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[quote=Anonymous]Sorry in advance for the long post - I’ve spent too much time thinking about this in the car.  :lol:

It’s apparent that for many reasons, the college application process has become untenable. There is too much uncertainty for both families and schools, which has led to a spiral of increasing applications, which has in turn increased the uncertainty. I think breaking down the application process into a few more discrete stages with specific constraints on each stage could help streamline the process and get students matched more efficiently to good fit schools.

[b]Stage 1 - In-state Public best-fit offer (Sept 15 apply, Oct 15 notification)[/b]
-- By Sept 15, students submit full academic record only: Student Reported Academic Record (SRAR), Test Scores (AP/IB, SAT, ACT) as desired
-- Students indicate academic major/areas of interest
-- Students rank all of the state schools from 1st to last choice, including community colleges.
-- Colleges review students in rounds by order of student preference. The schools see all students who listed them 1st choice and make one of these decisions:
----- Decline (not an academic fit)
----- Defer to Stage 2 (traditional early action with full application)
----- Admit to school, defer to Stage 2 for limited enrollment program
----- Admit to school and major
-- All students who did not receive an “admit to school and major” then go to the next round of 2nd choices, 3rd choices, etc.
-- Applications are automatically withdrawn from all schools ranked lower than “admit to school and major”.
-- Schools can be required to admit a minimum % of target student body this round (e.g. 10%)
-- Students can be incentivized with a tuition discount (e.g. $3000) to commit by Nov 1. (Many kids have an in-state school as their 1st choice. If they get accepted, encourage them to commit to provide certainty for the school as they build the class.)

[b]Stage 2 - Early Decision 1 (private)/Early Action 1 (public) (Nov 1 apply, Dec 15 notification)[/b]
-- By Nov 1, students complete their full application including ECs and Essays. This goes to the in-state public schools who deferred to stage 2 and the admit school (for review for merit/honors college etc.)
-- In-state schools continue to review and make one of these decisions. 
----- Decline
----- Admit to school, not admitted to LEP major
----- Admit to school and major.
-- Students may choose one private school to apply Early Decision 1. (normal process)
-- Students rank out-of-state public schools that they are interested in, up to 5 schools.
-- Out-of-state schools see all applications. They also see who ranked them as 1st choice (but not the rest of the rankings). Possible decisions:
----- Decline
----- Defer to Stage 4 regular decision (with request for mid-year transcript)
----- Admit to school, not admitted to LEP major
----- Admit to school and major.
-- Both out-of-state and in-state schools could incentivize students to commit by Jan 1 with a tuition discount. (e.g. $2000)

[b]Stage 3 - Early Decision 2 (private)/Early Action 2 (public) (Jan 1 apply, Feb 15 notification) 
OR Regular Decision (public & private) (Jan 1 apply, notification by school selected date)[/b]
-- Repeat the Stage 2 process for students trying ED2 or EA2. 
-- Otherwise, students apply regular decision to any public or private school.

[b]Stage 4 - Regular decision (public & private) (Feb 28 application deadline, rolling notification by April 1, beginning by school selected date)[/b]
-- This is for students who applied ED2 or EA2 and allows them to still submit applications for regular decision. However, they may be behind other students in review.

The most important change IMO would be to implement Stage 1, which could be done at the state level independently of other states. If students knew early on what their best-fit was in-state, it would set more realistic expectations for the rest of the application process. Obviously, there are a lot of details and tweaks that can be made to this suggestion, but what do you think about the general idea?
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