Due to technical issues with the Common Application (Common App), the Office of Undergraduate Admissions this year decided to extend its Early Decision I deadline and accept the Universal College Application (UCA) in addition to the Common App.
The university made these changes in order to help high schools and applicants struggling with the Common App, which previously served as the universitys sole medium for application, according to Dean of Undergraduate Admissions Lee Coffin.
This years Early Decision I (ED1) deadline, originally scheduled for Nov. 1, has been extended a week to Nov. 8, Coffin said. The deadline for Early Decision II and Regular Decision will remain on Jan. 1.
Coffin noted that although the extended ED1 deadline will put pressure on the admissions office, he hopes it will help alleviate tension among applicants.
The Common Apps glitches began this past summer, when a new version of the application, known as CA4, was launched on Aug. 1. Coffin said that this update immediately posed issues for Admissions.
We werent able to import and upload the applications, which is a significant problem, he said. We are now able to do that, but it took from August to about three weeks ago for the tech team at Tufts to be able to reprogram [the Common App].
Coffin noted that Tufts was not alone in its problems with the Common App, as almost all of the colleges using the application experienced similar issues. Even with Tufts reprogramming efforts, however, high schools and applicants have continued to contact Admissions regarding difficulties with the Common App.
What we are hearing now, with lots of phone-calls and emails, is that the high schools are having a hard time uploading the transcripts, guidance counselor letters and teacher recommendations, and the students are having difficult times with logging on to the Common App, saving their work [and] submitting their application fees, Coffin said.
According to Moira McKinnon, director of College Counseling at Berwick Academy, a private high school in South Berwick, Maine, the Common Apps slow loading times have created anxiety among many students.
The link between Naviance [an online college and career planning tool] and the [Common App], which allows teachers and counselors to send recommendations and transcripts, slowed to the speed of a slug, McKinnon told the Daily in an email. Wait times to upload a one-page PDF were 12 hours or more, and then ... it stopped altogether. This obviously was a major problem for anyone trying to meet a Nov. 1 deadline.
Coffin explained that after Princeton announced in early October its decision to accept the UCA as well as the Common App, Tufts began to consider the option as well.
Best case scenario, the Common App is working, and we have a second way for students to apply, he said. Worst case scenario, the Common App remains flawed, and we can point to a second place and say: Same application, different vendors.
The decision to also accept the UCA was relatively easy to make, Coffin said, as the format of the UCA does not differ at all from that of the Common App.
The UCA was founded about five years ago, when former Common App programmers created their own alternative college application. Competition between the UCA and the Common App, however, reduced the new applications impact. Before this years issues with the Common App, Harvard University was one of the few colleges that offered applicants the option of using the UCA, according to Coffin.
Historically, not many places have signed up [to the UCA] because the Common App was fine, it was working and there was really no need for a second one, he said.
Admissions is still considering the possibility of using a Tufts-specific application, Coffin said. Prior to the Common Apps launch in the 1970s, every college, including Tufts, utilized its own application.
This practice died down when the Common App became successful, leaving Georgetown as the last major school to use its own application. In light of the Common Apps recent failures, however, there may be reason to revive the old Tufts application, he said.
Has technology advanced to the point where college-specific applications are not as onerous as they were [before the Web]? he said. I dont know. I think thats a big question.
On the other hand, Coffin emphasized that shifting back to school-specific applications would also likely shrink the size of the application pools, which have grown dramatically since the 1980s due to the ease of applying to multiple schools though the Common App. 12
