<p>^That would give a) one hell of a huge advantage to applying EA, something they’re not willing to do, and b) it would decrease the chances of internationals even further, as if they’d need that, and c) nothing you can do senior year will likely be a tipping factor anyway, there’s no one magic trick that will get you in and d) doing what the admissions office asks you to do to get in kind of defeats the point of their choosing the class most well-fit to MIT based on merit alone (and by merit I mean people who don’t have an advantage and can still get in.) There are probably other points that don’t come to mind right now, but the idea is unfair - I wouldn’t have been comfortable knowing that deferred EA students knew something I didn’t.
PS: I know of the athlete/international thing which gives the former an edge and the latter a disadvantage in the process, so it’s not all based on equal merit and stuff, but this is sort of negligible in the grand scheme of things. And this is coming from an international student who didn’t get in.</p>