<p>Duke</a> early decision applications drop by 70 | The Chronicle</p>
<p>This is very interesting. As an ED applicant for the Class of 2017, I have mixed feelings. Does anyone have any interesting interpretations about this new stat or am I getting all worked up over nothing?</p>
<p>To be honest,I thought it was going to drop even more than that so I’m dissapointed as an ED candidate.</p>
<p>Well I’m certainly happy. Doesn’t that mean the ED acceptance rate will rise? Do you think this is mainly due to Sandy?</p>
<p>gmichski,</p>
<p>Doubt this has much to do with Sandy as Ivies that draw heavily from NYC/NJ/Conn area like Brown and Penn have experienced a rise in EDs. A three percent fall is pretty small and comes after big increases in ED applicants over the past five years, and so I do not think this reflects on the school.</p>
<p>It actually probably has a lot to do with Sandy. Duke foolishly gave its applicants a two day extension whereas its peers extended deadlines indefinitely. That is what made the difference in my opinion.</p>
<p>Yep, Duke only extended its deadline for 2 days while Dartmouth, for instance, is still accepting ED applications as it experienced a 12% drop in applicants. I think Brown and Penn gave affected applicants 2 extra weeks to apply.</p>
<p>I am extremely happy hearing this since I am an ED candidate.</p>
<p>I doubt this drop is at all significant given the recent trend. It is analogous to Apple stock dropping $20 after almost tripling in the past 5 years to $500+. A better measure would be to look at the applications in total after the RD deadline and an even better measure would be looking at rolling 3 year averages or something like that to smooth out blips.</p>
<p>After reading about how ED apps had been increasing so quickly, I was a bit worried about my son applying ED this year. If Duke had not been so clearly number one on his list, we probably would not have done ED. I wonder if other applicants may have felt similarly? Also, I have no idea as to the reality of this, but are more schools switching from ED to EA? I would think EA would draw more applicants as well. Just a theory, though…</p>
<p>As the other ED-ers have mentioned, for those of us our our kids who HAVE applied this year, it’s 70 less kids to compete against! (Just kidding… we all certainly want the school to retain its high standing)</p>