The U.S. News Short List, separate from our overall rankings, is a regular series that magnifies individual data points in hopes of providing students and parents a way to find which undergraduate or graduate programs excel or have room to grow in specific areas. Be sure to explore The Short List: College, The Short List: Grad School and The Short List: Online Programs to find data that matter to you in your college or graduate school search.
When it comes to getting admitted off a college‘s waitlist, the chances are often — though not always — slim.
Applicants are typically offered spots on a waitlist in the spring during the regular decision round of admission. If they accept their spot on the waitlist, these applicants typically don’t hear back about whether they have been accepted until after the May 1 deadline for accepted freshmen to submit a deposit and secure their spot. That can be as late as just before classes begin in the fall, experts say.
The university’s decision often boils down to how many admitted students choose not to enroll. The college might turn to the waitlist to fill the final spots for the incoming class.
[Discover how to get admitted off a college waitlist.]
Among the 91 ranked National Universities that submitted these data to U.S. News in an annual survey, the average acceptance rate for wait-listed applicants was 1 in 5 for the 2015-2016 school year.
Fourteen of those institutions reported that they accepted no students off of the waitlist. Of those, Lehigh University in Pennsylvania had the longest waitlist at 1,847 students.
Other schools accepted only a few students off the waitlist for fall 2015. Among them were Carnegie Mellon University in Pennsylvania and Boston University, which both admitted only four wait-listed applicants, or 0.1 and 0.2 percent, respectively.
[Avoid these three college waitlist mistakes.]
Several schools also fall on the opposite end of the spectrum. Ohio State University–Columbus admitted all 304 applicants off its waitlist for 2015-2016, and Clemson University in South Carolina admitted 99.1 percent, or 783 of 790 applicants.
Below are the 14 National Universities that admitted the lowest percentage of wait-listed applicants for fall 2015. Unranked schools, which did not meet certain criteria required by U.S. News to be numerically ranked, were not considered for this report.
| School (state) | Total applicants accepting a spot on the waitlist (fall 2015) | Number of wait-listed applicants admitted | Percent of wait-listed applicants admitted | U.S. News rank |
| Lehigh University (PA) | 1,847 | 0 | 0% | 44 (tie) |
| University of Illinois–Urbana-Champaign | 1,601 | 0 | 0% | 44 (tie) |
| Virginia Tech | 1,544 | 0 | 0% | 74 (tie) |
| Stanford University (CA) | 927 | 0 | 0% | 5 (tie) |
| Tulane University (LA) | 921 | 0 | 0% | 39 (tie) |
| Miami University–Oxford (OH) | 899 | 0 | 0% | 79 (tie) |
| University of Notre Dame (IN) | 869 | 0 | 0% | 15 (tie) |
| University of Vermont | 866 | 0 | 0% | 92 (tie) |
| University of Delaware | 851 | 0 | 0% | 79 (tie) |
| California Institute of Technology | 429 | 0 | 0% | 12 (tie) |
| Suffolk University (MA) | 427 | 0 | 0% | 188 (tie) |
| University of Colorado–Boulder | 363 | 0 | 0% | 92 (tie) |
| University of Massachusetts–Dartmouth | 37 | 0 | 0% | 220 (tie) |
| Widener University (PA) | 20 | 0 | 0% | 183 (tie) |
Don’t see your school on this list? Access the U.S. News College Compass to find admissions data, complete rankings and much more. School officials can access historical data and rankings, including of peer institutions, via U.S. News Academic Insights.
U.S. News surveyed more than 1,800 colleges and universities for our 2016 survey of undergraduate programs. Schools self-reported myriad data regarding their academic programs and the makeup of their student body, among other areas, making U.S. News’ data the most accurate and detailed collection of college facts and figures of its kind. While U.S. News uses much of this survey data to rank schools for our annual Best Colleges rankings, the data can also be useful when examined on a smaller scale. U.S. News will now produce lists of data, separate from the overall rankings, meant to provide students and parents a means to find which schools excel, or have room to grow, in specific areas that are important to them. While the data come from the schools themselves, these lists are not related to, and have no influence over, U.S. News’ rankings of Best Colleges, Best Graduate Schools or Best Online Programs. The admissions data above are correct as of May 16, 2017.
More from U.S. News
3 College Waitlist Mistakes to Avoid
How to Get Admitted Off a College Waitlist: 6 Steps for Success
10 Colleges Where the Most Applicants Are Wait-Listed
14 National Universities Where Getting Off the Waitlist Is Tough originally appeared on usnews.com
