Rolling admissions - American Education

A system whereby a college sets no fixed date for its admissions decisions, accepting applications at any time during the school year and responding to applicants within 30 days. Upon receipt of an acceptance, the student is usually given 30 days to decide whether to attend and to send in the appropriate deposit. Rolling early decision operates in much the same way, with colleges responding to applications within 30 days. As with conventional early decision applicants, however, an applicant accepted under a rolling early-decision program is under a moral obligation to withdraw all other college applications. The only difference between conventional and rolling early decision is that applications are not reviewed at a fixed time.