<p>Nothing particularly notable for most of you, except speculation from Ted that there will be many deferrals and a bit more about the Uncommon/Common Application thing:</p>
<p>I’m really starting to feel like I’ll be deferred. I showed a whole lot of interest but I just don’t have the grades and community service to compete with the Harvard and Princeton kids. Waiting until April is going to be brutal.</p>
<p>Or I could get in. Hopefully all my interest and knowledge about the school makes me stand out.</p>
<p>Yeah. I’m counting on a deferral. Oh well. If I’m prepared for it, it won’t be such a dreadful thing. I’m trying to keep myself sane by reminding myself there are other great schools out there.</p>
<p>Well, it also underscores that a deferral is NOT a rejection. It’s a “we like you, we like you a lot, but ****! We need to make room for you first!”</p>
<p>Think about it this way:</p>
<p>A good number of EA applicants also apply elsewhere ED. If they get in ED, Chicago is no longer a possibility, no matter how much they want to attend. Chicago doesn’t know, of course, who those kids are, but they are out there. Boom. Some competition out of the way.</p>
<p>A good number of EA applicants will also try their luck in the RD round. Some of them will either get into HYP etc., or they’ll offers they can’t refuse from other colleges (an example would be SBDad’s son, who eventually chose mad money Michigan over some money Chicago). Of course, there’s also no indication of this in the EA round either.</p>
<p>It might take a long time for Chicago to get paperwork regarding the plans of all of its applicants, so it might take a deferral and a waitlist before they know who they have room for. Patience and luck are key. Also remember that you have no idea how you stand versus the competition (due to the self-selecting nature of the school and the self-selecting nature of this website, you probably have an inflated idea of what the applicant pool really looks like!)</p>
<p>I am not sure how a deferral helps them manage the situation. They can assume that the yield of the RD pool will match historical norms, but that still does not help them figure out what EA yield will be. The only way they can manage this risk-free is through the waitlist pool, not the deferral pool. Am I missing something?</p>