<p>“Polite rejection”? Not necessarily at all, especially not this year. With EA applications up over 40%, there is no way that the same percentage of early applicants will be accepted this year as in the past. On the other hand, there has to be an open question whether the EA surge will reflect a corresponding increase in RD applications, or whether it is mainly due to factors (the lack of an early option at Harvard and Princeton, new participation in the Questbridge program) which may essentially have had the effect of shifting RD applications to EA. So I think it is likely that lots of EA candidates who might have been accepted EA in the past will wind up deferred, but will still be extremely good candidates for admission in the RD round.</p>