As 2013 drew to a close, hundreds of Andover Seniors searched their mailboxes and sifted through emails, hopeful to find good news upon opening early admissions decisions. Of the 40 percent of the Senior class that reported their results to the College Counseling Office on Tuesday morning, 62 percent have received letters of acceptance from at least one school, according to Sean Logan, Director of College Counseling.
This past Fall, approximately 83 percent of the class of 2014 applied to an early college program. Although the percentage of the class that applied early was similar to that of class of 2013, around 150 more applications were submitted this year as many students chose to apply early to more than one college.
Approximately 69 percent of those who applied early applied to an early action school, which does not require accepted students to enroll. Twenty-two percent of early applicants applied early decision, a binding commitment to the school if accepted. Nine percent of all students applied to a restrictive early action school, a non-binding program that only allows the student to apply to one early action private school, in addition to public schools.
Logan said that more students this year realized the advantages of applying early, perhaps due to loosened rules on restrictive early action.
Restrictive early action, used by schools like Harvard, Yale, Princeton and Stanford, means that a student applying to one of these programs is not allowed to apply early to any other private school. This shows a student’s high interest in a singular school, while still allowing him or her to apply elsewhere during the regular round of applications.
“In the past [for restrictive early action], students could only apply to their home state public schools. Last year, they made that change sort of late in the game, so over the summer, students weren’t really thinking about restrictive early action schools,” he continued.
“I think in the last couple of years, students have been saying ‘Hey, if I can get a couple of schools that would be a really good fit for me and I can get into them early, that might cut down a little bit on applications later on,” Logan said.
