<ol>
<li><p>By how much % do one's chances go up if they do EA / ED for colleges? For example, the % of students that get in to Cornell for regular decision is around 20%. What % chance would I have if I do ED to Cornell?</p></li>
<li><p>If you get rejected from an EA / ED college, can you apply again for regular decision?</p></li>
<li><p>Which of these schools would be best to do ED for? - Johns Hopkins, Emory, Cornell, or Washington University.
Or to better put it, what is hardest among these schools to get into?</p></li>
</ol>
<p>1) It varies from school to school, but for the most selective schools, the EA and ED crowd is already pretty self selective so it wouldn’t be a stretch to say that it’s just as competitive as RD.</p>
<p>2) No, you may not apply again. If you are rejected, you are rejected for good.</p>
<p>3) Do ED for the school you love the most. The RD rate shouldn’t matter that much.</p>
<p>1 & 3. Go to the CB site, they give numbers for EA/ED:</p>
<p>[College</a> Search - Find colleges and universities by major, location, type, more.](<a href=“College Search - BigFuture | College Board”>College Search - BigFuture | College Board)</p>
<p>But like Jaddua says, it’s not just all numbers, EA and RD pools are not necessarily similar.</p>
<p>In general, applying ED will almost always give you an admissions advantage - at some place, it is bigger than others.
WashU is notorious for waitlisting TONS of people in the RD round - the general consensus is that they often will waitlist great candidates that they feel might have gotten into an Ivy or other such school. They will then pull those students off the waitlist if they show interest, but it’s a bit of a gamble. </p>
<p>This is just my experience, but I think ED at Cornell confers a pretty good advantage. It’s still more selective than Hopkins and Emory (not that those two aren’t selective), but ED helps make it more reasonable, IMO.</p>
<p>That said, if you want to do ED, do ED at the school because you love it, not because of the admissions advantage. However, if you love all of them and would be happy at any, I don’t see anything wrong with picking one to ED at because it <em>can</em> help you a lot. Just don’t pick one <em>only</em> for it’s superior ED advantage.</p>
<p>Okay, so does that mean if I apply to top universities, there’s not much of a difference between applying EA / ED and RD? The only reason I would do EA/ED is to pretty much find out early if I’m accepted or not?</p>
<p>Yes, although it would also show that the school is your #1 school (which would matter more at WUSTL than Stanford).</p>
<p>No, ED (but not EA) will confer an advantage, so if you do have a number 1, applying ED can help. I think at any of the schools you mentioned, ED will give you an advantage. And you would know early, yes.</p>
<p>^No, not necessarily. Many Ivy adcoms have stated that they only accept people in the ED round that they would have definitely accepted in the RD round. They defer and reject the rest. </p>
<p>There may be an advantage in applying ED to the other schools, though.</p>
<p>"The only reason I would do EA/ED is to pretty much find out early if I’m accepted or not? "</p>
<p>But the difference with ED is that it’s binding on you to attend if they grant you ED admission. BIG difference to EA (which is just an early notification)</p>
<p>hmmm i see… BUMP</p>
<p>ED generally gives an advantage in admissions, but it does mean that you’re committed. Sure, you really want to attend the school you apply to November 2, but in 5 months when everyone else gets their decisions will you still be so excited?</p>
<p>EA isn’t binding, of course, but as a result of that it doesn’t really help you that much.</p>
<p>Please see this thread and scroll down to post #21 / 22. This lists the ED rates versus RD rates for the top 50 universities and top 50 LAC’s. The numbers are about a year out of date, but nonetheless, should help you.</p>
<p><a href=“http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/parents-forum/761568-applying-stanford-vandy-cmc-chicago-northwestern-tulane-ea-choice.html[/url]”>http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/parents-forum/761568-applying-stanford-vandy-cmc-chicago-northwestern-tulane-ea-choice.html</a></p>
<p>EA does help you, especially if you’re a strong applicant (although obviously not as much as ED). At a school like Stanford, for example, they’re going to look at 30K Applications in a year. If you apply EA, you sizeably shrink the pool of students you are grouped in with–so if you’re truly a strong candidate, you probably won’t be lost in the shuffle.</p>
<p>If you don’t have a true #1, and you don’t want to apply ED anywhere, I would say apply EA to the school that gives the EA applicants the best advantage over the regular applicants. You can always turn them down, and at least you’ll be able to take advantage of the advantages they offer through the application process.</p>