<p>What are the pros and cons to doing early decision? Is it a good or bad idea to do so? My son is thinking of applying early decision to cal poly. Should he?</p>
<p>IF your son is quite sure he wants Cal Poly and knows what he wants to major in, then ED is definitely the way to go. While I have no definitive evidence, I believe it improves the chances for acceptance. My son got into Aerospace Engineering ED and while his stats were quite good they weren’t stellar. Going ED helped. Another aspect of ED is that it removes the stress and burden of waiting to find out. However, there is a danger to that: the early onset of senioritis. My son’s HS GPA dropped because he coasted once he learned he was in.</p>
<p>My son was 100% sure he wanted to attend Cal Poly, so he applied ED as soon as the CSU mentor site allowed him to. He had good grades and test scores, but not stellar either. There’s no way to know for certain, but with as competitive as Cal Poly’s admissions are, any slight bump due to demonstrated interest via ED was welcome.</p>
<p>And I also second the “remove stress” advantage - at least, it removed my stress! S1 was unstressed during the application process and remained so throughout his senior year.</p>
<p>The only reason it would be a bad idea is if the student isn’t absolutely certain that he/she wants to attend.</p>
<p>This may be a bad question, but if you get rejected from Early Decision, does that mean you can’t apply again regularly? And does it mean that if you can apply again regularly, you probably won’t get in since they already rejected you?</p>
<p>If you are rejected ED you are put into the RD pool.</p>