I didn’t know that GT will defer to RD if not accepted EA. That is very helpful. All of your feedback is extremely helpful. So maybe we won’t be so eager to find an ED since you are right, he doesn’t have an absolute first place school. He wants to learn lots, have inspiring conversations with peers and faculty, have opportunities for direct exposure to DC activity (be it WH, state dept., foreign affairs).
He did talk with a dream-like quality (when we were visiting the 3 DC schools last Fall) that he thinks attending events at the DC Kennedy Center would be a huge plus, as well as “being able to sit by the Lincoln Center with a book at night” or elsewhere on the National Mall would be something he could see himself doing. Jogging around the capitol was another scene he described as a perk.
Note: He will be spending a week living on GW’s Mt. Vernon campus in July and I think that will also help him better gauge what he wants, etc.