Advice needed: UChicago ED1or2

Hello, I am a parent who follows this forum regularily but this is my first post to ask for independent advice for my kid.

His dream school is UChicago, visited in the summer and loves it. However he feels he may not be strong enough of an applicant to UChicago. He understand his best chance is applying through ED.

Reading through this forum and other online posting, last year UChciago ED1 acceptance rate is best estimated at 17.9% and ED2 is anybody’s guess but some put it on par with ED1 rate as 17.9%. Personally I believe ED2 rate will be lower then ED1 and is also more competitive as a lot kids got waitlisted from HYPSM will be gladly apply UChicago’s ED2.

He attends a decent public school in southeast where the school regularly sends kids 10-12 each year to Duke. He visited and likes Duke too but feels UChicago is a better fit. Duke’s last year’s ED acceptance rate is 21.39%. I think given Duke has a bigger athlete program, the real acceptance rate difference for an unhooked asian kid might be smaller than it is indicated as 21.39% vs. 17.9%.

The other fact is nobody from his high school has gone to UChicago for the last two years, which is little odd considering a comparable neighboring high school has 2 student was accepted to UChicago for the last two cycles. He doesn’t know if there was any previous misbehaving applicants from his school that might causes UChicago “blackmail” his school. He doesn’t think it would be because nobody applied to UChicago from his school either. He has a brand new counselor this year and can’t provide too much insight on this either. Of course we feel blatantly ask this to UChicago AO is counter-productive.

He is going back and forth if he should apply UChicago through ED1 since it is clearly his dream school and financial it is okay too. He is tored to think that to maximize his chance, he should ED Duke and should Duke waitlists him he will then ED2 UChicago. He think this way he might has two chances at two of the best educational institutes in the country. financially attending Duke as full-pay will stretch the family dollar to the very limit.

His stats:
SAT I: 1520 (7/7/7, 790, 730)
ACT: 34
SAT II (Type, Score): Taking on October 6
Weighted GPA: 4.68
Unweighted GPA: 4.0
Rank (percentile if rank is unavailable): top 2%
Decent ECs, a couple of club level leadership position but nothing extraordinary

Can some of you UChicago CC guru help with your advice or suggestion if he should stick with ED1 UChicago or apply Duke ED and Chicago ED2 to max his chance?

Also, is “blacklist” a highschool for a couple of years a myth or real?

I would not apply ED to Duke if he prefers UChicago.

“financially attending Duke as full-pay will stretch the family dollar to the very limit.”

UChicago is 78k/yr - have you run the numbers to see if you can afford UChicago? If full-pay at Duke is there a reason you would not be full-pay at UChicago?

Why does he think he is not a strong applicant to UChicago? The stats you posted look strong…

Most high schools send zero students to UChicago in any given year. There are something like 25,000 high schools across the country and 1,800 students in the class of 2022. Toss in the schools that regularly send 10+ (Andover, Exeter, Stuy, Thomas Jefferson, etc.) and a bunch that happen to send 2-3 in a given year, and I’d guess our class is filled by no more than 1500 high schools - probably less.

Because the numbers involved are so small, this is likely a product of randomness. If the other school consistently sent 5-10 students a year here, and your school sent 10+ to a bunch of top-10 schools, but none to UChicago, that might suggest a pattern. It might still be random

For reference, the number accepted at my school, over the years I know data for: 0, 0, 0, 0, 0, 0, 0, 0, 1, 2, 0, 0, ??? (This fall)

So depending on when you looked at this data, you could conclude that A. my school was blacklisted, B. UChicago liked us, or C. a few students got lucky.

Thanks happy and caymus, I think all the ultra competitive nature applying UChicago has got to him and somehow let him. I point to him that Duke is also ultra competitive. I think it’s normal for kid that age under the pressure to wavering in their thinking.

DunB, I also think it’s random and frankly there is no way to prove otherwise short of the GC at her school says oh yeah I remember a kid a year ago blacked out an ED commitment from UChicago. Most likely it’s pool of Chicago applicants from his school in the last fee cycles were not received as “truly standard out” by the regional AO or admission office as a whole. Even in this case, it will be a disadvantage to apply Chicago ED. It’s hard to fight against a perception unless you’re truly exceptional.

Regardless of preference, does the strategy of trying ED then ED2 again really give a better statsticaal advantages? This about it, you will have two chances: one at near 21% then another at near 18%, before all other changes at RD round drops to 5-6%.

Any family tried this strategy and regreted?

Meh. Admissions officers will consider the overall situation of a high school - is it challenging, are alums well-prepared for college, etc. - to make sure a student’s GPA and other data points are representative of their ability. They’ll want to be sure a student took a challenging courseload for their school. Class rank is another part of the picture. They’ll judge this by your kid’s transcript and his school’s profile. Admissions is not judging a quality of a school on the basis of a handful of applicants every year.

Your kid will not be disadvantaged by previous applicants having weak essays, or boring extracurriculars, or whatever, unless he submits weak essays and has boring extracurriculars.

I would bet the odds in ED2 are considerably lower for anyone that doesn’t get in during ED1.

If some factor kept UChicago from admitting a kid over other ED applicants the first time around, that factor will probably affect the student’s chances during ED2.

In statistical lingo, the events “deferred during ED” and “rejected during ED2” are not independent. A student’s odds of acceptance given they were deferred ED1 are lower than the overall ED2 rate.

The main exception that comes to mind is if there’s a major change to the student’s profile between ED and ED2. A major award, extracurricular accomplishment, etc.

Assuming cost is not an issue, I’d suggest ED1 at UChicago. Both great schools, but in the only ranking that counts (your son’s), Chicago is better than Duke. The best chances are ED1. If that is your “dream school” you want to give that your best shot.

I don’t think someone who is deferred ED1 is eligible to apply ED2. There are two ED rounds, but a particular student only gets one ED shot.

What you CAN do, and what has been very popular the past two years, is to apply EA initially, and then convert the application to an ED2 application when the EA application is deferred (as the overwhelming majority of them are). No one outside the Admissions Office has any idea what the success rate is on that strategy, but the anecdotal evidence on CC certainly seems to be that strong candidates who apply EA, get deferred, and convert to ED2 have quite a decent chance of being accepted. But I doubt it’s a better chance of being accepted than if they had applied ED1 in the first place.

As for the original question in this thread: If your goal is to maximize your chances of being accepted at a prestigious university, the best chance is applying ED elsewhere (like Duke), and then applying ED2 at Chicago if your first ED application is not successful. That gives you two bites at the ED apple, and essentially it’s what ED2 is for.

If, on the other hand, your goal is to maximize your chances of being accepted at the University of Chicago, obviously the better strategy is to apply ED1 there. I think that’s especially true if your “stats” are not stellar. Looking at CC, I think there are definitely people like that who are accepted ED1. Not necessarily a lot of them, but some. Not so much ED2 or RD. Between the SCEA/Ivy ED refugees, and the EA applicants who convert to ED2, I think the Chicago ED2 round has a lot of people with very high stats in it, and that’s where Admissions goes to make certain that its entering class is full of high-stats kids.

For the most part, however, I think that applying ED is a much better strategy where your application is a strong one for that college, not a marginal one. At a college like Chicago, the RD acceptance rate is so low that lots of very highly qualified candidates have to be rejected. In the ED1 round, by and large very highly qualified candidates are accepted.

Added thanks to DunB, Brain and JHS!

I agree to most of what you guys are saying - that the kid “will not be disadvantaged by previous applicants having weak essays, or boring extracurriculars, or whatever, unless he submits weak essays and has boring extracurriculars.”. Ultimately every aspect of his application has to be superb. And this is the only thing that is within his own control.

The EA UChicago then convert to ED2 strategy to me is the weakest one, for precise the reason DunB has listed “(If some factor kept UChicago from admitting a kid over other ED applicants the first time around, that factor will probably affect the student’s chances during ED2.”). I can switch the word “ED” here with an “EA” but essentually the same logic applies. Plus many Chicago EA applicants are also EA at school like MIT etc, the chance is not that great for a good candidates but the greatest ones.

Like JHS had pointed out, ED other school (like Duke, Hopkins) then ED2 Chicago will allow maximizing the chance to get into a prestigious school. One downside I could see, is that some kids from his school that are stronger then him comes back to the same Chicago ED2 pool when their other 1st choice campaigns are unsuccessful and they rediscover UChicago ED2 - aka local “SCEA/Ivy ED refugees”. All of the sudden, Chicago ED2 pool becomes bloody competitive.

Try his best effort and ED1 to UChicago seems to be a strategy that is more fundamental based. Also, if this is his dream school this should be his clear ED choice as he is also incline to put forth his best efforts in preparing, pull up a great essay etc. The downside is he can fall all the way down out of top 18th-20th colleges but this is also what everybody else is facing.

@myyuanfen There are plenty of awesome schools in the top 100 in the United States. What I told my son when he was faced with the same “Game,” map out the outcomes and pick the path that gives you the best chance to be happy. He chose ED1 at UChicago, knowing he’d be happy at his backups of Colgate and Washington&Lee (and maybe the USNA, but he never really fell in love with Navy). It wasn’t UChicago, then Yale, but both of his backups were places he’d feel great getting an education.

That’s not what I’m saying - ED is binding, so the college is 99% certain an ED admit will attend. So, all things being equal, ED offers a significant advantage over EA. EDII might offer better odds than EA because of this. In my post above, we’re assuming a student was deferred even with the ED boost, so the situation is different.

Not saying EDII will necessarily offer better odds than EA for a given student, but the same logic can’t apply to EA and ED.

DunB, I got your point.

Brian, one of my son’s friend is a ACT 36 applicant from a top elite public school and he was waitlisted everywhere last year. Eventually he is attending a fine state flagship school but he isn’t happy since this was his last choice.

My son, on the other hand, visited the same state flagship school and likes the school and knowing the backup choice is there and he could be equally happy there to get a good education relieves some pressure.

“one of my son’s friend is a ACT 36 applicant from a top elite public school and he was waitlisted everywhere last year.”

We saw many high stat kids in similar situations posting on the CC boards. It’s a stark reminder that at the T20 colleges, stats are only one part of the application. The ECs, essays and LoRs are critical. Your son can increase his chances for admission by doing some research to figure out what each of his top choice colleges is looking for. If he has the attributes they’re looking for and can show that through his essays and how he structures his app (down to deciding in what order to list ECs and how to describe them), that demonstration that he is a “match” or a “fit” for that college can be a huge help.

Isn’t Uchicago’s ED acceptance rates also are “inflated” by hooked applicants? Granted it is a Diii school, but does anyone know what percentage of accepted ED1/2 kids are of athletes/legacies/other hooks?

Yes, but the non-hooked rate is still best in ED1.

Not to question your statement but what does “non-hooked rate is still best in ED1” mean? @BrianBoiler asking because at the most recent hs parent meeting our GC stated that ED’s having higher admit rates “is mainly due to the smaller application pool with higher stat kids, so applying early does not increase your chance, it only gives the illusion”. Wonder whether anyone could prove otherwise.

Some smaller schools (I know for a fact Williams) have the same acceptance rate regardless of the round. The ED pool will calculate at a higher rate because the athletic department uses the ED process to get their athlete slots filled. At UChicago there is some of that, but the number of athletes is a smaller percentage of those totally accepted. I could probably do the math, but last year total accepted rate during ED1 at UChicago was around 17%. If you remove the athletes that applied in ED1 (our son’s track coach also told him he could have applied ED2, so this probably applies there as well) your acceptance rate was probably closer to 12% which is still higher than any of the other rounds.

I hope that makes sense. If not, I’ll follow-up.

Of course the other option is to go ED1 to UChicago and if not successful then ED2 to another college, maybe Vanderbilt or Emory or a host of other schools that offer ED2.

The other thing to consider is even though the unhooked rate is say 12%, that doesn’t really mean you have a 12% chance of being accepted. All the names are not dumped into a hat and they pick out 12%. Every application has an individual chance of acceptance. Your baseline will be about 12%, but you can improve your chances with exceptional essays, recommendations and ECs. I really believe (many disagree with me) that many great stats kids write a good essay, but is says nothing special about the student. I believe, many just go to their “most fun loving” teachers and ask for recommendations. My oldest, through some nefarious computer hacking, saw his reco from someone who he thought would be awesome. It was a form letter that didn’t even mention my son by name.

My second son actually sat down with each of his recommendation writers and discussed with them what he thought might be good topics to include in the letter. For example for UChicago, he told them that the University really values a students love for learning and asked them if they could include some examples of how he displayed that in his studies. He wrote very nice handwritten thank you notes after they sent them, because he may have wanted to use them again.

I think it is important in your essays to tell the UChicago that you are their type of student and that your goals align with theirs. Show them that you really did your research on what is important to the University and how you’ve applied that in the past and how you want to apply that in the future.

I’ve two boys that went through this process with very similar stats. S#2 won a National Merit Scholarship, but that was after he was accepted. S#1 was an Eagle Scout and I think probably a little smarter. The differences between their application process was great. #1 was an independent thinker who knew better. #2 was willing to take advice and weigh its merits and if he liked it he would apply it. #1 was waitlisted at choice #1 and choice #2. Ended up picking between #3 and #4 and has just come to grips with his university choice.

Sorry I got on a soap box at the end.

@CU123, Vandy could be an good ED2 option as well. He doesn’t think he fits there well but there are definitely pros and cons and it is a great school.

@BrainBoiler, there are different educated guess at UChicago’s ED1 acceptance rate, I was based on the discussion thread from April this year:
http://talk.qa.collegeconfidential.com/university-chicago/2071939-uchicago-final-admission-s-statistics-theory-p1.html

That thread puts UChicago’s ED1 rate somewhere north of 17%.

Throwing in the Diii athlete recruitment and legacy program, my guess for the un-hooked kids put is around 14-15%.

Now if you put your estimate for un-hooked at close to 12%, that’s a HUGE discrepency with a some estimates here. And frankly it’s hard to believe it’s lower than any of it’s Ivy peers. Still possible consider UChicago’s big time campaign reach, but a lot of the smart kids would probably steer away from Chicago ED.

Class of 2022 ED %
Brown 21.05
Columbia 15.91

Cornell 24.26
Dartmouth 24.89
Harvard 14.54
Penn 18.55

Princeton 14.79

Yale 14.69

Total Ivies 18.05
Duke 21.39

Vesus school like Duke for instance, clearly publishes their ED rate as: 21.39% (875 out of 4090) last year. Even you consider bigger promotion of athlete recruitment and legacy program, it will still be a lot higher rate (say 18%) than the 12% with UChicago.

It probably wouldn’t make my son to change his mind but statistically speaking he needs to fully grasp that he is competing in a tougher pool than the Ivies.