<p>"Despite Harvard's decision to stop early admissions, more students are applying for college earlier and earlier. And that has educators more and more concerned."</p>
<p>"Affluent, savvy students know that applying early means they may increase their chances of getting in. To these kids, it typically doesn't matter if committing early to one college means they can't compare financial aid packages from other schools. </p>
<p>The implications are sufficiently alarming that NACAC will vote at its national conference in early October to ban extreme early admissions at its over 2,000 member colleges."</p>
<p>Is it our job to even the higher-ed playing field? If schools want to foster a diverse student body, then yes it is. Is anyone systematically disadvantaged by dissolving early admissions? If no one, then the action serves a useful purpose. If new problems crop up, then it's time to find a new strategy.</p>
<p>The prom-date analogy doesn't work particularly well, in this situation. If a person can't secure a date early on, s/he still gets to attend the same prom as everyone else in the school. This is not true of college applicants.</p>
<p>this wont work as long as society is obessed with material wealth. for centuries, the disadvantaged have always been left out of the ring at schools like harvard, princeton, yale, and other big elites. more and more students apply early and people say why is this? no, its not that these kids want to enjoy senior year, but the fact that they have a sense of security for their future.</p>
<p>I think people get upset with success. If some kids want to work hard, apply early and make sure their future is secure, I think the society should welcome it. Those kids, though rich, are far better than those that stand around smoking, not studying, being tardy to their classes, taking easy classes etc. I see plenty of the latter kind when I walk to my school each morning.</p>
<p>^ Collegebound, you are perhaps forgetting that there do exist students who are poor but work hard?</p>
<p>The way I see it, this is like Arrow's theorem. There is no absolutely fair way of doing this, and whatever happens, it will not be possible to put everyone into the school that is right for him/her. It does seem, though, that whoever can complain the loudest gets to have his way...</p>
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Those kids, though rich, are far better than those that stand around smoking, not studying, being tardy to their classes, taking easy classes etc.
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<p>And those kids probably aren't going to get into Harvard, either, no matter what time of the senior year they try to apply. Besides, plenty of the wealthier students in my high school behaved the same way--the behavior is hardly limited to one socio-economic group.</p>
<p>Harvard is trying to treat hardworking students from all income brackets equally. That's the point of their decision to end early admissions. I read somewhere, today, that Princeton populated roughly half of its first-year class, this year (?), with early-admission applicants. Half. That makes it significantly more difficult for regular-admission students to earn acceptance letters. If Harvard is correct and the majority of applying students from lower-income households wait for the regular admission deadline, then this does put those students at an unfair disadvantage.</p>
<p>What are people's thoughts, though, when the early admission process is non-binding? Does it make as much of a difference? Are there still deadlines that would make it impossible to wait for regular decisions to arrive in the mail?</p>
<p>For more comments, look at the responses at the end of the Time article. Also, consider this one from poster Citation X on the Harvard forum about its EA thread:</p>
<p>"This dance of the college Presidents is really about 2 factors:</p>
<p>"1. how to admit (comparatively) less qualified but underrepresented minorities by fitting them under the "disadvantaged low income" category w/o finding themselves in court for blantant use of race as an admissions criteria</p>
<p>"2. how to limit overrepresented/highly qualified minorities like Asians w/o appearing to put ceilings on their admission</p>
<p>"The elite universities who worship at the altar of "diversity" are addicted to selective color-coding and really have no idea how to move to an actual race blind admissions policy."</p>
<p>I think offering very early admissions can be great for some students - if they know where they want to go, and finances are a known factor, then it eliminates stress for the whole admission season. (So do rolling admissions, of course.)</p>
<p>One thing to keep in mind is that the majority of students aren't playing the ultra-selective game. They may be looking at a single college they really like, or perhaps two or three, and where getting accepted isn't really in doubt.</p>
<p>The status quo, in my opinion, is fine the way it is. Assuming admissions is need blind, poor students need not worry because if they apply regular, the amount of aid is the same (or at least we would like to think). Maybe we just have to view the benefit of receiving an early decision as a price to pay; a benefit that comes at a "cost" (colleges are behemoth corporations, are they not?): not being able to compare aid packages.</p>
<p>I don't necessarily think that EA is bad, but I do have issues with ED. I didn't want to be bound to a college without getting a chance to apply to any others. I was admitted early to Stanford, but I still applied to 5 or 6 other schools RD. So... why did I bother applying early to Stanford? Because it was my first choice (but not necessarily dream) school, and I just wanted to know sooner if I could get into my first choice. I didn't work less hard after I was admitted, though I know there are indeed students who ease down to C's after admission.</p>
<p>I don't understand the point of forcing a student to go to your school if you admitted them. I feel that the most important thing is for the student to go where they will be happiest, so even if they were admitted early to their first choice, dream school, they should should be given the chance to reevaluate their decision and look at other options, as college choice isn't something that should be taken lightly.</p>
<p>Maybe we just have to view the benefit of receiving an early decision as a price to pay; a benefit that comes at a "cost" (colleges are behemoth corporations, are they not?): not being able to back out at the last second.</p>
<p>The point of being forced to attend your ED school, in the college's view at least, would be to raise yield rates. Any ED student should be aware of the ramifications of applying as such, it's not like they don't have a choice; he/she doesn't HAVE to apply ED. To me, ED is both a quid pro quo and legally binding contract type of deal.</p>
<p>I think 'experts' have forgotten the whole point of early decision (not action) to begin with.</p>
<p>It's a gross oversimplification to say applying early decision increases your chances of getting in. No. Just no. If anything, it makes it harder because you're competing alongside stronger students. The thing about ED is it sends a message to the adcoms. This is where I want to go; if you admit me, I'm coming.</p>
<p>They (the experts) are using a myth as an excuse to end early admissions in general!</p>
<p>Like other posters have said, the excuse of inequity sends a wrong message. It's basically saying, "Oh, you did research into our school and found out about our early decision program. WHAT IS THE MATTER WITH YOU?!?!?! DON'T YOU KNOW THAT YOU'RE BEING UNFAIR TO PEOPLE FROM POORER BACKGROUNDS?! DON'T DO RESEARCH!"</p>
<p>They don't explicitly say that your chances are better, but in the general case, admittance percentages are better for the ed pool than the rd pool.</p>
<p>The title of the article implies that the issue is the minority of colleges (1 in 4) which admit students before September of their senior year. What colleges are we talking about? Just curious. Is this really an issue which impacts disadvantaged students?</p>