awhile ago may prove quite useful to you.

Hopefully that helped! Good luck to everyone - March is a long ways away :)

This entry surprised me, mainly because my application (that is everything except for Evaluation B and Mid-Year report) has been processed since... late December, I think.

Still, thanks Matt for trying to keep us (anxious dreamers) calm.

I have a question, though. Is it normal that the admission office reads everything, except for one document (in my case, Ev B)?

If yes, then yay! If no, then I suppose I should ask my teacher to refax it, eh?

Well, good luck to everyone and...
And I'm off to sit in a corner, wishing I'm a part of the 4.33% likely to be accepted :P

Matt - This is a bit frustrating... MyMIT worked fine when I was just a regular accepted student. But now that I've deferred a year, nothing seems to be working. My biographical info says my entrance year is 2008, but when I click "Online Application & Tracking" it says, "Application tracking is no longer available for entry year 2007." How am I supposed to track my financial aid application? On top of that, I can't access the Class of 2012 guestbook, so I can't see who my classmates are. How am I supposed to monitor membership in the Facebook group? Is there any way to fix this? I can get a new account if that will help...

first of all, i have the same question as baggy - everything has been processed except for my SSR and transcript...do those take longer or something?
wow I didn't know the statistics for international students' admissions was so low!! oh maaaaaan.... anyway I heard MIT has a cap on the number of international students in the freshman class (10%). is that true???

Ghysella, I have the same problem- everything except Eval B. I thought I was the only one!

my only solace is that the admissions office is really accomadating about this!

International admissions is surely going to be tougher this year :(

@Libin Daniel - Do you live in India?

Hawkins, I am no expert, but I think you should create a new account just for the financial aid application which I assume you are doing this year.

hey matt..
I am so happy all my application docs have been processed by the admission staff!!! MIT Roxx!!!
but all i am worried about now is the financial aid application ...so after we submit the fafsa and the css profile does it show up on our mymit profile or do we have to make a separate account for that?? and is the financial aid on a first come first serve basis?
I request you to ask the financial aid department to post some blogs regarding these things..
Thank you very much...

Yup, right at the periphery of the burgeoning Capital!

it says i don't have application part b in but i thought i did it where do i go to see what is wrong with it or too fax it in because i dont have a copy of it

My secondary school report and transcript are missing on myMIT page, but my school counselor assured me that he'd sent all of my papers... should I wait a little longer or should I send another copy?

Hi Matt...
I'm Kamya (as you might have guessed from my username...pure genius) and I applied RD to MIT...the MyMIT website says that there are no educational counselors in my area (I live in Moscow) and now I don't have an interview....I was wondering if MIT did phone interviews or web chats or something so that the application becomes...more...I dunno - personal? Anyway could you tell me about the status of phone interviews?
thanks a bunch for the help..

Karen said:

"March is a long ways away :)"

But at the same time, it will come before you know it, bwahaha. Just enjoy your senior year! =p

Hey all,

I'm an international student from the Caribbean and so far only my evaluation B has been processed. I sent the documents over a month ago and I suppose those have been held up in an inefficient postal system :(. I was wondering about my testing requirements though. I test in december and the scores were delayed for about 3 weeks before they came out. I emailed MIT to tell them about the problem and they said that there was no problem with receiving the scores in January but yet the testing requirements box is still unprocessed. Why is this so?

I'm a junior.I've given my SAT this Jan.I haven't aplied to MIT yet(but intend to),so if i send my SAT scores now and then apply later,will that work?

I resolved the issue with regard to the SSR,and about my admission chances,I have published a paper in math on extension to pythagorean triplet of 3,4,5 and have also got recommendation letters from two professors who did research work with me here in India,all my math scores are good,but my english ones,I took the toefl test and got 97 in the iBt test. So any one here who is already in MIT how would you rate my chances?

I have another qn.
I've been to two High Schools.At one school(my old one)i feel the teachers will be able to recommend me better as they know me better.So,i want to know,is it necessary for me to get the recommendations and evaluations from teachers of my present school? Or can the teachers of my old HS do this?

Some of my application materials were processed rather late. I sent eval A and eval B on Dec. 14 and they were not processed until Jan. 19. This seems suspicious. Should I be worried? I do not know if the outgoing mail was sent on time.

@Monorina
hey...im from india too =)
anyway whenever you send SAT scores, they send the history...every SAT you've ever taken. you can send it now, but they might ask you to send it again l8er.
recc letter - teachers that know you best, even if they are old ones.
@baggy - shouldn't try to ask ppl to rate chances. admissions decisions are unpredictable. if you're looking for encouragement, then you will get it: ur smart. you have a chance. but you never know right??!!! hey im in the same situation - applying RA and have to wait for 3 MONTHS!!!!!!!! that really, really stinks. have no chance of getting in coz of the 4-5% selection rate for int'l students.
but i cant suppress the irrational hope, right? :P

@Bisma
Yay ^^! I'm glad that I'm not the only one facing this problem (not that it makes it any better), but at least it gives a higher probability that the admission process actually goes that way and I don't need to ask my teacher to fax my rec letter

@Kamya
3 months waiting is not a big deal. It's the pain that everyone has to go through when applying to the States. I applied to most my colleges in October, so that leaves me.... 5 months in false hope? Well, let's not be depressive. I'm sure everybody has a chance (regardless how minute that is) and it all comes down to how well you presented yourself within your application.

Still crossing my fingers :)

Ah, so. The game is afoot...

*ominous music*

kamya thanks a lot , I am not that optimistic about my chances,I have to bundle up all these applications and focus on my CBSE board exams which are coming up.

@Jermaine:
I wouldn't worry about it too much. It takes them a little time to open the thousands of envelopes that come in. It takes a bit more time to match the material with the names. Mine took about a week, but it could be because I sent it in late and mine is on the top of the pile. If you look at the blog, Matt says that they finally processed everything, so, I'm sure there's a few hundred of others who are in the same situation :)

@Kamya:
I'm not sure if they do phone interviews, especially overseas. But I read somewhere on the FAQs that there's no disadvantage to not conducting an interview. I'm sure they can judge your personality from your essays and recommendations. The 500-word essays were some of the most personal essays I've ever seen.

And to all fellow international applicants and US-based applicants, here's a bit of encouragement. Watch American Idol. Only about 0.2% of the applicants even get past auditions. International students have

i have a lot of the same questions as the other people here - i'm sure everyone at the admissions office is very busy, and i appreciate their hard work, but i would really like to have some answers.

Hey, half of my comment was cut off and I didn't even notice. I think I was ranting about international students having a bit less than 5% and US-based students having a lot more than that, so our chances aren't nearly so bad compared to AI or any other career of entertainment :)

Hey Matt

I am an international applicant. All my documents have been checked except my Mid Year Grade Report. But, as the form says, it is not required from me. What should i do now?

Hi,
How can i track financial aid materials? I sent them a week ago but don't know if u have got them. After researching mymit for a long time, I haven't seen any option such as financial aid tracking at mymit. What to do?

man!

no one is like me, I'm an international student who lives in the U.S. :/ I don't know exactly who I'm competing with! but, it's a lot of fun having 5% chance; makes it even more interesting.
what a pity no one else from my country is applying :(
good luck to all of the applicants, I hope the ones who deserve it the most, can get in ;)

How long is the processing period for financial aid application? How long to wait to see it "received"/"processed" on MyMIT? Many internationals (at least all of my friends) appear to have the same problem?

Does anybody know if any Bolivian is at MIT¿¿??

@Ghysella
I know I was being very, very depressive, but I'm trying to prepare myself. you see, if I have high hopes and get rejected, I'll be very, very, very upset (understatement of the century) but if I keep low hopes and get rejected, it would have been what I expected, and if i keep low hopes and get admitted, my joy will know no bounds. (That was one heck of a long, complicated, and convulted (grammatically incorrect?) sentence.)
wow 5 months is a lot longer than me. how do you manage it?

@baggy
haha good luck 4 the CBSE's...atleast you're not doing ICSE's right (those are harder...silver lining mate!)good luck for your future, I'm sure you'll be fine, with a brain like that.:P

@Muz
lol that American idol trivia cheered me up - thanks! (even though I would never go into a singing career - when my mouth opens, glass breaks. seriously.)
anyway thanks for the info about the interviews. I'm a bit disappointed - the interview would have been my strong point. but I guess the admissions officers know what they're doing right!

oops I forgot to put my name on the comment above. It's me. (very informative, I know)

@Manou
well, as long as you dont have american citizenship/green card you are an international, regardless of whether you live in the US. so 5% is your selectivity rate.
how do you know nobody from your country is applying? what country are you from anyway?
I'm being excessively rude. sorry.

I know what i'm going to ask has nothing to do with this blog, but I couldn't find Matt's email address or some contact address that I can ask a MIT student directly.

I am currently a high school junior thinking about applying to MIT. The program of studies, activities, and stuff looks great. But I want to know more.

I am also a hearing impaired student who wears a Cochlear Implant. I do not use sign language--I can speak. Since I wasn't sure if MIT had services for the deaf or not, i contacted the admission office, and a lady said if I got accepted, they will look over what accomadations I may need if I go to MIT. She also said there are some deaf people here. But the answer isn't good enough for me.

I would like to know IS there REALLY a deaf community here? How did they function in MIT? Any difficulties, etc? Are there any very small, structured classrooms with attentive professors? I also have many more questions. I would like to hear from a deaf student himself or herself directly to respond back to my inquires. If not, then somebody who knows this stuff would be fine.

So, please let me know and respond back my questions, because MIT sounds like a great place, but it would even be more fantastic if there were something for hearing impaired people--something beyond the bare minimum required by the law.

do many spanish girls apply? i neeeed to know now if im in or not...its killing me...!!!!!!!!!( probably not...but well...its worth a try) do internatinals get a big envlope if accepted?

n soz again, does anyone one which financl aid form internationals have to fill in?please answer asap

Do you think more thatn 2 years of foreign language is required?

Happy Early Birthday Matt!

Hey, Matt I have a "serious" problem. I believe that I did not get the best recomendation possible. I do not know if it is possible for me to send another set. I wasn't able to get the recs because the teacher that knows me best went on an official assignment and he's back but I have already sent in those ones already what do I do ?

Hey, Matt I have a "serious" problem. I believe that I did not get the best recomendation possible. I do not know if it is possible for me to send another set. I wasn't able to get the recs because the teacher that knows me best went on an official assignment and he's back but I have already sent in those ones already what do I do ?

Hey, Matt I have a "serious" problem. I believe that I did not get the best recomendation possible. I do not know if it is possible for me to send another set. I wasn't able to get the recs because the teacher that knows me best went on an official assignment and he's back but I have already sent in those ones already what do I do ?

Hey, Matt I have a "serious" problem. I believe that I did not get the best recomendation possible. I do not know if it is possible for me to send another set. I wasn't able to get the recs because the teacher that knows me best went on an official assignment and he's back but I have already sent in those ones already what do I do ?

Hey. 4.5 per cent of international students were admitted. The future doesn't look too bright to me. In fact I wish I had never known this; attending MIT woulod be really cool - but its shrouded thyiongs I see.

@ Kamya
I can tell from the names. they are either form India or China or south America.
Besides students in my country (which I won't tell :D ) believe that Undergrad programs are not really strong in the U.S. They are wrong obviously but, what can you do about it!
by any chance, does anyone know the average ACT score (composite) of international students?

answers from matt yet????