Early Action Apps Rise By 7.9% at Georgetown for Class of 2015

The number of early action applications rose by 7.9 percent this fall, Dean of Undergraduate Admissions Charles Deacon said Monday.

The Office of Undergraduate Admissions had counted 6,609 early applications for the class of 2015 as of Monday, up from 6,124 last year. Despite a Nov. 1 deadline for the early action cycle, Deacon estimated that the total would increase slightly as numbers are finalized. The admissions office has not yet released application totals for each of the four undergraduate schools.

Last fall, early action applications decreased 1.4 percent from those for the Class of 2013, but overall the university has seen an upward trend in the number of early applications over the past few years, Deacon said.

This year’s increase comes in spite of Georgetown’s decision not to “hyper-recruit” students as other institutions have done, Deacon said.

“There has been no change in strategy or policy to stimulate an increase,” Deacon said in an email. Deacon described hyper-recruitment as a tactic colleges and universities used to lower their admissions rates by seeking to attract more applicants and thus seem more selective. In an April 2010 interview, Deacon told THE HOYA that Georgetown has no plans to adopt such a policy because it does not attract more qualified applicants; those applicants who are best suited to Georgetown apply regardless of its relative selectivity.

“Since we don’t [hyper-recruit], changes in our pool might be more reflective of any changes out there in how students are approaching college applications in the current climate,” Deacon said.

Georgetown’s increase, while substantial, is not among the highest increases in early applications among its peers. Early-decision applications for Northwestern University increased nearly 26 percent, The New York Times reported on Nov. 12. Among schools using an early action cycle, The University of Chicago reported an 18.5 percent increase in early applications, The Massachusetts Institute of Technology saw a 14.4 percent rise and Fordham University reported an 8 percent increase. Many other schools observe a Nov. 15 deadline for early applications.

The university announces early admissions results on Dec. 15. Georgetown’s early action program is non-binding and permits students to apply to early programs at other schools.

http://www.thehoya.com/news/Early-Action-Apps-Rise-By-79-11161002/