A Word On Early Action & Early Decision

The greatest fraud of the American college is the cost of attendance. The second greatest fraud is the manipulative practices of recruiting and admissions. The thousands of misinformed high school counselors— which we could argue are deliberately misinformed by colleges— do nothing to the alleviate the pressures high schools (and society) put on their seniors applying to college. In the center of all the college mythology, sits early action and early decision admissions.

So we don’t confuse the terminology, let me briefly explain what each term means and why they really exist.

Early Decision

Early Decision (ED) is an option some schools offer. For applicants who choose this route, they apply earlier than the regular application deadline with the caveat that if they are accepted, they must attend the school. Therefore, students are not supposed to apply to multiple schools using this option. Families and students across the nation commonly believe that ED carries some advantages to it— above all else, that the student has a higher likelihood of admission. Counselors, teachers, and college recruiters repeat this year after year to each new class of prospective applicants. Why do they do this? Because it is recruiting tactic.

In reality, ED is employed by some universities as a way of recruiting highly sought after students, most of whom are athletes (followed by music, art or theater students, or other “special case students”). Non-special case students make up 99 percent of college applicants, particularly those applying to the type of schools that usually offer ED: highly ranked, selective research universities. The reason ED would come to be makes sense, however. How can a school guarantee an athlete select them? Make their application, and subsequently their acceptance, binding. This allows athletic departments to recruit early, making sure the family and student apply early— it’s about the school fulfilling their athletic goals (and to a lesser extent, but as influential, finding specific students to specialized programs such as music, or PR-friendly individuals).

One must be careful when looking at the average acceptance rate of ED. The difference in regular v ED acceptance rates are commonly marketed to families and high schools as evidence of the advantage of ED. But because such a large percentage of these seats are taken by special case students, the admission rate is heavily skewed. When assessing the few seats that go to non-special case students, the admission rate plummets significantly. For a school like Brown University, their regular decision acceptance rate is about 6% but their ED acceptance rate is 12%. This is misleading. Once you assess the number of seats actually available to students, the acceptance rate will fall to about 1%.

Early Action

As for Early Action (EA), this option is not as shadowy a topic. EA was born out of a need. With the advent of the internet, applicants could apply to colleges with a click of a button. Most schools receive way too many applications and it is very difficult to get through thousands of applications in a matter of weeks. EA is simple: apply early and receive a decision early. For schools, promoting this option is in their best interest: applications come in sooner giving schools more time to organize their admissions, revenue is brought in earlier, and urgency is kept up (something many high schools are guilty of advocating).

Though EA does not carry the significant recuperations that ED does, it does put undue pressure on applicants. With the start of the school year usually around mid-August to early- September, seniors scramble to meet an arbitrary deadline (commonly November 1) because everyone around them told them to.

At Chestnut State, we highly recommend applicants take an organized and methodical approach, submitting the best application they can. Please connect with us to learn more about EA, ED, and college admissions in general.