Princeton Eliminates Early Admissions

Less than a week after Harvard announced its decision to end early admission, Princeton issued a press release on Monday detailing a similar switch to a "single admission process" effective next year.

"This is something that we have been thinking about moving toward for quite some time now," said Princeton University spokeswoman Cass Cliatt. "However, we said last summer that it would be difficult to make this decision unilaterally, so the fact that Harvard made its announcement was certainly one of the factors we took into account for our decision. Now we hope that other schools will follow our lead."

Princeton, which has employed an early decision policy similar to Columbia's since 1996, cited increased applicant equity and a more relaxed application process as drivers for the change. Almost 49 percent of last year's first-years at Princeton were admitted under the early decision program.

"We are making this change because we believe it is the right thing to do," Princeton President Shirley M. Tilghman said in a statement. "We believe that a single admission process will encourage an even broader pool of excellent students to apply to Princeton, knowing that they will be considered at the same time and on the same terms as all other applicants."

The decision follows recent efforts by Princeton to reform its financial aid program, providing qualified students with grants that-unlike typical student loans-do not need to be repaid.

"We agree that early admission 'advantages the advantaged,'" Tilghman said in the statement. "We believe that elimination of early admission programs can reduce some of the frenzy, complexity, and inequity in a process that even under the best of circumstances is inevitably stressful for students and their families."