<p>^^Many, if not the majority, of the ED and RD applicants to the top 10 lacs have the academic chops for HYPSM, but prefer the a more intimate academic environment. You have to be comfortable with the idea of a lifetime of “My cousin went to Roger Williams too.” But some prefer to fly under the radar.</p>
<p>I think the Williams of the world are comparable to the old money ethos of driving non-descript cars and lived in clothing versus the Ivy mentality–for some–of “Look at this shiny bauble.”</p>
<p>Though I don’t see it as a huge problem, and it is indeed a luxury of a problem to have, I don’t like seeing kids “settling” at so early of an age instead of giving it a go. Fine if it’s their own idea, but most of these high schoolers are not that informed and are going by parental advice. Too often the goal is to get into the most selective, most prestigious school possible with the best odds. Again, not necessarily anything wrong with that. But I feel a twinge when kids are seeking an ED school because they want to get that ED school with no feeling that the school is truly first choice I’m old fashioned in that I feel that the ED commitment should be made when the school is a first choice school, not the because it 's optimal school by other factors. But that is not the way things have evolved.</p>
<p>No one said that HYPS “are always at the top of the heap for everybody.” I specifically said that they weren’t, and I am right here in the center of northeastern U.S. parochialism, where the Known World consists of the Amtrak Corridor and Silicon Valley, and everywhere else is Flyover Country or Where We Vacation. At the same time, I suspect that you are not going to find a college (other than maybe MIT) that is the absolute first choice of more 4.0+, 2300+ and/or 35+ students than those colleges, at least across a reasonably wide group of students. Even in Chicagoland.</p>
<p>By my lights, what’s wrong with this statement is that it’s an implied premise that a kid ought to have a “first choice school,” and that the “first choice” has a powerful, almost magical meaning. Neither is really true. By process of elimination, every kid has a first choice school, but the subjective difference between the kid’s first choice school and the fifth choice school may be practically nothing. And the objective difference between Choice #1 and Choice #5 is, in fact, in almost all cases, next to nothing. It would be perfectly rational, and no tragedy at all, to trade in a 3% chance of admission to Choice #1 against a 1% or 2% increase in the chance of acceptance at Choice #5. But the benefits of making the tradeoff are much greater than that.</p>
<p>Any system that does not please 100 percent of candidates sucks in theory, but why would we say that the systems sucks, and in particular the early admissions system? </p>
<p>Let’s start with the early admissions. As we know --or guesstimate-- the early admissions represent an opportunity for many students as the rates appear to be more generous. But its that the only benefit? How about reaping the benefits for having started earlier (a really, really good idea) in the August-October timeframe and being DONE in December? </p>
<p>No more worries about getting applications, test scores, LORs, and agonizing over decisions! That is worth a pot of gold before Christmas! </p>
<p>Let’s face it: the schools are indeed REWARDING the students who have a clear choice about their academic future or athletic future. One could say that the early admissions hurt the remaining pool, but that is a matter of perspective as in the end the same number of students are admitted in a formula that should deliver the appropriate yield. With the current lack of any meaningful bite in the ED agreements, the financial aid dilemmas have become quacking canards. </p>
<p>All in all, the system does work as intended. And the fact that it rewards the well prepared and astute applicant is simply one facet of working well. EA/ED is the Black Friday of admissions. </p>
<p>@JHS: In Chicagoland, I would say that’s not true. Don’t underestimate the home region effect. It’s also why most elite football players go to a program near home rather than far away.</p>
<p>In any case, UChicago would have a lock on the quirky intellectual kids (none of HYPSM are as quirky and fiercely intellectual as the UofC), while NU offers an atmosphere and supremacy in certain programs that the Ivies can’t match (Stanford would be competitive).</p>
<p>Ain’t that a bit of misplaced hyperbole? In general this would mean that none of the schools listed is as quirky and fiercely intellectual as Chicago. If if that were remotely true, could you say the same thing about the students who attend the schools? Unless, you mean that it relates to the projected and purported image, I really do not see how anyone could make such a broad statement and hope it to be considered legitimate. </p>
<p>That intellectual moniker is already tossed around enough!</p>
<p>@xiggi, sure say it’s the projected image. Whatever it is, the Chicagoland kids I knew who were quirky and intellectual had UChicago as a higher choice than HYPS.</p>
<p>One would think that a person’s “intellectualism” and “quirkiness” would lead that person to question the meanings of those words (or at least not to use the words until they become “hip” and meaningless), and to doubt such generalities, but…</p>
<p>It’s easier to claim that one herd is superior to another than to avoid the herd altogether.</p>
<p>To clarify, this post has more than one addressee. </p>
<p>There are plenty of kids in the midwest aching for an Ivy or a highly/most competitive in the NE. Sometimes, I think folks have the impression it’s really just a handful, some rarities who forget how good local options are. Not. Similarly, many think Texans prefer to stay in Texas. Well sure, many do. But that leaves plenty who want something different.</p>
<p>I think you have to get away from the idea “strong” is mostly about stats. Or that any kid applying ED to a competitive is plain old stronger. Imo, it’s more that when the kid does have the maturity and follow-through to have reasoned about college choices, and does determine he/she could happily commit to one if accepted ED, the best of them can clearly articulate why this college. Not all the applicants.</p>
<p>I agree that many kids do not have dream schools, In fact most students don’t even have selective schools on their lists. It’s a small sector that are dealing with the selective schools. Agreed that the reward for being prepared to get apps out by Early deadlines is often a more generous consideration and also having the weight of the application process over by the holidays What a bonus, what a relief, I agree. My son is revelling more in this than the choice of college even having a clear first choice to which he did ED. Had he decided to go the RD round (which he had pretty much decided he would not–he’d take an EA accept instead, he was DONE) he’d have some extra work to do as he should take SAT2s possible another round of ACTs to see if he could enhance chances. </p>
<p>The tradeoff is that a student does have time to learn about other choices, make other choices during the school year with what is picked up Many students simply are not ready to make that first choice college pick so early. This is my first that felt he was.</p>
<p>Whether an applicant’s strength is connected with stats or not depends on how you define “strength.” I am happy to grant that the probability of admission is not determined by “stats.” I might as well–it’s reality. I am happy to grant that there are elements of character that stats do not capture. That is absolutely true, although some persistent effort over many years does go into having high “stats”–not repetitive preparation for the standardized tests, but the kind of serious and meaningful intellectual effort that develops additional intellectual capacity. I am happy to grant that the probability of future success is only correlated with intellectual ability up to a point. There are a lot of other qualities that go into it, and being well-liked is one of them. I am happy to grant that there are lots of really great applicants out there, who are impressive in many ways, yet have lower GPA and standardized tests scores than the applicants that I would consider “strong.” </p>
<p>However, I think that one should not lose track of the fact that applicants with greater strength of the purely intellectual type do generally have high “stats,” actually. This emerges fairly clearly at the stage of application to graduate school, particularly in STEM subjects.</p>
<p>Also “aching for an Ivy” seems like a real exaggeration to me, when I think about Midwestern students I have known who would like to go to an Ivy or equivalent. I don’t know anyone, successful with Ivy applications or not, who was truly “aching” to go to one.</p>
<p>Perhaps it all relates to one’s definition of “intellectual” and it might describe a bunch of teenagers. Defining what intellectualism is in terms of college applicants might be an interesting exercise. From my vantage point, I consider that projected image to be a bunch of bull … if reading what is posted on the Chicago provides an insight. </p>
<p>There are intellectuals and pseudo ones in about every college in the nation. Chicago probably has a higher number of the latter. </p>
<p>"When the peer and family pressure starts to hit, there are some picks that are not first choices but crazy grabs to get something "</p>
<p>I get family pressure, but peer pressure? Gag. If my kids “listened to peer pressure” they’d be hanging with the hs crowd at a directional school where the parties are awesome and the academics merely ok. Certainly D would never have chosen an elite NE LAC!! It’s our job as parents to teach them to ignore the opinions of others who aren’t directly involved and who haven’t been consulted, and that includes all their BFFs for life who they will never see again. </p>
<p>“I’m old fashioned in that I feel that the ED commitment should be made when the school is a first choice school, not the because it 's optimal school by other factors. But that is not the way things have evolved.”</p>
<p>Some people are maximizers, some people are satisficers. Some people really value keeping all options open til the better end, others really value “done in December.” Different people value different things, and are willing to make different trade offs. </p>
<p>We all, I very much included, over-dramatize this process. While it feels very personal and important when you are in the middle of it, as a parent or as a child, most of the time what’s really at stake is not much more consequential than the difference between a Snickers and a Milky Way. That difference matters a LOT if you happen to be allergic to peanuts, but otherwise they are both awfully good candy bars and pretty much equally enjoyable unless you get all hung up on whether you should have had the other one. </p>
<p>As everyone says (and no one quite believes): It’s really the person who matters, in the end, and where you go to college doesn’t make much of a difference to who you are. Assuming, that is, that you go to college, and that you aren’t shunted into what’s effectively a trade school unless that’s what you want. For most people, however, the difference between their “best” option and their most realistic one is not very large.</p>