<p>After reading the thread about people whose daughters/sons/themselves got deffered/rejected EA, but then accepted to other ivies RD, I began wondering...</p>
<p>what if the reason for these turn arounds isn't just because of the unpredictability of admissions, but also the evolution of one's application itself.</p>
<p>I know Yale EA was my 2nd application (another international school was my first) and by my last (9th) i felt my essays, short answers, application as a whole had improved. </p>
<p>Is this the case with everyone else? Esp. essay wise, and if so, then if your last application will be the strongest, doesn't applying to your first choice school early, almost defeat the purpose (that is if you don't get in, but get in to other prestigious schools later)?</p>
<p>I actually felt that way - Yale was the first app I did.</p>
<p>However, when I reread my essays recently, I thought they were all about the same... different perhaps, but not necessarily any worse or better.</p>
<p>I felt most confident by my last application, anyway. I submitted to Harvard as a lark, and for the first time I had no worries about my essay needing revisions or my ECs being impressive enough. It was very strange.</p>
<p>I agree: Yale EA was my first application (and by far, my worst). In fact, I think my apps got progressively stronger as I sent them in, with my last app being the strongest. I don't think that's why the "turnarounds" happen though. Different schools will look for different things. Also, I suspect that there's more politics involved in the early around anyway (legacies, private schools/schools with strong connections to Yale, recruited athletes, etc.). RD is the plug-and-chug round. Good luck to all.</p>
<p>i think the improvement of my application from EA to RD is the reason i got deferred from my EA school and got into all the schools i applied to RD</p>
<p>I definitely agree. I mentioned this to my dad a couple of days after I was deferred, and he sort of waved me off but the more I thought about it the more it made sense. In October, when the bulk of us are doing our EA applications, we are naive and unsure about how to fill out a college application. My guidance counselor wasn't really a lot of help, and I pretty much had to figure it out on my own. I think my essays and talent at picking out what to include on my app and what was trivial enough to throw onto a resume sheet and send in to the school separately also improved, and I applied to Harvard completely last minute just to see if my luck would change. I do feel that that was one of my strongest apps, and I think that next year's EA crowd should learn from our mistakes and do a couple of applications first before they tackle Yale's.</p>