Graduate School Admission Decision; University’s Response Time

Here’s a question from Anand about the response time in the admission decision process by graduate schools in the U.S.

Hi, I am Anand. My score details are as follows:

• GRE: 1,320
• TOEFL: 111/120

I had applied at 5 U.S. universities for the spring 2010 intake and they are: USC, U. Texas-Dallas, ASU, V. Tech, and TAMU. Though I applied as early as early August 2009, until now (i.e., Oct. 2009), I haven’t  received a single response from any of those universities. Could you kindly tell me some tentative time when can I expect these universities to start responding? I am a little concerned due to the delay. I am also thinking of applying again for the Fall of 2010.

University Admission Decision

You have to understand the entire Graduate School Admission process. (What happens after you submit your college admission application.)

• Typically it will take 2 to 4 months for U.S. universities to respond to international students’ applications.
• This response time also depends on the type of admission deadlines followed by U.S. universities (Hard Deadline vs. Rolling Admissions)

University Hard Admission Deadlines

• Example – When a university specifies deadlines as Nov. 2, 2009 or Jan. 15, 2009.
• All graduate school applications will be collected until the deadline.
• The application packets will be processed after the deadline or all admission documents are required (Application Fee, Test Scores, etc.).
• It will take 2 to 4 months after the deadline for US universities to reach admission decisions.

Rolling Admission Deadline

• Universities typically process applications upon receiving them.
• Will take 2 to 4 months from the date universities had received all admission documents
• If you apply too early, they will wait before your application will be even opened and processed.

Read about the 5 Ways  to Check Graduate School Application Status, and go back to all the universities’ websites to check the deadlines and admission policies and calculate when you can expect to receive responses from them.

Suggestion: You should wait ’till you hear back from all the universities you had applied at before applying for the Fall 2010 semester.

Try to find the admission status by following any of the 5 ways discussed above. Have lots of HOPE and POSITIVE THINKING.