<p>Dstark: I thought you were. You have argued that it’s okay to apply ED and that it’s okay to comparison-shop and to walk away from the ED commitment if the comparison shows that a better deal can be had elsewhere.</p>
<p>momofthreeboys - no, I am dead on correct. The facts are all here (except for those posts of the OP on the MIT forum which have mysteriously disappeared).</p>
<p>No. No . No. Marite. </p>
<p>You are allowed to apply to a RD school and if the RD school gives you an offer… You don’t have to throw it away. I agree with Calmom. You can accept it.</p>
<p>But once you discuss 
and come to agreement with the ED school… which doesn’t have to take long, you’re done. You cancel your apps. You don’t get to shop around anymore. That’s it. Then the ethics come into play.</p>
<p>I’m with marite. As I’ve read this long discussion, it does seem that those that dislike ED:</p>
<p>(1) agree that one who wants to comparison shop should NOT apply ED;
(2), BUT if they do apply ED (for whatever motivation), they can walk away without a thought if a better deal comes along.</p>
<p>The ED agreement gives the applicant an out if the Finanacial Aid award is not sufficient–based upon certain critieria, which, I believe is made abundantly clear that “not sufficient” to the family is not necessarily “not sufficient” to the college given all the people needing/wanting/wishing for those finite dollars.</p>
<p>That discussion, to me, should be focused on the Financial Aid award offered by the ED school and the family’s disclosed finances. It should not be a discussion based upon whatever ‘better’ price/offer/merit scholarship another instution offers.</p>
<p>The comparison shopping occurs in the RD mode. ED mode required that the comparison opportunities are by-passed in order to receive the early admission.</p>
<p>I don’t see what is ‘unfair’ in that regard. The student & family never has to elect to go ED. It is a choice. Choices always come with ‘costs’ of some type.</p>
<p>ClassicRockerDad - please. You can call backing out of the ED agreement and keeping a MIT EA app active what you want, but I call it supporting and endorsing unethical, shady behavior. I am entitled to my opinion just as you are entitled to yours. And the truth is unethical behavior disgusts me - in any situation.</p>
<p>
No she’s not. There’s nothing wrong about this and she is breaking no rules at this time.
She is not comparing competing packages. She received an unexpected full-ride offer right before her ED acceptance. Even if she is accepted to MIT, she will not be able to compare Penn and MIT FA simultaneously because she will not receive MIT’s FA offer until spring. At that point, she will have either accepted Penn’s ED offer and withdrawn her MIT app, or she will have rejected Penn’s offer and be free to accept MIT (though the latter is under debate here.)</p>
<p>Here is an interesting article about game theory (Nash) and early admissions. Interesting, the authors spent much time with both Penn and MIT during the research.
(Just since we act as if the “gaming” is somehow all on the side of the students in these equations. ) [College</a> Admissions under Early Decision](<a href=“http://www.docstoc.com/docs/6251128/College-Admissions-under-Early-Decision]College”>http://www.docstoc.com/docs/6251128/College-Admissions-under-Early-Decision)</p>
<p>Penn permits ED applicants to apply EA at other schools. The only point at which OP is required to withdraw her other apps is when she has accepted her ED admittance. That has not occurred yet.</p>
<p>Anneroku, you selectively quoted my statement to make a point I was not making. My entire statement was: </p>
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</p>
<p>While I did not write that the OP did do any of this, the point remains that, in general terms, such behavior should NOT be condoned or excused. </p>
<p>As far as when a conflict between the various application arises, it is obvious that there are different opinions. I happen to think that it should be January 1, or within a couple of weeks after submitting ADDITIONAL information to Penn.</p>
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<p>The ED agreement is clearly unenforceable in court for the following reasons:</p>
<ol>
<li><p>As a general rule, courts will not order specific performance in these sort of situations. That is, no court would force the applicant to enroll and attend school.</p></li>
<li><p>An essential term of the contract – the monetary cost of performance under its terms – is unspecified. To be enforceable, all essential terms of the contract must be specified.</p></li>
<li><p>Lack of mutuality: courts will not enforce contracts that are too one-sided. In this case the college pretty much has all the power – they can decide whether to accept the student, set the fees according to their own standards, and they retain to the ability to withdraw or rescind the offer of acceptance later on. </p></li>
<li><p>Failure to provide a measure of damages: As noted above, specific performance against the applicant cannot be compelled. A liquidated damage clause would probably be enforceable – but the ED contracts do not specify one. Therefore there is no way to calculate money damages if a student walks away from the contract – which eliminates the one thing a court could enforce. I’d note that in the present case, it is likely that Penn SAVES money by having the OP turn them down – let’s say hypothetically Penn offered $35K in grant money – that means that Penn won’t have to pay out that $35K to OP next year – so it would be particularly hard for a college to prove money damages against a potential financial aid recipient, especially if the amount of offered aid met or exceeded the cost of tuition. </p></li>
</ol>
<p>Additionally, to the extent any provision of the contract could be enforced, the terms would have to be strictly construed against the college and liberally construed in favor of the applicant, because it is a contract of adhesion, drafted by the college – so the ordinary rules of construction mean that vague terms will be construed in the applicant’s favor. Terms like “possible” are undefined and clearly vague – for example, a student could simply assert that they can’t afford the airfare, so therefore it isn’t “possible” to attend.</p>
<p>I think it would be very easy to draft an enforceable agreement – but the colleges have chosen not to do that. I think the reason is that if they created a solid, enforceable agreement, it would be harder to get students to sign it – and their primary goal with ED is to lock a solid percentage of full-pay students in their entering class. (No matter what they say about financial aid, they only want to lock in the students who are full-pay or those who need minimal financial aid — there is absolutely no benefit to them to lock-in a student like the OP who needs a substantial amount of aid. So no matter what the debate here, the reality is that Penn won’t mind if the OP turns them down in favor of a full ride elsewhere. )</p>
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<p>Berryberry61, unethical behavior disgusts me too, so I agree with you on that point. </p>
<p>You are entitled to your opinion on what is unethical shady behavior. That’s allowed and encouraged by the terms of service. I and others read the same ED agreement that you read and drew a different conclusion. </p>
<p>You are not allowed, under the terms of service, to accuse other posters here (and I personally feel unjustly accused by you) of supporting and endorsing unethical behavior, which in and of itself would be unethical. I think that is disrespectful (see the Courtesy clause), and makes me feel uncomfortable and unwelcome (see the General Behavior clause). I do think that I and those that disagree with you have a contribution to make here. </p>
<p>Furthermore, and with all due respect, I personally don’t think your post on the MIT board accusing the OP of being unethical made her feel all that comfortable and welcome either. </p>
<p>I’m not the CC police you know, and I do think you also have something to contribute, just try to debate and not accuse.</p>
<p>This was quoted from the Penn web site many, many pages ago (#195):</p>
<p>“Early Decision (Binding)
Early decision (ED) programs are usually binding. ‘Binding’ means that the applicant promises from the start that they will attend the school if their application is accepted. It is not an obligation to be taken lightly, since schools honor one another’s binding decisions. If you renege on an early decision obligation to one school, it is unlikely that another competitive school will accept you. Students can seek release from an early decision obligation on the grounds of financial hardship, if the financial aid package they are offered is genuinely inadequate; however, the burden of proof in these cases is on the student.”</p>
<p>The FA aspect is very clear. The student doesn’t just say “sorry, not enough.” S/he has to PROVE that the offer is inadequate. My impression is that s/he is considered to have accepted until she proves otherwise, but I’ll admit that that’s not clear.</p>
<p>And if she didn’t get scared away, perhaps we would have had a chance to KNOW how her discussion with PENN went and if they released her. I think it would have been very interesting and informative.</p>
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<p>I don’t think anybody is shedding a tear for Penn. They are more concerned about other disappointed ED applicants. After reading a lot of the posts on here it seems to me that if there really is an unexpected serious financial issue then there is no issue legally or morally. If there is no financial issue and it is just an admissions strategy, there may be no legal issue but it sure seems like a moral issue to me. But unless somebody actually knows otherwise, I’ll just take the OPs post at face value. And since she got scared off, I doubt we’ll find out the outcome anyway.</p>
<p>
Apparently we think alike on this one.</p>
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</p>
<p>Arguing specific performance misses the point by a mile. I do not think you’d find anyone who would believe that a school could and should force a student to attend a school against his or her own will. </p>
<p>The real issue remains about the OBLIGATION by the school to release a student from what they consider a binding contract or … moral obligation. As it stands, a student who does NOT obtain a release would be precluded to attend schools that have decided to honor the commitment to OTHER schools. Obviously, there is little that could stop a school to ignore the successful application at one of their peers. </p>
<p>Thus, the issue is not about a school ability to force a student to attend, but is entirely about a school’s ability to successfully hinder the efforts of students to ignore the binding commitment they DID make. </p>
<p>And that is perhaps why there is an entire discussion about … obtaining a RELEASE. For some, as the wishful thinking in this thread indicates, obtaining a release should be either automatic or not … relevant.</p>
<p>And, more importantly, it is this type of sterile discussions about “legal” semantics that precludes posters such as the OP to receive helpful advice based on the reality of college admissions.</p>
<p>Indiana91. I posted that quote and it wasn’t from Penn. Sorry for the confusion; my first quote in that post was from Penn. I then wrote the quote you provided in #592, and I had the link below the quote. Sorry…here is the link again though: [Early</a> Decision versus Action Admissions](<a href=“http://www.admissionsconsultants.com/college/earlydecision.asp]Early”>http://www.admissionsconsultants.com/college/earlydecision.asp)</p>
<p>Yeah, kind of bummed she got scared off, too. 1. would have liked to hear the outcome and her thinking…2. Feel ashamed a bunch of adults ran off some kid like a bunch of codgers with banging pots and pans. :eek: Oh, well, I"m sure we will carry on regardless. It is hardly in the spirit of CC to be worried about what the OP was, in fact, asking. Carry on.</p>
<p>This is a fascinating thread. </p>
<p>And I know this has been said a few times, but I’m going to say it again.</p>
<p>anneroku wrote: The only point at which OP is required to withdraw her other apps is when she has accepted her ED admittance. That has not occurred yet.</p>
<p>According to the common application, that is not correct. The common ap states: </p>
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</p>
<p>As I read that, the student must withdraw other applications either when they have been accepted (NOT when the student accepts the acceptance) or when they have received notification about financial aid. The OP was accepted and received information about financial aid, and so is supposed to withdraw other applications – including the EA to MIT.</p>
<p>Xiggi, you bring up an excellent point. </p>
<p>If you go back to the mock conversation in my post #175 (which was yesterday, LOL), under what circumstances do you think UPENN would release her?</p>
<p>Fireandrain, does it not also imply that if the financial aid is insufficient for you to attend, then you need not withdraw other applications. Otherwise, what’s the point of allowing you to wait for the financial aid decision.</p>