<p>Today's Baltimore Sun ran a reprint of this article that originally appeared in U.S. News and World Report. It is short and sweet and should be helpful for those parents of juniors and younger students who are not yet in the thick of the college search process.</p>
<p>6</a> Kinds of Students Shouldn't Apply to College Early - US News and World Report</p>
<p>There are many different kinds of students who apply early decision. In my opinion, ED is the route to take only if a student has a college s/he really truly wants and the family can afford it. Yes, there can be changes in mind, buyers remorse and all of that even so, but in that situation the ED option is optimized.</p>
<p>I have had this discussion with friends a couple of times. It is important for parents and students to understand. I think the article may have understated the financial aid aspect. My son was applied ED to a competitive program this year (his clear first choice). The school website lists scholarships by test score and class rank, so I knew he qualified for one, and from previous experience I knew we wouldn’t qualify for more aid than the scholarship amount. It was the perfect situation for us, but certainly not for most.</p>
<p>If there is any doubt about being able to afford the school, then ED is not a wise decision. Time & time again we do see some regrets on CC. For wealthy families who do not need financial aid & the student is very sure then fine! Otherwise, no, cast a wide net & be able to compare financial aid packages.</p>
<p>I doesn’t have to be a wealthy family that doesn’t need financial aid. It can also be a family that needs aid and understands the basis on which aid is awarded by the college in question, and can live with that. That can be either formula merit aid or need-based aid and the family is highly confident that it can predict the college’s aid package. That depends both on the college, and on the family. Having significant assets like a family business or farm, even if it is completely unprofitable, will usually mean that you cannot predict what your financial aid will be.</p>
<p>Since inadequate financial aid IS an acceptable reason to break an ED agreement, I could even argue that a student who needs significant aid and can’t be certain of how much he will get could decide to apply to that college ED and see what happens. He should understand, though, that if he is accepted and has to turn down the acceptance because of inadequate aid, he won’t be able to see what happens in the spring before he has to walk away from his first choice school, and he won’t have any competing offer to compare the ED school’s offer against (or to use in negotiating with the ED school). So, arguably, he could be worse off than if he had applied RD. That’s a risky strategy – not crazy, just risky.</p>
<p>ED should be an informed decision. On CC, we know plenty of kids and families just aren’t informed. If there is any doubt about being able to afford the school… That’s the problem. So many parents have NO doubts their kids will get the aid they need- and are blindsided, later. </p>
<p>My D1 applied RD and got nearly identical packages from all. (We did a lot of homework about various colleges’ aid realities.) Nothing had changed in our financial picture, when D2 made her choices. So, we were comfortable letting her apply ED to one of those. We made sure she understood that she had to get the right aid or that school would be impossible. You might say, we crossed that bridge * before* we came to it. She did get a good package that we can afford, with the usual scrimping, etc.</p>
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<p>Kim Clark usually gives good advice, but this time she is wrong … or at least misleading. Regular Decision does allow families to compare aid offers and to sometimes use the best one as leverage to raise others. And some colleges do tend to give bigger merit awards to applicants who are not sure things. BUT … need-conscious colleges may accept borderline applicants in the ED round who would not get admitted in the RD round.</p>
<p>So my advice is this:</p>
<p>If you have financial need and your child has a clear-cut favorite college that meets full demonstrated need (or at least comes close) but is not need-blind, then an ED application might make the difference between an affirmative decision and a denial.</p>
<p>For seniors with a number of front-runner colleges but no real favorite, then Kim Clark’s advice is sounder. But I’ve seen ED applicants with financial need get turned away from top choice colleges in the Regular round although they would have had a good chance of acceptance in the Early round.</p>
<p>SLUMOM said it better than I could.</p>
<p>Earlier this application season I contemplated started a thread titled, “ED - Just Say No”. </p>
<p>Although my son never cotemplated ED, I read a lot about it on CC. And I’ve heard horror stories at our high school. Yes, there are some circumstances that do make ED the right choice… but to me it seems that GC don’t steer enough students away from ED when not right for them.</p>
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<p>This makes no sense at all. </p>
<p>If a college is need-aware, it is going to favor those students who have less need in both the ED and RD round. The chances ED for a borderline student probably do go up for full-payers, because those are the students that the college would love to lock in … but there is no benefit whatsoever to a college to tie up a space in its class with a borderline student who needs financial aid. The last thing a need-aware college is going to do is accept a student in that position. </p>
<p>I mean, the colleges aren’t crazy. They are not ever going to make admissions decisions that go against their own interests. </p>
<p>My guess is that the statement in the referenced article that “research shows” that students “who get into several colleges get more aid than those who get into only one” is based on actual “research”. (Otherwise they would have written “many people believe” instead of “research shows”.) That is, statistics probably bear that statement out-- overall those students who preserve their competitive advantage in the college application season by applying to many colleges and weighing offers from different school probably do end with better financial options.</p>
<p>Calmom, I think you are dead wrong on the effect of being “need aware”. A number of colleges with a very strong commitment to educating students with need are forced to be need aware by the state of their endowments. They may accept (marginally) fewer students with need than they would like, but they accept them with a full commitment to fund them. And if you are among those accepted, that is what matters to you. </p>
<p>I don’t know for sure, but what Sally says makes sense to me. However, it’s really important not to fantasize about how colleges will calculate your need. If there’s a house with built-in equity, or a small business, or a partnership in something, or a farm in the picture, then you need to do real research before you decide you are comfortable with your aid prospects. EFC based on FAFSA calculators will mean just about nothing.</p>
<p>Re research and multiple acceptances. I would bet anything that research would show that applicants who pursue a strategy to maximize their financial aid will get more aid than those who don’t. And close to 100% of the former group will be in the multiple-acceptance pool, and the single-acceptance pool will consist almost entirely of the latter group. So it’s not very interesting to me that the multiple-acceptance pool gets more aid than the single-acceptance pool.</p>
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But wouldn’t they prefer to accept STRONG applicants who are needy rather than weak ones? </p>
<p>Why would any college select anything other than the best applicants among their ED pool, rather than the weakest? Of course they also use ED to bring in athletes or other hooked candidates – and if the college is need-aware, then it also makes sense to give and admissions break to full pay students… but why bring in weaker, needy students at that time? Isn’t it better to preserve their financial aid dollars for the most capable students?</p>
<p>If it was a student that they would be inclined to admit anyway, in RD round, then it would make sense, because it enables the college to get more mileage out of a conservative financial aid budget. That is, every strong financially needy student is more likely to accept a spot with less money at that point; in the RD round, yield is threatened if the need-aware college’s aid doesn’t compare favorably with peer college, so it end up having to modify its policies, throw extra money at RD admits to compete with other schools, and/or lose a significant number of top candidates to other schools.</p>
<p>But a borderline candidate? Why?</p>
<p>Here’s my question: when the need-aware college is admitting all those financially needy borderline students ED…who do you think they are turning away?</p>
<p>my oldest attended a need aware school that met 100% of need.
Her stats & scores were lower than * median* of accepted students.
Still she had other things to offer that they found valuable ( good writer- first-gen, cute as a button- socially skilled compared to the average bear)</p>
<p>My kid applied ED to his first-choice school. He had (and continues to have) high financial need, but the school meets 100% of need w/o loans, and they made it easy to predict how much need-based aid we would receive. He’s a junior there now. I’m very glad he made that ED decision. His stats were in line with other accepted students, but not in any way above them, and the school’s admit rate is super-low. If ED was a help, great. If it wasn’t, at least he’s still at his 1st choice school, it’s affordable for us, and we were spared all that mishegoss of 10 other applications. :eek:</p>
<p>I have the same story as 'rentof2. ED worked for us and there are no regrets. It’s really about the schools and their aid policies. I would not have signed off on my kid applying ED at NYU but the handful of meets full need without loans or loan-capped schools can be a great deal.</p>
<p>My daughter applied and was accepted ED, and now, as a college senior, has no regrets.</p>
<p>But she was not a candidate for need-based aid.</p>
<p>Of course, a college, need-aware or not, will pick a stronger candidate over a weaker one, especially ED where there is no real issue about yield. But many colleges, especially those not in the tippy-top tier, attract relatively few ED applications, and (as emeraldkity’s experience shows) whether a candidate is seen as strong may depend on things other than grades and test scores. It’s not at all hard to believe that there are situations where a particular candidate is in the top group of the ED pool but not clearly a shoo-in if considered as part of the RD pool.</p>
<p>I should also add since this is a thread about applying ED ( I’m sorry, but it reminds me of that lil blue pill), my D did NOT apply ED.
While the school swore that if you applied ED you would receive same aid as RD, she decided she still wanted to compare packages.</p>
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LOL!
If I check the CDS can I find out what percentage of students were cute as a button and what percent fell below the “button” cut-off?</p>
<p>I think ED is the “secret weapon” for full-pay parents, and I’m not ashamed to admit that we used it, in our case with great success. Is it fair? No, but life isn’t fair.</p>
<p>When ED works out, it is wonderful. I so envy my friend, whose two kids filled out exactly two applications between the two of them and were done with this whole process, accepted to their dream schools before Christmas. I wish I have taken that route. </p>
<p>And I have known families whose kids applied ED wanting, needing financial aid and getting a package that was manageable and fair, in their opinions. It’s all beautiful and perfect when it works out, but so is anything. The problem with things is the fall out when it does not work out.</p>
<p>It is possible that financial aid does not come out to the numbers you had anticipated in ED. Then you are faced with the decision of backing out, only after discussing,negotiating, submitting more information, debating, planning, worrying. Not a a good thing in an already stress filled situation. You also can have the issue of the student showing up on the ED accept lists. I do know for a fact that this happens as I saw it happen once. You then have to involve your counselor and let the other schools know you are being released from your ED acceptance. Not really a piece of good news many times. Adcoms hate kids who do that since it does put a kink in a process. Mind you, you are doing this without knowing if the offer you got is going to be typical. I’ve known a number of cases when parents have been surprised at money awards other kids get in May from schools that their own kids were considering that indicate that maybe their package from the first choice school was not so great. You just never know because you can’t compare.</p>
<p>I’ve also known kids who have used the ED as a strategy to get into the “best” school they can by picking a school that is in range but not a sure shot. I know of DS’s classmate who was accepted to Tufts that way. But she was really a bit upset when peers were accepted to UPenn and GT with stats that were not quite up to hers. She had "settled " as a strategy. To be so afraid of failure and rejection to have to do this at age 18 seems ludicrous to me. It’s really not that important. So afraid that she would not get into any of them that she picked one with the greatest likelihood of acceptance with the ED boost. Maybe at my age, doing something like that is understandable but really, at age 18, hedging ones bets?</p>