I lived in Boston for 13 years and now live in the Boston suburbs. If you like art museums, the MFA is excellent as is the Gardner Museum (subject of a famous art theft). To take in typical Boston architecture you should walk through the Back Bay and Beacon Hill. Boston is very walkable compared to a lot of US cities. I hesitate to recommend restaurants since I’m out of date - I like a bunch of places in the North End if you like Italian. You can take the red line over to Harvard square and check out Harvard - it’s a cute area though it isn’t as funky as it used to be now that all the chain places have moved in. MIT is in Cambridge as well.
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S24 is probably going to drop U Chicago. He dropped it from EA as he didn’t feel he could do a good job on the essays given his other ED/EA apps (to schools he prefers). Also, Chicago is notorious for encouraging EA students they like to move to ED2. Those who don’t do that are typically rejected or waitlisted (have friends with kids at both public and BS that have had this experience). As Chicago isn’t a school he would commit to over others in the RD pile, he’d be a hard no on that. Given all that I think he is going to drop it - he may add another match in its place (he is low on matches and high on reaches).
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My son has a huge upward swing in grades his senior year. He actually emailed AOs and requested that they consider his senior year grades. Not sure if it helped, but they also said “absolutely.”
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Lived in Boston for nearly a decade, and now that D20 is at school there, I still visit several times a year. Was just up there two weekends ago, so here’s my list:
Museums: MFA and Isabella Steward Gardner
Places to just get a general “vibe”: Just walk around the following neighborhoods - Back Bay, Beacon Hill, North End
Food: I like Juliet in Somerville (accessible via the green line) and Metropolis Cafe in the South End. In the North End, I like Carmelina’s and definitely Modern Pastry for desserts (cash only). Also, for a very Boston Brahmin-like experience, make a reservation for afternoon tea here: https://silverdovetea.com/
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I think Tufts is the most likely school my son will drop. I think (academically at least) it seems like a good fit. But the low acceptance rate, higher than average cost on the NPC, and fact that (even though we live only 40 minutes away) we haven’t been able to get there for a visit, make it seem like it is going to fall off the list.
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Highly recommend the Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum. Beautiful. Lots of places for lobster rolls in the city. Cold vs. Hot is purely preference. I prefer cold but the warm with butter is tasty as well. You can take the T to Hynes Convention Center and start at the top of Newbury Street and walk down to the Common. Lots of shops to see. Grab a warm chocolate chip cookie at Levain Bakery. The Common is nice to walk around. Boston is a very small city so it is easily walkable. You can hop on the red line at Park Street (on the Common) to go to Harvard Square. That is also fun to walk around. Hopefully you have nice weather. It has been chilly here but still nice for being outside. Check the weather before you come to make sure you have right clothes if it’s cold.
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I approve (for what it’s worth! 
) I have to give Tufts the side-eye because of their yield-protection practices in the past.
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Tufts really, really likes ED applicants . . . And, they call it Tufts syndrome for a reason.
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From my S, Tufts won the award for best tour, out of six. It wasn’t the school per se; it was tour guide luck, following a typical boring info session and a little bit of disorganization. I certainly hadn’t had high hopes going into it.
I read somewhere Middlebury took 75% of their class through ED last year. Has anyone heard this?
Not sure about class of 2027, but 68.7% class of 2026 was ED 
I hope you realize how much money you just saved. 
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Seriously!! S24 added CU Boulder to his list and we are really trying to keep the faith that he will not fall in love. He has not visited yet and I know it is a beautiful campus. He already has acceptances in hand to fabulous schools with great merit awards and we feel like Boulder is def not worth the $20K + higher tuition.
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TCNJ
She opted at the last-minute to submit and EA app to Rutgers as her in-state public option.
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S24’s list isn’t really final with some visits still to come, so I am not sure dropping is the right term for any colleges still under consideration that don’t make the final cut.
There is one college I wonder about which has an earlier deadline for full scholarship consideration and is not a particularly easy application. It is possible we will know about a preferred school by then (although that is also possibly in flux) so I think there is a chance that one gets cut.
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UMD has everyone beat in this department 
They admitted 93% via EA (class of 2027).
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Per their 2022-23 CDS, they admitted 439/1039 out of ED, 1644/12952 total, so that implies 1205 non-ED admits.
However, only 639 total enrolled, so assuming all 439 out of ED did enroll (might be off by a small number), around 200 of the non-ED admits enrolled, which is about a 16.6% yield rate from outside of ED.
I point this out because it appears people sometimes look at things like the estimated 439/639 (68.7%) of enrolled students coming out of ED and believe that means these colleges cannot admit many more people after ED.
But actually, they often can and do admit a lot more people after ED. And in fact they need to, because their yield out of non-ED admits is pretty low. So, they need to admit a lot of people non-ED in order to fill out that remaining portion of their target class they did not admit ED.
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CU is one of those schools that kids fall in love with on the tour.
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516 of the 730 students enrolled in Middlebury’s classes of 2027 and 2027.5 were admitted ED. That’s approx. 71%.
Overall, Midd accepted 1,553 of 13,297 applicants. We know 1,326 applied ED and 11,971 applied RD.
ED acceptance rate = ~38.9%
RD acceptance rate = ~8.6%
You are right, however, by the stats you shared Middlebury only accepted 13% of RD applicants so one’s chances aren’t great. I guess given the terrible yield in RD, it makes sense for Middlebury to fill a large proportion of their class in ED. They are far from the only school to do that, of course.