When do people get off the waitlists?

[withoutlyrics]

I have a couple of waitlists and a couple of updates that I could send right now (rec, new healthcare-related FT job, not a publication). I am wondering if it's worth sending the updates now or later... now more seats are truly open, but they have not gone through all the candidates and my guess is I would not be an alternate unless they were expecting better people to come along in the cycle. When the cycle is closing, they have most seats filled, but will not be really getting any new quality candidates, so perhaps they will reach into the alternate list then? What's the smarter thing to do?

Edit: Ah, meant to post this in the general DO forum.

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[Totoro Po]

I honestly don't think it could hurt for you to send those updates to the school right now (as you said there's more possible openings at this point in the cycle). I've read posts on SDN where students have done just that as well as sent letters of interest to the school to eventually get off the wait-list for an ii.

However, I can't say if these people are just a "lucky few". I know that some schools have policies in place for which they only review their "alternate/wait-list pools" after a certain date- usually closer to spring.

I hope that helps, and good luck!

 

[withoutlyrics]

These are post-interview waitlists and it seems that one of the waitlist schools lets people off in the spring and the second one all throughout the cycle. Since the post above, I have actually gotten an acceptance, so I think I will research the 2nd school a little more closely before sending an update letter. I would not want to get off the waitlist only to reject it... I don't think the first school is worth losing a deposit over, but perhaps I will feel differently come March. Thank you!!