<p>Perhaps it's premature to raise this question. However, as I looked over the boards in recent weeks, it seems fairly clear that a number of top schools received a record number of ED or SCEA applications. I can remember reading this about JHU, Princeton, U Penn, Cornell, Duke, Yale, and Columbia. There may certainly be others I haven't heard of. (Anyone hear of any?) </p>
<p>To what extent is this due to the increasing number of applicants overall, and to what extent does this reflect the fact that people are trying to game and outguess the system? Is this ED increase also happening at other schools outside the circle of big research universities, or is it unique to the latter?</p>
<p>Secondly, what will all this mean for the formation of the class of 2010? Are schools likely to draw a larger portion of their class from the early admits, i.e, perhaps select half of the class instead of a third? Or will the percentages of those selected in ED/SCEA drop? Will their be fewer applicants in the RD pool because so many applied ED, or will the number of RD applicants also be larger? </p>
<p>I was looking at the Virginia ED acceptances yesterday on CC. I have no idea whether their applications are up or down, but I was stunned to see some of the instate deferrals: students that look very competitive on paper.</p>
<p>I am obviously interested in all this not just as an academic exercise, but how it will affect my son. He has an EA application in at Chicago (haven't heard about the numbers there) and is filing a number of RD applications. All of these questions can only be a guess at this point, but I am truly curious what others think, especially some of our posters who seem to have so much knowledge of the system.</p>
<p>From what I have read on the Penn board in particular and at the Daily Pennsylvanian, at Penn they will take roughly the same % of their total class from ED as usual, that means a somewhat smaller % of the ED applicants admitted this year compared with last- they have 21% more ED applicants this year- which is truly staggering I think. I haven't followed many of the other boards to know if any other school has that big a jump. Penn is well known to favor ED applicants. The demographics might be a part of the explanation- isn;t next year the peak? </p>
<p>My son was the only ED applicant to Penn from his school last year, and this year there are 8!! I asked the GC why he thought this was true. The class is larger, kids like my son ( ;) ), have a sense of how competitive an applicant he was, maybe think they stand a chance...I really don't know. The GC says the top kids are applying....</p>
<p>I have also heard that a higher % at our school are applying to all the very competitive schools ED/EA at a much higher % this year than last- again maybe in response to what happened to ED applicants (as opposed to RD) from our school last year. For example, the excellent EA applicant to Stanford was accepted, when the Val applied RD he was wait listed, I think...etc. I can only speak for our school though. </p>
<p>I really don't know...good luck to your son. I can't help but feel fortunate we are not applying this year instead of last...but you just don't know.</p>
<p>For what its worth, the last year that there were statistics available for Chicago, the admit rate for EA was exactly the same as for RD - I think it was 40% in either case. So at least for Chicago, there is no reason to expect a particular advantage. (My daughter also has an EA app in at Chicago - and I have mixed feelings on the whole thing -- but I think the main benefit is that she will get an early answer from at least one college.) I also think that with the unique essay requirements for Chicago, its good to get that one out of the way early.</p>
<p>Chicago may be very different from other schools though. For one thing, they have that famous self-selecting applicant pool -- since EA is not binding, there is no particular reason for them to favor the EA applicants. Also, even though the EA/RD admit rates are the same, some EA applicants get deferred, so those borderline candidates essentially have a 2nd chance.</p>
<p>Thanks, Calmom, and Robyrm. I do agree that these changes in number of applicants are less likely to affect the Chicago EA pool. It is more self selecting; the application and the unique nature of the school guarantees that. I was actually more curious whether the higher ED numbers at these particular schools might also have an effect on their later RD admissions. </p>
<p>Will the numbers in RD also be up, simply reflecting a greater number of applicants overall, or will the RD pool at a given school stay level or even drop a tad, since so many more students seem to be applying ED? Robyrm, I did see the comments by Penn which said they weren't going to increase the percentage of the class accepted in the early round. If a lot of the top tier schools did that, and the increases in ED applicants continue year after year, you might eventually reach a situation similar to Chicago where there is no clear cut statistical advantage to applying early, at least at these "upper tier" schools where there is so much hoopla. From my personal view, I actually think that might be a good thing. </p>
<p>I came up with two other schools not on my original list that saw substantial increases in ED candidates. MIT announced a 10% increase and Rice, 15%. I don't think anyone has topped Penn in terms of sheer numbers though.</p>
<p>I think the numbers of ED/EA aps are up mainly because, in an increasingly competitve process, students will understandably seek whatever advantage is available to them. Analyses of Harvard and Yale over the past few years have shown that if you add together the EA acceptances plus the EA deferred/then accepted students, it makes up 49% of the class. It has been suggested that they want to stay under the "magic" number of 50% of their class being made up of EA candidates. I can't speak about U Chicago that the OP mentions, but it would be interesting to see what the EA admit rate would be if you add in the EA deferreds that are later accepted.</p>
<p>When my kids were applying (both did EA at different schools) the thought of having their apps being compared against 4,000 others, as compared to the additional 15,000 that would come in the RD round, made it seem obvious that they'd have an easier time standing out with EA. They were fortunate that their first choice schools had EA vs. ED (Brown was EA at the time...I am not sure my d. would have been ready to commit to ED).</p>
<p>Today's (12/5/05) edition of the Brown Daily Herald has a story about the increase in ED/EA applications at the Ivies this year. Here are the reported increases over last year's numbers:</p>
<p>Penn - up 21%
Brown - up 16%
Dartmouth - up 12%
Princeton - up 9%
Columbia - up 5.5%
Yale - up 3.5%
Harvard - DOWN 5%
Numbers for Cornell were not reported.</p>
<p>The article suggests that the increases are due to the larger applicant pool this year (just more seniors graduating) and students starting much earlier (in sophomore year) to research colleges and hone in on their top choice.</p>
<p>btw, Brown's acceptance rate for ED candidates last year was 28% compared to 13% fro RD candidates.</p>
<p>
[quote]
What is the "famous self-selecting applicant pool"?</p>
<p>Doesn't that apply to all elite schools?
[/quote]
</p>
<p>Not in the same way. Chicago has much less name brand recognition than other schools of its level of quality. Added to that, it has a reputation of being particularly hard (not saying it's harder than other top schools, just that this is the rep), and finally, they have a particularly idiosyncratic and challenging application. </p>
<p>This all adds up to a smaller application pool made up of very qualified students who choose Chicago despite (or more likely because of) its intimidating reputation.</p>
<p>I had to grin when I saw your response: "More rejects, and GREAT classes at other schools."</p>
<p>I think you are right!</p>
<p>I also predict that when the ED decisions are in, a school like Chicago (along with Carnegie Mellon, U Rochester, Tufts, and lots of others) may get a large bump up in RD applications. (Not that I am hoping for that!)</p>
<p>** Worried_mom- ** Thanks so much for those figures on Brown. Son has an RD application going in there.</p>
<p>
[quote]
More rejects, and GREAT classes at other schools.
[/quote]
</p>
<p>There may be some merit to that. I'm beginning to think that applicants are finally starting to realize that single-digit acceptance rates at three or four schools equal approximately 0% chance of admission and are adjusting their college choices accordingly.</p>
<p>I don't have last year's ED1 numbers, but according to a current student who spoke to the Admissions Dean last week, Swarthmore has received 370 ED1 applications this year. That is up 64% over the ED1 applications for Fall 2004.</p>
<p>Last year, they received 321 total ED1 and ED2 applications.</p>
<p>From what I recall about an article about Rice, that university had targeted increasing ED apps as a goal. If a school has a larger ED pool from which to draw and all of those kids are expected to attend if accepted, the school can be more assured of having a certain number of well-qualified students in its entering class. With RD, it's a somewhat educated guess to determine what the attrition between those accepted and those matriculating will be.</p>
<p>Yale has said for years that they reject entire classes of students "as good" as those they enroll. Not "almost as good", "about as good", "just short of as good", but "as good", as in "equivalently good". Same is true for all these schools. These students are going elsewhere, and will continue to do so. </p>
<p>I think demographics play a role. In the 1980s, every year saw roughly 50,000 to 100,000 more births. The echo boom. Now we're seeing these kids apply to college.</p>
<p>I think it's interesting to speculate which schools will benefit the most from all this spillover generated from so many ED students being rejected. In addition to the established research universities, there should surely be spillover in the RD round with "rejected" students applying to top LACs like Amherst, Swarthmore, Haverford, Wellesley, etc. </p>
<p>The interesting thing, of course, is that the spillover effect won't stop there. Other applicants will be "bumped out" of these 'elite' small colleges, because of the schools' own increase in ED numbers, along with the additional spillover applicants from the Ivies who go ahead with RD applications in late December. It's like a series of cascading waterfalls. I just hope everyone has thought ahead and ends up at a school that is a good match for them. </p>
<p>Thanks for those figures on Swarthmore ED, ** interesteddad **. As you know, son is preparing an RD application. BTW, Swarthmore did tell my son that he'll be getting some information about scheduling an interview in the near future. While the two schools are different in many ways, there are aspects of Swarthmore that remind him of Chicago, where he spent some time this past summer in a research program.</p>
<p>"Last year, they received 321 total ED1 and ED2 applications."</p>
<p>Students and families are getting more sophisticated in analyzing data. The important number was not that 321 applied ED, but that 160 were admitted. An admission's rate of close to 50% looks extremely favorable to the usual rate that is about half of that at Swarthmore. Among leading non-coed LAC schools, you can find ED rate of admissions of 60% and 80%. For students who know those schools are their first choice, given the lower competition -and often lesser qualified pool- such information is precious. </p>
<p>In addition, there is another key number to monitor: the percentage of ED enrollment in the final class. Even if all 160 Swat admits enrolled, they would represent less than 30%. This means that 70% are admitted RD or from the WL. On the other hand, at some schools the percentage of ED/EA is much higher -with that mystical number of 50% at many schools. </p>
<p>The problem is that there is never a guarantee that the ED boon will still be there, as Yale demonstrated two years ago.</p>
<p>I don't think it's "spillover" in terms of which students end up going to which schools. By that I mean that the same students, relatively speaking, are ending up going to the same schools they always have. The difference is that, years ago, students did a much better job of figuring out where they would end up and just applying to those schools.</p>
<p>With the advent of the common app, students are now taking a more shotgun approach, applying to 8-12 schools, many of which they realistically have no prayer of getting into. This leads to a big increase in the number of applications, but a signficant number of those apps are so poorly targeted that they really aren't in the game. Basically, the selectivity isn't really fundamentally different, there is just a big slice of wishful thinking and disappointment layered on top.</p>
<p>Real selectivity did decline in the late 1970s - early 1980s following the end of the baby-boom and the shock to the system of allowing women to apply to the elite mens colleges. The current demographic bulge has driven real selectivity back to where it was in the late 1960s - early 1970s.</p>
<p>The other factor is that a particular demographic group (wealthy white male students) has seen its share of the total elite college slots decline as colleges have opened up slots for women and non-white applicants to a degree unheard of 30 years ago. Much of the hand-wringing has come from the group that has lost slots.</p>
<p>But if this trend continues over several more years, won't the advantages given by ED eventually be worn away under the sheer weight of applicants? Presumably, this would happen first at the 'top' schools. Will Penn ED still look like a clear bargain after you factor in the 21% increase in applicants? Is the top tier of the ED system doomed to implode, a victim of its own success? Will next year's applicants or the year after that choose to apply ED to schools that are just slightly less selective, so they do get a greater bounce in the numbers?</p>
<p>
[quote]
The important number was not that 321 applied ED, but that 160 were admitted. An admission's rate of close to 50% looks extremely favorable to the usual rate that is about half of that at Swarthmore.
[/quote]
</p>
<p>But, that's misleading. Don't get me wrong, I think a well-qualified applicant can increase his or her chances in the early decision rounds at a place like Swarthmore. But, the key phrase is "well-qualified". ED does nothing for an applicant who wasn't going to get accepted in the first place. That's why I'm not a fan of wild-reach ED applications. IMO, a well-targeted ED app should be to a school where there is a legitimate expectation of an acceptance letter. Not necessarily a sure-bet, but a solid chance. Call it a 50%/50% chance which, not coincidentally, is about where ED acceptances usually end up.</p>
<p>IMO, ED offers the biggest admissions edge to a solidly-qualified, but not "walk on water" applicant, who is a good fit for the school. In other words, the threshold question in ED admissions would be, "is this student what we are going to end up with in the final enrolled class in June (after yield)?" If so, then it makes sense to accept that student ED. In effect, the ED applicant is competing against the "enrolled pool" versus the "accepted pool".</p>