Being deferred by Georgetown wasn’t the plan. You were going to apply, and then have an answer. Maybe the answer would be no, and you were hoping it would be a yes — but you weren’t planning for a maybe. In this post, we’ll give you the plan for what comes next: how you increase your chances of admission to Georgetown, and how you ensure your entire college application experience is successful.

First, though, let’s talk Georgetown details. The Georgetown early action program has nearly the exact same acceptance rate as regular decision (about 10%). This is by design, and they maintain a policy of not favoring early applicants. There is another interesting, and fairly unique, admission strategy Georgetown practices: they don’t reject anyone Early Action. Literally, no one. “Georgetown does not deny students in our Early Action program,” they write. Now you’re part of that pool. This means that you can’t know what your chances are of eventually getting in, because they aren’t giving you any feedback through this deferral other than that you haven’t been accepted. So, you need to get in the headspace that you are back at square one, as if you haven’t submitted any applications yet. Now this is what you do next.

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Before you turn your attention back to Georgetown, you need to get the rest of your college application strategy in order. Even if you have been working on applications for months, we highly encourage you to go back to basics by reexamining the framework of your college strategy and refining the stories that will support your application before you submit.

Review Your College List

Perhaps you’ve had a set college list for months, or maybe there are a few schools you like in addition to Georgetown, but you haven’t started in on the applications yet. Either way, being deferred from Georgetown shouldn’t make you rethink everything, but it does offer an opportunity to rebalance. You didn’t get into one of the most selective universities in the country. That doesn’t mean you can’t get into another hyper-selective school. Even if Georgetown had rejected you, that wouldn’t be a memorandum on your eligibility for a top-tier college. However, you do have higher stakes now. The early application window has passed, and you only have one more go of this. For that reason, we highly recommend a well-balanced this that guarantees that you have somewhere to go in the fall that you will love, even if it isn’t your first choice.

To this end, your college list should have 3-4 ‘foundation’ schools, or safeties, and 3-4 target schools. Identifying what is a ‘target’ can be tricky, so we like to let statistics lead. If your grades and scores are in the top 50-75% range of recently admitted students based on the most recently available Common Data Set, it is most likely a target.

Focus on your Essays and Supplements

Since the Georgetown application is independent, it’s possible that you haven’t spent much time on the Common App. A big part of this next step, then, will be navigating a new application platform — and the main Common App essay. You may be able to repurpose some Georgetown writing for the main essay, as well as for supplements, but getting away with doing less work isn’t the point.

To inspire your next writing steps, take a look at our 2024-2025 Guide to the Common App Essay. It may also help to read some successful recent essays that helped our students get into exceptional universities. Once you have an idea of what works, it’s time to start writing — or revising — or rethinking. Wherever you are in the process is okay, as long as you move forward with focus and vision.

Press Submit

Finally, you need to submit your regular decision applications. This sounds obvious, and it really should be. Unfortunately, it’s not. We see a lot of bad editing happen in the lag time between an application being done and perfect, and when it’s actually submitted. Avoid falling into this trip by submitting when your application is ready and then moving on.

You have good reason to get applications in and move on, too! You have Georgetown to fight for! The university will not review your application again until after the regular decision deadline, so there is no reason to turn anything new in until that date. However, you’re going to want to start working on the pieces of the deferral puzzle in advance of the deadline.

WHAT GEORGETOWN WANTS

As we said, Georgetown really takes a ‘catchall’ approach to deferral from the Early Action round of admission. If you aren’t accepted Early Action by Georgetown, you are deferred. Yes. Everyone. So, whether you were right on the cusp of getting in, but they just want to see more grades, or you have absolutely no chance at all, you’re in the same spot. Because of this, you can’t make any assumptions.

No assumptions means all action. If you still want any chance of getting into Georgetown, you need to take three decisive steps that update and elevate your application.

Updated Grades

Georgetown will want to see your mid-year grades, and your school counselor should automatically send them. Don’t assume anything, though. You should absolutely check in with your school counselor to confirm that your grades will be sent.

Advocacy Call

When you are checking in with your school counselor, you should also ask them in an in-person meeting about making an advocacy call. An advocacy call is a literal phone call (or sometimes an email) that a school counselor makes to an admissions office on behalf of a student and in specific support of their application. School counselors need to be strategic with these calls, as they know it is ineffective to advocate for many students aiming for the same college. So, if there are three students in your class who were deferred by Georgetown, your school counselor may only make an advocacy call for one. This means that an advocacy call is not a right, and it’s not a given — but it is worth asking for.

Alumni Interview

If you did not do an alumni interview as part of your initial application, there may be an opportunity to do one now, as alumni interviews are scheduled into February 2025. You may not be able to do this, but it is absolutely worth asking, and preparing for.

Letter of Continued Interest

The final piece of your updated application following a deferral is the letter of continued interest. This letter should be short, 400 words at most, and will be submitted through the application portal. The letter must include 2 key things:

First, the letter absolutely must state, in no uncertain terms, that Georgetown is your first choice school, and you will attend if accepted. Not that this is not a binding statement, and you don’t actually have to go because you say this — but if you don’t say it, you will not get in.
Next (and last), you need to include a small number, no more than four, meaningful updates. These could include recognitions or awards, publications, new leadership roles, or other successes that weren’t in your initial application.

Close the letter positively, and express gratitude for their time and attention.

Accomplishing all of these tasks doesn’t guarantee that you’ll get into Georgetown, but not taking these steps does ensure that you won’t get in. So, get going.

Every year, we help top students get into their dream schools, even after a deferral. Email us to learn more.