<p>The usual argument is that the EA pool is more self-selective and tends to end up being a better fit for MIT for various reasons…</p>
<p>Sorry guys, I had a test and I’m too tired to type out the whole thing.</p>
<p>What a discussion! I won’t touch many of these hypotheses, but I will wade in here to correct one factual issue. </p>
<p>One poster wrote, “My cousin is a big time stud athlete who’s also brilliant. He was told in August that he’d be admitted if he applied EA.”</p>
<p>Regardless of what this applicant was told or heard or told others, this is incorrect. We do not offer likely letters, nor do student athletes get an “early read,” as some schools provide. All athletes, music kids, mathy geniuses, awesome-people-skills-people, take-it-apart-ers, and kids-who-save-the-world get looked at during the same selection period, by the same admissions officers who see all applicants to MIT. Our particular style of egalitarian admissions is one reason I love working for MIT.</p>
<p>We have tremendous scholar/athletes here at MIT. We have the largest number of Academic All-Americans in Div 3, and we’re #3 ALL TIME, BABY! amongst all Divisions. (BTW, women’s field hockey and soccer are on their way to compete in the NCAA Championships, which is awesome.)</p>
<p>-McG</p>
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<p>Actually, it’s two months earlier</p>
<p>Whether your unaccepted, rejected, or deferred to MIT or your other top school I hope you all get into a school that your happy with. I think we’ll look back in ten years at how we viewed life today and laugh at ourselves for being wound up so tightly.</p>
<p>Here are some numbers about EA and ED for class 2013. (The order is sorted according to the acceptance rate)</p>
<p>School |Applicants | Admitted | acceptance rate (%)</p>
<p>MIT | 5019 | 540 | 10.7
Stanford | 5363 | 689 | 12.8
Yale | 5557 | 742 | 13.4
UPenn | 3610 | 1147 | 31.8
Duke | 1539 | 547 | 33.5
Dartmouth | 1550 | 401 | 35
Cornell | 3405 | 1249| 36.7
JHU | 1049 | 502 | 47 </p>
<p>From the above data, you can see MIT is the most selective school in class 2013 EA/ED admission. Hope the EA acceptance rate will be increased this year.</p>
<p>Well, yes, that is because all of the other colleges you listed have SCEA or ED admissions, while MIT has nonbinding and nonrestrictive EA…</p>
<p>fireshark - I know you meant total rate, but from both my calculations and your calculations, EA deferred applicants are accepted at about the same rate that RA applicants are.</p>
<p>I actually wish MIT had ED…</p>
<p>Far be it for me to guess at MIT’s rationale for having a non-restrictive EA program, but I think it definitely does help to get top students. My daughter was very interested in MIT as well as other top schools such as Stanford, Yale, Cornell, etc. While it was arguably at the top of her list anyway, with the others having restrictive programs MIT was the clear choice for an early application because she could also apply early to state U (financial fall-back) and a couple of other good schools (academic fall-backs). </p>
<p>Thus, after experiencing the thrill of opening her tube, she had four months to envision herself as an MIT student and build up anticipation about CPW before she even heard from other top schools. Even after they accepted her they would have had to make up all that ground in a short period of time, which obviously did not happen.</p>
<p>P.S. CPW has got to be the most activity-filled (and fun) accepted students event in the country. I’m not sure if it’s another part of MIT’s strategy to schedule it early in order to make the first impression, but CPW was the first event she attended. I think its virtually 24 hour/day schedule and draining pace led to her getting very sick in the following days and thus missing the accepted students events at two other schools that she was seriously considering. Shrewd…very shrewd.</p>
<p>fontaine: I think the reason is that ED shows demonstrated interest, and MIT doesn’t care about demonstrated interest.</p>
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Hmm, biological warfare as a yield tool… cunning! :)</p>
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<p>This is why I applied to MIT EA, so it certainly makes sense from my point of view.</p>
<p>I did not want to commit to any school by December, particularly because financial aid will play a big role in my decision. For that reason my EA line up consisted of MIT, Chicago, and my two state schools. MIT originally was not necessarily any higher on my list than Stanford, Cornell, etc. but I think my exposure to MIT this early has drawn me closer to the school.</p>
<p>I would’ve applied ED if MIT had it, but I’ll take EA. Idk I wish other schools weren’t restrictive or ED so that I could’ve applied early there as well as MIT. Definitely through this EA process, I learned a lot of great things about MIT.</p>