<p>Cue7, you were puzzled why UChicago’s number of RD applicants was lower than that of Duke and Stanford, while it’s number of EA applicants was so high. The main reason is that UChicago’s EA is both non-binding and non-restrictive, while Duke’s ED is binding and Stanford’s SCEA is restrictive. There is no tradeoff for applying early to UChicago, while there is to applying early to Duke and Stanford. Consequently, a lot of applicants who are planning to apply to UChicago anyway just go ahead and submit their application early.</p>
<p>Comparing EA, ED, and SCEA is not an apples-to-apples comparison. It’s nice that UChicago had a lower early acceptance rate than Harvard this year, but that’s largely because there were a lot fewer early applicants to Harvard than to UChicago. And that in turn is largely because Harvard is SCEA and UChicago is non-restrictive EA.</p>