This year, the Early Action (EA) / Early Decision (ED) deadline for the Northeastern University is November 1.
List your unweighted GPA, any SAT /ACT scores, and ECs. What majors are you going into?
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Does NU offer interviews with AOs as part of their admissions process?
No interviews are offered.
students have higher chance in EA or RD?
Only ED would give an applicant an advantage.
Iâm willing to be contradicted by specific data from Northeastern showing otherwise, but in many schools, EA applicants do have a higher acceptance rate than RD. Thatâs simply a function of timing. Early applications are being evaluated at a time when all/most spots in the class are available. Typically odds are a little higher, since there more available spots in the class to play with. By the time RD rolls around, often half or more of the class is filled by EA, ED1 and ED2. But, again, if anyone has data that this is not the case at Northeastern, I stand corrected.
Except at schools like NEU (and UChicago) that simultaneously offer EA along with ED - in which case youâre disadvantaged applying EA instead of ED. And if deferred and you roll your application to RD instead of ED2 your chances of acceptance plummet.
Sure, I agree, ED is much better for an applicantâs chances than EA, but the OP isnât asking about EA versus ED. Theyâre asking about EA versus RD, and Iâd still say thereâs at least a chance that thereâs a better shot at EA than at RD.
For example, very different school, but here are Colorado Collegeâs stats, which also offers both EA and ED:
26% Early Decision I/II; 15% Early Action; 3% Regular Action.
Actually, I was referring to chances as an EA vs RD applicant at NEU but I realize I didnât make it clear. If you apply EA and are deferred youâre less likely in my observation to be accepted vs having applied RD.
But I donât mean to debate. So we can simply agree to disagree.
(Edited to further clarify that my comments are for unhooked applicants)
S23 is planning to apply to Northeastern. We were looking at the CDS to try to figure out what SAT score would be worth submitting (he is retaking on 10/1).
Looking at these numbers, it is quite striking how few of the entering class submitted scores. Is it better to just apply TO? Does Northeastern look kindly upon TO applicants? Have they offered any guidance?
Screen shot below is from Common Data Set | University Decision Support at Northeastern University
Conventional wisdom is to definitely submit if at the median or above, possibly submit between the 25% and 50%, and not to submit if below 25%. Applied here, that would mean, submit if 1480ish or above, possibly submit if between 1440 - 1480, and donât submit if below a 1440.
Of course, the hard spot to be in is if your kid has scores between that 25% and 50%. Thatâs where my daughter is for most of her reach schools, although sheâs closer to the 50%, than the 25%. Iâm recommending to her that she submit her scores that are just below median.
Of course all bets are off on the conventional wisdom if the admissions office says to submit (or not to submit) above or below a certain score, in which case of course do what the admissions office recommends.
Itâs also interesting that Northeastern still lists test scores as being âvery importantâ in the CDS, which is unusual in the days of test optional.
Daughter wants to EA to Business major. Stats - UW 3.92, 6 APs so far (5 5âs, 1 4), 5 APs senior year in progress, SAT 1560, extra curriculurs average - Marketing Internship, Paid Internship at a large museum , Student Coun, High School Diplomats summer program, TedX speech, Covid fundraising, business/non profit startup. Moved from NJ to CA (1+3 years). OOS state student. Does she have a chance?
If you look through past years cycle, it seems admission told students to not submit scores unless they were over 1400 or 1450, similar to your thinking. Not sure what the guidance would be this year. We havenât seen the CDS from the last cycle yet, so things may have changed a lot.
Does NUâs âED Visit Daysâ make a difference in the schoolâs decision? Surely it doesnât hurt but would like to see your thoughts?
My son plans to apply EA. He received an invitation to the NU Preview Day on October 8th. Any insight into this event or if itâs truly exclusive and for select students? We checked the admission visit page and there is nothing scheduled on 10/8 that is open to the public so I assume itâs invite-only, which is cool. He recently received the National Hispanic Scholar award (as per his PSAT) and has shown âdemonstrated interestâ with a visit and info session last October and some email inquiries, so maybe thatâs how he showed up on the radar as a candidate for this. Anyone else get this or have any inside info about this?
The email begins like this:
I am pleased to invite you to join us for NU Preview Day! Taking place on Saturday, October 8, this event is an exclusive opportunity for select students to experience Northeastern University.
Register With Your Personal Link
NU Preview Day is an excellent way to gain a firsthand perspective on life at Northeastern, and see if it is the right fit for you.
Well, applying ED, you are committed if you are accepted for regular Fall Admission, so it looks like these days are so you can be sure that NU is your top choice, I would assume that everyone applying ED has done their research etc and really wants to go, so itâs more likely this that is to benefit you, less so admissions IMO. it cannot hurt to express more interest and there is a virtual option for those who cannot be there on those two particular days.
We are contemplating whether or not S23 should send his SAT scores. I realized that if only students whose scores fall in that 50% or better range based on last yearâs admitted students submit their test results, that artificially drives up the median each year. Almost 60% of students did not submit. This coming cycle, students will likely only submit if they are about 1480 or better, but itâs a safe assumption that the students who got in TO had scores below that.
I get the impression that Northeastern wants this effect to happen. We just received a brochure from them in the mail that says (among other things), âWe recommend that students consider our middle 50% score ranges for the SAT and ACT when deciding to submit scores.â
Thatâs what I am mentally wrestling with - do they want you to go TO so they can artificially inflate their averages OR will it eventually be a ding against you (despite what they say) because they know your scores are lower than their average? They just donât know how much lower.
If your scores are below the range, it probably would be a ding against you either way. Submitting low scores would be a negative, and going TO is probably a slight negative. But they would prefer if you go TO, so that if they choose to admit you based on the other strengths in your application, it wonât hurt their averages.
Edit to add: The only thing thatâs not completely clear to me about their guidance is whether scores should be submitted that are between 25th and 50th percentile.
