<p>I think part of it is the pool of kids they are getting EA....too much of the same? Maybe all wonderful, but Harvard must have been somewhat concerned...and to take SO many so early, I wonder what they saw with that group of kids we aren't understanding....</p>
<p>There is ALWAYS more to the story, and even though what they say sounds nice, it shouldn't be assumed there isn't more</p>
<p>Are some of those kids turning out to be not the best match at Harvard, are their some issues or patterns</p>
<p>I may be off base, but me thinks it goes deeper than then just what is "best" for the applicants...if they wanted what was best, they wouldn't send out all those mailers and push for more applicants</p>
<p>If Harvard had binding ED, I can understand the stated rationales for this policy change but it does not. Furthermore, Harvard was always free in processing its SCEA applications to defer enough kids to have space for those supposedly unsophisticated kids who apply by Jan 1.</p>
<p>And now, all of a sudden, they are worried about senioritis? One day the colleges are saying that high school kids are too pressured and overextended, now they are worried that the overachieving kids Harvard is likely to accept might actually take it easier for a few months. And besides, some EA/ED schools ask for quarter grade reports -- they don't rely solely on grades through junior year. Perhaps Harvard has done this as well. </p>
<p>I am just a cynic about the stated reasons for the change. And why the change now when all of the undesirable effects of the early admissions process have long been known and discussed?</p>
<p>Why "non-advantaged" students took less advantage of SCEA is not the issue. The fact, as stated by Bok, is that they didn't. H. doesn't have to worry about competitors. Yield will go up as those who don't want to wait til April will go ED elsewhere. All the backup football quarterbacks will be compared in the same pile (the recruited one will have already gotten his "likely" letter), and if they lose a few applicants here and there, do you think they really care? And it might spark a bidding war among developmental admits to ensure little sonnyboy's only chance. I can't see why one has to look for ulterior motives when the stated ones, from H.'s point of view, make so much sense.</p>
<p>Frankly, I think he hopes other schools DON'T follow H.'s lead. The whole point is to siphon off students who submitting "wing-and-prayer" applications, and who, even if they were admitted, didn't have any particular reason to be at H. to begin with.</p>
<p>Yeah, I still don't buy it. The "free pass" argument is complete crap, since no one has a free pass first semester, and everyone has a free pass second semester. If you are talking about quarterly grades, then maybe there is a quarter swing in there, but so what? -- let the kids who didn't get in somewhere EA/ED shine a bit, rather than having the top dogs competing viciously that quarter, too. (Says the father of a fairly vicious top dog, who would be competing anyway because that's what he does, because he olans to apply RD to a couple of schools even if he gets into a SCEA school, and because there's scholarship $ based on class rank at stake, too.) It's practically insulting to suggest that there's a huge problem with Harvard's 600 or so early acceptees going to pot over the winter. And, based on what I've seen, there's nothing like an April that includes tears, cheers, frenzied accepted-student visits to multiple schools, and the biggest life-decision a kid has ever made to kick a big hole in the kid's attention to school work.</p>
<p>At the HYPS level, comparing financial aid packages is a little bit of hooey, too. The only really big swing is for relatively well-to-do kids getting merit scholarships from second-tier institutions. From the standpoint of Harvard's stated goals -- increasing accessibility for the less well-off -- that is a controversial practice. But Harvard does plenty to facilitate that for the families who want it: Not only does it do EA rather than ED, but probably just as importantly it gives much more/better aid to truly poor kids, thus sucking the most talented poor students away from lesser institutions, and freeing up money that can be used to bribe middle-class kids. The only thing that will change with the new system is that a few kids who would have gone to Harvard had they gotten in EA will wind up being enticed by money from some other school they wouldn't otherwise have applied to.</p>
<p>Curmudgeon and family aside, I don't know of lots of kids who have turned down Harvard or Yale for merit money elsewhere. I know of one pretty rich kid who chose a full ride at CMU over Yale, because she wasn't going to get any $ at all from Yale, and one absolutely penniless (and pretty much homeless) orphan who chose NYU over Columbia because Columbia was going to make him borrow $25,000/year. Neither was in the EA/ED pool. Both decisions were perfectly rational, but the current system did nothing to impede that.</p>
<p>Do you believe in getting all stakeholders on board before announcing a new policy? Harvard went from EA to SCEA a few years ago and now feels that neither system works best for it, so it has decided to try a new tack for a few years. If it finds that the new all RD system does not address its needs then it will review and make new changes. What's so strange? </p>
<p>Actually, I believe in self-interest. I'd be worried if Harvard did not try to protect its interests while instituting reforms. </p>
<p>It is possible to be overextended up to and only up to the time of application; senioritis is a pretty logical consequence of that phenomenon, like a deflating balloon. I attribute the fact that my S did not have senioritis to the fact that he did not feel overextended. Until I got onto CC I had not known that it was possible to contemplate dropping AP-Calc just because one had gotten into some college already. But dropping challenging classes seems to be frequently done, judging by what gets posted on CC.</p>
<p>"Curmudgeon and family aside, I don't know of lots of kids who have turned down Harvard or Yale for merit money elsewhere."</p>
<p>We've had three H. admits out here over the past four years (that I know about.) Two went to BYU; one went to Calvin College. This year, for the first time anyone can remember, we had one student admitted to Yale who wasn't an athlete (but I think he went to Chicago - I'll have to check.)</p>
<p>I agree with that. While the new policy may benefit the middle class applicant who must evaluate financial aid packages, I seriously doubt that the change had anything to do with fairness. I don't know what that reason is, but anything that levels the playing field seems good to me.</p>
<p>Actually, I know someone two people who compared offers from Harvard, Princeton and MIT and came away with quite different amounts. In one case, it would have amounted to nearly $30k over four years. And there is the famous case of Evil Robot whom the whole Parent Forum advised on whether to attend Yale, to which he had been admitted SCEA with some finaid, or Vandy, which gave him more generous finaid (he went to Vandy). I'm sure if we dig into CC archives, we could find other examples. </p>
<p>
[quote]
And, based on what I've seen, there's nothing like an April that includes tears, cheers, frenzied accepted-student visits to multiple schools, and the biggest life-decision a kid has ever made to kick a big hole in the kid's attention to school work.
[/quote]
</p>
<p>True, but by then, they've learned rather more materials than if they begin slacking off at around Xmas. My S continued to work hard--especially in May, what with APs (even though he was not going to take Advanced Standing), school finals and college finals but he remembers at least one classmate as having a huge case of senioritis.</p>
<p>Mini: Are you saying that those kids chose BYU and Calvin College over Harvard for money? I suspect there were other factors at play, too, based on where they went.</p>
<p>I didn't say I knew no one who turned down Harvard. I have known lots of people who turned down Harvard or Yale, including myself. In the past few years, I have seen kids turn down Harvard for Northwestern (film program), Indiana (dance program), and Deep Springs (general unique coolness). But not for money.</p>
<p>And marite: That comparison happened under the current system. And $7,500/year is about a 16% difference -- important if you are comparing equivalent schools, but really unlikely to send someone out of the HYP system into Merit World.</p>
<p>As far as senioritis is concerned, my D was accepted ED (with a merit scholarship, to boot) and continued to apply herself for the rest of her senior year. This is her nature, and it is also very fortunate, because she ended up being unhappy at her original college and applying to transfer (a story for another thread....perhaps applying ED was not such a good idea after all....) In any case, she needed to submit her h.s. transcript with GPA and rank as well as h.s. teacher recommendations as part of the transfer process. If she had slacked off and received poor grades as a senior, it is unlikely that she would have been admitted to the very selective college she is now attending as a transfer.</p>
<p>I know Evil Robot turned down Yale strictly on financial grounds. He agonized over a thread that probably ran as long as the Duke Lacrosse one. The other case I know chose P over M strictly on financial grounds, too; for a middle class family, a difference of $30k was hard to ignore.</p>
<p>My son, who graduated h.s. in 2002, applied Early Action to Harvard and MIT, and was admitted EA to Harvard and was deferred from and eventually admitted in April to MIT. At that time, neither of the schools was Single Choice. He truly did not have a clear first choice college, but applied EA because there was no disadvantage to doing so, and it could only increase his odds of admission to these schools. He actually applied to 7 other schools, because our h.s. required that applications be turned in to guidance to be mailed out with transcripts and recommendations prior to the notification of EA decisions by Harvard and MIT. After acceptances came in April, he visited Harvard, Stanford, and MIT, and, after much agonizing, chose Stanford on the last possible day for deciding. (At the time, Stanford was ED, not EA, and he applied RD.) He did not abuse or take unfair advantage of EA, but he definitely did not use EA as it was presumably intended to be used, to apply to a clear first choice college. I am sure this is true of many of the students who apply ED and EA.</p>
<p>There are more students who opted for substantial merit aid over Yale, or similar schools. Two of my friends did. You'll find the details of Eadad's son turning Yale for UNC-CH on College Confidential. Of course, the Morehead is one scholarship that goes well beyond the mere dollars. Another friend from the same school decided to go UT at Dallas on a scholarship that mimics the Morehead (McDermott.) </p>
<p>On the other hand, I also know students who turned down full rides for the privilege of paying full tuition at Harvard.</p>
<p>
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On the other hand, I also know students who turned down full rides for the privilege of paying full tuition at Harvard.
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</p>
<p>And a good thing, too. Financial aid and merit aid should go to students who really need aid. The new USN&WR issue is devoted to how to pay for college. The new president of Drew University quotes his daughter as not wanting to apply for scholarships: '"Dad, we can afford college; other people can't."
As to the rest of his claims, I am dubious. If a college president (all right, of only two years) feels stretched paying college tuition for two kids, who else can afford college?</p>
<p>
[quote]
Financial aid and merit aid should go to students who really need aid.
[/quote]
That's an interesting normative statement!</p>
<p>Response #1: Let colleges buy the students they want to buy, however they want to buy them. (This free market response would require biting the bullet on legacies, etc.)</p>
<p>Response #2: Even if what we care about is truth and justice, maybe it's not so bad to tie aid to merit/accomplishment. It incentivizes exactly what we'd like kids to strive for.</p>
<p>Well, I felt like Weisbuch's D. I did not steer S toward schools where I was sure he would get very susbtantial merit money. Like Weisbruch, "we can afford college." Lots of students, as accomplished as my S, cannot, without aid of some sort.</p>
<p>I agree, too. We did turn down big merit aid, but we felt we could afford to. We actually had, at the time, a much smaller income than mini says is the norm for non-aid families, but, c'est la vie, we knew we could stretch. Now, though, when this year's income puts us in the middle of the middle group mini writes about, we're feeling tht taking aid might not be such a bad thing!</p>