So, how do others feel about schools offering Early Decision for boarding school, much like colleges and universities do? There was one school this year that my daughter applied to that offered Early Decision starting with this cycle (she is applying Regular Decision). Do you think other schools will follow suit or is this going to be an outlier? Are there other schools that already offer this option?
Well, what school did your daughter apply to in order to determine if there are “other schools that do this”?
Ah, sorry. Yes, she is applying to Suffield Academy as a regular decision candidate, but they offered early decision this year. I’m just curious if others think this is something that more schools will begin offering and if so, what other posters think - is it a positive/beneficial to candidates? Negative/more stressful for students? Somewhere in the middle?
My daughter definitely wasn’t ready to pick one school right away as her top choice, so early decision wasn’t for her.
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I do think it helps rather than someone telling you the school you already know. I believe I saw International School in Boston has early admission but I haven’t looked at them much beyond “who is this sending my kid stuff”. They may only be a day school, I’m not sure. I noticed they also had a rolling admission after the regular deadline, too.
Out of curiosity, do you know, does Suffield fill their class on M10 or do they have a rolling admission because they have more spots after M10? I’m just wondering if this would be something schools who are trying to take every opportunity to get students would do. BS isn’t the same sort of dynamic as university (tight knit quarters vs vast campuses where most students won’t even ever encounter each other). I would think early admission would lead some schools to some problems trying to round out their perfect student body at the time of regular admission. Picking a class of 100-200 students when you can compare them all at once is far different than putting together a class of 8-10 THOUSAND. I could be wrong but I don’t see it becoming a thing for the schools that have no problem filling up at M10. There is no benefit for them. They don’t care if it is your money or my money, their budget will be complete with a full class whether they sign up 10% in December or 100% in April.
I think they do have some post-M10 admissions for certain spots where they did not yield what they anticipated. The acceptance rate is about 25-30%, so not the most selective, but definitely not “easy” to gain admittance.
That’s a good point that it would be a way for schools to secure certain kids ahead of time and have a good basis for the class overall and then they could know what they need from RD to round out the class.
Right, not that they aren’t selective, but they may have times they don’t fill their class then fall to rolling admission. Early decision gives sort of a 3rd point of acquiring students that makes it easier on them not having to rely perhaps on rolling admission (or waitlist is the other thing I didn’t even think about) after A10. It gives a school some breathing room sooner in the process. That being said, it could also shoot them in the foot in trying to round out their class given the small class sizes of a BS (unlike universities who have class sizes in the thousands). If a school has a class of 100 and they decide to take 10% ED, what if they don’t get a huge variety of students in that pool to choose from? What if they are heavily concentrated in athletes or in music? Now they already have let’s say 10 musicians or 10 athletes, will they take any others from their regular admissions pool? What if there is a “better” musician candidate or athlete in the regular pool and they really want that kid at their school but they already have too many admits in that pool? If they all were in a pool together (regular admission), they could have said one of those earlier admits wouldn’t have been on their short list leaving room for the “better” candidate. BS just don’t have that wiggle room like a university does unless they aren’t filling their roster after M10 and a waitlist. I think few schools would want to jeopardize that. Maybe I’m wrong but I just see it like Black Friday sales where stores push it earlier and earlier just to capture the crowd (or the $) and continue to stay in business. The earlier a BS can capture students, the bigger the opportunity is to ensure their classes are full and they aren’t having to scramble in the end, hoping they fill their class up after the majority of kids applying are already taken.
Suffield has always done this. To my knowledge (I live in the area) it’s mainly used by siblings of current students and others who for one reason or another are only applying to Suffield. Students who are applying to multiple schools tend more often than not to wait till January.
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There are a number of BS that have lower or middle schools, and many have a process that allows/encourages continuing students by giving them an early decision provided they commit. They tend to be day students, but this is a useful tool for those schools. I can definitely see how it could be useful for them with siblings, faculty kids, etc. who are being given preference as well - a good quid pro quo.
Overall, though, I suspect that with the universe of schools being smaller, and the student bodies being smaller, this is less meaningful all the way round than it is with colleges. And I may be rosy-glassed, but it has always felt to me like BS are more concerned with making matches that everyone feels good about, and ED can add stress to the process. Choice seems to help in finding - or acknowledging - the Cinderella fit.
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