@classof2017,
A truly affordable safety is always a good thing, but here’s the kind of scenario I’m talking about…
The student applies ED to Dartmouth. Her family has set a budget of $20,000/year. The cost of her safety, UMass, will be $19,000. She’s hoping for merit money at her other schools, Vanderbilt and Emory, and she also applied to Harvard, known for great financial aid.
The offer at Dartmouth comes in with an EFC of $21,000. Should the student find the extra $1,000 or stick to the budget? How would that answer change if she could compare offers? What if she didn’t get into Harvard, Vanderbilt or Emory? Would it be worth saving $8,000 to attend UMass instead of Dartmouth?
What if, on the other hand, she was destined to get into Harvard with an EFC of $19,000 or one of the other two with merit awards that brought the EFC down to $10,000? Unfortunately the only way to find this out would be to roll the dice and turn down an offer from her first choice school.
Kids who need a lot of FA are of course free to apply ED, it’s just much more complicated, and more fraught, than it is for kids who don’t need it.