<p>What you need to be aware of is that you will be competing in the SCEA round with all of the recruited athletes to Stanford’s many sport teams, who have already been notified of their acceptance in the early fall- [subtract 210 spots from 700 early acceptances- taken from the Common Data Set numbers for athletic scholarships awarded] as well as the children of Stanford profs, children of Alumni, and DA admits in the early round. So in reality, it really is just as hard to get in early if your are NOT a WoW applicant[ walk on water], athlete, or other wise hooked. What you give up by applying early is the opportunity to apply EA to other colleges where applying early really is a benefit statistically. In addition, 85% of those applicants that are not accepted in the early round are rejected- only about 15% of applications are carried over for consideration in the regular round. If you are not a scholar-athlete, or otherwise hooked, and don’t have tippy top stats, you may want to wait until Jan to apply.</p>