Spring is in full bloom as demonstrated by my flowering pear tree so it is time to provide a final round admissions update. This will be my last scheduled blog post until all admission decisions have been communicated to applicants.
We have started to receive midterm grade data from the Ontario Universities’ Application Centre (OUAC) for Ontario Secondary Schools. Once we receive all the data we need, we will proceed with the final round of admission for the Faculty of Engineering. Our team will assess applicants over the next week with all offers being communicated prior to May 17th. During our final round, we will not be able to respond to individual inquiries regarding applications. Please be patient with our admissions team. We realize this is a highly stressful time for applicants, families, guidance counsellors, teachers, and school administrators.
Most, but not all, offers to Ontario Secondary School students will be communicated at one time. There are always a few offers that involve a bit more processing so these take longer. Offers to Non-Ontario Secondary School students often roll out in small batches. These offers have more complicated conditions that involve some manual processing. Our awards office will also be awarding entrance scholarships to selected applicants. All admitted applicants including those who have already received an offer of admission are eligible for these entrance scholarships in our final round. We must communicate all decisions by May 17th. All applicants will know whether they have been admitted and whether they have been offered a scholarship by May 17th.
New this year, some applicants to Civil Engineering will receive an email inviting them to request an admission offer to either Environmental Engineering or Geological Engineering. The Civil Engineering applicant pool is deeper than in previous admission cycles. We also anticipate that we will have available spaces in Environmental Engineering and Geological Engineering at the conclusion of our final round. We hope to fill these available spaces with students who might be interested in considering an alternate offer to Environmental Engineering or Geological Engineering. These programs share many courses with Civil Engineering and often lead to similar career paths. A special email will be sent to qualified applicants who have not been selected for an admission offer to Civil Engineering. This email will invite them to request an alternate offer to either Environmental Engineering or Geological Engineering. These individuals will have a short window of time to respond to the email. Otherwise, they will be denied admission to the University of Waterloo when the final round concludes on May 17th.
The reason for the short time window is related to ensuring that all admission offers can be made at least two weeks prior to the deadline to accept an offer. This also allows time for applicants to apply for residence while the residence guarantee is still valid. We considered giving out offers automatically to one of the two programs, but we felt it would be better to provide this select group of applicants with a choice of program. While both programs are similar to Civil Engineering, there are some key differences. Individuals will be given the opportunity to reach out to our faculty to find out more about these programs before making a decision. Agreeing to receive an offer does not require a firm commitment to accept an offer. Applicants will still have at least two weeks to decide whether they wish to accept the alternate offer. For those who are not currently applicants to Waterloo Engineering, I do not expect this opportunity to exist in future admission cycles. Our situation this year is unique and unexpected.
While we still have many offers to give out in the final round, I have no doubt that many strong applicants will unfortunately be denied admission to programs with highly competitive applicant pools. The reason is simply the competitiveness of our applicant pools. There will be students with high averages and strong extracurricular involvement that we are unable to admit. We have a limited number of spaces in our engineering programs. Hopefully, you will receive some good news next week.