I have often wondered why many schools in a common association/league all agree on a certain date to notify students and then agree on a certain date which is the deadline to respond?
I am also curious as to what the rationale is for giving a very short time period between these two dates, like a week.
As far as I can tell, many of the boarding schools are rather generous, giving a month between the two dates. However, I know of day schools giving just a week or less between the two dates, which seems to me to be far too short for students and their families to make a decision.
I’m sure there are many benefits for the schools to agree like this, which is why the must be doing it, but how does this help the students who may be seriously considering two or more schools where the admission decision is positive?
I’m looking forward to hearing answers to this question!
The members of the Ten Schools Admissions Organization is a collaborative that has agreed to and abides by M10 as their common decision date; many other schools just follow suit. Outside the formal agreement among these schools, other schools can do whatever they want. This year, it looks like the TSAO has agreed to M9 as M10 is a Sunday.
https://www.tenschools.org/
Schools can’t consider the calendars of all the other schools out there. Each just needs to decide on the dates that make the best sense for them. After all the effort that goes into applying to these schools and all the ranking and first-choicing and second-guessing and tea-leaf reading and hand-wringing that goes on here, I think most candidates are able to make their decisions pretty quickly after all notifications are in (often within minutes). If a student has an absolute first choice school whose decision does not come in until after the deadlines for other schools, you can contact that school to discuss. This happens all the time.
Thank you, @ChoatieMom. However, I am still puzzled as to why the schools want to do this and how/whether it helps or hurts the students.
Also, I am most interested in the gap between the date of conveying the acceptance decision and the deadline to commit. I think the TSAO is generally pretty healthy with a full one month gap, at least with those schools with which I’m familiar. I am concerned about situations where schools have agreed to a very short time period between those dates. What exactly is their (collective) rationale in doing do?
I am forever impressed with your wisdom (and that of many others on this forum), so all thoughts welcome! I honestly haven’t a clue about this (as with most things 
)
The decision period among the TSAO schools is a month, not a week, and they host revisit days during that period to help those on fence or choosing among multiple options.
As mentioned, my issue is not so much with the TSAO schools which give a generous month. Many day schools, however, give FAR less, to the point that it’s almost absurd (for example, less than a week).
In any event, I still am curious why the schools need to agree on these timings.
We were posting at the same time, @mynameiswhatever. You should contact any schools with shorter timeframes to get your answer from the horses’ mouths. I would guess that all schools feel they are giving adequate time for students to make decisions or they would come up with different schedules. I don’t think anyone is deliberately helped or hurt by any schedule. They are what they are and applicants know these dates when they apply. If any dates cause real, demonstrable problems, an applicant can always try to work the issue with the school(s).
As for why the TSAO schools collaborate, it’s most likely that they share a large percentage of the BS applicant pool, so it makes sense to manage them as a single herd and not use independent dates as a poaching tool.
I would guess that day schools know that if you are applying, you are in the area and that they are a known quantity and that you know your preference in advance of a decision. I agree that a week is short, and that students bear the brunt of a school’s enrollment management challenges.
Many kids applying to BS know the school solely from a morning spent touring and interviewing and given that they’ll be living there, additional consideration is needed. Revisit days often are the basis for decisions.
BS may compete with each other for students, but overall, they recognize that as a group, they serve a small segment of the population. They collaborate as a group on data collection, developing best practices, etc. and I suspect they realize they and their students are best served by the common deadlines, especially those who need to evaluate FA offers. Colleges tend to do something similar although the universe is bigger and decision dates a bit more variable (ivy day, for example), but there is a common deadline for response from applicants.
Given that a student can choose not to attend - for any reason - by forfeiting a deposit, I can imagine the mayhem it would create for the schools if commitment dates differed. I would also guess that at some level, they “work back”. If they announce earlier, they have to stop accepting applications earlier – they are creating a class, not just sccepting good students --which may also be hard for them because everyone still needs to visit and interview. As it is, most families have a 4 month window to visit while school is in session and there are a few down weeks in there too.
Also remember that admissions officers aren’t ad hoc readers, they are professionals (who often move from school to school and often colleges too), and the workings of their operations have been worked out over many years. So “mixing it up” may be seen as something that may break a system that is seemingly working well.