<p>My son is planning to apply to Vanderbilt but its probably the longest reach on his list of schools. He's also read that applying ED is the best way to improve your chances of admittance at a reach school. Using Vanderbilt's NPC the school would be within financial reach if the numbers are accurate. </p>
<p>Do schools squeeze you with financial aid if you apply early decision? If he is accepted and the financial aid package is not to our liking, is there a window where we can back out? I assume we'd need to provide some financial supplement as a best guess so they can provide a FA assessment.</p>
<p>If your student is applying ED I to Vandy, the early priority deadline for the 2014-2015 Profile submission is November 5. This means you MUST submit the Profile using your best possible estimates for the 2013 tax year by that date at the latest…if you want to receive a financial aid award with an ED I acceptance.</p>
<p>As an FYI, this info is readily available by using the search function on the college website “early decision financial aid deadline”. You should check for all of the additional required submissions and the deadlines for those.</p>
<p>NPC’s are only as accurate as your family finances are simple. Add in self-employment, a family business, unusual assets . . . and the NPC results can end up being no more reliable than buying a lottery ticket!</p>
<p>So, evaluate your finances very thoughtfully. If there’s anything that might throw a wrench in the works, ED may not be a good option for your son.</p>
<p>The Common App ED application process says that, if you are accepted, you do not have to withdraw other applications until you get the FA award. That implies there is a period of time where you can decide whether you can afford Vanderbilt or not.</p>
<p>Have your Son start the Common App, add Vanderbilt, select ED admissions, and then go to the Recommender section. After he invites recommenders, he can invite you (parent) to complete the ED Agreement. You can then read what your rights and obligations.</p>
<p>ok thanks everyone. This gives us something to go on as we think through our college app strategy. I wasn’t sure about the finer details of ED and my bias has been to avoid it entirely to give us to flexibility of comparing all offers as they come in. I had originally thought ED meant, if you’re accepted, you’re going but it does sound a bit more flexible than that.</p>
<p>Well…if you want to be able to compare bottom line costs amongst more than ONE college, than ED is NOT the way to go. </p>
<p>Simply put…you will get that ED offer, and will have a very short window of time to make up,your mind. The thing is…it could be the BEST offer…or the WORST. Suppose you determine that the ED offer is not suitable and decline it…only to discover in the RD round that it was really the best offer your kiddo got? Too late…it is gone.</p>
<p>yes, you are probably right and instinct tells me the ED bump would help full pay students but probably not so much for those needing significant FA.</p>
<p>There is ED, EA single choice, and EA. See how many schools on S’s list are EA. It may be better to apply EA to multiple schools than ED or EA single choice to one.</p>
<p>Actually, many of the schools accepting ED applications are need blind for admissions…so admissions does NOT know your financial need when making their admissions decision.</p>
<p>That being said…if your kiddo is a competitive applicant for a school ED, then they would be competitive RD. yes, it appears that the acceptance rates ED are somewhat higher, but remember, these include recruited athletes, legacies at some schools, and developmental admits. The “bump” for most students is not really appreciable.</p>
<p>thumper, you often say, “if your kiddo is a competitive applicant for a school ED, then they would be competitive RD.” I know an alum familiar with the current application process for a highly-selective school who said that DS’s HS has been pretty much black-listed for RD candidates because they are tired of the <em>REALLY</em> high-end students using the school as a safety and none end up attending. In this case, ED is more than a “bump”. Now I think if DS shows interest in this school and have this person pass on that DS is very interested, he can get past this filter, but ED is definitely being used for more than you think.</p>
<p>To clarify, I am not saying to necessarily ED, but I am saying you really need to make sure you show interest and desire to enroll should you be admitted and the aid is sufficient. Don’t just assume RD is the same as ED.</p>
<p>“Do schools squeeze you with financial aid if you apply early decision?”</p>
<p>A school that makes an ED offer to an applicant needing financial aid really, really wants the student to attend, so much so that the school is willing to take a substantial economic “loss” on the student. And with the Net Price Calculators now online, a change from ED time to RD time (for the same inputs) would be exposed, probably here by CC members.</p>
<p>^ I don’t know if I’d agree with the economic loss language but agree with the general thought. I doubt a school will nail you if you applied ED vs. RD. Word of Playing around with FA offers like that would get out.</p>
<p>One reason to do RD instead of ED is so that you can negotiate for better FA using an offer from another school as leverage. However, you say that Vanderbilt is the biggest reach on your son’s list. That makes me think that if your S was accepted RD but without enough aid, and you asked Vandy to meet College X’s offer, Vandy wouldn’t see College X as a “peer” institution and wouldn’t feel compelled to match the offer. </p>
<p>Just make sure that your son understands that he would have to be admitted AND he’d need to receive enough aid to make the school affordable. And make sure he has his other applications ready to go if he doesn’t receive good ED and FA news!!!</p>
<p>"I doubt a school will nail you if you applied ED vs. RD. Word of Playing around with FA offers like that would get out. "</p>
<p>Bottom line, no one knows for sure what do the schools do. Do they play around with numbers ED vs RD? Why do people can negotiate an offer in the first place? That suggests there are wiggle rooms, some maybe small but some might be substantial. Otherwise, the whole process should be a lot more transparent and straight forward. And the reason it is very unlikely to get out is because you need a large group of people from EDs and RDs to sit down and compare their financial situations and aids received. That simply would never happen.</p>
<p>Both RD and ED applicants use the same NPC. If people who applied ED are consistently saying that the NPC underestimated their aid, while the RD folks say that the NPC was accurate, that would show that the school wasn’t being even-handed.</p>
<p>That is a good point, but do we even have data about the accuracy of NPC? If it happens that ED consistently get lower by a few percentage, how would one even know? Not even RD vs ED, how about one candidate vs another? Do some get worse and some get better? Show me the calculations and make it transparent and I will have no doubt on the sincerity of the whole process.</p>
<p>I think it’s impossible to have total transparency. Or even total accuracy! There are too many variables. It’s well known, for example, that NPCs often don’t account for situations like divorce or a family-owned business. The NPC is also only as good as the data going in. If someone puts in hasty rough estimates versus exact values, that’s going to influence the outcome. </p>
<p>If the goal is to be able to minimize the amount a family is paying out of pocket, there’s no substitute for waiting for the actual offers in RD. If OTOH the goal is to see if the school will be affordable, having a reasonably accurate NPC is all that’s needed.</p>