Hello everyone!
I’m a 2017 QuestBridge Prep Scholar, and I was recently looking into how the National College Match works when I noticed something a bit confusing. Apparently, if you rank any colleges (even the non-binding ones), you can’t apply Early Decision or Early Action to any other schools. Not being able to apply Early Decision obviously makes sense because admission is binding, but why can’t you apply to other schools’ non-binding Early Action programs? I’m not yet sure about whether I’ll rank any binding colleges, but Georgetown is one of my top schools, and I was planning on applying there EA to strengthen my chances of admission/consider my options from there. So anyway, does anyone know why this is?
Thank you! 
For one thing, Georgetown EA would preclude you from sending in any binding admissions.
From Georgetown’s website: “Early Action (Georgetown’s policy) allows applicants to make multiple Early Action applications, so long as they are not applying to a binding Early Decision Program.”
But what if you only rank non-binding schools? There would be no admission conflicts there. I think I’ll email QuestBridge about it just for surety’s sake, but I’ll report back with my findings!
So this is what they replied to my email:
“Thank you for contacting us. If you choose to rank one or more colleges for the National College Match, you cannot apply to other colleges through Early Decision, Early Action, or Single-Choice Early Action (also known as Restrictive Early Action), even if all the schools ranked are non-binding schools. Because QuestBridge acts as a representative of our college partners, applying to QuestBridge and another early program violates the policies of many of our participating college partners.
If you choose not to rank any colleges (and apply only through QuestBridge Regular Decision), you may apply early to other colleges outside of QuestBridge. Also, if you apply to QuestBridge but are not selected as a Finalist, you are released from this policy and may apply early to any colleges.”
So it seems like it’s because of the participating schools, not really QuestBridge itself.