The point I’m making is that UChicago plays the ranking game to improve its ranking and is less than totally honest and transparent with its applicants in so doing. The exact number of early applicants is irrelevant except that it’s a very large number (much larger than those of schools of its size). BTW, nobody outside of UChicago AO and admin knows the exact number since it’s kept secret, along with other crucial data. By playing the EA/ED game, UChicago was able to increase the number of its early applicants dramatically relative to schools of its size through EA while improving its yield with ED, gaining an undeserved ranking advantage.