<p>If you are not a Legacy then Stanford SCEA is in my opinion not worth applying for, unless you live in CA or attend a HS with a strong relationship with Stanford in terms of admissions. Do regular admissions instead if there are other schools you would want to use the statistical benefit of an ED application on for a reach school. Stasford has taken only one kid form our HS in the last 15 years and in that time lots have gone to Ivy League Schools like Brown, Penn, Cornell, and a few to Harvard, Yale and Princeton, and a number to Duke and other of the "Young Ivies". Even students withy impecable rades, class rank, extra cirriculars and the like were given a cold shoulder. The only exceptions seemed to be under represented minoroties, or if you are being recruited to play there for sports, and if you are in that catagory then I would consider applying SCEA. It is an excellent school and the campus is one of the nicest I have visited. With that said so is the Duke Campus and the quality of live and the way students enjoy the schools are similar if you read up on student comments. I honestly feel that Duke is more consistant in its admissions and like Harvard and Yale Stanford is totally unpredictable. That is because they want to balance their class and what you know or how hard you work are irrrelevant if they don't need your demographic and can fill it wih California Alums kids. I am not trying to be negative but as a private school they can do what they like for admissions and I would not be discouraged if you don't get tapped. For tat reason if you really feel Duke is a good fit I would not waste a SCEA on Stanford and apply if there is still time to Duke ED.</p>
<p>thanks everybody, </p>
<p>I ended up going ED to Duke, I'll try for Stanford regular decision</p>
<p>On an unrelated note, how's the Duke vs. UPenn battle looking?</p>
<p>I know Penn has that great business school, but which school is better for the liberal arts?</p>