<p>I agree. One thing I’m thinking may have hurt me is that I wrote my Why Chicago essay the day the app was due… it was kinda rushed and didn’t contain much in the way of specifics. I think that maybe this year they based the decision between acceptance and deferral on (among other factors, of course) the likelihood that the applicant would enroll, given the huge increase in EA apps and the fact that many of those apps are from people with their sights on Harvard and Princeton. Just a thought.</p>