<p>Hi I couldn't find a definite source saying it's specifically not a Restrictive EA.
So I was trying to make sure.</p>
<p>MIT is EA right? Not a Restrictive EA?</p>
<p>Under MIT’s nonrestrictive EA program, you are allowed to apply to any other school early, so long as that’s okay by the other school’s rules.</p>
<p>To take full advantage of this, I would recommend doing the MIT/CalTech EA combination.</p>
<p>and perhaps Chicago, depending on your level of interest</p>
<p>I find it quite annoying that MIT does not accept by school or major. It’s more difficult for people who have shown aggresive passion for one particular aspect of life or career.</p>
<p>No, it isn’t.</p>
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You can indicate your passion on your application. You don’t apply to specific schools/major because most people end up changing their minds later on after they learn topics they’ve never been exposed to.
As as stated on the MIT application:
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<p>As a parent this is one of my favorite aspects about MIT. College freshmen will be exposed to many new concepts during their first year and I think it is fabulous that MIT allows kids this opportunity before selecting a major.</p>
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<p>At age 17 or 18, the best indicator of future contribution to science or engineering is broad ability in math and science. Specialization before age 18 doesn’t tell you a whole lot.</p>
<p>I really wonder, though, what does MIT do to ensure that there are enough students in the different majors? What if one year no one majors in linguistics?</p>
<p>^ There is flux from year to year. Generally, there aren’t drastic changes, and departments deal as changes come.</p>
<p>You can see the enrollment numbers for each major for the past ten years [url=<a href=“Statistics & Reports | MIT Registrar”>Statistics & Reports | MIT Registrar]here[/url</a>] (I linked the most recent one; the rest can be found in that directory).</p>
<p>MIT doesn’t do anything to ensure that there will be constant numbers of students in each department. Individual departments will do more or less active recruitment of undergraduate majors depending on their inclinations</p>
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<p>The short answer is that they don’t care. If one year there were no chemistry majors obviously something would be seriously wrong and admissions might look at what they’re doing, but for somewhat odd majors like linguistics or ocean engineering they don’t expect to have someone every year. </p>
<p>If recognized academic talent were represented as a vector which can be directed in any number of directions (fields), MIT bases its decision on the magnitude of the vector. I think that’s the right strategy.</p>
<p>Because if they didn’t, high school students would start interning at ship-building companies, then majoring in ocean engineering and going to Wall Street (or maybe not even majoring in ocean engineering.) It’s the Heisenberg Principle of admissions; if people think admissions is looking for something, a lot of people will become that until they get in (and then go back to what they were before.)</p>
<p>^Totally off-topic sidenote that has nothing to do with your point – there’s no more course 13! The department got absorbed into 2 during my junior or senior year. Sad.</p>
<p>I may be mistaken, but don’t most schools (and all top schools) not admit by major?</p>
<p>^ They don’t admit by major, but they admit by different disciplines (like School of Engineering, Arts and science, etc). I think that’s what WLSilver was referring to.</p>