Early Admission Binding?

Hi everyone! I was looking into the early admission process for some of my top colleges, but I'm a little bit confused about something. When you apply early admission, are you bound to attend that college if accepted, or can you still choose another school? Any clarification would be great!

There are two types of early admission processes: Early Decision (ED) and Early Action (EA). The main difference between the two lies in the binding nature of the acceptance.

Early Decision: If you apply to a college through the ED process and get accepted, you are bound to attend that college. ED is a binding agreement, and once accepted, you'll be expected to withdraw your applications from other colleges and enroll at the ED college.

However, in case of an inadequate financial aid package, you could potentially back out of the ED agreement. Do still make sure to use the school's net price calculator before applying ED, and contact their financial aid office with any questions you have, to get a sense for whether the financial aid package will be sufficient. While allowed under unusual circumstances, backing out of an ED agreement is stressful, and heartbreaking, as you have to tell your dream school no after being accepted, so best to avoid that if possible.

Early Action: On the other hand, EA is non-binding. You can apply to a college through the EA process, and if accepted, you're not obligated to attend that college. You can still apply to other colleges during the Regular Decision cycle and wait to make your choice until you have more acceptances and financial aid offers to compare.

To summarize, Early Decision is binding, whereas Early Action is not. If you want the freedom to choose among multiple acceptances, EA would be a better choice for you. If you have a clear top choice and are willing to commit to it, then ED might be a strong option since it can sometimes increase your chances of getting accepted at that college.

To learn more about the various types of early admission, and how they compare to the regular decision process, check out this blog post from CollegeVine: https://blog.collegevine.com/ea-vs-ed-vs-rea/. Good luck with your applications!