Hello. I am a high school junior. No legacy and not a recruited athlete. I was wondering if applying to Uchicago ED I increases your chance of getting in more than applying ED II does. I love Uchicago and I want to ED there however I was wondering if I should try my hand at ED I at another school or EA-Restrictive and then apply to Uchicago ED II. However, I don’t want to do this if it decreases my chances of getting into Uchicago.
ED (I) should be used if you have a clear number one school that would be affordable if admitted and you don’t want to compare financial offers. Either it matches that criteria or it doesn’t. Hint, if you are considering ED I at a different school, UChicago isn’t a clear #1.
While what @Eeyore123 says is a very true statement. It isn’t the answer to your question. That answer is a firm “yes” in the past years. I don’t know if it will matter as much. If you fit the profile of “full pay,” which most EDer’s fit, the difference might not be that big. I understand that in normal times UChicago is need blind, but I think that may have to change going forward after a year of decimated finances at most schools. To play it safe, yes ED1 is a bigger bump than ED2 has been since they have offered both.
Slightly different take here. UChicago doesn’t provide acceptance rate data for ED1 or ED2 so we don’t have much of an idea of which one is more favorable. It probably differs by year and by pool. Furthermore, paper odds aren’t the same thing as personal ones. If you have a strong preference for UChicago and you don’t need to compare FA packages, then why not use ED as a means to help you specify that preference when the time is right. If you feel that another school would be a better choice in the early round, go ahead and apply there, and then if deferred, go ahead and hit UChicago in the ED2 round. If UChicago is your clear first choice, then go ahead and apply ED1. IMO, there is no one particular ED plan that is superior to the other.
Will have to disagree with Brian - I doubt they will drop need-blind and make ability to pay a criterion for selection. That would be very contrary a long-standing practice and tradition at the College. They have already come out and said that FA will not be impacted this next year and they have frozen salaries to help make that happen. Tuition + Room/Board will see no overall increase. Not sure what will happen for the class of '25, but the Class of '24 won’t be impacted other than perhaps having an altered O-Week and fall quarter compared to prior classes. But we’ll see.
concur. No way they are dropping need-blind. Too many easier ways to favor the middle/upper income in admissions by targeting certain ECs and zip codes. For example, lean towards varsity athletes who participate in Olympic sports as opposed to football and basketball. Target top suburban and prep school kids. Bonus points for participating in international math/science competitions vs. working as a bagger at the local grocery store.
Moreover, ED already leans towards folks who can pay sticker or much of it; by definition, kids who need to compare financial offers can not apply ED.
@bluebayou , to credit your recitation of these cynical ploys one would have to believe that the desired end has nothing whatever to do with high intellectual promise and achievement and everything to do with merely finding wealthy kids - and doing it hypocritically and dishonestly at that. Is that what you truly believe? What kind of a goal would that be for the University of Chicago? It would make a mockery of a Chicago education and of the aspirations and experience of almost all of us who ever attended the place. What is your own experience, and what is your evidence? Reflexive cynicism is neither of these things. And where exactly do you yourself stand: are you giving your approval to these tactics and this goal?
It is what it is, and has been for years, at colleges where EC’s matter. While perhaps not the primary intent, focusing on certain EC’s just also happens to be a benign way to manage the finaid budget, among other things. (This is also one big reason why a college’s financial aid budget is consistent year-after-year-after year.) My personal view matters not.
Do you disagree that certain EC’s are highly correlated with income? If a college wants a fencing team to be competitive, it will recruit fencers who can win state/local tourneys. And those kids are not working part time to pay the bills. If a college wants to recruit Intel/Siemens/AIME winners, those kids are also middle/upper class. And all of those winners and semi-finalists have “intellectual promise”.
Highly competitive schools like Chicago turn down (or WL) dozens if not hundreds of applicants “with high intellectual promise and achievement” every year bcos there ain’t enuf room at the inn. So it’s not the binary choice for admissions that you make it out to be.
btw: on a different thread, I think it was posted that approximately half of Chicago matriculants participated in Varsity sports in HS. I was personally surprised at that number since it is not very ‘monkish’. I wonder how much it has changed over the years, at least since Ted O’Neill’s watch. Any idea? (And just to be clear, I’m not implying that athletes don’t show intellectual promise, however defined.)
Note, I said nothing about doing anything hypocritical or dishonest. (I thought critical reading skills were product of a Chicago education?) If the Dean is concerned about the finaid budget, and I am not saying that he is, I see nothing wrong with admitting a few more AIME semifinalists or debaters or published poets this year. Still need blind. Still meets full need.
Have to agree with Marlowe.
In fall 2017, despite a reportedly significant number of ED matriculants (1,200 by some counts out of 1,700 some odd matriculants), 61% of UChicago entrants were on some form of financial aid. This was an UNCHANGED percentage from the prior year, which admitted 100% EA and RD. So where were all the full-pay kids? And this was BEFORE supplementing the Odyssey and similar programs with the Empower Initiative. Haven’t heard numbers for this year, but Class of '23 saw a 20% increase of low income and first gen. matriculants. Some of that will come at the expense of admitting perfectly qualified full-pay students who might have gotten in w/o question in an earlier year.
UChicago’s messaging has been the exact opposite of what some are suggesting about “favoring” upper or middle income kids either by cutting out “need blind” or using other obvious factors to guess at income levels. (By the way, the ACTUAL “middle income” portion of the distribution is guaranteed full tuition, fees, room and board at UChi. FYI). Just like at other top institutions, the university community will be experiencing pay and hiring cuts in order to preserve the commitment to the principles and goals of the financial aid program.
The cynic in me reminds everyone that stats come out eventually. There’s hardly a way that UC can “disguise” admitting some higher proportion of full pay kids 
Intuitively I believe you have the best chance with ED1. The ED2 pool is going to pick up a ton of strong candidates who applied to HYPS with SCEA and were deferred or denied.
With regards to the financial aid discussion I am hearing that the majority of people being pulled off wait-lists for T20 schools are full pay, that is anecdotal but it seems somewhat inevitable, albeit quite unfortunate.
I dunno, Blue, when you talk of “finding easier ways to favor the middle/upper income” and then proceed to reel off several instances of such oblique methods, a fair reading of your plain words is that the goal Itself is favoring the wealthy and that the means to that goal a mere subterfuge. It’s being disingenuous to claim merely that you did not use the words hypocritical or dishonest. The actions you allege are saying it. If that was what was really going on here, why would not all the disfavored arise and put a torch to this institution?
Could being an athlete sometimes be a tie-breaker? It could. Possibly not as often as being a poor kid who didn’t play sports because he had to work jobs after school. Give me a matchup between those two, with the same academic promise, and I’d put my money on the poor kid every time. But being an athlete also shows something in a kid and it is something unrelated to the fat wallet of a parent. The more pertinent educational correlation is with discipline and competence. It could assist an application to the same degree as being an artist, musician, scientific prodigy, or any number of other accomplishments. Chicago would want them all, but most of all the ones who have captured something especially poignant, perceptive, unorthodox, or otherwise thrilling in an essay.
That these things are taken note of and given weight is hardly remarkable. The kids with inherent advantages in these departments, many of which correlate with the wealth and education of their parents, get a leg up in this competition. We all know that. That is not cynicism but, as you say, recognizing the way things are. There are many exceptions to that correlation, and the exceptions to it may get a boost from being, well, exceptional. That it has to do with noticing fancy zip codes and the kinds of sports that wealthy white kids tend to play is, frankly, ridiculous at the University of Chicago, whatever may be the case elsewhere.
- This is a specious argument. Most of the athletic programs at UChicago - football, basketball, soccer, wrestling and track and field - are consistent with what's offered through community programs and high schools everywhere - even in low income areas. They are not club sports such as golf or fencing (there is a tennis team, however).
My kids’ high school sends a decent number of talented scholar-athletes to top schools (D1, not D3). As an elite college prep that doles out a significant amount of financial aid in order to attract the best and brightest from all over our metro, it educates a large segment of under-represented students (including URM, immigrant, first gen) and helps them realize all their talents. I’m sure this school is not alone. There’s money to assist the best and brightest who need it - even for athletics. And even for club athletics.
You don’t need to be high income to excel at theater arts, student government, community service, academic teams, etc. Music can get expensive, but most top conservatories have scholarship money to subsidize talent in that area.
Rather than “income” (a broad term) a better way to think about correlating factors would be basic things like a stable home, supportive parents, and so forth. It doesn’t actually take high amounts of income to do most EC’s.
My guess is that most colleges use EC’s to screen for those factors that are highly correlated with success in college (perseverance, dedication, etc). Not income.
- Uh, true on that last part! There might be a parent or two interested in answering that one, Blue :wink: By the way, the College has been a member of Division III since 1986 so even before Ted O'Neill's day.
The earliest stats I have on athletics is from the Class of 2015 (so entered fall 2011). 43% of entrants were involved in high school varsity athletics. By two years later it was over 50%. Lately it was as high as 60% which is pretty remarkable. Taking a quick look at Class of 2023 vs. 2015, high school EC’s overall have increased with selectivity so it’s not just varsity athletics (although that is a notable increase). Second highest is theater. As the College became more of a first choice (due, in part, to improving the quality of student life), they attracted more top students who were also accomplished in other areas and wanted to continue pursuing those or similar at the collegiate level. “Monkishness” no longer the default. There’s a huge difference in overall quality - academic as well as other - between the current classes and those from the more “monkish” days.
So i’m curious - per @marlowe1 and @JBStillFlying - affordability is a huge institutional priority for Chicago. So, if they are pouring lots of money into aid - what do the EA-restrictive, wealthier schools (HYPSM) offer more of here?
What are the trade offs? Does hyps have more endowed professorships? A larger array of cutting-edge scientific equipment? Lower faculty student ratio? More extravagant dining hall brunches?
If the fin aid budgets are roughly comparable, what are the differences between the mega-rich schools and places like Chicago? Where does all that extra money go?
Harvard provides better funding for its graduate programs and it might have a lot more endowed chairs. That’s in part where all that extra money goes. But Harvard also has a better FA program than does Chicago - or at least doles out more grant money per recipient (about $13k more per year). Furthermore, a higher percentage of the incoming class in the fall of 2017 received some form of financial aid (77% vs. 61% at UChicago) which tells me that their class skews less wealthy than UChicago’s. Higher percentage of Pells as well (although average size of grant is similar between the two). This is the latest available data but UChicago has been a moving target on the issue of “affordability” so there is still a “TBD” aspect to this story. . .
However, IMO, it’s a mistake to assume that someone chooses to apply to Harvard or to UChicago due primarily to FA. Grants and scholarships help remove barriers but at this level they don’t tend to attract the price-seekers. And most students admitted to an elite school also have excellent - even superior - low-cost choices from less prestigious but still respectable institutions.
While acknowledging that Harvard can be more generous due to better resources, it’s not clear to me that the discrepancy in aid stats between H and UC is specifically due to differences in generosity. It could be due to the type of student who is accepted and matriculates. UChicago is a uniformly more rigorous program of study than Harvard, and intellectual development is a primary goal. In contrast, and appropriate to its goal of bringing in and educating leaders of all types, Harvard offers a wider variety of curricular paths and levels of rigor. Both institutions undoubtedly seek to admit those who would most benefit from the respective education, but UChicago has a distinctive - and narrower, IMO - criteria compared to Harvard. That’s one possible reason.
Another is that Harvard might go beyond “need blind” and actually have target numbers of low income that it feels it must admit. Given its relatively broad criteria of admitting (and educating) leaders, such a directly need-aware strategy can be perfectly consistent with the goals of the institution if they believe that four years on the Harvard campus is transformative to anyone and that “benefits the most” should be defined along economic criteria. We already know that Harvard has race quotas so it’s not a stretch to think they might have SES quotas as well.
@JBStillFlying - interesting. I am far removed from applying for fin aid, so I’m curious - is there a stronger correlation between wealth and intellectual preparedness, so that’s why Chicago’s class skews wealthier than Harvard et al?
Does Chicago’s narrower criteria lead to wealthier classes? Would this be a big change from the old N.Y. times data, which cited Chicago’s classes as being the least wealthy in the ivy plus mix (similar to mit)?
Both schools have v high yield rates, so it looks like few are going elsewhere, for any reason. Why would Harvard be more generous here, or dole out more grant money for a similar class size?
You would think, with similar applicant pools (and an emphasis on affordability), the classes would look similar socioeconomically. But you’re saying it looks like Chicago’s classes are wealthier than Harvard’s (I never thought I would say that).
^ Undoubtedly academic preparedness is correlated with income. That does not exclude an exceptional low income student from succeeding at UChicago (any more than an exceptional high income student). We do know that UChicago went TO precisely because qualified prospective admits from under-represented communities, which surely must include low SES, were scared off from applying. That tells me that 1) there is a perception out there that general trends in low SES and academic preparedness apply in the individual case and 2) UChicago knows that this isn’t true.
I do not believe that UChicago’s narrower criteria would lead to a wealthier alumni group than its peers. But that’s just an impression. We have income data on UChicago grads from relatively recent years - respectable but not tippy-top (haven’t looked at it too recently though). Some of that reflects regional differences; those who flock to NYC/DC/Boston might earn higher incomes than those who stay in Chicago but work a comparable job.
Both schools meet full demonstrated need, so if Harvard is doling out more grant money that either means that the need is greater or that Harvard defines “need” more generously than does Chicago. The difference is sizable; about $10k per student on average. That probably means Harvard’s FA policies are satisfying a greater degree of need.
In order to see which school matriculates “wealthier” students, you’d have to look at the distribution of family income by quintile. We don’t have that data. We know that UChicago charges significantly more for full-fare tuition/fees/R&B than does Harvard currently, and that in 2017 the matriculating class received less in institutional and federal grant money. Assuming that’s still the case, UChicago is a more expensive school to attend, on average. How that impacts who applies there - not known. We know that, prior to Empower at least, UChicago had a smaller percentage of very low income students applying and matriculating than did Harvard just due to the Pell numbers. However, whether that’s still the case given the impact of Empower isn’t clear since we don’t have current data. My guess is that it’s still lagging Harvard, but perhaps less so.
In 2017, during the time that UChicago matriculated its first class of ED, the College doled out several million more in FA than it did the year before. Which is an interesting finding when you consider that they were supposedly bringing in all these new full-pay matriculants. Of course, the class size increased as well, by about 150 (9.3% growth); however, total grant and scholarship dollars increased about 16% and the number of Pells increased 20%. Average yearly grant size increased by nearly $5K. Overall, UChicago still saw about the same proportion requiring any sort of financial aid - 61% - as it did the prior year, and the average net price (after subtracting out grant and scholarship aid) actually declined slightly from the prior year. So it’s not clear that the introduction of ED skewed the class more wealthy. More data is needed.
@JBStillFlying - the disparity in fin aid budgets for two need-blind schools (with comparable applicant pools and class sizes) seems strange to me, especially when you consider Harvard’s other institutional priorities.
Off the cuff, even more than academic preparedness, I would think preference for squash players, rowers, skiers, sailors, water polo, etc. (all wealthy sports at Harvard) AND noted preference for legacies (e.g., wealthy ppl) would tip the scales for the wealthy. Again, wouldn’t this mean Harvard’s classes would typically be wealthier? If anything, I would think Harvard’s applicant pool (and admitted students) would be wealthier than Chicago’s, for all these reasons.
Yet how is it Harvard spends tens of millions more on aid each year, with the same size student body? Per their priorities, it seems strange their admitted students would be needier than Chicago’s.
Also, how could one need-blind school be “more generous” than another? Isn’t the definition of need fairly uniform, across the board? If schools have different definitions of need, lots of schools could be “need-blind” but, in actuality, wouldn’t they be very different?
I thought need-blind worked like this:
We admit students regardless of their ability to pay. We then meet all the demonstrated need (defined uniformly) that exists.
It seems strange that the school with legacy preference and wealthy sports (and comparable SAT numbers) winds up with a class that is considerably more needy than Chicago’s.
This is even more strange b/c, just ten years ago (when Chicago’s classes were quite strong academically), Chicago’s classes were noticeably less wealthy than Harvard’s (per the NY times report). Has Chicago begun to value something in the past 10 years, that is found disproportionately in the wealthy, as opposed to other SES groups?
@cue7 wrote:
Need is not defined uniformly, at all. Each school has their own proprietary formula for calculating need.
Most private schools use CSS Profile, U Chicago has their "financial aid worksheet’ (but one can sub in the Profile).
For example, among the set of schools we are talking about, some may factor a larger proportion of home equity into the calculation, or expect parents to sell off real estate holdings to fund college, or disallow (add back to AGI) typical business deductions for parents who own businesses.
Notably U Chicago is one of the few private schools that does not require non-custodial parent financial information when calculating need, although they reserve the right to ask for it. This can be a huge advantage for applicants of divorced parents.
On CC threads you see differences in FA packages every day. There was a recent one where Princeton gave much less aid than JHU, a surprise to many…and Princeton declined to match that off on appeal.
@Mwfan1921 - if need isn’t defined uniformly, it makes everything more complicated for applicants. Frankly, that just stinks.
Shouldn’t schools that are “need blind” say this more candidly? That is: “we are need-blind, but we define need however we want. Have fun figuring out the differences between all these “need-blind” schools!”
The whole crazy system seems to tilted.
[Elite schools to admitted students: “You are only here to advance our institutional priorities!”]
FA is a part of the craziness for applicants…finances are the most important factor for most students when making their college decision.
Here we are only talking about the relatively few schools that meet full need (even though they calculate it differently). Most schools don’t meet full need (as calculated by them), which can leave gaps of tens of thousands of dollars per year.