With early action right around the corner for most schools, let’s take a look at where students are applying this year. From West Coast schools like UCLA, to schools in our backyard like University of Maryland College Park, students this year are applying all over.

Where students apply and where students actually attend college are different questions. Some students apply to a lot of schools located all over the country just to see if they can somehow get into challenging schools. Others only apply to schools near home because they don’t want to go that far away.

Another factor for where students are applying this year is price. College is extremely expensive, especially for out of state and private schools. The in-state price for UVA is around $35,000 but for out of state students it can be up to $75,000. UVA isn’t a private institution and though students might live closer than some kids in Virginia, they would have to pay close to $40,000 more.

To help cope with this issue UVA has a student loan policy where the max student loan a person can take on is 25% of the tuition. Other colleges, however, do not have this generous policy in place. “UVA is my dream school and for them to have such a great policy like this is something that I think is truly amazing for them to do,” senior Nikhil Bakshi said.

Most private schools offer early action and also offer early decision. This type of application is binding, which means if you apply to a school with early decision and you end up getting accepted to that school, you must attend. This can help better students’ chances of getting into prestigious schools but also doesn’t give students options if they get into that school.

There is also an application called restricted early action, which is pretty much the same thing as early decision. The differences are that restricted early action prohibits students from applying to any other private schools early action or early decision but students can still apply to those private schools via regular decision. “I decided to not do early decision or restricted early action because I want to see all the schools I get in and choose which school I want to go to. I also don’t want to be stuck with just one option unless I truly love a school, which I don’t,” senior Jared Su said.

The most popular school students are applying to this year is University of Maryland College Park, a top 60 national university. This is the most popular one for students because it’s close to home and offers in-state tuition. “I have grown up always watching Maryland sports so having a chance at actually attending the school would be amazing for me and my family,” senior Parker Leibowitz said.