<p>The meritocratic system you desire already exists. It’s called the state university system. The best in-state students apply to and get accepted at Timbuktu U., the next tier attend Timbuktu State and the third tier move on to West Timbuktu U or Timbuktu Tech.</p>
<p>The Ivies and their brethren are private institutions. How is it possibly in their best interest to move to a completely meritocratic system? That type of system would imply a clear cut ranking of the schools, (goodbye USMWR!),1 Harvard, 2 MIT, 3 Stanford etc. There would little if any debate about who is truly “better”, (goodbye College Confidential!).</p>
<p>The current system lets private companies (sorry) institutions decide who they want to accept based on their own uniquely, if sometimes vaguely, defined parameters. A meritocratic system would eliminate the need for review, (goodbye AdComs); Harvard gets the first 1600, MIT the next 2000 and so on. Why would any school want to give up that power and control?</p>
<p>I don’t think that’s what Cue means. I think what Cue means is that many of these schools that employ ED also state that they love diversity, especially socioeconomic. It doesn’t take a rocket scientist to know that ED is a plan that will diminish, not enhance, socioeconomic diversity. I will disagree with Cue though on one point: it definitely helps some students out: those who would not have been strong enough (not stats wise but overall package wise) to get in during the regular round but due to their wealth can afford to commit to a school. This obviously helps the school out by driving down the RD acceptance rate, increasing yield, and increasing the number of full-payers for the school.</p>
<p>45 percenter, early action can help students avoid the mayhem of April. If one gets admitted early to a school, no one is forcing them to
apply anywhere else. And this also helps other kids who may not be as financially advantaged to apply early and find out early. Also you very well know that saying Penn accepts more kids RD than any other of its peers, save Cornell, is deceptive. Penn is the second biggest school amongst its peer group so obviously that will occur. Penn might even accept more kids RD than Harvard accepts in total!</p>
<p>As I pointed out earlier today (perhaps in another thread?), even with ED, Penn still accepts 2700-2800 applicants through RD, equal to or more than just about any peer except Cornell. Your condemnation of its use of ED on social policy grounds is, quite frankly, a bit overwrought.</p>
<p>Furthermore, I am not a student, but a rather grey-headed alum. I have decades of intimate experience with Penn, and I can assure you with great condidence that it is, in general, a much happier campus today than it was before it began extensive use of ED, when most non-Wharton Penn students felt as though they had somehow settled. Penn has made it’s ED goals quite clear to its various constiutuencies (including, of course, alumni) over the decades, and increasing the overall happiness and satisfaction of undergrads with being there has been a major goal. You, with whatever knowledge and experience you may possess, can question that, but be careful about labeling things with which you’re not intimately familiar as “garbage.” There’s a lot of complexity, subtlety, and nuance out there that such characterizations fail to acknowledge.</p>
It’s not deceptive at all! My point is that Penn’s size allows it to pursue both a vigorous ED program and a substantial RD program that admits as many or more kids through RD than most of its peers. You and Cue7 condemn all binding ED programs–including Penn’s–out of hand without accounting for the unique attributes of each school and the contours of each individual program. That’s overly simplistic–especially for a Stanford student! :)</p>
<p>45 percenter - unfortunately I’m leaving on a trip for a few days so I won’t be able to respond in the near future. I do, however, definitely want to respond to your posts, and I vehemently disagree with the benevolent ring you give to UPenn’s approach to admissions. I look forward to continuing this discussion soon.</p>
<p>Well it depends if you want to look at proportions or raw numbers. I still think that although Penn may admit a large number of kids RD, by proportion close to half the class is still going to have been admitted ED. I must admit that I am condemning all binding ED programs because the early commitment that prevents kids from comparing other schools offers and especially FA offers overwrites whatever advantages ED may bring to the community of the school. I think that early action is a much better alternative if the school feels the need to get some admits who really want to come without all the downsides of early decision. All that you sacrifice is the huge boost in yield which shouldn’t be that important at the end of the day.</p>
<p>I am totally lost with the EA thing. I thought that the weaker schools need EA to lock better students. Even with 1156 from EA, Penn ranks the second to last among ivies in terms of admission rate.</p>
I’ll be glad to discuss it further, but I’ve never characterized Penn’s approach to ED as being in any way benevolent. Quite the contrary, it is most definitely in Penn’s self-interest to be perceived by potential applicants as highly desirable and in demand. The school has NEVER tried to obscure that as one of its goals, and has proudly and loudly lauded its ED admissions program for helping it to accomplish that goal. Penn has realized that to thrive in the world of elite academics, it has to have an undergraduate student body that, for the most part, really WANTS to be there, and does not percieve it primarily as a safety school (which, except for Wharton, it largely was until the mid-90s and its increased use of ED, among other initiatives). I’m sorry if you have a problem with that but, believe me, the vast majority of Penn students and alumni are quite pleased with the enhanced stature and prestige that Penn’s use of ED has helped to bring about.</p>
<p>That’s really good for Penn! But I have a question, that is sort of open ended, if every other Ivy followed Princeton’s lead and removed early binding programs, wouldn’t Penn remove its own too?</p>
<p>The numbers in post #67 cannot be correct. To begin with, Yale, Stanford, and MIT have not abolished EA, so the number they admitted that way must be more than zero.</p>
<p>The whole premise of the thread as stated in the OP is garbage. Given two schools of equal caliber students (Duke/Dartmouth example), the OP would conclude that the place with the higher yield is more desirable and presumably choose that one. More desirable to whom, though? Other people? Who cares? It’s such a loser, follow-the-crowd strategy for an applicant to care about what a school’s yield is, since it means that the applicant can’t think for himself which school he’d prefer to attend, but makes judgments based on polling other people for their preferences. The school admin should certainly care about yield, but not an applicant. </p>
<p>And good for Penn, I say. If so many kids are interested enough in Penn to forego applying elsewhere, to commit 100% to going, well, that’s the very definition of desirable, and it’s disingenuous to suggest that it’s not part of yield when it’s the ultimate yield.</p>
<p>I disagree. Yield should only be determined by if a student chooses to go there. Yield numbers can be skewed if ED numbers are calculated into the yield. True yield is of the students accepted (not during ED), how many students in the end decide to attend that school.</p>
<p>What really stinks about the ED of Penn is for the students that are applying RD for numerous reasons. Penn filled almost half its class with ED applicants - that doesn’t leave many spots for the thousands upon thousands RD applicants. And most likely the majority of applicants applying RD would apply ED if it were not for Financial Concerns. Applying ED definetly gives an advantage to an applicant that does not need to worry about Financial Aid.</p>
<p>Sigh.
Student A gets into Penn and another school, and chooses Penn. You say that’s evidence that Penn is desirable, because he’s chosen it over the other school.</p>
<p>Student B loves Penn SO MUCH that he’s willing to “foresake all others” and doesn’t even want to BOTHER applying elsewhere. But that’s not evidence that he finds Penn desirable, no siree. @@</p>
<p>Hello, preferring a given school so much that you don’t even want to apply elsewhere, that you’ll commit on-the-spot to going before even seeing where else you might be accepted, IS the definition of desirable. What if Penn filled 90% of its class ED, for the sake of argument? That would mean … follow along here … it was SO desirable to those kids that they didn’t even want to wait and see if they got into other schools.</p>
<p>You don’t know that, but actually that proves my point, not yours. In other words, if it weren’t for finances and the need to weigh various finaid offers, they would find the school THAT DESIRABLE that they’d apply ED and be bound to it.</p>
<p>Let’s take two cars that compete with one another, Mercedes and BMW. (just for the sake of argument)</p>
<p>What’s more of an indication of desirability?
People test-drive both M and BMW and decide to go with the M?
Or people don’t even <em>bother</em> with the BMW and go straight for the M?</p>
<p>Seems to me that the latter is a more desirable place for the M brand to be in.</p>