<p>I am aware of the self-selection. This issue was brought up in the other thread where I mentioned this difference.</p>
<p>The point remains: different applicant pools demand different criteria. West Coast applicants in general are different from East Coast applicants. The universities, as you have pointed out, do cater to their respective regions, which has an impact on how they view applicants from those regions. The geographic biases are of course due to self-selection of applicants, but the fact that they exist at all is still indicative of differences in the admissions process.</p>
<p>If you are willing to drop that point (without a resolution, even), consider the traits that Stanford seeks to examine through its supplement. Now consider the HYP supplements. Clearly different.</p>