Hello.
I’ve heard from a few sources that if you’re a student who has received good scores on standardized testing, it is better to do early action. Is this true? What type of schools does this apply to?
@CollegePanda12 This applies to every school that offers early action (not restrictive, as this limits the schools you can apply to early and is similar to choosing to apply ED to a school.) Applying Early Action is beneficial as it can qualify you for full-tuition/top-level merit scholarships; having an earlier decision removes some of the stress accompanying the long waiting periods, and schools tend to accept more students early action rather than RD (Tulane and UChicago are examples,) given that these students are more likely to have prepared and well thought out applications than those applying right before the deadline.
TL;DR: Always apply non-restrictive early action if possible, as long as your application will be ready AND GOOD by then.
Hope this helps! Good luck with admissions!
@PikachuRocks15
I think you slightly misunderstood my question. I wasn’t asking about how early action itself affects things, but about how standardized testing would impact early action, considering the huge numbers of students who will not submit their scores.
In other words, would doing early action when having a good SAT/ACT score be more beneficial now, than it was doing early action having a good SAT/ACT score before?
Whatever benefit you get from applying EA vs RD (and this varies by college) will be the same whether you apply with scores or without. The real question is whether there is a boost to applying with scores. And any answer is purely speculative.
Unfortunately, I applied during a more “traditional” application cycle, so any answer provided, like @skieurope states, is “purely speculative,” unless one of us is affiliated with an Admissions Office. Even if a college is test-optional, if you have strong test scores (within the class profile range,) it can’t do anything but help, given that its another factor for Admissions to utilize in assessing your academic strength.
Hope that helps!
Better standardized test scores help your application no matter when you apply.
In general, early applications tend to help your application regardless of your test scores.