<p>I am a junior right now. I just visited the Claremont Schools and loved them, especially Claremont McKenna and Pomona. My plan right now is to apply Early Decision I to Claremont McKenna. I have 2100 SAT, like 3.5 GPA, and not much for Extracurriculars, but I think my interview at CMC left a very good impression and I know for a fact that one of my two teacher recommendations is going to be INCREDIBLE. So, I think I definitely have a chance at CMC, even if it is not a particularly strong one, right? </p>
<p>So my questions:
- would it be a good idea to apply ED because I love the college so much, and it would give me a better chance to get in??
-- or, is the advantage applying ED gives me so negligible that I would be better off going regular decision??
-- would it be stupid to waste the chance to see other school's financial aid offers? (although I will be needing a lot of aid, I don't think this is a huge problem because CMC recently introduced the no-loan policy (only grants and work-study), and they meet 100% of need, so my package is pretty much guaranteed to be adequate, right?)
- also, I had really good grades in Junior year (all A-/As), whereas I was mostly a B+ student in Freshman and Sophomore year... I guess in Early Decision, the college only sees grades from the first three years of high school.. is it possible that my application would be more attractive if I applied Regular Decision because I would have another trimester (first tri, senior year) of good grades to put on my GPA?? </p>
<p>keep in mind, I was at these schools for 5 days for my brother's graduation at Pomona and just LOVED the whole place... Obviously, I am thinking that I will only apply ED if I am 100% sure that I want to go to CMC, and at this point, I am</p>
<p>Strategically, to get admission, it is a very good idea to apply ED. Schools like that really want to attract students who really want them, instead of students settling for them because they got rejected from Harvard.</p>
<p>The main downside is financial aid, you will have no opportunity to compare offers and it may limit your bargaining ability.</p>
<p>I can see why you would love CMC. I personally love it to, and I also am sure you're bound to get good financial aid.</p>
<p>Your situation is a tough one because you seem to lack strong EC's or a super high gpa, and applying ED will only benefit you. However, I think you should apply RD regardless of how much you love a school. If they have EA, go for EA instead, because you change a lot between beginning of senior year to end of senior year. You may not think so because you may look at it as a change from beginning of junior year to end of junior year, but trust me, you grow a lot as a person your last year of high school. Your tastes change, your interests change, you change. Applying ED to a school that is very specific to gearing its students towards one track, is not a smart choice because you may realize that Pomona College might be a better fit than CMC in the long run.</p>
<p>BTW you may want to check the stats, ask CMC whats the acceptance rate of ED applicants and RD applicants. Sometimes its the same, which end up being no benefit to you. but if ED rate is say 40+ compared while RD is below 20, then obviously you know what to do. But if the margin is only 5 percent give or take its not worth to ED.</p>
<p>That's a tough situation, and one I was in myself earlier this year (although not with CMC). I guess I don't really see any reason not to apply ED if you are absolutely positive that CMC is your first choice. But if you have any doubt whatsoever, I would recommend applying RD. I'm glad I didn't do ED because I wasn't completely sure where I wanted to go. I feel like ending up where you really want to be is much more important than any small statistical advantage you might have, particularly when CMC is such a high reach for you anyway.</p>
<p>Their admissions are weird at CMC, though. I was flat out rejected with a 3.9 and 2210/1460 after an interview that lasted several hours and went very well while other students with significantly lower numbers were admitted. I'm not bitter at all, I just want you to know that CMC is a school that is well known for people who would otherwise not get in being able to write their way in.</p>
<p>So I guess what I am saying is work really hard on your essays and who knows, maybe you'll be there next year.</p>
<p>yea, i think i can do really well in essays, so i'm optimistic about it... </p>
<p>i mean, CMC meets 100% of need, and they have the no-loan policy, and it's not like i have merit-scholarship worthy stats at other schools, so i don't see how i could get a better package</p>
<p>^^^You've gamed this out pretty well, I think.</p>
<p>yea, the one thing making me hesitant is that i don't know if i would rather be at pomona or cmc.... but i think it is worth it to just choose one</p>
<p>Just to game this out a bit. Look at all these people on waitlists, hoping to get into Harvard or Princeton or wherever. It's May 20 the acceptances are still going out. The last thing a place like Pomona or CMC wants is a student who is holding out hope upon hope through June that they'll get into Harvard, but has to "settle" on Pomona or CMC. ED is a huge win for them, and therefore they're going to make it worth people's while to pick the ED option.</p>
<p>thanks a lot. </p>
<p>one question, and this is something that i will talk to CMC admissions about:
--i matured a lot later than most kids in my school, so i was mostly a B/B+ student until this (junior) year.. this year I'm getting straight A's though..</p>
<p>my question is, would my application look more attractive after another trimester and a half (senior year) of A-/A grades?? </p>
<p>As opposed to applying ED, where I BELIEVE (let me know if this is wrong) that colleges only see grades up to and including junior year..</p>
<p>With ED they only see up through junior year.</p>
<p>However, depending on the school, they may or may not reject or defer you if you apply ED. A rejection means just that: they don't want you and are done.</p>
<p>A deferral, on the other hand, means they throw you back into the RD pool if they don't accept you and you get another chance.</p>
<p>Schools do this differently. Some reject everyone who's not accepted, some defer everyone who's not accepted ( Georgetown, for example) and some do a little of both (UChicago, for example). You may want to look into exactly what CMC and Pomona do to ED'ers who aren't accepted as I am not sure for those schools.</p>
<p>^^this is a very good point, that they could defer you to see your senior year grades. But in that case, you still win by applying ED I think, because you have demonstrated your strong preference for their school.</p>
<p>Based on the Common Data Set, </p>
<p>ED acceptance rate @ CMC: 31.94%
RD acceptance rate @ CMC: 16.59%</p>
<p>ED acceptance rate @ Pomona: 20.72%
RD acceptance rate @ Pomona: 15.79%</p>
<p>It really depends how important going to CMC is to you. I personally didn't apply ED because I knew that most of the colleges I applied to were great places and that getting the best financial aid offer was more important. Lo and behold, the final cost of attendance for the school that gave me the worst need-based aid was $10,000 higher than the final cost of attendance for the school that I decided to attend.</p>
<p>I'm not sure how true this is, but lots of schools say that the reason ED applicants have a higher acceptance rate is because the pool is more self-selecting, meaning that as a whole they are more well-qualified than the RD pool, leading the school to accept a greater percentage of them.</p>
<p>Whether this is true, or if schools are just trying to make sure ED candidates aren't applying just for a statistical advantage, I don't know.</p>
<p>Even though both Pomona and CMC will meet 100% of "need," this is a need that the schools determine themselves. Pomona is known to have very generous financial aid, so you might be able to levy their offer against CMC's to get better aid from Claremont. </p>
<p>In response to post #7: It goes without saying, if you aren't 100% set on a school, and convinced that you would take it above all others, it's imprudent to apply ED. College admissions isn't a place where you want to end up wishing you had done it differently.</p>
<p>I'm going to attend CMC this fall and I went through this same dilemma. I visited both and really wanted to like Pomona more, but CMC ended up feeling like home. Foolishly, I planned on applying ED to Pomona until a few days before the deadline when I decided not to submit it. I submitted my application for Pomona under ED II, and was deferred and then rejected. I'm glad I didn't apply ED to CMC though because I think I needed the admissions offices at both schools to sort out where I belonged. CMC came through for me because that's where I belong. It kind of makes you wonder if the CMC adcom and Pomona adcom discuss common applicants. My host at CMC said they do, but who knows?</p>
<p>Leadership positions at CMC are a BIG DEAL. CMC paid someone I know to visit out there to interview for this pretty selective scholarship and while she and the rest of the scholarship applicants were there they asked an admissions officer how he decides who gets rejected and he went through an application with them there:</p>
<p>"GPA good (close to a 4.0), SATs good (2200ish)... rejected."</p>
<ol>
<li> They had no leadership positions.</li>
<li> Their essay was really really short (sometimes short can be good, but apparently that wasn't the opinion of the admissions officer)</li>
</ol>
<p>So watch out for CMC. If you're rejected you'll wish that you had applied to less of a reach ED round. Believe me, that's what happened to me and it's not fun. Make sure you finish all your other applications by the time you hear back from CMC.</p>
<p>Pomona and CMC, as separate institutions, do not discuss common applicants. At Pomona, financial aid and admissions are separate offices (and BLIND to eachother), so they couldn't even find out from your FAFSA the other schools that you had applied to (had you applied for finaid).</p>
<p>I recall Pomona and CMC both asking me which schools I applied to. It might be the conspiracy theorist within me that wants to believe it, but I think it's kind of hard to know for a fact whether they do or do not communicate. I'm sure they share ED lists...</p>