<p>This seems to be a very hot topic for many high school counselors and private school counselors now. There is a speculation that it may make it easier for students to get into next tier down during ED (Cornell, NU, Duke, JHU, Chicago, UPenn, even Dartmouth or Columbia). The single choice will prevent EA applicants from applying to those schools mentioned during their ED/EA round.</p>
<p>My sense is number of relevant applicants (with the right stats) for RD may also go down a bit, because students who got into Princeton or Harvard EA may also then apply to fewer schools during the RD round.</p>
<p>I wish I believed your sentiment (2nd paragraph), oldfort. I think that many students accepted at Princeton or Harvard EA, will still be “trophy hunting” and applying to other “Top brand name” schools, just to see…:rolleyes:</p>
<p>This has just been what I have seen. For example, get into Stanford SCEA, still apply to HYP. (Money not an issue.)</p>
<p>can’t see the GC logic for ED. Anyone desiring HYP, would not apply ED anywhere. So, under the current policy, they would not have applied to the other Ivies early, bcos it’s all ED. Only Chicago on your list is EA and yes, they and other EA “safety” schools will see a drop off in early apps.</p>
<p>For RD, I agree with you, but the numbers are so small, it is a rounding blip in the total applicant pool. Some of the ~1k students accepted early to HYP will still apply to the other HYP schools during the RD round, looking for money, a better fit, trophy hunting, etc. Some of the “middle class” may also apply RD to Duke, Vandy, Hopkins, Emory et al, and other full merit schools seeking the full ride.</p>
<p>Sure, net-net, the applicants to the non-HYP schools will decline slightly, once an early acceptance to HYP is in hand. But acceptances under SCEA just don’t total that many to have a huge impact.</p>
<p>I don’t think everyone would agree with that. College admission has become so competitive now, many students would rather ED at a “sure thing” than going for the moon. It is part of the reason why Princeton and Harvard are going back to SCEA. They feel like they are losing many good applicants to other schools.</p>
<p>FYI - D2 is in that predicament now. Her counselor is trying figure out the pros and cons of her foregoing ED at one of those very good schools, or go for broke.</p>
Maybe, but the effect would probably be too small to isolate. Harvard and Princeton might admit a total of 1,500 students via SCEA. Let’s assume that another top university might lose 500 of these applicants during regular admissions. Then their admission rates might change by 0.1% to 0.4%, assuming that they would be admitting the same number of students from a smaller applicant pool.</p>
<p>Notice, I said relevant applicants. There are a lot of students who apply to schools that they do not have necessary stats for. Students who get into HYPS during EA would be the most qualified. With fewer of them applying to next tier down would make other students (next tier down) more competitive.</p>
<p>I agree that it is the ED not the RD numbers that may be affected based on above analysis…</p>
<p>The ED numbers of the “lower” Ivies and the like will be affected purely by the number of superstars who want to “shoot the moon” in SCEA…if there are alot, it will be evident</p>
<p>Personally, I don’t think it will affect it that much because there will STILL be kids who want the better odds to be admitted to a top school ED…it will still be the tippy-top kids who prob would have been admitted RD to Princeton and Harvard who will be advantaged by seeing their decisions earlier…</p>
<p>I’m sure there will be the delusional who think SCEA is going to give them a better shot but that will flush out after year 1 of the new system…when the SCEA admission rates are released (and they are still ridiculously low)</p>
<p>I disagree. This presumes that everyone “loves” HYP more than they would love another school on this list. I don’t agree that it’s “I want to get into an upper Ivy / lower Ivy / another elite school” in that order. I think people have specific schools in this elite group that they either like, or don’t. I find it really odd to think that no one could just prefer / desire one of these other schools and not be interested in HYP at all.</p>
<p>I think depending on HPYS SCEA admittance rate, the ED/EA colleges will adjust their admittance rate to make the game more interesting. For example, if the ED/EA colleges have the large part of ED/EA students then the kids whose stats are not absolute or not close to absolute will not gamble to apply to SCEA schools.</p>
<p>Right, and if they wanted to ED to “game” the system, they would do it anyway, regardless of SCEA or not. That is why I don’t get the logic. Someone who wants to improve their odds at (non-HYP) Ivy would’ve ED’ed last year and would do so next year. SCEA would make no difference to them bcos it will not be much of a boost, if any at all. </p>
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<p>I truly think that they are only losing students to each other. And, the change REALLY benefits donors/developmental candidates, and therefore the schools. Think about an H legacy (or scion of a world leader), who applied and gets into Yale or Stanford SCEA. Then visits and falls in love with that campus. Goodbye H and the developmental/political dollars! </p>
<p>Of course, I’m an admissions cynic, and commented that dropping EA/ED was a bad move for both H & P and predicted that it would be back. It HAD to come back – not for the students, but for the schools themselves. “Follow the money…”</p>
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<p>Don’t read what is not there (although my Son was one). The point is that if someone really, really wants to attend HYP, they will not ED to the other Ivies. If they do ED elsewhere, they obviously didn’t desire HYP that much.</p>
<p>I suspect we’ll see trends on the part of colleges to limit the total applications and complete the process sooner. Yield is a far more important “number” than the total number of apps vs. the total number of acceptances which if you think about it is somewhat meaningless. SCEA is an interesting a viable concept since I suspect the trophy hunters are few. Really anything that shortens the cycle, stops this insane situation of kids applying to more than a handful of schools is a good thing for everyone I’ve thought this for a few years.</p>
<p>^^But that is the point: it won’t matter. If Harvard accepts half of its class in SCEA, that’s ~1,250 students. And in P’ton, and its another 1,000 or so. Total = 2-3k. Some/many of these early acceptees will still apply elsewhere (for all kinds of reasons, perhaps undecided about Eng so still considering MIT?), but will drop most of the safety schools. </p>
<p>Out of 1.5m high school graduates, the impact is immaterial, to all but the “safety” schools, who will no longer receive a Jan 1 app.</p>
<p>Not all of those 1.5m graduates are competitive for top 20 schools. I think a 3.9 GPA student would rather compete with a 3.5 student than with 4.1 student who is saving the world.</p>
<p>Those tippy top schools only do holistic admission up to a point.</p>
<p>Students who want to apply to Harvard or Princeton (and that could be thousands) may end up applying H&P SCEA, hoping for that slightly better chance of getting into those schools during EA instead waiting for RD. If those top students were locked up by SCEA, then those students will not be part of ED pool for the next tier down schools. </p>
<p>I am not clear if they would allow students to apply EA at other schools, like Chicago. If the answer is no, then Chicago could potentially get fewer applicants during EA.</p>
<p>I think it will take the edge off somewhat. If you look at the threads of the Yale SCEA, you see kids who had a list of about 3-5 other schools that they might apply to, if they got admitted, but 6-10 if they did not. There is no reason to assume why that dynamic would not be similar for P and H if their SCEA works similarly. If there is less incentive for a scatter gun approach at the top, maybe the arms race of every increasing application numbers per applicant will be moderated.</p>
<p>Not to mention the “push down” affect. Parents read about “how competitive” it is to get into college but don’t realize that many but a small handful of colleges are still accepting a high percentage of kids. Those parents “think” their kids need to apply to 8 or more colleges which just simply isn’t true if you look at the hard numbers.</p>
<p>^^Bingo! EA schools like Georgetown and Chicago (and “safeties” such as Boston College) are not known as being generous with finaid, so an RD app after an SCEA acceptance would make little sense. Ditto Michigan, particularly for OOS. MIT may still warrant an RD app, however, for those still undecided about tech/Eng.</p>
<p>Michigan will not be affected (unless the SCEA schools have changed their minds) because Michigan is rolling admissions, not EA. Most rolling applications to state schools are not prohibited by SCEA. BTW, I believe that Georgetown was already SCEA. I agree that Chicago will probably take a big hit in the caliber of students applying EA.</p>