Is Early Decision Just Volunteering to Give Away All the Cash You Have?

[Anonymous]

OP, it is not some sort of scam because the colleges are pretty upfront with the advice. The colleges are not taking your money, as you seem to imply, but you are volunteering the fact that you do not need to comparison shop. Do not apply ED unless you are sure you want to attend AND can afford it. The schools with the better endowment still give great FA for their ED students, but not all schools can afford to do this. And your kid does not need to get into your first choice school to be happy and successful.

[Anonymous]

OP has a some sort of obsession with ED. Multiple posts about it.

Get off of DCUrbanmom. Stop being a victim. Look at schools that actually give merit aid or are instate. Or just work harder to earn more or spend your time applying for scholarships.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:OP, it is not some sort of scam because the colleges are pretty upfront with the advice. The colleges are not taking your money, as you seem to imply, but you are volunteering the fact that you do not need to comparison shop. Do not apply ED unless you are sure you want to attend AND can afford it. The schools with the better endowment still give great FA for their ED students, but not all schools can afford to do this. And your kid does not need to get into your first choice school to be happy and successful.

The above is all incredibly basic information that OP should already know.

[Anonymous]

Yes. Early decision is only for the rich and keeps the poors out.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Yes. Early decision is only for the rich and keeps the poors out.

Except it doesn’t.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Yes. Early decision is only for the rich and keeps the poors out.

Except it doesn’t.

So then why does everyone agree that you should only apply ED if you are sure you can afford it?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Yes. Early decision is only for the rich and keeps the poors out.

Except it doesn’t.

So then why does everyone agree that you should only apply ED if you are sure you can afford it?

Because families that can afford to spend $80k/year per child for college are simply "middle class" in DCUM world.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Yes. Early decision is only for the rich and keeps the poors out.

Except it doesn’t.

So then why does everyone agree that you should only apply ED if you are sure you can afford it?

No. Everyone agrees you should not apply to ANY COLLEGE at ANY TIME unless you can afford it.

[Anonymous]

While we are able to be full pay at any university, my child decided to trade-off higher admission probability with overall cost. She ended up declining two T25 acceptances that were full pay to accept full tuition merit award a lower ranked (but still strong) school.

It just depends on your priorities. If you don't mind being full pay, ED is a great way to go.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Yes. Early decision is only for the rich and keeps the poors out.

If the system is designed to keep the poors out it is doing a terrible job. Look at % of first gen and Pell grant eligible kids at elite colleges. Give me a break and take the whining elsewhere. Your kids are not going to be destitute because they didn’t get into their dream school.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Yes. Early decision is only for the rich and keeps the poors out.

Except it doesn’t.

So then why does everyone agree that you should only apply ED if you are sure you can afford it?

Multiple people have posted stories about kids who go in ED who have significant need-based FA. Why are you ignoring that. I'm sort of on the fence about whether ED is a good or bad thing --- but I don't think that the money thing really weighs in. If you are eligible for need-based FA, it doesn't change the picture at all. If you are full pay and aren't worried about comparison shopping, then it doesn't change the picture at all. If you are not eligible for FA, but are middle class hoping to get merit aid, you should not be applying to schools like Brown, Northwestern, Columbia, Duke, etc., anyway, because those schools never give merit aid. There are a fair number of schools that give merit aid for EA kids, so if you are shopping for merit and hope to be able to comparison shop, you should look into EA.

There is a small number of kids whom ED disadvantages ... these are kids who are saying "Well, I would go to Brown full-pay if I could get into Brown AND I could not get merit anyplace else. But if I got good merit at someplace like Tulane, I would pick that over full-price at Brown." That kid is giving up the opportunity to get a slight advantage in admissions at Brown by not applying ED so that they can see if they get merit at Tulane. I just don't think there are that many kids in that scenario. And, if they are and really had a shot at Brown, they will probably get the merit at Tulane (or whever) applying RD, so even if they don't get into Brown, they will end up in the same place---at Tulane with merit.

[Anonymous]

Yes. If the NPC says you are full-pay, you are taking that chance. We were full pay everywhere. One of DC's favorite schools was U Miami. It's on the pricier side and has a boost for ED. While we could have paid full price, we wanted to see options. DC still got in EA and was given about 25% in merit. Maybe the merit would have been there either way, but the school wouldn't have been as incentivized to offer it if DC was locked in.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Yes. Early decision is only for the rich and keeps the poors out.

Except it doesn’t.

So then why does everyone agree that you should only apply ED if you are sure you can afford it?

Multiple people have posted stories about kids who go in ED who have significant need-based FA. Why are you ignoring that. I'm sort of on the fence about whether ED is a good or bad thing --- but I don't think that the money thing really weighs in. If you are eligible for need-based FA, it doesn't change the picture at all. If you are full pay and aren't worried about comparison shopping, then it doesn't change the picture at all. If you are not eligible for FA, but are middle class hoping to get merit aid, you should not be applying to schools like Brown, Northwestern, Columbia, Duke, etc., anyway, because those schools never give merit aid. There are a fair number of schools that give merit aid for EA kids, so if you are shopping for merit and hope to be able to comparison shop, you should look into EA.

There is a small number of kids whom ED disadvantages ... these are kids who are saying "Well, I would go to Brown full-pay if I could get into Brown AND I could not get merit anyplace else. But if I got good merit at someplace like Tulane, I would pick that over full-price at Brown." That kid is giving up the opportunity to get a slight advantage in admissions at Brown by not applying ED so that they can see if they get merit at Tulane. I just don't think there are that many kids in that scenario. And, if they are and really had a shot at Brown, they will probably get the merit at Tulane (or whever) applying RD, so even if they don't get into Brown, they will end up in the same place---at Tulane with merit.

+1 You should only ED if you run the net price calculator and are OK with the number it gives you. "Affording it" will be different for a family that is full pay vs. one eligible for a lot of need based aid. If they don't come in at the price from the calculator (save the info) then you are not out of line to decline the offer for financial reasons.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Yes. Early decision is only for the rich and keeps the poors out.

Except it doesn’t.

So then why does everyone agree that you should only apply ED if you are sure you can afford it?

For the 1000th time, because what you can afford is determined by the NPC. You can be dirt poor, the NPC for Brown will say you will receive 100% FA, you apply ED and guess what...you will receive 100% FA. If you don't, you call Brown and ask them to reconsider and if they don't, you tell them you are no longer bound by the ED agreement because there is always an out that the school pulled a bait-and-switch on FA.

The people crying about ED want merit aid somewhere and are pissed because they can only apply EA or REA (though those schools only give need-based aid)...even though Brown or Penn or Dartmouth won't be providing any merit aid because they don't provide merit aid. It's just they are hoping maybe USC or WashU or Emory or Tulane offers me a ton of merit aid.

Folks, there are schools that will give you an EA decision prior to receiving your ED decision. My kid heard from a number of top 50 flagships with merit aid prior to their ED decision. You can at that time decide to withdraw your ED application if you decide maybe you now want to take your chances in RD and look for merit.

[Anonymous]

For the top 25 -- most do not give merit aid or most would not match an offer from a lower school. So you lose nothing by ED if the number in calculator is ok.