It’s up on their Financial Aid page already - for 16-17, students can apply EA, ED, EDII, and then RD:
https://collegeadmissions.uchicago.edu/costs/apply-for-aid
This is ridiculous. Seriously, why even bother having an RD round then? Between EA, ED, and EDII, Chicago can easily fill 70-80% of the class, and have an absurdly high yield. All these options also just further confuse the process.
I’m already writing an email to Nondorf.
More power to the college, less power to students
EA/ED is the new RD.
You’re either early, or you’re late.
By adopting ED Chicago has surrendered itself as a true competitor to HYPS + M + Cal Tech in the college admission game, I think.
What’s really interesting to me is the ED II option. I don’t think any other really highly-ranked universities have that, and only some of the LACs that might compete with Chicago for students. (Swarthmore, Pomona, and Reed, yes, Williams and Amherst, no.) I could see ED II at Chicago following SCEA or ED deferral elsewhere as a very popular option.
Gotta hit those bonus targets!
Is our current yield not sustainable or something? This seems like a last ditch attempt to squeeze the last drop of talent out of the applicant pool.
I do not like the idea of a less competitive student to get in only due to ED. On the other hand it should be a two-way street. Schools choose students and students choose schools too. Many Chicago’s peers have already demonstrated that an ED school can have a very high (but not true) yield by manipulating ED admits. Unfortunately Chicago is moving to that direction too.
I don’t see EA surviving for too long. They are essentially splitting the EA pool into ED1, ED2 and RD. Right now they had to guess. Now they will know exactly which student is which. Great for them. Not so great for the student, who will find it increasingly difficult to keep Chicago in their back pocket by applying EA and then keep shopping. After a few cycles, Chicago will drop the EA option altogether
A couple of years ago, I have made a comment in one of the threads saying that it’s inevitable Chicago would move to ED eventually. It surprised me that it got to that point so soon. Personally, I’d like to see the University adopt the strategy of SCEA just like HYPS.
@eddi137 I agree at some level, but as an incoming student and as an EA admit whose top choice was UChicago, I can tell you that interest and passion for a school is infectious. Students love to be around students who want to go to their school. I can sense a few people who are going to UChicago because they didn’t get into HYP or whatever, and though they are among the smartest students, I find that the students who I most interact with might not be the smartest of the bunch (though they are extremely bright in their own right and most of them are smarter than me haha), but they are extremely excited that they are going to UChicago and I love that about them. Nearly all of them were EA admits. Personally I agree with @VeryLuckyParent. They have never done this before. They need a bit of time to figure out how it all works. They should eventually drop EA. I don’t think the student body will get that much less competitive, especially as Chicago’s reputation begins to expand. And I definitely believe the interest and enthusiasm that generally accompanies ED/ED2 will more than make up for it. And with time, this will improve.
Though again, there is a certain fear factor that accompanies binding decisions, which can ultimately lead to people ending up at the wrong place. I can see both pros and cons in this. I expect this will mostly be a time thing, and it will make it hard on future applicants who have to keep up with all the different plans.
@jarrett211, I have seen some of your positive comments on Chicago and am very glad for you to be a member of Chicago’s community.
I have seen some laments regarding die-hard Chicago type’s students who were not be able to get in even with competitive credentials. The ED definitely will favor them and I have no problem at all. I just do not want to see less competitive students whose first choice is not Chicago but get in due to ED, and some of them resent their decision later.
I would admit Chicago’s admission office really thinks out of the box to have EA and EDs together. I have not seen any other schools having EA and EDs. I hope they can use their innovation to filter in die-hard Chicago type’s students only.
UChicago 2016 - the admissions journey.
ED: Show us you love UChicago and help boost yield to 70%
EDII: Show us you love UChicago and boost our yield while lowering HYPS’s
EA: Show us you don’t really love UChicago and increase the denominator of our acceptance %.
Coming soon - SCEA: Show us you can pick the worst of 4 options.
The glass-half-full view is that ED allows the students who most want to attend to have better odds of acceptance.
The glass-half-empty view is that this is an attempt to boost yield, prevent cross-admits to Columbia/Penn/Dartmouth/Brown ED from lowering yield, and thus move ahead/further ahead of these schools in the rankings.
The “I ordered a Coke” view is that the above is irrelevant except in a trivial ranking that should be #1 on Donald Trump’s censorship list, but the way ED will screw applicants looking to compare aid offers has actual consequences.
I think it’s all of the above.
The information is now on the first-year applicants page, if it wasn’t there already. https://collegeadmissions.uchicago.edu/apply/applicants/firstyear
And here they provide information about the four choices. https://collegeadmissions.uchicago.edu/apply/applicants/firstyear
I know of at least one school that does it. SMU.
Dickinson has it, too. They have EA, ED, ED II, and RD. Have been that way for several years.
So UChicago got around 12,000 EA apps this year. What would be the guess on how many will apply for ED1 next year. My guess would be between 3,000 and 3,500. My guess is another 4,000 to 5,000 would apply ED2.
Northeastern also has EA and ED. No EDII though.
So I have to say Chicago’s admission office is not too innovative to have EA/EDs/RD together as the first mover. But I still hope they use it wisely since they have already determined to use it.
Just for fun. Does any school have SCEA / REA / EA / EDs / RD together?