College Application Programs 101

RA (Regular Admission): Students are required to apply by a fixed date with the following time frame:
     Application Deadline: around December 31.   
     Result:
           Accepted -- You have choice to attend the college.     
           Rejected  -- You can't attend the college.   
           Waiting Listed  -- You are currently not accepted, but you may be accepted at later date.
     Result Notification Date: around April. 1.
     Student Enrollment Notification Deadline: around May 1.       

Rolling Application: The college considers each student's application as soon as all the required credentials such as application, school record, and test scores have been received. The college usually notifies applicants of its decision in 4-6 weeks.    
 
ED (Early Decision): binding application, if you are accepted by the college, you need to enter that college and withdraw all other applications. Here are some examples of colleges support ED: Dartmouth, Columbia, Cornell.

EA (Early Action): similar to  ED except that students, if accepted, are not required to accept admission or withdraw other applications. They have until May 1 to notify their decision. Here are some examples of colleges support EA: MIT, Univ. of Chicago, Caltech

SCEA == Single Choice Early Action, it is more restricted EA, students can only apply one college early. Here are some examples of colleges currently support SCEA: Stanford, Yale

The time frame for early admission (ED/EA/SCEA) is:
     Application Deadline: around November 1.   
     Result:
           Accepted -- You have choice to attend the college.     
           Rejected  -- You can't attend the college.   
           Deferred -- You are currently not accepted, but you will be reconsidered and may be accepted during RA
     Result Notification Date: around December 15.
     Student Enrollment Notification Deadline: around May 1.  

Note: college application programs are determined by the individual college and it can be changed at any time, for example, both Harvard and Princeton eliminated EA a couple of years ago, and resumed EA in 2012. You need to go to individual college's web site to get the current application programs.