The solicitation and evaluation of applications for graduate study at Princeton is one of the most important functions of the Graduate School as well as that of our academic departments and programs. The season is especially hectic and tense for us as well as our applicants, with decisions made on a rolling basis as we meet with each of our admitting departments. Realizing that a timely response to our applicants is very important, we have chosen this less-than-perfect method of advising you of our admission decision electronically, since that is the very quickest way of communicating this important information to you. We apologize for the informality of this email, knowing that past practice would have you receiving a formal, signed letter from my office (I would, of course, be happy to provide such a letter if you so desire).
Your application has been carefully reviewed by the Graduate School and by the Civil & Environmental Engineering Department. I regret to inform you that the department was not able to recommend your admission for the forthcoming year. The number of places available at Princeton for entering graduate students is very small, whereas the number of applications is quite large, so we are unable to offer admission to many who are well-qualified. Admission decisions take into account not only the merits of the applicants, but also the suitability of the departmental programs to the candidates’ expressed interests. All this is to say that we must turn away more applicants than we would like in our efforts to achieve sound matches between the strengths of our programs and the applicants.
I regret that you will not be joining us at Princeton. Please accept my best wishes for success in graduate study elsewhere