<p>I’m kind of hoping that the OP doesn’t withdraw the applications, and ends up getting caught. I am appalled by his/her lack of remorse or moral compass. I don’t think for a minute that Harvard is in the business of not honoring ED acceptances, but even if they were, it would be wrong of them. Two wrongs don’t make a right. The right thing for the OP to do is clear, there is no gray area here.</p>
<p>We’ve beaten up on the OP quite enough, and we ought to stop.</p>
<p>She’s 17 or 18, and one way or another she has lacked for good advice. She made a decision she regrets, something all of us have done once or twice. She wishes she could erase it, which is completely natural. She did a little bit of research and misinterpreted some things, and didn’t fully think through the consequences of her words and actions. True, but also age-appropriate and no crime.</p>
<p>The ED agreement is a contract, not a covenant with God. One of the first things they teach you in law school is that breaching a contract isn’t necessarily a matter for moral condemnation, just damages. (And “damages” here are approximately the cost of bulk-rate postage.) That doesn’t mean the OP will or should get what she wants – almost certainly she won’t and shouldn’t – but that won’t be because she has committed some heinous sin, it will be because she is in a system in which her needs and desire don’t necessarily come first. Like all of us. All of us have had to come to terms with that, and so will the OP.</p>
<p>She may even find – I hope – that her initial “bad” decision wasn’t as bad as she thinks, after all. There’s a perfectly decent chance it will turn out to be good, that she will look back at this and thank her stars that she stumbled into a great situation despite herself. (I suspect she will not be the only freshman in September at her LAC who wishes she were at Harvard instead, and I also suspect that as soon as next winter there will be far, far fewer of them.)</p>
<p>She has done two things wrong. (1) Not withdrawing her applications, which is a pretty common error and not worthy of punishment. (2) Expressing her perfectly normal desires too nakedly and too publicly, and without making proper obeisance to community standards. She has been smacked down for that plenty.</p>
<p>It is amazing how self-righteous and moralistic people can be and how quick people are to condemn very young people who are stuck in a system that is rigged against them. The whole ED system is based on playing on the fear and insecurities of 17 year-olds to force them into making poor, ill-considered, financially disadvantageous decisions.</p>
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<p>Hallelujah!</p>
<p>JHS, however, after she shared her desires nakedly and too publicly (desires that are not so unusual), she persisted after getting GOOD and WISE advice and kept looking for a way to justify continuing on and not withdrawing those apps. She kept questioning if Harvard really DOES honor ED to other schools (yes, they do…people have posted quotes from Harvard even). She is still looking for a way to not follow the rules. Often such kids get burnt. We don’t wish that for her.</p>
<p>I’m with mathmom. If the OP does not withdraw his other applications, I hope he gets caught. A 17- or 18-year-old who has enough brains to consider applying somewhere ED – ED is, after all, a relatively sophisticated concept --also has enough brains to understand what it means to apply ED and what’s required of one who is accepted ED. I think the OP does get that; he simply does not consider himself accountable. Rules are for others. I would also hope that every 17- or 18-year old would have the integrity to accept the consequences of a decision to apply ED. I just don’t think that’s setting the ethical bar too high. (I recognize that there are extreme cases – illness, financial hardship that may compel backing out of an ED decision.) Obviously, the OP fails that test, too.</p>
<p>The OP’s sole purpose in posting this thread was to figure out whether Harvard would look the other way at his/her ED acceptance, not to get guidance on an ethical solution to his/her predicament. He made it crystal clear from the outset that he had no intention of withdrawing his application to Harvard or to any of the other schools he applied to after receiving his ED acceptance. I’m thinking about the other kids who didn’t receive ED acceptances from Williams or Bowdoin or Amherst or whatever LAC the OP got into. Yes, if the OP’s acceptance is rescinded one of those kids may eventually get in. But for obvious reasons an acceptance in December would have been preferable.</p>
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<p>Right, which means that the ED agreement will carry more force. Contracts have the law and the courts backing them up. God is on his own.</p>
<p>“She’s 17 or 18, and one way or another she has lacked for good advice.”</p>
<p>Judging by what I’ve seen here, she’s gotten lots of good advice, but seems to think that rules are for other people. Any person who is smart enough to be hoping for an acceptance to a place like Harvard is also smart enough to understand ED. Such a person, however, may lack ethics, and that seems to be the situation here.</p>
<p>I have no sympathy or empathy for her. I hope that she feels the consequence of her own unethical behavior.</p>
<p>My father is an attorney who does alot of contract law. It has always amazed me how breaching contracts is a routine business practice, with the expectation that much of the time damages will never be collected, making the risk worthwhile. I anticipate the OP will not get burnt at all but will successfully beat the system and end up at a selective school that she applied to RD. She will have a good laugh at us.</p>
<p>And I find it pathetic that the expectation that one respect the terms of the ED contract (or any other contract) would be considered self-righteous, moralistic, or showing insufficient “obeisance to community standards.”</p>
<p>“Unconscionable”</p>
<p>Look it up:
[Unconscionability</a> - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia](<a href=“http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Unconscionable]Unconscionability”>Unconscionability - Wikipedia)</p>
<p>To all of you holier-than-thous, if the OP decides not to go to her ED school and instead enrolls in the local community college, is that deceitful and evil as well? What if the OP applied to UC Berkeley, which doesn’t play this ED game. If the OP decides to enroll at Berkeley, is this sin as well?</p>
<p>As my grandfather often quoted “He who closes his ears to the view of others shows little confidence in the integrity of his own views.” Just look at Eliot Spitzer or read Sister Carrie to know the consequences of one bad decision.</p>
<p>It’s ok to apply to UCs and an ED school because the deadline for UCs is Nov 30 which is way before the release of ED decision.</p>
<p>You know, it is hard enough to raise kids to have a sense of ethics in todays world without people like the OP and the people who actually support and encourage the OP in her/his gaming of the system. </p>
<p>1) The OP states that he/she is a Harvard quality applicant. Being a Harvard quality applicant and being too naive/immature/stupid to understand the implications of an ED contract are mutually exclusive (unless of course, Harvard ain’t all it’s cracked up to be). Your average 10 year-old can grasp the concept.</p>
<p>2) The OP applied to the LAC with the sole intention of gaining an advantage over other students. </p>
<p>3) The OP has clearly stated that she/he really doesn’t care about any of the ethics involved, he/she just wants what he/she wants, no matter what. I’ve never read so many “me me ME me me” posts in my life.</p>
<p>I really don’t care how many contracts are reneged upon in the business world. I really don’t care if the OP has no sense of right and wrong. But I do care about all the other applicants who are doing the right thing, and are trusting HYP et al to uphold a standard of fairness. </p>
<p>I hope the OP reconsiders. I hope HYP are as vigilant as we all want to believe.</p>
<p>I think there is more involved here too. It sounds like there is something improper going on with sending the high school transcript as well. I don’t believe this is an uninformed 17 year old but rather a very informed 17 year old. For example, my own kid would not know the term “Tufts syndrome” and what it means.</p>
<p>JHS’s construal may be generous to the OP to a fault, but if she’s on the phone withdrawing those apps this morning, I share his wish that she’ll have a great experience at her LAC. Time to lay off until we hear how she handled it; I hope she’ll report back.</p>
<p>I would say the dead horse has been sufficiently kicked…</p>
<p>As a non-lawyer and a more-or-less atheist, I am not in the habit of thinking that contracts are made to be broken or making ethical deals with some higher power. I have to answer to myself. If I give my word, I give my word. If I sign a contract, I sign a contract. If I break my word, then I must think less of myself. I don’t get to talk about being “saved” by some third party or tell myself that “everyone does it” and or think that by handing my dishonesty over to a lawyer and paying legal fees I’m off the hook. </p>
<p>JHS, I just went back and read the OP’s posts serially. I’m with Northstarmom.</p>
<p>Time to let this thread finally die . RIP</p>
<p>You were helpful.Thanks =)-</p>
<p>^^^^^ And that’s why this thread should die. While I agree that some of the rhetoric has been a little over the top, you asked a question, you got an answer, you don’t like the answer and so you keep tyring to plead your case for why the vast majority of posters are wrong, but those protestations have fallen on deaf ears.</p>
<p>I’d love to hear how this all turns out, but will anyone believe anything you post? Of course not, because you’ve lost credibility.</p>