Question about Preferred Deadline

[hatunashnu]

I am applying to the Univesity of Maryland school of Public Policy and I was wondering what they exactly mean by preferred deadline. The website does not explain it, however, other grad programs at UM say that it is for financial assistance. I was wondering if I can just assume that is true for the public policy school too.

Also, it seems that April 1st is pretty late.

Thoughts??

From: http://www.publicpolicy.umd.edu/prospective/application.html

APPLICATION DEADLINES

Fall – All (but EXPM and POSI)

· Preferred Fall: December 15

· International: February 1

· Final Fall: April 1

[pea-jay]

That's gotta be for financial aid purposes. Most schools usually say that directly though

[socialcomm]

Yeah, I'd assume that the April 1 applicants might not be considered for funding.

[alexis]

And if you go for the Dec 15 deadline, you might have better chances of getting in if they doing a rolling app process.

[johndiligent]

I'd say December 15 is the deadline to get considered for financial aid. With absolutely no guarantees, they'll keep accepting applications after that deadline but only until April 1.

In other words, you should apply by December 15 if you're at all keen on getting in.

[hatunashnu]

Cool, thanks for the replies.