Many high schoolers whose top college choice is Brown apply under its binding early decision program, which has a higher acceptance rate.
But 35% of students who applied in the regular, non-binding cycle also said Brown was their top choice, a Herald poll found. Why didn’t these students apply early?
Many experts told The Herald that uncertainty around financial aid was a major factor.
Since 2001, Brown has used early decision to attract applicants with the prospect of expedited admission, peace of mind and another chance to express interest in the University. But such practices have caused socioeconomic disparities within the applicant pool. Last spring, a University committee recommended that Brown maintain a binding early decision program despite some opposition, The Herald previously reported.
The committee acknowledged that the early decision applicant pool “is less diverse than the RD pool in terms of race, ethnicity and socioeconomic status; students who apply ED are less likely to be from historically underrepresented groups or be low-income, first-generation or international applicants.”
But they also said that such a program benefits the University, as it allows Brown to determine “the composition of roughly half of the incoming class at a relatively early date.”
The early decision students, now contractually obligated to attend the University, are unable to learn of their official financial aid package until after they are accepted and commit to attending.
“If finances are not an issue at all, then a student can almost always end up applying early decision if their top choice offers it,” said Sara Harberson, a former Penn admission counselor who now runs a private college admission consulting company.
But most families are not in that position. Families “are nervous committing to one college” without being able to compare various financial aid awards, she said.
Last winter, during the school’s second-most competitive early decision round in history, the University admitted 14.4% of its early-decision applicants. These students make up over half of the class of 2028.
In a poll of first-years conducted by The Herald, nearly 60% of respondents who were admitted early said they were not receiving any financial aid. Over half of the students who enrolled from the regular decision pool reported financial aid covering some or all of their costs.
Eric Sherman, a college admissions counselor at IvyWise and a former admissions officer at Columbia, shared that some students are deterred from applying to universities under a binding early admission plan because of the “sticker shock of the total price of college.”
Sherman noted that this is a concern even for schools that guarantee they will meet an admitted student’s full financial need, such as Brown.
Cathleen Sheils, the senior associate director of college counseling at Solomon Admissions and a former director of admissions at Cornell, told The Herald that while it’s difficult to guarantee what the specific financial aid package will be, it is possible to have some sense of the range.
“Most financial aid offices, within reason, will talk to people,” Sheils said. Students and their families are often able to determine the range of financial aid they would receive through tools the university provides.
Brown offers multiple financial aid calculators that are frequently updated, which can give students an idea of their future cost of attendance.
Sheils said there is often no discrepancy between the financial aid for early and regular applicants.
But some students and their families may want to compare regular decision aid packages, she said, as there are very few schools that offer exclusively need-based aid. Most colleges and universities in the U.S. offer merit aid, which is not dependent on an applicant’s financial need. Brown and many other highly selective institutions do not.
For Sheils, access to information about higher education is one of the key barriers to applying early for students from less wealthy backgrounds. “When I was at Cornell, I heard from several students that they were surprised with the aid package, that they had always heard that privates and Ivies are too expensive,” she said.
“When a year of college can be more than your family makes in a year, it’s completely overwhelming,” she added. “I was a first-generation college student at Cornell, so I know firsthand.”
“Students who are able to apply early decision and get in early decision are oftentimes students who can just imagine the cost of college as a number” and not a burden for their family, said Nick Lee ’26, the co-president of Students for Educational Equity.
Lee noted, though, that for students in the middle, not knowing what college will cost is a big deterrent to applying early.
Data from The Herald’s poll of first-year students in the class of 2028 showed that while around half of students admitted early decision attended public schools, over 60% of students admitted regular decision attended public schools.
Harberson believes part of the reason private school students are more likely to apply early is that their high schools typically have stronger college counseling programs.
At traditional private day schools and boarding schools, “most college counselors have college admissions experience … at a fairly selective or sometimes highly selective institution,” Harberson said. These counselors are aware that when a student applies early decision, their chances of admission increase. But many public high schools do not have similar opportunities for their students, according to Harberson.
“Most counselors at public high schools have caseloads of hundreds of students that they are responsible for, whereas I was a counselor at a private high school and was responsible for about 40 students a year,” Harberson told The Herald.
Harberson added that many counselors at public schools do not have the experience in college admissions that private school counselors traditionally have.
Lee believes that at private schools, there is a cultural expectation that students will apply to their top choice school in an early decision cycle.
He noted that the early decision pool often includes many student athletes and students with familial ties to a school, which already gives them a statistical advantage in the admissions process. Polling conducted by The Herald has confirmed this discrepancy.
When asked about paths towards more equitable admissions, Sherman emphasized the importance of eliminating “unearned advantages,” such as legacy admissions and priority recruitment of athletes, particularly in sports with high participation costs.
Shiels believes that the way to reach underrepresented students is to lean on resources outside of a student’s traditional guidance counselor. She pointed to community-based organizations, religious organizations and other trusted advisers that can help support a student on their path to college.
Harberson believes it’s integral for colleges to reframe how they recruit and evaluate applicants, advocating for one nationally designated deadline.
“Having one deadline could transform this process,” she said.
Talia LeVine is a Senior Staff Writer for The Herald covering admissions and financial aid. They study Political Science and Visual Art focusing on photography. In their free time, they can be found drinking copious amounts of coffee.
