s/o on offer acceptance thread: Offers ALREADY?

[Brilliant]

I was very surprised to see in the thread about when to accept an offer, that many of your students have offers already.

 

My dd will probably be applying to only 2 colleges - we don't have her SAT scores yet for the October test date, but expect her to be in the top quartile for both schools. Her first choice (if she gets into the honors program) has an early deadline of 11/1. Transcripts, SAT scores, and recommendations are already on their way, and she plans to get the application in today or tomorrow. Then they will let her know by mid-December, including any scholarship offer, but, she won't find out about the honors program until the spring.

 

She's going on an overnight visit to her 2nd choice in November. They have rolling admissions. So even though transcripts, SAT scores, and recommendations are on their way, I wasn't going to waste the app fee $$ on the final application until she'd done her visit. So, we thought she'd submit her app by Thanksgiving and be notified within a few weeks.

 

Now I'm wondering if we should have applied already to both (the schools would just be waiting on the SAT scores coming out this week). Is it normal to apply in September and be notified in October? Are the colleges who notify in October competitive schools? (I realize I'm too late with this dd...but we have another student in high school, and I'm already keeping a list of all the things we did wrong with dd in high school!)

[creekland]

Now I'm wondering if we should have applied already to both (the schools would just be waiting on the SAT scores coming out this week). Is it normal to apply in September and be notified in October? Are the colleges who notify in October competitive schools? (I realize I'm too late with this dd...but we have another student in high school, and I'm already keeping a list of all the things we did wrong with dd in high school!)

 

Your plan doesn't sound bad to me. It's not wrong to have applied already nor is it wrong to wait just a little bit for the reasons you've mentioned. Most people prefer to apply early if they know where they want to go, but it's not necessary.

 

It's wrong to miss deadlines, but that doesn't seem to be happening.

 

Schools with rolling admissions accept people till they fill their class. Then - if needed - they waitlist others. Many don't fill though, but certain majors or departments can, so later can have issues. Scholarship money can be awarded quickly too.

 

I don't think any of the colleges that notify people this early are the super competitive colleges, but that certainly doesn't mean they are bad schools. They just do things differently. Personally, I prefer those that do rolling admissions and notify quickly, but, we don't get to choose how they do things, so we'll adjust to how the schools my guys like do it.

 

This year we're sitting out and watching. Next year we're back in the game.

 

:lurk5:

[mcconnellboys]

Lots of schools have early admission deadlines as well as regular admission deadlines. If you submit all your stuff by the early admission deadline, you're guaranteed notification of admittance (but not generally of scholarships) at a predetermined earlier date.

 

My son applied for the early deadlines to all schools that offered that feature just so there would be more time for him to decide. Most of those schools also began sending in scholarship info a little earlier, too, so that was also helpful.

 

In the event that he had not been admitted to his initial round of targeted schools, not offered any money from most of them, etc., it would have also given him time to expand his search and apply by the regular deadline to some other places....

[TravelingChris]

DD has only 4 schools that have deadlines in Jan and those are the schools that have early decision. She has no favorite so she isn't applying early decision. Everyone else has an earlier deadline for merit aid or else has early acceptance. If they have early acceptance, she is doing that. As it is, we have a lot of work to do between acceptances and decision time. We need to make sure they will give her a Yellow Ribbon aid, make sure she can get a single room, and check on other accommodations (spelling). She also wants to know where we will be living next year and the earliest we will find that out is January and much more likely March.