<p>From the Star Ledger newspaper this afternoon (NJ state paper)</p>
<p>Princeton drops early admissions
Following Harvards lead, Princeton University announced this afternoon it will drop its early admissions program and instead ask students to apply in a single pool.</p>
<p>Students currently applying for early admission will be the last to use the controversial program that some critics say is unfair. High school students applying to enter Princeton in the fall of 2008 will be the first to use a single admissions process to get into the Ivy League school.</p>
<p>We are making this change because we believe it is the right thing to do, said Princeton President Shirley Tilghman. The ultimate test of any admission process for Princeton is whether it is fair and equitable to all our applicants and whether it allows us to enroll the strongest possible class. </p>
<p>We believe that a single admission process will encourage an even broader pool of excellent students to apply to Princeton, knowing that they will be considered at the same time and on the same terms as all other applicants, Tilghman added.</p>
<p>Last week, Harvard University announced it was dropping its early admissions option.</p>
<p>Early admissions programs, which are offered at many top colleges, allows students to apply and get accepted to their first-choice school early in their senior year. Critics say early admissions favor wealthy students and contribute to the college application frenzy.</p>
<p>This year, nearly half of Princetons 1,230-member freshman class was admitted through early admissions.</p>
<p>It really is amazing that they did this considering that nearly half of Princeton's class is accepted early. As I said in the other thread, I wonder how far and how fast this will go.</p>
<p>I thought you'd argued that ED was all about students being confident and certain of where they wanted to matriculate. Why should Harvard's yield increase at the expense of Princeton's if students who applied ED to Princeton really truly wanted to be at Princeton?</p>
<p>This is going to nail the coffin on ED/EA at the Ivies and Stanford. I don't think Yale wants another 6,000 EA applications, and once Yale goes Stanford, Brown, Columbia . . . just like dominos.</p>
<p>The only questions left are whether Duke is going to define itself with the big boys or grab for those extra valedictorians, and whether any of the LACs are going to follow suit.</p>
<p>Can't see why LACs such as Swarthmore or Williams would want to follow suit. Here's their opportunity to find a new pool of qualified, full-pay customers, who really want to be there (but put in "lick-and-prayer" applications to other schools anyway.) Seems like a win-win to me.</p>
<p>Well, as I said before, peer schools may want to try ED without the binding part: rolling admissions, with internal deferrals until all the apps are in.</p>
<p>(Just a radical thought.)</p>
<p>And I agree, mini, the LAC's & places like NYU are sitting pretty now. No reason for them to change.</p>
<p>I just think this is going to make the whole process harder for <em>everybody</em>.</p>
<p>Wow, I have to be impressed that Princeton was willing to give up ED, and how quickly they followed Harvard's lead. Perhaps they are now more confident of holding their own yield-wise, with their #1 position in the US News rankings. I can't imagine now that Yale won't follow suit. However, I'd be surprised if the other ivies will give up ED, as they have so much more to lose. And while I can see the increased fairness to all with no early applying (esp. regarding ED) , I am personally extremely thankful that we had it.</p>
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Can't see why LACs such as Swarthmore or Williams would want to follow suit. Here's their opportunity to find a new pool of qualified, full-pay customers, who really want to be there (but put in "lick-and-prayer" applications to other schools anyway.) Seems like a win-win to me.
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<p>Let's just hope that Al Bloom at Swarthmore and Morty Schapiro at Williams don't take stupid pills.</p>
<p>If everyone follows suit on ending ED, mark my words: the biggest losers, by far, will be students who rely on need-based aid.</p>
<p>Without ED, yield would drop precipitously at most elite colleges. They will have no choice but enter the merit-discount bidding wars. Where's the funding for that going to come from? Yep. Right out of the need-based aid budgets.</p>
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At ED schools? I was under the impression that the only legitimate alternatives were rolling admissions ones.
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<p>The biggest reason that well-matched students for Dartmouth or Penn or Duke or Swarthmore or Williams or Amherst don't apply ED is that they want to take their lotto-ticket wing and a prayer shot at Harvard first.</p>
<p>I agree with Mini that ED applications at these schools will likely increase, unless these schools do something monumentally stupid and fall for Harvard's sucker play.</p>
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I just think this is going to make the whole process harder for <em>everybody</em>.
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<p>It'll be good for high-stat wealthy students as the remaining need-based aid schools abandon that policy in favor of merit-discount bigging wars for high-stat students.</p>
<p>If anyone thinks that the universal end of early decision will benefit low-income students, they aren't thinking through the ramifications. The limiting factor on lower income enrollment today is the tuition discount budget. One of the reasons the tuition discount budgets are at historical record highs is that colleges can predictably enroll a known percentage of full-fare customers. </p>
<p>If ED ends across the board, predictability goes out the window. It'll will inevitably lead to bidding for high-stat (higher income) students.</p>
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The biggest reason that well-matched students for Dartmouth or Penn or Duke or Swarthmore or Williams or Amherst don't apply ED is that they want to take their lotto-ticket wing and a prayer shot at Harvard first.
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<p>I don't understand your reasoning. If the students take their lotto-ticket wing and a prayer shot at Harvard, it means that Harvard is their first choice, and the only reason to apply ED at other schools is to increase their chances of getting in. Hardly an endorsement of ED as a clear signal that the school is the student's first choice, which is what I thought you'd been arguing as a reason for retaining ED/</p>
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If the students take their lotto-ticket wing and a prayer shot at Harvard, it means that Harvard is their first choice, and the only reason to apply ED at other schools is to increase their chances of getting in.
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<p>Right. We are talking about students who DON'T currently apply ED to other schools.</p>
<p>What mini and I are suggesting is that ending early action and ED at three or four of the Ivy League Football schools will probably increase ED applications at other schools as students take a calculated look at the schools they actually have a shot of getting into.</p>