Vanderbilt Deferred You: Now What?
Submit a letter of continued interest immediately, and afterward, have your guidance counselor call or email the admissions office to update them concerning all of your awards, publications, accomplishments, and grades since you applied. Your counselor should affirm that no matter what other admission decisions you receive, you will choose to attend Vanderbilt if offered a spot. Additionally, make sure your school counselor submits your first semester (or second trimester) grades once they become available, Vanderbilt specifically requests this for deferred applicants.
But not just any letter of continued interest. This letter should be one of the most inspired pieces of writing you've ever composed. In it, you need to let your heart write a love song for Vanderbilt and translate that into giving the reader a concrete picture of exactly who you will be as a person on their campus. This includes demonstrating how you will contribute to spaces and organizations on campus and reminding the reader of your academic hook. In reintroducing your hook—the academic niche you spent time and effort carving out in high school to distinguish yourself from others, you want to remind the reader what makes you uniquely compelling.
When it comes to bragging about grades, prizes, or publications, please save it. If you made it this far in the admissions process at an elite school like Vanderbilt, then you already have enough academic credentials to be a strong candidate. If you did not, then you wouldn't be deferred and reevaluated in the regular decision round, you would have been rejected. Your guidance counselor should be the one bragging on your behalf. When they do it, it carries much more weight and shows the admissions committee that there is something beyond those accomplishments to consider. By your guidance counselor going out of their way to share your accomplishments with the admissions office, it demonstrates to them that there is something compelling enough about your personhood for them to be doing this.
Given how accomplished you must be to be even deferred from Vanderbilt in 2025, where the Early Decision acceptance rate was just 13.2% from a record-breaking pool of over 6,700 applicants, this intangible quality they can infer is what will distinguish you from other overachievers.
How to Structure Your Letter
After a lighthearted and positive opening, I would then proceed to talk to the reader about something related to your niche, such as a new cutting-edge development or something new that you learned. Avoid explicitly referencing the deferral or conveying disappointment, make the experience as comfortable as possible for the reader.
I would then connect this new piece of information regarding your niche to something currently going on at Vanderbilt and explain how, by leveraging certain opportunities there, you can achieve some goal, and make the reader understand how achieving this goal can change the world. Vanderbilt's motto, Crescere aude ("dare to grow"), speaks to their commitment to developing students who will make meaningful impact. If your goals align with this ethos, weave that into your letter.
Think about specific opportunities at Vanderbilt that align with your academic interests. Whether it's undergraduate research through specific faculty members, interdisciplinary programs, the Curb Center for Art, Enterprise and Public Policy, the Wond'ry innovation center, or particular courses and seminars, demonstrate that you understand what makes Vanderbilt uniquely positioned to help you achieve your goals.
Afterward, paint them a picture of you on their campus. Have fun here. Feel free to write a hypothetical scenario of you making some of the best memories of your life there. You want the reader to feel like by not admitting you, they will be denying you the opportunity to live your best life for four years. Show them you doing activities that have garnered you friends in high school on their campus, whether that's intramural sports, singing groups, community service, or late-night conversations in the Commons.
To conclude the letter, I would thank the reader for their time and add something to the effect of thanking them for the opportunity to share with them your favorite subjects and hobbies. Finally, I would tell them that no matter what other decisions you receive, you are absolutely resolute in attending Vanderbilt, and that if you are offered a seat, you will immediately accept it no matter what. I would then include a signed signature.
Keep your letter to 500-650 words.
If you'd like help writing your letter of continued interest for Vanderbilt or any other school, please schedule a free consultation with us below.
