How early is too early to apply for most colleges?Answered
I'm a junior, class of 2022. I was wondering if most colleges would open applications (for the 22-23 fall) by August or September, or is it a little later? I'm having a bit of a hard time finding info out there.
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2 answers
They app opens for cycles meaning the class of 2023 can't apply until our class the class of 2022's cycle ends (It asks what term your applying for fall or spring 2022 last time I checked). When you apply depends how you apply. You could apply early action or decision, with rolling admissions, or regular decision. Each of there have their own deadlines. In general I believe most open August 1st with a deadline in November but it would depend on the school. Although just because you can't submit your application until they officially open for our class you can make a common app account and get a head start. A lot of the information is general personal stuff like family information so it's nice to have it done. Just make sure you revise it before you submit your applications sometime in the fall.
If you are graduating HS in 2022, then you will be matriculating into the Class of 2026 for colleges which starts Fall 2022-Spring 2026. Therefore the usual and customary deadlines for applying for the Class of 2026 are this fall and winter.
If you are interested in applying ED, EA, or SCREA to any college the deadline will be November 1, 2021, for the Class of 2026. These colleges make their applications available through the Common or Coalition App or in the case of Georgetown through their own portal about 3 months prior sometime in August. Each college sets its own "open" date so you just have to create your college list on the Common or Coalition app and check in weekly. If you are applying for any kind of financial aid, you will need to submit a FAFSA and CSS profile and those applications open each year about 30 days before the early admissions deadline or Oct. 1, 2021. You fill out the FAFSA on their website and the CSS profile through the CollegeBoard portal.
The Caveat to these early admissions deadlines is Large State Colleges that have either rolling admissions, multiple start dates ( like Fall, Winter-Spring, Summer) such as UC colleges which have a rolling submission window of Nov 1 - Nov 30 each year.
The regular decision deadlines are typically January 1st, 2022, but some colleges have different deadlines like 1/15, 1/30, 2/1, 2/15 so it's important that you do your own research against your college lists and create a spreadsheet so you know what order to apply to the schools and what is required by each school.
If you apply early, you typically will hear back by December 15th, 2021.
If you apply regular decision, you typically will hear back between 3/5-4/7. The last colleges to give decisions are historically Duke 4/5, All 8 Ivys, 4/6, and Stanford 4/7.
(Ivy day used to be the last week of March but since all Ivys and Elites are getting up to 50% more applications, their admissions offices have extended the decision date 2 weeks. I expect this to continue indefinitely.)
This is roughly the same process each and every year for the past 30-40 years.
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