<p>The University of Delaware will discontinue its early-decision admissions program this fall. In a message sent on Friday to an admissions e-mail list, Louis L. Hirsh, Delawares director of admissions, said his staff had concluded that early decision had significant drawbacks for applicants that outweighed its benefits.
Families with financial need and students with outstanding academic records are at a disadvantage since early-decision programs force them to make a decision without being able to compare other colleges financial-aid and scholarship awards, Mr. Hirsh wrote. We found it equally troubling that, even though we assured them otherwise, many students still felt pressured into applying early decision because they believed that it would enhance their chances of gaining admission.</p>
<p>Relatively few colleges have dropped early-decision programs once they have established them. One of the few was the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, which ended the practice in 2002 (The Chronicle, May 3, 2002).</p>
<p>Call me cynical, but I wonder if the real reason that the program was dropped was that U Del found that the top students it thought it was getting through Early Decision found ways of breaking their contracts after they got into better schools.</p>
<p>Seems to me that if the program were discontinued for the reasons that U Del stated, the program would have been discontinued a longer time ago as the concerns the director of admissions listed have been widely publicized by a variety of published articles about flaws in the ED system.</p>
<p>That is a little cynical. If that were the case then I would think lots of schools would have the same problem with kids breaking contracts (and they probably do).</p>
<p>U Del is actually a great school that lots of kids see as their first choice. It is an affordable, smaller university attractive particulary to refugees from the SUNY system.</p>
<p>Personally, I think ED stinks, although I don't necessarily mean to engage that conversation on this thread.</p>
<p>I think IS cynical. Besides, you don't have any evidence that ED students admitted were not matriculating. That said, their IR shows only 596 students were admitted ED meaning that they probably would lose 12-15 students like most schools do in the ED round. </p>
<p>This would not be enough to prompt such a drastic policy shift. Also the Director has only been the head honcho for 2 years so saying the change would have happened a long time ago is irrelevant.</p>
<p>I am going to echo what weenie said- For a lot of kids (especially in NY). U of Delaware and U of Md- CP are their dream schools. I can't tell you how many kids I know who were anxiously waiting for their acceptance letters from U of Delaware because that was the school they wanted to go to. My neice who was rejected from Delaware last year, had to "settle" for UConn- but luckily she made a fine adjustment and is quite happy. We may have been on these boards way to long when we can't recognize that for a lot of kids, their dream schools may be Delaware-UConn or even Suny Binghamton!!</p>
<p>Marny1, One more thing to add- for a lot of NJ kids UDel is their dream school too. S said that it seemed as though half of his high school's graduating class applied to UDel.</p>
<p>U of Delaware does extensive recruiting in New Jersey. Has for the last 20+ years. Since many in state students seem reluctant to attend Rutgers or other NJ state schools, U of D (just 10 miles from the NJ Border) seems to be a welcome alternative. It does have a nice campus and is a decent state university, but IMO it's popularity with NJ students says more about their opinon of Rutgers and other NJ state colleges than it does about U of D. </p>
<p>Penn State and U of Maryland (CP) are other state schools that reap the benefits of this attitude of NJ Students.</p>
<p>I know alot of metro NY people who just hate the drive to Penn State (route 80??)..May not be the best reason not to go to a particular school, but that seems to be a factor as to why U Delaware and Maryland are more popular in my school district. These schools used to be considered "safety" for A- student with 1300 SAT's. Those days are gone for LI kids. Those 2 schools are now attracting top students whose parents do not want to pay $40,000/year for college.<br>
Jetblue will start flying from NY to Pittsburg soon. I am going to predict that U Pittsburg and CMU will get more applicants from the NY area real soon. U Pitt may attract the same type of student that is looking at Del and Md.</p>
<p>And, truthfully, UD was one of the few universities where ED didn't seem to add a lot to the chance of admission. I think the ED acceptance rate was lower than the RD acceptance rate. I'm not sure UD really saw how ED was helping them in any way.</p>