<p>There are schools with a noticeably higher acceptance rate for ED. U Penn, George Washington, Brandeis, Northwestern, Cornell, Dartmouth, JHU all have ED acceptance rates 15-20+ points higher than the general acceptance rates that includes ED and RD.</p>
<p>Is the ED acceptance rate boost real? As in: in exchange of "yield boosting commitment" on the part of the students, the school gives a better chance to students with border line stats for whom RD decision would could have gone the other way.</p>
<p>Or, is it a matter of self selection among the candidates who apply to ED such as:</p>
<p>(1) more athletes and legacies apply to ED as opposed to RD in that particular school
(2) students with higher stats tend to apply to ED in that particular school as opposed to RD.</p>
<p>I know different schools have different realities. That said, I am interested in knowing what your thoughts and experiences are. What other schools that show up in the first few pages of USNWR ranking web page have a "real boost" for ED acceptance?</p>
<p>It seems counterintuitive to me that candidates with better stats would be more likely to apply ED. The better your stats are, presumably, the more and better choices you should expect to have, so the value of foreclosing those choices in exchange for a better shot at your first choice would seem to diminish, if anything.</p>
<p>I agree with you. I am just listing all possible reasons for the ED boost that is not a real boost. Who knows, maybe intuition by me or you is unproven?</p>
<p>If the ED boost is a real one, a borderline candidate is much better off applying to the best school within a striking distance with a real boost in favor of RD to the same school or other schools without the ED boost.</p>
<p>I think it depends on the school, but in some cases the advantage is real. They could be chasing yield, but also some schools just want to have students who are thrilled to be there.</p>
<p>Lehigh is another one with a big ED vs. RD difference. Many of the LACs also seem to have huge differences.</p>
<p>Im not so sure it is counterintuitive. My S applied ED to Vanderbilt even though he had “great stats” and probably a decent shot of being accepted at most of his choices. His reasoning - it was truly his dream school and he loved the thought of being finished with the process in December and enjoying the remainder of his senior year. </p>
<p>Perhaps, he isn’t the norm, but most of his friends that did the same (at top schools) had the same thoughts. Also, most of these applicants are very confident with their “resumes and stats” through Junior year, thus making the group more “self-selecting”</p>
<p>I think students with higher stats for Cornell, JHU, Northwestern…may choose to hold out for Harvard or Princeton and not do ED. I think for those schools it’s beneficial for them to admit as many “good enough” applicants during the ED round, just so they wouldn’t have to compete for those appplicants during the RD round. I don’t think they would necessary admit lesser qualified students just because they apply ED.</p>
<p>My daughter did much the same thing with Cornell. It was her first choice and a very realistic one. And she wanted to get the whole thing over with. </p>
<p>Most of the people accepted ED from her high school had applied to schools that were realistic choices for them – Dartmouth, Barnard, and Vassar were among the others. All of these kids could conceivably have applied to Harvard or Yale. They elected to enhance their chances of admission to a more realistic choice instead.</p>
<p>At Dartmouth, anyway, ED is where they admit virtually all of the recruited athletes, as well as many highly desirable (ie, high-statted) URMs, legacies, and other hooked students. Last year I was paying attention to the CC kids who applied to D ED, and it seemed as if most of the extremely strong unhooked kids were deferred or rejected. So unless you are hooked or a legacy, applying to D ED doesn’t seem to help much. In fact, it may be my imagination, but I almost think that if you are unhooked you are better off applying RD. There is a degree to which the bloom is off the rose with deferred candidates, I think.</p>
<p>OTOH at MIT, which limits ED acceptances to 15% of the planned class size and defers a lot to the regular round, somehow 50% of the class ends up being made up of kids who originally applied ED. I can’t remember my math, but I figured my son had about a 1 in 4 chance of getting in. (He didn’t get in BTW.) Anyway my impression there was that the ED candidates were very strong. I think the deferral helps makes those candidates stronger, because they are encouraged to add extra material.</p>
<p>Vassar says ED is a boost.</p>
<p>One of the schools we looked at in DC doesn’t defer ED decisions - it’s either up or down.</p>
<p>Hmm…so I am considering applying ED to Penn, do you think I am loosing anything by making this choice or should I wait? It is genuinely my first choice and I do wish to get the process over with in Dec, if possible. However, if it’s considered a “drawback” then I’d rather not…</p>
<p>If your HS has Naviance, you can compare ED and RD stats–in our school’s results, ED always has a significantly lower average stats. This does not mean that many kids with excellent scores do not apply ED; just that many schools understandably lower the bar for ED to encourage its use. I think applying to your dream school ED is clearly smart; a harder choice is faced by those whose top choice is, say, Harvard, but think that applying Ed to Penn, etc, may give them enough of a boost to ensure they wind up in one of the most selective schools.</p>
<p>From my kids’ high schools, looking at Naviance over several years, ED did not help kids at any ivy other then Penn and Cornell–and it was very marginal at those. It helped significantly just below at schools like Tufts, Vandy, NU.</p>
<p>MIT no longer has ED. It’s unrestricted EA (not a single choice EA like Stanford or Yale).</p>
<p>The DC area school that has either yes or no with ED with no deferment to RD is George Washington.</p>
<p>By the way, if demonstrated intelligence and clue-ful-ness of an admission officer is any indication of the quality of education one gets from that school, GWU goes WAY DOWN on the list </p>
<p>The adcom I communicated with couldn’t even read the stats of his employer (school) and was giving totally erroneous information contradictory to all the available stats published everywhere and came up with a completely asinine and mathmatically implausible explanation rather than simply saying “sorry I made a mistake” when I politely pointed out the discrepancy.</p>
<p>I know it’s just a case of a single ill informed and clueless adcom.</p>
<p>I thought GW gave a fine presentation, but S2 hated the campus. It might have been at GW though where the admissions officer said the slides hadn’t kept up with the stats.</p>
<p>“I am considering applying ED to Penn, do you think I am loosing anything by making this choice or should I wait? It is genuinely my first choice and I do wish to get the process over with in Dec, if possible.”
hardworker, you should take a hard look at the common data set information for Penn. they are VERY ranking conscious, based on the huge % of accepted students who are in the top 5% of their class. Take a look
[Penn</a> Admissions: Incoming Class Profile](<a href=“http://www.admissionsug.upenn.edu/profile/]Penn”>http://www.admissionsug.upenn.edu/profile/)</p>
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