@3SailAway ED is morally and ethically binding I think unless the NPC is SO off (or of such poor quality) that you really couldn’t do your own homework to see what the chances of affordability were.
Anyone could “say” that the offer wasn’t affordable but realistically (to me) to be ok saying that I’d need to prove that I thought it might be and that it really wasn’t. We have seen some on CC play this card when the reality is they had other acceptances in hand when the ED result came in and did in fact compare offers. I find it slimy.
However, there are cases where the NPC was really really off and it’s a valid reason to get out. But… in the interim the student has been through a horrid emotional roller coaster of choosing an ED, getting in, and then having to get out and may well have missed some application windows or putting in a solid application, in the process. Undue stress. If you know you can and will (full) pay and it provides the admissions advantage you want/need, not to mention being done with the process early…then go for it! Just know the risks.
I called Davidson and the ED students are indeed considered for merit BUT you have to commit as an ED student and then it’s a bonus if you receive one of their competitive merit awards. So, for us, that means be willing to pay full price. We have some thinking to do. There are only eight Belk Scholars each year and a handful of art scholarships that he could get so it would most likely be a full pay ED situation with a Hail Mary for the scholarship come spring. I’m guessing it could be the same for some other schools with competitive merit like Vanderbilt and Duke.
I posted on here a few thousand posts ago and have not had time to keep current. Sometimes I get on and see there are 500 new posts and slowly read and try to catch up. Five years ago today D13 got her Yale admittance on Ivy Day after being deferred EA. If anyone has any questions about Yale, feel free to PM. She had a fabulous four years there.
Now S19 is slowly getting interested in the process. He has known for a while that the Ivy path is not his. He is looking for something in the Computer Science or Math field. Just got SAT scores 750M/660V - very similar to mom and dad’s scores in the 80s.
It looks like he qualifies for the UAH auto tuition with a 3.7 GPA. He is probably more interested in staying in the Mid-Atlantic region. Looking at state schools and privates that may give him a scholarship to get down to state school prices. No visits done yet. He has a box of mail from PSATs in 10th and 11th grade, but I don’t think he’s really looked at them.
His scores gradually improved each test, but he got serious on the Khan Academy math review for a month before the SAT. It really helped because he is in AP Calc BC so some of the exponent rules and other info. was no longer fresh in his mind. He is content to be one and done, and we can find financial and academic safeties that mom and dad are comfortable with.
Good luck to all who are still testing or waiting for scores!
Last year, D was accepted to Davidson RD. She was called by an English professor a few days before decision day to say that she was one of five finalists for their big creative writing scholarship (and was accepted to the college). She had to attend their scholarship weekend (around the first week of April) where we met many kids who were competing for the various other scholarships and were there for interviews. I don’t remember meeting any kids who had applied ED but that doesn’t mean they weren’t there. I got the impression that most were still in the decision-making process and would wait to see what merit money might come in. I do think kids interviewing for the other scholarships had been notified of this weekend earlier than us (like for Belk and some of the leadership scholarships). It’s already hard enough to wait until April, but then to have to wait closer to mid-April makes it pretty stressful. Just wanted to share how the process seemed to work last year.
Somehow I have these things in my mind:
1 ED > 2 EA
2 EA > SCEA
3 EA > 1 ED.
But it’s hard to find 3 EA schools to apply.
S09 applied to 2 EA schools and got result around December 7. We went on vacation after that.
D11 did not apply to any EA or ED. She had to wait until April 1 to get the result she wanted.
I am not sure what D19 will do yet.
My DS16 applied to 5 schools EA and had 5 acceptances by Christmas . He had to wait until Feb for Honors notification, and March for notification of his competitive scholarship award.
Believe me, I would love to have a few EA schools in the mix but I’ve pulled the list up a number of times and cannot really find fits. No big state schools for S19 amd the others just don’t work geographically or for another reason. Right now we are keeping Dickinson on the list as an EA school. I think it could be a good fit. I’ve read good things about it on CC and S19 has met with the AO when he came to our school. I wanted to keep Wisconsin on the list but S19 doesn’t want to apply at all now. Honestly, I’m not sure how much of a sigh of relief it will be to get accepted somewhere early action since all of the rest of his schools would be RD. (If we don’t change our minds completely and go ED somewhere.)
I was hoping that D21 would have more EA schools but she saw Davidson yesterday as well and thought it was the perfect size. Not many LACs have EA in the parts of the country she would be looking either.
I’m all for an easier road than waiting until March. Just doesn’t work for everyone.
The more I’ve thought about it the more sure I am that I hope son finds a school he would really like to attend ,and apply ED in the Fall.
I don’t think he is dead set on any one place, but seems to think he could go numerous places and be happy and do well. So, pick one, apply ED and see what happens. More and more kids are applying ED and getting deferred anyways, so might as well take that one shot on an ED app to a school he’d really like and see where the chips fall.
I doubt we’re going to see any financial aid as things stand, so we’re not worried about that piece.
Son17 should’ve applied ED to his favorite place, but didn’t, and he ended up not getting waitlisted. I think he had a decent shot at ED, his stats were in line.
Found out yesterday that our daughter will get an “Ivy League” Book Award – here’s an example of one (not the one D19 will get): https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Harvard_Book_Award – at her National Honor Society induction in a couple weeks. Apparently there are a number of such awards sponsored by various alumni groups (I’d never heard of them before). While the award itself means relatively little in an overall college application sense, and D’s class is small enough that it’s not like she beat out, say, 50 other just-as-worthy candidates, it’s nice to know that the faculty thought her schoolwork and work for the school merited recognition, which suggests that letters of reference for her next fall will be of good quality.
And, of course, it will be nice for her to have her work externally validated.
@BorgityBorg Congrats to your D! That’s impressive!
RE: ED - So I know people back out of ED for financial reasons, but we will have a high EFC that we can’t afford. I assume that backing out because you didn’t get merit aid is frowned upon when your EFC shows you don’t have any need. If that’s the case, the only affordable ED school I can think of is William & Mary and S19 is not interested, so that’s that! I guess he’ll likely have some rolling and EA schools.
ED is confusing me some. S19 will apply to two rolling admissions schools in early fall and likely to get in. We will not put a deposit down or commit. In the meantime will apply to one school ED (super super reach), and any EA schools as well. I assume this is legal as long as no deposits are put down, and if by any change the ED school would say yes, and it met our financial need, we would then turn down any previous acceptances and pull all are other apps. Is this how it would work, or is S not allowed to apply to any rolling admissions schools and EA until he hears from ED.
@sdl0625, in most cases (i.e., read the fine print), applying ED means that applying EA elsewhere is completely and utterly right out.
The question about acceptance received before applying ED is an interesting one. It would seem to me to run against the (incredibly questionable and manipulative, IMO—I’m not remotely an ED fan) spirit of ED, but there are schools that allow it (though they generally describe their system as single-choice EA rather than ED, I think).
@eh1234 Your assumption regarding ED is my assumption as well. We will also have an EFC that we consider too high. Merit will be needed to consider private college options. And I assume that you can’t back out on ED because no merit was offered. So, EA it will be for S19.
I also assume that there are a lot of parents out there who fall into this same category.
It doesn’t make any sense to me that applying to one school ED would preclude you from applying to others EA. There is no guarantee that you will be accepted to the ED school, so why should you not have a back-up (or two or three) if the ED school does not accept you? Pretty much every kid I know has done that, with the full support of our school’s college counselors. The caveat is, of course, is that those EA applications get immediately rescinded upon acceptance from the ED school (providing no negative FA surprise, which is a completely separate issue). My oldest was deferred from her ED school, and had some nice choices to consider from the schools that accepted her EA. Many of her friends were accepted to their ED choices, and they rescinded their EAs.
We are hoping to crank out most of the applications in August or September, because the kiddo will as usual be heavily involved in the fall play and that generally kills most of October and November. We’ve already applied to one super safety school that doesn’t need an essay, that will be complete as soon as the teacher recommendation goes through.
Is there a major downside to applying very early? The ones that I thought of are that it means we have to have all standardized testing done by the end of the summer (don’t think that will be a problem) and that the kid will have less time to polish essays for the colleges that don’t require EA/ED.
I think getting the app in as early as possible shows interest, but I could be wrong?
We are visiting Gettysburg on Monday for the first college interview. I emailed the admissions office and just got a long bubbly reply back offering to arrange multiple class visits, lunches, and tours for us. It’s giving me warm fuzzies. I would not mind that at all as an option.
Hi I’m joining this parents group! : ) We live in Colorado, and my D19 is the last of my 3 kids to go through this college admissions process. D15 attends Univ North Carolina Wilmington (Creative writing, professional writing) and S17 attends Clemson (mechanical engineering). So, my D19 loves STEM, writing, and art… we are in the research phase of locating good schools for her.
She is hoping to apply to some schools with rolling admissions and some public early action ones… along with a reach ED. Excited for this process! Looking forward to conversation with you all!
If you are a Single-Choice Early Action applicant to Yale, you may apply to another institution’s early admission program as follows: You may apply to any college’s non-binding rolling admission program. You may apply to any public institution at any time provided that admission is non-binding.
Swarthmore’s ED rules say:
The Early Decision plans are designed for candidates who have thoroughly and thoughtfully investigated Swarthmore and other colleges and found Swarthmore to be an unequivocal first choice. On applying to Swarthmore College, Early Decision candidates may not file an early decision application at other colleges, but they may file early action/regular applications at other colleges with the understanding that these applications will be withdrawn upon admission to Swarthmore.
