<p>Harvard and Princeton dropped EA/ED in part because studies suggested two things: 1) applying EA/ED increase the probability of admissions by about the same amount as having 100 additional points on the SATs; and 2) students with an ED admission (and maybe EA) who needed financial aid were disadvantaged in bargaining for better aid from the school because they didn't have additional offers to compare (and perhaps play different schools off against each other).</p>
<p>Yale and Brown, among others, retained EA/ED. Is there any data suggesting an advantage (a la point 1) for applying EA/ED last year?</p>
<p>As far as I’m concerned, Harvard and Princeton dropped EA/ED mainly because applicants tried to ‘beat the system’ by trying to use shady strategies to have better chances of getting in.</p>
<p>Harvard’s OFFICIAL line on why it dropped EA is that EA advantaged “applicants from certain regions,” and Harvard wants all applicants to be on an even footing. I heard this at a Harvard admission information session on the Harvard campus in February 2008. Princeton’s press release said, </p>
<p>I think it’s still a little early to say which colleges will imitate which other colleges as to early action or early decision policies. What everyone is doing right now is an experiment vis a vis what competitor colleges are doing.</p>
<p>All the data I’ve seen suggest this varies widely by school. At some schools it’s an enormous advantage to apply ED: much higher acceptance rate, and a large percentage of the entering class admitted ED. At other schools the ED acceptance rate is closer to the RD rate (but ED is almost always somewhat higher). You just can’t generalize on this. Data for each school are available in US News.</p>
<p>I’m wondering about this issue too, mainly concerning top LACs. What if I’m not 100% sure about a school but I would be realllly disappointed if I didn’t get in? Is applying ED worth it?</p>
<p>What aren’t you sure about clippie? I mean not sure of one top LAC over another, or not sure you want a small LAC at all? When my son was considering ED I said, come up with a short list of your favorites. He came up with 3. I said, if they all accepted you, which one would you go to? He narrowed it to 2. I said, I am more confident in the one school’s financial aid policies than I am in the other’s. He said, okay, that’s the place then. ;)</p>
<p>Legacies and Athletes are included when ED is calculated.</p>
<p>ED does increase chances, but the pool is different. It is not as though if you wouldn’t get in RD, you would get in ED. However, it does help to show that you would definitely attend that school if accepted. It increases their yield numbers.</p>
<p>Certain schools, like JHU and many Jesuit schools take most of their applicants ED. JHU took a ridiculous amount ED, to the point where it is almost not worth applying RD, because there are just so many people for so few spots.</p>
<p>ED Definitely increases chances – colleges want to keep their admission rates low and ED students ensure that they’ll have to admit fewer students because there will be fewer who may not attend.</p>
<p>Single Choice EA does as well.</p>
<p>EA overall does slightly. Colleges know that EA applicants are more likely to enroll. For that reason, they tend to offer more admittances than to regular students.</p>
<p>Not necessarily true; it really depends on the college. Looking at the data for several colleges, it’s clear that there is no difference in admissions rate between EA and RD. Heck, Notre Dame even tells kids not to apply EA bcos that app pool is stronger.</p>
<p>Colleges say that frequently, but they usually don’t give independent researchers access to the data that would allow confirming those statements. </p>