“Early Decision applicants who applied to but were not admitted to the BME major are released from the Early Decision contract to enroll at Johns Hopkins and may apply to other colleges but must make a decision about enrollment at Johns Hopkins University and return their Reply Form to the Office of Undergraduate Admissions by January 15.”
The way I am reading this makes it seem that you can be accepted to JHU, but not BME and with that being the case you need to notify JHU of your enrollment decision by Jan 15. If that is the case then what is the point of releasing you from Early Decision, as you won’t have heard back from any regular decision applications by Jan 15?
Since the ED decisions come out in mid-December, releasing you would enable you to submit applications before January 1st for regular decision schools and ED2 schools.
Excuse me for being dense, but what would you be notifying JHU of on Jan 15? That you are still interested but will make a final decision in April when you weigh all your offers ?
I think you tell them on Jan 15 if you commit to attend even though you did not get into BME or if you do not want to attend since you did not get into BME. Essentially, they are letting you out of your ED application commitment if you do not get into BME but giving you the option of attending without BME.
By January 15th, you have to let them know if you still want to attend. It is still ED so you do not have until April to decide. I guess it’s if you only want to go if you can do BME–if you don’t get in, you can pursue other universities.