What are your views on students not withdrawing from all schools after they have got a binding ED offer? Some students simply want to see whether they will get other offers which will take up the spots of those who really need them.
My understanding is that they could lose their ED offer. It seems like a pretty big risk just to see the results from other schools that you aren’t even planning to accept.
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It’s unethical. Period.
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My feeling is it’s not right.
As for your 2nd part, I don’t think that’s the case - because that would assume 100% yield and most schools are less than 25% yield. So they are not taking a spot.
But given they signed a contract, as long as the $$ work as pre determined, they need to withdraw.
If they want to see other offers, they had no business ED’ing to begin with - which is a separate issue all its own.
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The thing is, these unethical students are just curious to know which other schools they could get into. They will end up going to their ED school. So how will their ED school know?! 
At our son’s HS, school policy dictated that as soon as an ED offer was made or a student accepted any offer, all outstanding apps had to be withdrawn. If the student didn’t take timely action, the CC kindly did it for them as a courtesy to other classmates, no waiting for remaining decisions. Of our son’s ten applications, after accepting his appointment, he forfeited knowing what the five outstanding decisions would have been. Ethics over curiousity.
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Well for one thing, their college counselor shouldn’t have provided mid year grades to the other schools after an ED acceptance and should have followed up that all other apps were withdrawn.
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Perhaps they won’t choose the ED school after all.
Maybe the ED schools is what they thought cost wise - $60K, $80K.
But another comes in at $30K so they switch.
I’m sure that some students ED up front for the admission edge, knowing they very well might not end up there. And then some simply have changed their mind - they thought they wanted the ED school but they are 17 and so they changed.
Many students like to get acceptances, even if they know the money won’t work.
It’s a brag or confidence thing.
It’s true for ED1 but for ED2, counselors are still supposed to send their RD schools their mid year grades.
Yeah - that’s the unethical part… don’t make agreements you aren’t willing to stand behind.
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The college being applied to presumably has an idea of the likelihood of the applicant yielding if admitted and counts that amount of space taken up. E.g. if the college believes that the applicant has a 20% chance of yielding if admitted, then that applicant will take up 0.2 of a spot in the frosh class if admitted. Of course, different applicants have different likelihood of yielding in the estimation of the college – an applicant reaching for the college will be assumed to have a high chance of yielding, while an “overqualified” applicant will be assumed to have a low chance of yielding (if they did not apply ED).
My understanding is most ED gives you a few days to accept and pay the deposit, so this would entail accepting, depositing and then later withdrawing when RD decisions are out. Pretty sure the ED school in this case would realize what was going on and having a chat to the counselor…?
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No idea but no doubt all schools have an allowance for breakage.
This thread is rinse and repeat each year :).
Are schools really going to waste their time chasing the occasional breaker down ?
I doubt it but that’s likely school specific.
Same policy at my D’s school and there was a lengthy meeting to understand the binding nature of ED with the guidance counselor before submitting.
Totally unethical and selfish to not follow the ED rules.
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No they’re not, unless it’s before the ED acceptance date.
If you’ve come here looking for permission to do this, you’re not going to find it.
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Absent waiting for resolution on FA issues, my view is they are selfish, egotistical scumbags who deserve to have their acceptance revoked.
Their parents, who also signed the ED agreement, must be so proud. 
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We didn’t have a lengthy meeting or indeed any meeting at all, given the counselor situation at the school at that stage, but I did have to sign something as a parent agreeing to all the ED rules.
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My feeling is that students (and parents who allow this) who do not withdraw other applications after an ED admit with workable finances are incredibly self indulgent and think they are above the rules.
Guidance counselors who continue to send transcripts to other colleges for a student after an affordable ED acceptance are irresponsible and unprofessional.
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I agree with everything that you wrote except:
Agree with this unless they are at an understaffed public school, in which case counselors have far more important responsibilities than tracking ED decisions.
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Sometimes, it’s the parents pushing for this. Just to be able to brag on where their kid was accepted. Ugh!
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