stats of EA

JHS
Tue, 18 Nov 2008 18:21:16 +0000

30% would mean no increase in EA applications vs. last year. Without looking it up, I think last year there were a little more than 4,000 EA applications (an increase of about 25% compared 2006, accounting for ), and about 1,300 EA acceptances. There was some expectation that the EA pool would probably include a higher-than-previous percentage of Harvard and Princeton acceptees, and thus that yield from the EA pool would be lower than in prior years (i.e., fewer EA acceptees would enroll). One way or another, however, that seems not to have happened, and for the third year in a row final enrollment was somewhat higher than the target.

So my guess is that there will be slightly fewer EA acceptees this year. But not a lot fewer, because Chicago gets good students out of its EA pool, in part because it markets the heck out of the ones it wants from December-April.

There are lots of big factors swishing around that could have affected the number of EA applications: the crappy economy, continually increasing recognition of Chicago’s high quality, the effect of being on the Common App, another year’s worth of sophistication in the good-high-school-student world about application strategies in a world without early options at Harvard and Princeton. I will be surprised if EA applications increased as much this year as they did last year, but I will be equally surprised if they don’t increase at least a little.

Bottom line: 30% acceptance rate in the EA pool is probably a smidgen too high. I’m guessing 27%.