University of Colorado Boulder Early Action for Fall 2024 Admissions

Absolutely this is the case.

Thank you for that link. It is very good read and confirms some of my suspicions. I can see where my kids may fit into a few of the assumptions, but I am betting that the algorithm falls short on assessing exactly how much the parents are willing to contribute for a top level applicant. If the schools don’t return the demonstrated interest, how do they expect to get a truly diversified campus? I suspect the answer to which schools are best for OOS candidates getting scholarships lies in the answer to that question 
 those schools that have higher OOS enrollment are your best bet for getting scholarship recognition.

Based on our experience, if your student is top level candidate, you’re better off taking a chance on a private institution with a large endowment. You may be more likely to get the money 
 if you are fortunate enough to get in!

It’s a shame, really. We flew out to CU Boulder a few months ago to visit the campus and take the tours. My daughter loved it. She is applying to a few ‘dream’ schools, but wanted to have a few others that she could apply to and hope to get in. She wants to get away, so staying in state is not an option for her 
 doesn’t really work for her major anyway.

So, she applied to CU Boulder and is thrilled to receive an offer to attend. We know she would love it there, and we would love to visit her there. Unfortunately, it is not going to happen without some merit. It simply is not competitive with her other offers. She is applying for other CU scholarships in hopes that she can piece something together, but she knows it is not likely.

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Once you gets other decisions with FA $s, it’s not unheard of to go back to your first- or second-choice schools to negotiate better aid? If your D still considers Boulder a top choice after hearing from other schools, maybe that’s her next course of action?

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Possible, but the biggest problem is that she has two other offers that are very good and the housing applications are due in February/March timeframes. Since we already have a few ‘dream’ schools that we will not know admissions until end of March, we have to whittle the others down now and commit some non-refundable $$$$ to housing applications.

I know that our situation is not unique; virtually all OOS families are forced to play housing application fee roulette 
 where do you want to donate your money this year? FAFSA changes aren’t helping. I tried the ‘go back to FA for more money’ route with my oldest many years ago and it was not pleasant. We have learned to be grateful for the opportunities we are given and move on.

I don’t think CU is one of the schools that awards a lot of money as the application season goes on. Not sure if CU re-awards the funds if others turn them down.

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Yikes! What schools require housing deposits before the May 1st acceptance deadline? My kids will be waiting until late March to receive responses back from all submitted applications. I never encountered this housing scenario with my older children either. Please advise. Thank you!

I’m not going to name schools here, but I can assure you that there are many schools that use FIFO for processing housing applications and prioritizing room selection. If you don’t get the application and deposit in early, you have literally no chance of getting decent housing. For one in particular, we submitted our housing application and non-refundable deposit in October for the housing the next Fall. We had another school that employed a lottery system for room selection, so room selection was not something we could affect.

Specific to your question about May 1 deadlines, our primary state university has housing deposits and applications due February 15th. I’ve seen others in early March. One of the schools our D24 is considering has the LLC/honors applications due March 15th, but you have to pay the non-refundable housing deposit in order to complete the LLC/honors applications. So, some of the deadlines are hard deadlines, and others are a result having dependent deadlines.

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This is an older article, and not the one I was looking for, but it talks about how out of state students help fund the Colorado university system,

There are many out of state students whose families can afford the tuition and want the Colorado lifestyle. There isn’t an incentive to give a lot of merit to OOS students.

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I haven’t encountered this personally (D23 goes to a LAC), but I know from her friends’ experiences that if you’re weighing offers at big public universities, especially those that don’t guarantee housing, you have to put housing deposits down even before you commit to the schools – otherwise you could be shut out. It’s really worth it to look into this, even if you’re not sure where your kid will go yet. I’ve heard stories of students scrambling for housing and roommates when they wait too long to make a decision. You also need to look into policies about refundable/nonrefundable deposits and what to do if you choose not to attend a school where you’ve put down a deposit (there’s a long thread on CC about a family who thought they’d properly withdrawn from their housing when they declined admission, and it turned out they needed to inform Admissions and Housing separately).

This is not the same as accepting an offer of admission. But you really should look into the housing situations at the schools you’re considering.

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My OOS daughter (engineering) received an email today telling her she was given the Chancellor’s scholarship.

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Oh interesting! So there’s still hope lol

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Does this show up on the portal as well?

Good question!

Congratulations!!! That’s really interesting. When they responded to me they said all awards were sent out with acceptance letters.

Same. OOS so was hoping it was for more to make the cost competitive. Will pass for better schools offering more.

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Accepted with no merit.
OOS
3.848 UW GPA
7 AP / 5 HN
Test optional
Great ECs

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CU doesn’t give a lot of merit to in state students either. It’s a great school in several areas but I think their business model is highly flawed. In state and daughter accepted to Leeds. If she chooses to go there I’ll grit my teeth when writing tuition checks. Probably not a popular opinion here but I think they should run CU-Boulder like Texas and California operate their public flagships and cater to high achieving in state students as their first priority. I understand Colorado is a much smaller state which is an obvious hurdle but maybe CU has gotten too big.

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Hi–Does anyone know when regular deicsions come out? I know they say by April 1 but was wondering if it will be earlier? I looked on the 2023 page and doesn’t have much acceptances after February. Thanks.

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Does anyone have the 2024-2025 Cost of Attendance breakdown? Thanks, in advance!