<p>I'm wondering what your thoughts are on this. My daughter will hear from her ED1 school in 8 days. She has a handful of other schools she wants to apply to if she does not get in but my question is; Will the admissions at these other schools somehow penalize her or look unfavorably on her application if it comes in right after many other schools reveal their ED1 decisions? Would it be obvious that she's only applying at that time because she did not get into her first choice? I know they probably don't really have a way to know that for sure but I wondered if there's any inherent bias towards apps that come in right at those ED1 notification dates.</p>
<p>My kid applied ED two years ago. She had all of her RD apps ready to go out if she didn’t get admitted. She saved us over a $1000 in application fees. Unless schools are rolling admission, I don’t see the need of sending apps early. My kid’s high school wouldn’t even send any supporting docs until ED result is out.</p>
<p>Her RD schools will never know she applied early somewhere else unless she tells them. ED and EA notifications come on many different days in December. Many students submit RD apps in mid or late December and doing so will not indicate to a school that it is not the applicant’s first choice. Don’t worry about the timing of her RD apps from that perspective at all. She should apply when it makes financial sense to pay those fees.</p>
<p>If the RD is not rolling, it would not make much difference as long as you submit the application by the deadline. If it is rolling, then submitting earlier would be beneficial.</p>
<p>If your D needs/wants merit from safety schools, then those apps should go in now since some have Dec deadlnes for merit consideration.</p>
<p>This is a problem every year for ED kids who find out that they can’t afford their ED schools. They look over their ED pkgs at the end of Dec and find out their parents can’t pay the cost (or they didn’t get into their ED school). At that point, they’ve missed many of deadlines for big merit at safety schools.</p>
<p>Do any of those other schools have rolling admissions, or do any of them have merit scholarships whose deadlines are before the ED notification or which are awarded on a first come first served basis? If so, those schools should be applied to without delay.</p>
<p>We are in the same boat and here is what my D has done. She submitted apps to 3 other schools that she felt were at the top of her list, and 1 safety for which there is merit aid potential and for which there was no app fee. The merit deadline was Dec 1 so hence… She could have indeed waited on the other 3, but she felt that she wanted them to know she really wanted to go there, and she felt if she waited until mid-Dec, then it might be more apparent that she was waiting to hear from an ED… right or wrong, the cost wasn’t massive. She has 2 other apps ready to go upon hearing of her ED, and then well… she is a bit behind… her list has another 4-6 schools that she wants to apply.</p>
<p>If your child has any schools on her list for which there is merit aid, AND your child’s grades/test scores are way over their mean, then I would highly encourage you to send those apps in roughly two weeks before the deadline, regardless of the ED decision. I heard from a friend who used to be a college adm rep who commented that when it came time to awarding merit aid, she definitely took a shorter look at the student who sent the app in the day of the deadline…</p>
<p>Our daughter did ED but applied to our state schools because of an earlier due-date, one LAC because of merit scholarship deadline and EA to a favorite safety. There are still a few left but she’s waiting until after the ED decision comes in.</p>
<p>Even if colleges realized that they weren’t your D’s first choice, it wouldn’t make any difference. After all, she’s applying elsewhere, so she didn’t get in to her first choice, or it wasn’t affordable. That’s different than these other colleges figuring out that another RD school is her top choice. And even then, who’s to say that your D would stick with her first choice? High school seniors can change their minds up till the last minute.</p>
<p>Besides, they’re high schoolers! And they’re human! Waiting until the last minute to submit is typical. </p>
<p>D1 submitted her ED app, her UC app, and one app for an OOS public to meet a merit deadline. Every other RD app was on hold pending what happened ED. She was admitted, so there was no need to pay other app fees. D2 submitted her ED app, her UC app, and 3 EA apps. One remaining RD app is on hold and will only be submitted if she’s denied ED.</p>
<p>if a college does not have rolling admissions, and there is no early deadline for merit money, then might as well hold off until ED decision is in. Save the app fees.</p>
<p>But be ready for bad news from ED schools (deferral or worse), so have all RD supplemental essays completed and ready to go NOW. (Otherwise, your child would have to scramble on the supplemental essays while still feeling the sting of the less-than-favorable ED decision.)</p>
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<p>If the college does not publicly state that the early bird can get the worm, such a practice would be unprofessional and unethical, IMO.</p>
<p>Thank you all so much for your input! ED2 at another school is one reason I am advising her to hold off and of course saving those app / sending test scores / css profile fees. She has already submitted her UCs and one private school whose merit aid deadline was Dec. 1, but as far as we could tell none of her other schools had earlier deadlines for financial aid. It’s a bit scary because I noticed the one school she applied to because of their Dec. 1 aid deadline did not have that deadline displayed on every applicable page of their website so we had to make sure to check the admissions page, the financial aid page, freshman application checklists, and anything else we could think of just to be safe. There’s no point in applying if she won’t be considered for aid.</p>
<p>“There’s no point in applying if she won’t be considered for aid.”</p>
<p>Then she needs to be very clear about what the numbers have to be in the predicted aid package if she is admitted at the ED college/university. If the money isn’t good enough, she needs to be prepared to walk away from that acceptance and move on.</p>
<p>For my S, awaiting an ED decision this week: he applied to his ED school and one other RD school on his list that had a 12/1 deadline for merit aid. Other than that, he has done essays and completed all of the CA pieces, but is waiting to hit “send” until after he hears from ED. I agree - why waste the $ for app fees and test reports? But I do want him ready to go if the news isn’t good this week. Good luck to your D!</p>
Waiting until the last minute to submit is typical. </p>