That makes sense. I’d probably prefer December 20 over January even still. Early December is better, but I get why volume could make that difficult for a lot of places.
1 Like
I’ve seen this a lot (C26 is not applying for engineering but is very interested in Boulder), but at the end of the day it doesn’t seem to actually matter for the students - it looks like they can pretty much replicate first year engineering in PES and that is an easy process to transfer in in sophomore year. Seems the only real difference is that a PES student may not get Will Vill where most engineers get their dorms.
The impression I have gotten from following last year’s thread was that it is not only less competitive students but a number of high stats students get this too and it is almost as though they don’t want to allocate too many engineering spots to students who might not enrol.
1 Like
Yes but Jan 30 not March 30! This wait is killing me even for the Jan ones!
6 Likes
I do wonder if the early-release EA schools that get a large volume of applications do a quick scan for high stats, read those holistically, then defer a good portion of the rest to RD because they just don’t have time to read them all.
Jeff Selingo says each application gets maybe 8 to 12 minutes of review – at most.
(Which stings a little when you think about how long our kids spend working on them!)
4 Likes
Clemson does this for sure.
1 Like
And Clemson has only done EA for two or three years, right? I do remember it was a hot mess when it was first offered.
I think University of South Carolina does this as well.
I wonder if it helps to apply really early to these EA schools. If they’ve had your app since early September, they’ve probably had at least a little time to review it and assign some kind of ranking to it, so you have a lesser chance of being deferred.
4 Likes
S26 kept saying it’s great he’s spending hours on his essays only for them to be skimmed in 5 minutes. 10 minutes is probably generous, they have thousands of applications to go through. My guess is look at highschool/region GPA and it’s go no go, then stats if you meet that then they will skim your essays maybe glance at EC. Then it goes to another pile for a bigger group. And we’ll never know who got in and why or why not.
1 Like
Possibly not as popular as some of these, but from past years reddits (almost nothing on CC despite it being a school with ~24k undergrads) it seems UIC does this too - the way some of the posts were worded it seemed less like a true deferral than “we didn’t have time to read all the applications”. Arch specifically says “ Because of the high demand for limited spaces in our programs, we encourage students to submit an application as early as possible “ .(their emphasis). What is interesting about UIC (at least for arch but I assume college wide?) is that the “why this major” supplement is actually read by department staff and not just by general AOs. Beyond just knowing that arch is one of the more competitive majors there we have no idea what the admit rate is.
2 Likes
My D is applying to UCSB CCS, and our understanding is that the special application to the CCS is read by professors who would be teaching her. It’s due Jan 6 and she’s excited about writing that essay, “I can nerd out as much as I want!” 
2 Likes
UIC had the longest supplement C26 wrote (500 words) and they did enjoy that.
CCS doesn’t even have a word count limit! Which seems very much like CCS in general. S23’s friends who go there say “CCS is the ultimate cheat code.”
1 Like
Yes she did get in- thank goodness! Dovetailing with the acceptance rate discussion, it was very interesting because during the interview with admissions, D26 asked if the acceptance rate for film majors was lower than the published 72% general rate. The AO said that the acceptance rate for Quinnipiac was actually 55%. We don’t necessarily buy that, but it made D26 feel good when she was accepted!
4 Likes
If that’s the case, I would imagine they would have to defer a bunch of people because it could take a while (especially at this time of year) for the department staff to read through those supplements.
I’m assuming that’s part of the reason they encourage applicants to submit “as early as possible” (as opposed to just by the EA deadline, which for example UIUC does).
1 Like
My good friend’s daughter graduated from UCSB’s CCS in biology. She loved it. She is now a marine biologist working at an aquarium/zoo in South Carolina… living her dream! I don’t know what’s meant by “cheat code” but it worked really well for her.
4 Likes
They just meant that CCS gives them so much academic freedom that it feels like a cheat code! They love being able to take the classes that they want, and as many of them as they want.
Thanks for the positive story! 
(My D is applying for CCS biology, too.)
2 Likes
I did see that the process to get into CEAS at CU after the first year is a non-competitive process, which I guess is a positive.
My D22 was a direct admit to the business school at UW. Had she not been directly admitted, she wouldn’t have gone there. I read heartbreaking stories about kids who didn’t get directly admitted but still chose to attend UW with the ability to apply to Foster at the end of their sophomore year. But as a capacity constrained major, it was competitive, and there were kids who worked their butts off for 2 years and still didn’t get in, only to be left floundering to figure out a different major. For some reason those stories still haunt me even though that wasn’t D22’s situation.
But regardless of how competitive it is to transfer into a major, there’s still something meaningful to have a school confirm their confidence in you right from the start rather than asking you to prove yourself further.
PS…hopefully CU will be an option for both our kiddos. 
2 Likes
This is the reason that C26 didn’t want to apply to UW, and also why UMN is pretty low on their list - both have pre-arch with competitive admission to major.
Boulder is one of the top choices so yes definitely hoping they both get in! We visited in spring and we all loved it.
2 Likes
Happy start to our weekend here. S26 got into one of their safeties today with a big scholarship, bringing the cost close to our state school.
23 Likes