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Meet the Millionaire Masters of Early Decision at Colleges
The enrollment chiefs at Tulane and the University of Chicago attracted many early applicants. Now both of them earn a lot of money.

https://www.nytimes.com/2025/11/29/business/tulane-university-chicago-early-decision.html?unlocked_article_code=1.7k8.udP8.k1GX-ndYwYCs&smid=nytcore-ios-share





https://www.nytimes.com/2025/12/10/opinion/college-admission-early-decision-application.html?unlocked_article_code=1.7k8.EK2b.bDrXbxTJXpuX&smid=nytcore-ios-share

At Boston University, her chances through early decision are three times as likely as through the less restrictive options. Elsewhere, the numbers are even more skewed: If you want to get into Amherst, signing away your chance to consider other options gives you an almost fourfold advantage. At Tulane, the advantage is fivefold. At Northeastern, it’s more than tenfold.

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As she put it, “I’m only 17. At the end of the day I’m still a kid. I get why schools do early decision. But asking a 17-year-old to sign an agreement” that could obligate them to “pay $90,000 a year is a really, really big ask.” As of this writing, she’s still waiting to hear the school’s verdict.
The early decision agreement that students, parents and high school counselors must all sign states that a student must attend the college if accepted, but it hints at an exception if, even with financial aid, the cost of attending is still too high for the student to afford. The thing is, says Mark Salisbury, an expert on how financial aid and admissions interact, the school gets to decide what qualifies as too high. A spokesman for Tulane told me that of the people it admitted by early decision last year, it released around 10 percent from their obligation, for financial reasons. But applicants don’t know in advance how this will play out.