Has anyone regretted their ED choice?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I think the short answer is don't apply ED if it's not the first choice school.

My kids applied ED and got into T20 schools in that round. One and done. Very simple. Neither is spending four years lamenting their chances at Harvard or Princeton because these weren't schools they wanted to go to regardless.

Having gone though this though, I do think the SCEA schools - Harvard, Yale, Princeton, Stanford, CalTech, Notre Dame - are losing a lot of talent because of Early Decision. Those smart students aren't applying anymore because they were already accepted elsewhere.

So the way it's working today is that a lot of accepted HYPSM students today are rejects from the early round elsewhere. The ED schools are generally taking the best students as quickly as they can. And Harvard and Princeton get the leftovers.

It happened at our private

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I think ED makes the psychological aspect of the college process so much worse. The best way to go into the process is to not pick a dream school and feel like there are many schools on the list you love and would be happy at, but ED encourages students to pick a first choice and then fixate on one first choice school. And An ed rejection can be really hard since it is months before happier news. I watched my DC’s class go through this, and several people had very unhappy and stressful senior years after ED rejection even though in the end all of these particular kids wound up at fantastic top schools.

it is your job as a parent to ensure this doesn't happen. My Top student went into ED knowing that their chances were slim to none (just like everyone else). They knew it was fine to have a top choice but they also needed to get excited about their targets and a few safeties, as they were much more likely attending one of those.
They got Deferred ED, we let them "be upset" for 24-48 hours and then got them back involved in the process of deciding, do you want to ED2 to your next choice or wait to hear from ED1 school. And let's get focused on the rest of the choices. Thankfully they only had 2 more applications to do, as most schools were EA or RD due by Nov 1/15. But we didn't let them mope around for days/weeks about the deferral. It's not healthy. They had a great list of reaches/targets/safeties and we got focused on those. It did help that within the next 7 days after ED1 deferral, they got acceptance to their top safety (with great merit) and one of their top Targets. So they knew they had excellent choices.

But it's on you as a parent to not let them get obsessed with a "Top choice", especially when the acceptance rates are single digits. Set the expectations and focus on reality (which is you are going to a target most likely---if you create the list accurately your kid will get into 50%+ of their targets)

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:So withdraw ED for financial reasons. They don’t come arrest you.

"They don't come arrest you" - this isn't how ED is supposed to work, it's a contract. Jerks who renege on ED ruin it for everyone.

But especially with ED2, you can pull the "financial reasons" and get out.

But I agree, you shouldn't do that. ED1/2 are a contract and you should honor it unless there are real changes in your finances. I wouldn't let my kid do that personally

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I think ED makes the psychological aspect of the college process so much worse. The best way to go into the process is to not pick a dream school and feel like there are many schools on the list you love and would be happy at, but ED encourages students to pick a first choice and then fixate on one first choice school. And An ed rejection can be really hard since it is months before happier news. I watched my DC’s class go through this, and several people had very unhappy and stressful senior years after ED rejection even though in the end all of these particular kids wound up at fantastic top schools.

I agree with all of this. This system bifurcates those that can get in and enjoy the next few months or those that have to scramble and get in another dozen applications during holiday break. And talk about the mindf*ck of getting deferred and not knowing whether it's a soft rejection or if you actually have a shot at RD or if they defer everyone who is not accepted so it doesn't tell you anything (I'm looking at you Harvard and MIT!).

But if your kid has the resume for a T20, I would hope they can process the entire ED process mentally. If not, 4 years of college at a Top school might be a bit too much for them as well.

And yes, I had a kid who was ED1 at a T10 deferral. They then had to decide whether to wait for RD or ED2 to somewhere. They chose to wait, were rejected, but thankfully got into what would have been their ED2 in EA and are attending that. They had to make choices, they did and are happy and thriving where they chose.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:One of DC’s friends is regretting it because she was steered by school counselor to change her ED school. It turned out now kids with lower stats are ED her original choice. Should stick to your guns.

My relative w 1550 SAT regretted early to BC. Felt should have aimed higher, but likes it.

So why didn't they pick their actual top choice ? However, their top choice should not be made based on "aiming higher" but rather on the best school for them. That's the issue, pick what is top for your kid (hint not all T20 are the best for your kid, it's not possible)

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:One of DC’s friends is regretting it because she was steered by school counselor to change her ED school. It turned out now kids with lower stats are ED her original choice. Should stick to your guns.

My relative w 1550 SAT regretted early to BC. Felt should have aimed higher, but likes it.

So why didn't they pick their actual top choice ? However, their top choice should not be made based on "aiming higher" but rather on the best school for them. That's the issue, pick what is top for your kid (hint not all T20 are the best for your kid, it's not possible)

I think we wanted to be strategic. College counselor said only 50% change early at BC. I think status wanted in order to feed low self esteem.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:One of DC’s friends is regretting it because she was steered by school counselor to change her ED school. It turned out now kids with lower stats are ED her original choice. Should stick to your guns.

My relative w 1550 SAT regretted early to BC. Felt should have aimed higher, but likes it.

So why didn't they pick their actual top choice ? However, their top choice should not be made based on "aiming higher" but rather on the best school for them. That's the issue, pick what is top for your kid (hint not all T20 are the best for your kid, it's not possible)

DP. My kid didn’t because our private never gets anyone into this one school (barring an occasional athletic recruit) per out counselor. We weighed the odds and it seemed like a th throwaway. Kid was WL there during RD and then into many equivalent schools/other Ivies so now we think it might have worked out if he chose to SCEA there. Oh well. Happy at a different school,

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:One of DC’s friends is regretting it because she was steered by school counselor to change her ED school. It turned out now kids with lower stats are ED her original choice. Should stick to your guns.

My relative w 1550 SAT regretted early to BC. Felt should have aimed higher, but likes it.

So why didn't they pick their actual top choice ? However, their top choice should not be made based on "aiming higher" but rather on the best school for them. That's the issue, pick what is top for your kid (hint not all T20 are the best for your kid, it's not possible)

I think we wanted to be strategic. College counselor said only 50% change early at BC. I think status wanted in order to feed low self esteem.

If chasing status, then you have to live with the consequences.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:One of DC’s friends is regretting it because she was steered by school counselor to change her ED school. It turned out now kids with lower stats are ED her original choice. Should stick to your guns.

My relative w 1550 SAT regretted early to BC. Felt should have aimed higher, but likes it.

So why didn't they pick their actual top choice ? However, their top choice should not be made based on "aiming higher" but rather on the best school for them. That's the issue, pick what is top for your kid (hint not all T20 are the best for your kid, it's not possible)

I think we wanted to be strategic. College counselor said only 50% change early at BC. I think status wanted in order to feed low self esteem.

Yep, that is the risk. While I agree with people saying as parent's we have to help our kids think this through but I don't think people realize how hard this actually is. There is a lot of pressure to make the "strategic" decision and ED to their 2nd or 3rd choice and I think parents generally care more than the kids about having it all over early. It is not easy for kids, even ones with supportive parents, go against the ED grain.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:One of DC’s friends is regretting it because she was steered by school counselor to change her ED school. It turned out now kids with lower stats are ED her original choice. Should stick to your guns.

My relative w 1550 SAT regretted early to BC. Felt should have aimed higher, but likes it.

So why didn't they pick their actual top choice ? However, their top choice should not be made based on "aiming higher" but rather on the best school for them. That's the issue, pick what is top for your kid (hint not all T20 are the best for your kid, it's not possible)

DP. My kid didn’t because our private never gets anyone into this one school (barring an occasional athletic recruit) per out counselor. We weighed the odds and it seemed like a th throwaway. Kid was WL there during RD and then into many equivalent schools/other Ivies so now we think it might have worked out if he chose to SCEA there. Oh well. Happy at a different school,

And that is a great choice. ED to a school where the rates for everyone is low and knowing nobody from your school ever gets in would not be a smart choice. Yes, then you look at the data and help your kid realize that it would be wasted (99.999% chance of that) so let's look at the 2nd choice and do that. I get the gaming and in this case it's reasonable.
what I don't get is people who do this then get buyers remorse about the "highly unattainable school". You looked at the data and realized you were not getting in, so why waste your ED there. Wrap your head around that and pick the next choice

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:One of DC’s friends is regretting it because she was steered by school counselor to change her ED school. It turned out now kids with lower stats are ED her original choice. Should stick to your guns.

My relative w 1550 SAT regretted early to BC. Felt should have aimed higher, but likes it.

So why didn't they pick their actual top choice ? However, their top choice should not be made based on "aiming higher" but rather on the best school for them. That's the issue, pick what is top for your kid (hint not all T20 are the best for your kid, it's not possible)

DP. My kid didn’t because our private never gets anyone into this one school (barring an occasional athletic recruit) per out counselor. We weighed the odds and it seemed like a th throwaway. Kid was WL there during RD and then into many equivalent schools/other Ivies so now we think it might have worked out if he chose to SCEA there. Oh well. Happy at a different school,

And that is a great choice. ED to a school where the rates for everyone is low and knowing nobody from your school ever gets in would not be a smart choice. Yes, then you look at the data and help your kid realize that it would be wasted (99.999% chance of that) so let's look at the 2nd choice and do that. I get the gaming and in this case it's reasonable.
what I don't get is people who do this then get buyers remorse about the "highly unattainable school". You looked at the data and realized you were not getting in, so why waste your ED there. Wrap your head around that and pick the next choice

I agree with this. The difference between top schools is not so vast. Lots of people shoot for the moon and end of getting shut out of all of their top choices. I think the mentality is 1st choice or bust, but really, in this market, any kid who gets into one of their top 3 favorite places should be thrilled. And if your kid doesn't have at least 3 places where they're excited to attend, it's because the parents allowed them to fixate on one school to the exclusion of all of the other amazing schools out there.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I think ED makes the psychological aspect of the college process so much worse. The best way to go into the process is to not pick a dream school and feel like there are many schools on the list you love and would be happy at, but ED encourages students to pick a first choice and then fixate on one first choice school. And An ed rejection can be really hard since it is months before happier news. I watched my DC’s class go through this, and several people had very unhappy and stressful senior years after ED rejection even though in the end all of these particular kids wound up at fantastic top schools.

My DS had 3 top reach schools and didn’t fixate. He got into one of them ED2, and was happy with the result. ED works as long as an applicant doesn’t idealize RD possibilities and assume acceptance after being admitted ED.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I think ED makes the psychological aspect of the college process so much worse. The best way to go into the process is to not pick a dream school and feel like there are many schools on the list you love and would be happy at, but ED encourages students to pick a first choice and then fixate on one first choice school. And An ed rejection can be really hard since it is months before happier news. I watched my DC’s class go through this, and several people had very unhappy and stressful senior years after ED rejection even though in the end all of these particular kids wound up at fantastic top schools.

it is your job as a parent to ensure this doesn't happen. My Top student went into ED knowing that their chances were slim to none (just like everyone else). They knew it was fine to have a top choice but they also needed to get excited about their targets and a few safeties, as they were much more likely attending one of those.
They got Deferred ED, we let them "be upset" for 24-48 hours and then got them back involved in the process of deciding, do you want to ED2 to your next choice or wait to hear from ED1 school. And let's get focused on the rest of the choices. Thankfully they only had 2 more applications to do, as most schools were EA or RD due by Nov 1/15. But we didn't let them mope around for days/weeks about the deferral. It's not healthy. They had a great list of reaches/targets/safeties and we got focused on those. It did help that within the next 7 days after ED1 deferral, they got acceptance to their top safety (with great merit) and one of their top Targets. So they knew they had excellent choices.

But it's on you as a parent to not let them get obsessed with a "Top choice", especially when the acceptance rates are single digits. Set the expectations and focus on reality (which is you are going to a target most likely---if you create the list accurately your kid will get into 50%+ of their targets)

Similar to what happened with our son, especially the prompt subsequent acceptance, but was more of a target.

[Anonymous]

My son’s friend was steered to EA MIT from Ed Penn. ended up didn’t get in MIT ea. WL at Penn then rejected.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:My son’s friend was steered to EA MIT from Ed Penn. ended up didn’t get in MIT ea. WL at Penn then rejected.

Your son's friend's strategy makes no sense because EA MIT is non-restrictive and the kid could have applied to Penn ED and MIT EA at the same time.