Anxiety. Fear. Hope.

Like every other round 1 applicant, I am feeling the butterflies in my stomach. Submitted the Wharton application on 13th and since then whatever free time I had, has been spent on s2s. The round one applicants who applied to Wharton have started coming in open, asking questions about interview, the app reading process etc. Everyday, I feel the anxiety levels higher than the previous one. And the interview invites haven't yet started... Oh! I'm sure that come 21st, few people will start getting up in the nights, having to go back to bed realizing that it was a dream! Hope the dreams are good for everyone!

Today (ok, technically yesterday morning) Wharton adcom sent a mail to everyone. Here is the excerpt.
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Thank you for submitting your application for Round 1. Here is some information to guide you through the next steps in the process.

Your online status:

- "Complete for Round One": means we have received all your application materials and your file has been forwarded to the Admissions Committee for review.
- "Received": means the Operations Team needs to process your hard-copy materials. After these are processed, your online account will be changed to "Complete for Rd 1" and your file will be forwarded to the Admissions Committee for review.
- no status appears: if you applied by hard copy, we are still processing your application materials. You will receive an email on how to access your online account once your application has been processed. Please allow operations until Friday October 29th before inquiring about your application.

Invitations to interview:
- we will begin releasing invitations on Thursday, October 21st and will continue until 5pm Eastern Standard Time (EST) on Thursday, November 18th. There is no particular order in which invitations are released.
- if invited for an interview, you will need to complete one by Thursday, December 9, 2004. Interviews will be available on-campus with trained 2nd year MBAs who are full members of the Admissions Committee or off-campus by alumni or staff. All interviews carry equal weight in the admissions process. There is no advantage to interviewing in one venue over another.

Final Admissions decisions:
- Candidates who have not received an invitation to interview by November 18th will receive a final admissions decision indicating that they are no longer being considered for admission this year.
- Candidates who are offered an interview will receive their final admissions decision by 5pm EST on Thursday, December 23rd.

Thank you for applying to the Wharton School. We look forward to reviewing your application.

Sincerely,
Wharton MBA Admissions Committee
Lauder Admissions Wharton MBA Admissions Office

http://mba.wharton.upenn.edu

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Which basically indicated that most likely my app is (or soon will be) in the hands of a reviewer. I wonder whether the app will bore the reader to death. Every now and then, my mind wanders to the scene of an adcom reading a page with my essay printed on it, with a coffee in other hand and a pen ready to put comments. I sincerely hope and pray that they are good comments :)

Otherwise, the Stanford deadline is nearing, and as usual, I will need to put a couple of all nighters toward the end to make it into the system by 27th. My recommenders have suddenly become unreachable making me think whether I updated them on the deadline for Stanford. I hope things will fall in line and the fabulous guys will make sure that I am not hung to R2 because of a small delay in reco. They were of immense help for Wharton and submitted 3 days before I could submit my essays.. I hope it is same in this case also.

Ok, enough of wasting your time, now back to anxiety, fear and yet again, hope.

Best of Luck to all the Round-One applicants!