A match and safety is a self designation. There is,in reality, no such thing. So you can’t hold a school liable for where else you did not get into.
I think the entire argument is silly. Any student can plan to meet their needs…whether it’s the best rated school they can get into or cheapest.
We applied to 15 and 21 schools. Someone said b4 it’s too many. I say it’s not.
We played the game. We didn’t win everywhere. But we won at enough schools for my kids to have options. My thing was ‘value’. Some schools like Miami with $25k merit, American with $15k or Maryland with none didn’t work value wise for dad. We had some rejections but had several that did work (last year for my daughter).
So if you plan right, I don’t see 20 as the person b4 said as too many. But yes there’s planning so if you get rejected or accepted with too few $$ at a place like CWRU, you have fallbacks and the plan works.
Btw step 1 of the plan: never fall in love with any school.
At the end of the day, I think an interesting question is: To what extent is “yield protection” a real thing/phenomenon/technology vs just a coping mechanism on the part of the applicant? If it is a real thing, then it seems to make for a more efficient marketplace (imagine what can be done with AI in this regard). Nevertheless, this example with CWRU clearly demonstrates the success of “yield protection” in more efficiently matching sellers with buyers… Market efficiency…
Helping kids avoid traps would best be accomplished by encouraging them to find schools that are a good fit, for both the student and the college. It’s more like online dating where not every school swipes right for every student but not every student swipes right for every school. Everyone wants to be wanted - both the school and the student.
The existence of yield protection doesn’t need an excuse. Colleges are selling a service. Managing enrollment is no different than optimizing staffing and allocating resources. A college cannot function efficiently or effectively with more “overhead” than the demand warrants and it certainly can’t do it when there aren’t enough resources to go around. It is a delicate balance between bankruptcy and chaos and if you think it is something else, take a look at all of the schools with over enrollment issues this year and balance that out with all of the schools closing, eliminating academic programs, and merging.
OP please see the “success” story that @1NJParent described up thread. It would suggest that if your son is sincerely interested he may be able to leverage that interest into not just an acceptance but FA if worthy. This option may prove particularly valuable if you want to compare offerings and opportunities as @1NJParent’s example did.
You were very humble in mentioning the other exceptional kids that were accepted. It confirms the EA option isn’t a dead end or that “everyone” gets deferred as some suggest but idiosyncratic and unpredictable as are all holistic college admissions decisions.
Good luck as the other decisions roll in and please let us know if you opt to engage CWRU with continued interest.
I have appreciated all of the perspectives offered on this thread- very much a learning curve for me! My son did send a LOCI with a few updates though was concerned that he doesn’t have much to add given his initial application went in just a couple of months ago. He should hear from other matches, all recommended through this forum (i.e., Lehigh, RIT, Northeastern), and we’ll see where things fall. He’s been accepted to Pitt (also suggested here!) though no merit, presumably due to CS major. Again, we’re fortunate to have solid in-state (VA) options that he should be competitive for. Edited to add- his preference is not to be in VA, particularly since one of the schools is a couple of miles away.
I suspect that down the road a statement to an AO that an offer would be accepted might be well received given some of the comments. Of course only worth doing if that is your kids desire.
Once again good luck sounds like some great options.
None of them was taken off the waitlist, other than the student who called to find out if she could be and what CWRU would offer her in FA/merit award. This isn’t applicable to the OP, but I’d advise the students in that category not to apply EA to these few colleges, because if they did but were unwilling to switch to ED2 for whatever reason, all their other efforts to demonstrate interest became fruitless. They’d be viewed by the colleges as unlikely to matriculate. They’d be better off skipping the early rounds (EA/ED/ED2) and applying RD instead.
Did any of them (other then the one who was successful) directly express continued interest in attending CWRU as their first choice which is customary for those seeking admission off a wait list?
This is relevant to OP as a potential course of action. True measure of demonstrated interest is a commitment to attend.
Why? Applying EA resulted in an early acceptance for @mdboymom and in the example you provided the student was offered acceptance and generous FA once she expressed continued interest.
TLDR Why did colleges start offering ED and EA? Simple answer is to manage yield. Early options provide many benefits to colleges and few meaningful benefits to applicants. A system with one deadline treats all applicants equally and should lead to more consistent decisions between applicants with similar profiles.
Why are students with very good statistics and strong applications deferred in early rounds? It could be to protect yield for rankings. My guess is that is more likely to protect financial resources. High ranking students who will have many options are unlikely to attend without a merit and they would like their merit budget to go as far as possible.
Why do they need to manage yield?
Class of a size they can handle logistically.
Class they can handle financially.
Distribution of students across colleges and majors.
Fill slots on sports teams, band, orchestra, theatre productions, etc.
Diverse student body - laudable in that students go to college to broaden their horizons and, less laudably, diversity is a selling point
Ratings - yield is a factor in ratings and indicates popularity as a singular statistic
Bonus - ability to assess applications over a longer span of time
Benefits to students
Bump in chance of admissions for ED
Earlier decision
Disadvantages
Can’t weigh financial packages
Less time to research colleges
Young people are growing and changing so an early commitment might not be the best choice a year later
Provides opportunities to try to game the system leading to an additional complication in decision making
A simpler solution, if this is truly about finances for the college, would be an “accept by” date on EA. Basically, merit will be offered, but the offer is gone as of X date. At that time the resources are freed up to be used in RD. It has the added benefit of getting concrete enrollment numbers (yield) from EA which is a far larger pool than ED. If many schools did this, EA would essentially become RD1, followed by RD2.
I have to think so many smart people at schools have already thought of this option and dismissed it, because the denial and deferment of very high qualified candidates IS much more about yield stats than finances.
There has not been a ton of conversation about yield management during RD- but I suspect the names we are tossing around employee is aggressively there as well.
Schools haven’t done it because kids who need to compare financial aid packages would NOT have anything to compare this offer to! Again, cementing in the “privilege” advantage. Kids who can afford to accept a modest merit award (gives the parents bragging rights) can participate in this. Kids for whom a 5 or 10K merit award doesn’t even get CLOSE to what they need are shut out.
Focus on EA. If a school offers someone admission EA 12/15, with merit, and says we need an answer back by 2/15, or the offer is rescinded. If several schools did this, both parties win:
kid can compare multiple EA offers
school can offer merit to kids they think are not a lock to attend, because come 2/15, the merit frees up if they do not accept. added benefit, they probably have more committed EA candidates by 2/15, which eases the enrollment burden in RD
Even if many schools didn’t do this, the kid is still better of if a school applied to did.
I think some school won’t do this because they truly do want to say NO to someone they are not sure is coming- for prestige / stats.
…and if the “yield management” of EA candidates is truly about having a better visual on enrollment and uses of merit resources, the solution should eliminate those concerns.
The result should be a benefit to the applicants: more acceptances where they previously might have been yielded out due to being overqualified. It comes at a price: you no longer have until May to accept this offer- but that has to be better than a bewildering deferral or denial to someone who otherwise seems very qualified.
But this only assumes there are multiple EA schools that the applicant has applied to and gotten acceptances. The main benefit of EA from an applicant’s point of view is that an acceptance creates certainty at an earlier stage in the process allowing the applicant to adjust their RD list and reducing the stress of having somewhere where they know they are “in”. Being able to compare against RD decisions is a big benefit.
Schools as good business practice are trying to predict final enrollment within a certain margin of error for resources and financial purposes and yield management is part of that. Too few (full or close to full pay) students represent almost 100% lost marginal profits given the high fixed costs of running a college, too many (especially partial pay) students is a strain on resources and in most cases limited resources for FA plus potentially very high incremental costs to accommodate the extra bodies.
school gets more enrollment certainty early in the year, as well as a second shot to reallocate unused merit. This should be to the schools benefit financially for another reason- they might choose to offer less merit per kid in EA, knowing they will still have RD to fill out the class.
student gets a real shot at being admitted, without an obligation. True they would not then be able to compare it to RD options- but for something gained, something must be given. If EA options once compared do not work out, kid proceeds to RD.