With college admission season coming to a close, many seniors have a school their heart is set on. In years past, you would likely do early action or submit your rolling application early to hear back from schools as early as December. However, none of these acceptance letters mean you have to go to that particular school. You have until May 1 to decide between schools, unless you choose this specific acceptance option.
Early decision is similar to early action, but if you are accepted you are bound by contract to attend that school. While it may seem like a good option for students with their heart set on one school, does it have any other benefits?
Early decision has been shown to increase your chances of being accepted to your school of choice. According to Collegevine, applying as an early decision applicant can raise your admission chances as high as “60 percent.” Besides having an edge in admissions, doing early decision takes away the stress of doing a ton of different application processes and settling into planning out your future in college. It can be difficult to decide on a college, so if you have your heart set on one in particular, early decision may be the way to go.
However, according to a similar article by Forbes, early decision applicants often don’t get the full financial aid packages that are offered to early action and rolling admission applicants. This is an important factor for many students who may struggle to afford tuition, so that is a serious limitation for some students. Furthermore, early decision is binding, meaning if you are accepted you must go to that university. Backing out of an agreement is incredibly difficult, and it’s hard to predict how your mind can change about college during your senior year.
One of the benefits of early action is getting college admissions out of the way early, while also benefiting from having more choices in scholarships and college decisions. If you want better financial aid options and a wider range of choices for majors and colleges, I recommend early action over early decision.
Early decision seems to be a good idea if your heart is set on one school and one school only, but I would recommend taking the time to research the pros and cons between early decision and early action. College admission season is known to be chaotic but finding the process that will benefit you the most is a necessity.
