Understanding the two types of early admission is crucial to the planning of the college application process. These two types of admission not only allow students to be aware of the college decision earlier than regular admission but also increase the chance of getting accepted into the college of their dream significantly. Each admission type will be explained to help understand which college you should apply through which admission type.
What is Early Action?
An early action admission is an admission that allows students to apply to college earlier than regular admission. This is beneficial to the student as the result from early action comes to students in advance, allowing them more time to consider and think about their choices. Students are able to apply to as many schools as they wish for early action admission.
What is Early Decision?
Similar to early action, early decision allows students to apply to a college earlier than the regular decision allowing them to know their result in advance and have more time to consider.
However, unlike early action you can only apply to one school through early decision. Early decision admission is a binding commitment, if you are accepted to that college you are to withdraw all of your college applications from other colleges that you have applied to and enrolled into the early decision college. Some schools will allow students to have the chance to take advantage of the early decision commitment again with having early decision 2 available for students.
What are the advantages of applying early?
As mentioned earlier, applying through the two types of early admissions allows students to have more time to understand the school they have been accepted or the school they have been rejected. This also allows students to change their plan regarding the school they wish to apply for during the regular decision, as early admission results are usually out before the deadline for regular decision. In addition to knowing your results early, students who apply to the two types of early admission have the benefit of competing with fewer applicants. This means that students have a much better chance of getting into their dream school when
applying through the two types of early admissions than applying in regular decision.
What are the important dates and deadlines?
It is very important for students to keep in mind the deadlines for the early admissions, as they do not want to miss the chance of applying. Colleges that accept early action or early decision 1 start accepting student applications on The 1st of November. Each college has their own deadlines for their early admission application. However, The deadline for early action and early
decision 1 is usually between the 1st of November up until the 15th of November. Students who apply to early decision 1 will get their result much faster than early action, as colleges usually give out early decision results around the 15th of December. Result from early action varies between colleges as some results will come out as early as sometime during December and as some colleges will give out their early action results as late as February. Furthermore, some colleges have the option for students to apply for early decision 2, the deadline of early decision 2 is usually the same with the regular decision deadline.
Are the two types of admission available for all colleges?
Every single college is unique in terms of what type of admission is available to the students. Students must check within the college’s website or within the online application platform, to what admissions are available for them to apply. Some colleges will offer all types of early admissions, while some might offer only early action or just early decision, and some might not
even have the option for the students to apply early.
