<p>My D applied to 3 schools that did not require essays and 2 schools that did. (None of them used the common app). The three that didn’t require essays were submitted in September and acceptances were back in fairly short order. The two that required essays went in at the last minute on November 1, which was the deadline for early notification. This was because the essays were not finished and ready to go until approximately 11:50 pm on the deadline date. D is a big time procrastinator. She went to the wire even though I told her that all the other procrastinators would be trying to submit their applications online at the last minute too and the systems would be incredibly slow, if not crashed.</p>