So first, this is an impossible question to answer. The data doesn’t exist (that I know of) and every college is different.
For example, ED admits may include:
- Athletes
- Legacies / Donors
- Questbridge Applicants.
- Children of Uni Staff.
- Etc., etc., etc…
But it is pretty hard to figure out how many ED applicants/ED admits are hooked vs unhooked.
I would like for this thread to just cover personal anecdotes–i.e., things that you have personally noted about the ED process. What did you learn that surprised you?
Examples might include discovering the number of athletes who were ED at a school. The number of Questbridges. Policies that you may have inadvertently discovered.
I will start. My wife went to a fairly famous LAC. At her school, Legacies are told to apply RD. They don’t want you to apply ED. No official reason was given. This surprised me, but you can speculate and perhaps infer logic from such a policy.
You are correct that the data does not exist.
I did alumni interviewing for one of the Ivies for more than two decades, including chairing our region where I saw all the admit data. The number of non hooked students being accepted ED were nearly zero. Legacy was getting less and less likely too, unless coupled with another hook.
That said, there other highly ranked schools that admit the majority of their class in ED where there are plenty of high stats, non hooked kids gaining acceptance. Forbes published a list this summer: Early Decision Provides A Big Bang For Your Buck At These Colleges.
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That is fascinating and great firsthand insight. Exactly what I am looking for as I would not have guessed this.
A question–did your school push athletes into ED?
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Yes on athletes in ED. At my school, many of the athletes were also legacy, so a double hook.
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This could be an interesting thread. But if you’re trying to accumulate possible data points, naming the school would be necessary in my opinion.
Here’s some data I have seen: Ivy League schools have around 200 recruited athletes in each year’s ED cycle. Depending on the school and the year, that number may be a bit lower or higher.
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You are correct. However, we are trying to stay anonymous. I have probably already revealed too much on CC.
Thank you. I have always wondered how that worked.
Ivy League athletes are D1. But D1 athletes are supposed to be able to change their minds on schools all the way up to National Signing Day. Does going the ED route mean that athletes give up this flexibility?
FWIW, we know multiple kids (5+) admitted ED (both rounds) to Wesleyan this year, including my kid. None were hooked. Boys and girls.
Wes admits more than half of its class ED. It’s a larger LAC (~3000), so while it has a similar number of athletes as other NESCACs and similar LACs, the percentage is lower. No legacy preference. Large number of QuestBridge admits relative to size (49 matched this year). Technically need-aware but says it’s need-blind for 95% of applicants (but not sure what this means, practically speaking).
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Sorry to add to the fog with this anecdote, but I’m also reluctant to name the college in question for fear of betraying a confidence.
During this last cycle, in November, a trustee of a rejection-heavy liberal arts college told a friend of mine (while playing a toney racquet sport, no less):
“Admissions is really only looking for athletes and boys in Early Decision.” (Boys, of course, to address the gender imbalance at liberal arts colleges.)
And this is at a college that says it considers legacy.
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Adding some texture. By mutual agreement, Ivy League schools are limited in how many athletes can be offered a spot each cycle. HP tends to be close to the max. The others set a slightly lower number, which can adjust from year to year
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I have no concrete evidence to support this, but I’ve heard that the actual number of athletes is as low as 180 and as high as 230.
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That’s the general ballpark
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Curious if you saw their admitted stats on Scoir or Nav.? Were these average stats above or below the Wesleyan average?
Just speculating but…if I had to guess they are need aware for internationals.
Your post, when combined with others, clearly shows that schools have different motives in how they use their ED processes. Some might try to get hooked applicants in. Some might address student body demographic imbalances. Some might use it as yield protection. Some might do all of these things.
Not fog. Fascinating. So the school addresses demographic imbalances and gets its athletes in? The schools all have different motives in how they use ED, to be sure.
No worries on betraying confidence. You and your confidence have a right to privacy. I appreciate the reply.
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Based on what I know about the kids (not based on any actual stats knowledge beyond my own kid and one other), I’d say at or above average for Wes.
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And, yes, you’re right. They discourage international students who need financial aid from applying ED.
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Ivy league athletes do not sign NLI letters. No scholarship money in this league vs other D1 divisions. High schools may host a signing for celebration/photo opportunity - but no “real” letter for the Ivy commits.
If an Ivy league athlete is receiving financial support from the school it would be financial aid no other options.
Yes, they can change their mind and get out of the ED agreement - guessing not common.
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That explains it. Thank you.
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It may be outdated by now, but I found the chapters on ED and on athletes in “Who Gets in and Why” very interesting. The author is Jeff Selingo, and he did an AMA on CC.
His piece on Amherst was eye-opening (although not solely about ED.) He said, based on the #s at that time, 157 of the 490 of the admission slots for freshman were reserved for athletes in some fashion. And most of those skewed white and not low income. So if Amherst is aiming to get diversity in the remaining slots, and you don’t contribute to that diversity or help field a team, seems particularly hard to get in.
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This is a different kind of anecdote, but when I looked at SCOIR data for our feederish HS, at most highly selective colleges there did not seem to be much difference between the ED and RD pools in terms of competitive ranges and hit rates. Maybe a few more hits outside the normal competitive ranges ED, but that would be consistent with those kids being hooked in some way (that data is not in SCOIR).
What I have struggled squaring this with is that our college counselors have seemed to start suggesting that kids might want to find an ED college, or at least ED2. This is not a hard push–my S24 did an REA college, then passed up ED2 after being deferred, and that was fine with his counselor. But I do wonder if they are maybe seeing something I am not with the better data they have available. Like maybe not for every college, but for some colleges they are seeing our kids do better with ED.
And I do think that is plausibly true at colleges that might be worried about our kids just using them for deep backups. Indeed, I sometimes wonder if the reason why my S24’s counselor did not push ED2 harder was that his ED2 college would have been WUSTL. And from the data it is clear WUSTL happily takes a lot of our high numbers kids RD, and then in fact actually yields quite a few (including my kid), because WUSTL has a really good reputation in our HS.
But if, say, his possible ED2 would have been Tulane? Or maybe if his second-choice was Rice, that could even have been an ED1 conversation? Those are less popular destinations in our HS (I think in part because there is a substantial number of kids who do not want to be in the South). So I don’t know, but maybe they would have pushed harder in those cases.
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