I am wondering if a college has EA/ED, would admissions look at RD applications that arrive at the same time as EA/ED applications or would they put it in the RD pile and not look at them until after EA/ED?
Can’t speak for all of them, but when my daughter did that with one, she got the decision the same time as all other RD decisions came out.
Depends on how busy they are with Early apps. Many colleges are coding your app for whether it’s Early or RD and using their work time accordingly. If their policy is to respond to RD later, you’d get that notification later. Use your remaining 6 weeks wisely.
I was told by several GCs and AOs that is the case. That most schools with specific EA, ED programs do work on those first before evaluating the RD apps. That does not mean that the info on RD apps are not entered in their systems. That happens automatically as received at many schools but the evaluative process is supposed to be kept separate, I have been told. It does make sense.
However, practice is not the same as reality and it can happen that early program apps get evaluated in the mix. How do I know? Two of my kids were accepted early, during the EA acceptance period when they applied RD. One was accepted SCEA. Clearly a mistake and we immediately let the high school GC and that college AO know, and, yes, it was the college’s mistake. Everything was clearly and appropriately marked RD., the application materials were just sent out early. I think the other acceptance was deliberate—kid made special visit to AO and told the AO that he had fallen in love with the school during that visit. Won’t work with the most selective schools, but it did with this school that was fairly selective.