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Statement to Applicants

To promote a fair and transparent admission process, the member schools of the Association of Independent Schools of Greater Washington (“AISGW”) have established the following guidelines for working with families and students applying to their schools.  We strongly encourage all AISGW schools and applicant families to abide by these guidelines.

Schools should make clear to applicants all dates pertaining to admission and re-enrollment. AISGW recommends the following timeline:

  • Notification Date – Notification of admission decisions shall be the first Friday in March. Electronic notification, which includes email, telephone, online portal, or any other form of instant notification, shall not occur before 4 pm. Letters may be placed in the U.S. mail to be received on the first Friday in March.
  • Registration/Reply Date – Enrollment contracts for newly admitted students are due back to the school no earlier than the third Friday in March or two weeks from the date of notification.
  • Tuition Binding Date – Enrollment contracts for newly admitted and re-enrolling students are binding as of 4:00 pm on June 1. This means that schools may not release the tuition obligation of a family that has already enrolled unless the family notifies the school of its decision to enroll elsewhere by 4:00 pm on June 1.  If June 1 falls on a weekend, the binding date shall be 4:00 pm on the immediately preceding Friday.

Upon receipt of an application, member schools of AISGW presume that if an applicant is currently enrolled at another independent school, the applicant’s family already has notified that school of an intention to apply elsewhere in the independent school community.

An AISGW member school will not accept a student from another AISGW school without receipt of appropriate records directly from the student’s present school. Families must request the relevant records (i.e., transcripts) from their current school as part of the application process.

Families should inform all independent schools to which they have applied if and when they no longer seek admission to the schools for the coming academic year.

Families should not submit an enrollment deposit at more than one school.

With respect to financial aid, families should note the following:

  • A family’s aid shall be provisional until all requested documentation is submitted
  • Schools and families shall not engage in discussions regarding other schools’ awards for purpose of bargaining for students to the extent such discussions could lead to awards that exceed demonstrated need
  • With respect to merit-based aid, such awards and the criteria for receiving them shall be published by the school in its admission materials and/or on its website.