is it really easier to get into a college ED?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Affirmative action for people of means.

This trope gets old. Most of the selective schools were falling over themselves in presentations last year to assure folks requesting financial aid that they could apply ED. Use the NPC to check in advance. If your aid doesn’t reach that level or your situation changes before spring, you will be excused from the binding agreement. In the meantime, you are allowed to apply to state schools and those with scholarship deadlines before ED decisions. My kids have had multiple acceptances with merit in hand on ED decision day, with more in the pipeline. Stop whining and do your due diligence.

However, if you look on college confidential, a lot of the new schools doing ED that don't have the $$ that Ivy and other huge endowment schools like Michigan do, the financial aid packages are NEVER good enough for middle class families and are not nearly as good as RD packages. They are always spending more than their FAFSA said they should. So I would NEVER apply ED to schools that do not meet 100% need. Even those are sketchy because they add loans and work study to meet that need. For my nephew that was $10K between 3 loans and work study to get to the 100% need on his ED. And we all know even the FAFSA starts higher than you really want.

So it truly is for athletes, legacy, and rich.

But you can get out if the package is un-affordable. It can work for everyone who does their homework. No reason not to. None.

No, you really can't. If they are within $5K of what your CSA/FAFSA states you can pay, they expect you to come. Now they can give you a bunch of loans to do that. Many people realize heck no, but it is too late. Can you pull out of it? Yes. But you, your school, and your counselors get shamed. Your name also goes out to other peer colleges before ED2 and RD.

That’s just untrue and no one reading this that is considering applying early decision should believe it.

Run the net price calculator and print it out. If the actual offer is less you are out of the agreement with no penalty to you or the school. You also have the opportunity to discuss this with the financial aid office to see if they made a mistake.

You also can open a dialog with the FAO before applying ED. To the extent that colleges are using special offers to lure students, they will do that at any stage of the game (or they will tell you flat out it won't happen).