Are parents making the $250 now so that you get preferred Housing? Or does it not matter when you make the deposit. My daughter does not know where she is attending yet, but does not want to miss out on the Housing choices.
Your housing slot is dependent on when you make the deposit … so yes your housing options will be better now than if you wait… however a friend who’s daughter is there now discouraged me from putting down an early deposit without a real commitment to the school. “An early commitment definitely helps on the housing front—though honestly there are no ‘bad’ dorms. The older dorms with shared bathrooms, for instance, are just steps from classes, the strip, and the student union. They actually have very high rates of satisfaction. But committing as soon as she hears back from other schools will still put her way ahead of many others.” She works for a university though where she understands how it affects the admissions process. “Schools like UTK use that commitment to limit how many other offers they make. Those admissions decisions in aggregate help determine acceptance rate and yield—both important factors in national rankings. More importantly, qualified students who apply later may be denied or waitlisted because UT believes they’ve hit their admissions target.”
Basically I do feel like it’s a little bit in bad faith for us to move ahead on the deposit although I know we are also tempted because if she ends up at UTK… then it’s a shame we didn’t jump on it earlier … but most people really aren’t going to be making these decisions I think until late winter and early spring. So I am trying not to push ahead on that… it’s not like it is at Auburn where there is not enough housing. I feel ok that with UTK she will be ok on housing … hopefully I am not wrong. I think my daughter will be able to make a decision in Feb well ahead of the May deadline and that should be adequate. I know that people don’t follow it but also the common app asks you to sign that you aren’t going put down multiple deposits.