David Graves in Blog



From now until October 15, one of the most common questions for the admission office will be “Should I apply for Early Action (EA) or Regular Decision (RD)”? There is the perceived notion that one option is better than the other (NOT TRUE!). We review EA and RD applications through the same process, however EA admits will be very strong in grades, rigor, and test scores.

Over the last few application cycles we’ve seen increasing numbers of applications, with most of the growth being in Early Action. Since we have to be careful not to admit too many students and EA decisions are released before we see final numbers for total applicants, the students we admit through EA will be at the top in terms of academics. EA applicants have three potential decisions they’ll receive by mid-December at the latest: admit, deny, or defer. If your application is denied EA it would also have been denied RD, so your next pathway to UGA is the transfer process. If you are deferred EA we’d like to see additional grades as well as any updates to your application by late January. Deferred and RD applicants will receive a decision by mid-March.

When you are deciding when to apply there are a few key things to consider: Where are your stats relative to our admitted class from the previous year? Do you have plenty of time to complete your application by October 15? How would you feel if your application decision is deferred? Remember, we don’t have a preference and our process is the same for both applications. If you need more time for any reason or you don’t want to have your decision deferred for several months, Regular Decision will be the better option.

For both Early Action and Regular Decision applicants, give yourself time to get your application together, and do not rush to complete it on the deadline. This is like pushing off writing a 10 page report until the last day, and wondering why it did not turn out as well as you thought it would.

Ultimately the decision of whether to apply EA or RD is up to each student as you know yourself best.