University of Chicago has established a new binding early decision admission plan for high school seniors who participate in its summer precollegiate programs. UChicago Summer Student Early Notification (SSEN) FAQ | UChicago Summer Session High school seniors will find out early in the year if they are admitted to the University. The program is a continuation of uchicago’s reliance on binding early decision and may increase to popularity of its precollegiate programs if they are perceived to provide admission assistance.
Well, there’s a way to get around “need blindness”…
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I’ll be generous and point out that U Chicago does provide need based aid for their summer sessions, some of which cost $14k. I have no idea what proportion of students receive FA for these programs.
I see this new admission round as a way for Chicago to increase their already high proportion of full pays like you said, as well as increase their yield (also already high.) It’s difficult for me to support this option.
ETA of course this will drive more summer session apps too as OP said.
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Yeah, I don’t see much to like about Chicago doing this, and I am quite confident they do not care what I think. They seem to have gone all-in on being the school that nakedly tries everything they can think of to get people to apply to them binding.
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Do you not like them gaming the system related to yield rate, or is it something else?
This is a bad look for Chicago. I don’t like it at.all.
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My S24 applied to UChicago RD and will be attending this Fall. UChicago was his top choice but he never considered ED for UChicago or any other school. He didn’t like the idea of giving up all of his options and sincerely enjoyed the roller coaster ride of applying to an array of colleges. By contrast, my younger child is much more risk adverse and keen on locking in early when he eventually applies to college. I admire schools like UChicago that offer a lot of different application options because every prospective student has unique preferences and constraints, both financially and emotionally. I wish universities would either collectively decide to only offer EA/RD or, alternatively, go all in like UChicago and put the full spectrum of options on the table.
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It’s unnecessary IMO for any school to increase the advantage of already advantaged students.
I will add that the feedback from counselors is generally not supportive and the group where that feedback is being shared includes U Chicago AOs.
Colleges can’t do this because it would be collusion.
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I judge, and don’t like, ANY school that games admission/yield stats, bluntly. That group includes Tulane, Northeastern, and Colby. Undoubtedly there are others. Frankly, if Chicago was such an elite institution such tactics should be beneath them – because they shouldn’t be necessary. But, to attract the students they want, I guess they have to resort to them. Truly not a good look.
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Personally, I don’t like binding applications generally because I think too often a kid/family’s thinking can evolve, sometimes just in response to getting unexpected offers, after the time of application.
But what bothers me about Chicago specifically is all the ways they put psychological pressure on kids to make their application binding.
In this case, to me it looks like they are trying to get kids to do their summer programs as a way of possibly getting an admissions edge (they may not say that, but kids/families will inevitably think that way and they know it), then will put the hard sell on those kids to immediately apply binding instead of taking more time to even the normal early deadlines, to minimize the chance they will choose some other college for ED/REA/SCEA.
Ick. But oh well.
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For several years I have been saying that UChicago’s head of admissions, Jim Nondorf, is part brilliant marketing guy, and part used car salesman. The used car salesman part reared its ugly head again.
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This is the slimiest thing about it.
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UChicago offers the illusion of options.
Congrats to your son. The school is a household favorite over here (admission practices aside). Curious if he was accepted from RD or from WL?
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Yeah, the basic underlying issue is long ago people figured out that Chicago was losing more cross-admit battles than it “should” given its general rankings/academic reputation.
A lot of that was sort of the reverse side of the coin–Chicago really made itself into an “elite” institution on the basis of being seen as a more academically rigorous and generally intellectual institution than most of its rivals.
But as various rivals sort of shifted less and less from social elitism to more intellectualism, and as more and more kids started looking nationally and not just regionally, Chicago appeared to be struggling with competitors where maybe they were PRETTY rigorous and intellectual, but not THAT rigorous and intellectual.
So apparently part of what they are doing is trying to soften that image a bit. Like, maybe ix-nay on the ere-fun-goes-to-die-whay thing.
But apparently that is not deemed enough by the current administration, so they are also trying to get more kids to “choose” them in a way consistent with their rankings/academic reputation, “choice” in this case meaning pressuring those kids to apply to them binding out of fear they will not get into any other college they would actually prefer.
Again I don’t like that, and I also know they don’t care. And of course if someone actually just loves Chicago (and it has many virtues) and just wants to apply there ED because it is their affordable favorite, OK.
But as someone with a Chicago degree (not undergrad though), I am a little sad it is not still going with its original pitch. Because I was one of those people who at the right time felt like that was exactly what I wanted anyway.
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I’m not seeing how UChicago’s summer program that offers the possibility of an early acceptance is “slimy” when many elite universities (Georgetown, Yale, Northwestern, Harvard…) host summer learning experiences at ridiculous prices where (in the fine print) they state there’s no guarantee of boosting admissions chances at the host school but families nevertheless pay the exorbitant fees just so their kids can have some association with the elite school. That’ practice is “slimy” in my humble opinion.
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I don’t love any of that either.
My S24 actually attended one of those programs at a highly selective university, but in his case he took two actual summer college classes. And although it was expensive, it wasn’t really more expensive than it would cost their normal students. And we thought it was worth it because he got a lot out of the classes (including an unexpected new interest that may carry over to college), and he got to experience a preview of college life. But we knew it was not somehow going to help him get into that college, and indeed he ended up not even applying there, which was fine with us.
However, there is no doubt many of the kids/families in his program (or ones that were running concurrently so he met the kids) were absolutely thinking this would help them get into that college if they did well. And in fact, it was a big shock when they got the first set of grades back and a lot of the kids apparently did not do as well as they were used to doing in high school. Which reportedly caused a lot of those kids to shut off all the social stuff and start grinding out the rest of the program.
And I don’t think those kids necessarily had a great experience, and I definitely don’t think they were likely to get what they were hoping for.
But all this does not make me any happier about what Chicago is doing, because it seems to me they are just doubling-down on all this. Again, I’d be throwing stones through my glass house if I said kids should never do their programs. But in my ideal world, the only kids doing those programs would be the ones who could comfortably afford them and their only motive was just to have an interesting experience that might help further prepare them for college.
So to the extent Chicago seems to be nakedly hoping even more kids will do those programs because they think it will help them get admitted to Chicago if they do well enough–possibly even when it is really not comfortably affordable for their families–that’s the exact side of these programs I do not like at all.
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Most pay to play summer programs aren’t even run by the colleges themselves and the universities are clear that they don’t offer a boost for admission. IMO, the very most they offer is a leg up in the “why us” type essays because as student has the experience of being on campus.
What U of Chicago is doing is completely different and I agree with the others that it seems like a way to increase the advantage for already advantaged applicants, and further help to pad their yield numbers.
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I’m not defending pay-to-play summer programs, but at least these schools make clear that it doesn’t affect admissions chances, while UChicago is implicitly saying that participation in its pay-to-play summer programs does confer advantages. In other words, they’re saying: In addition to ED (which already benefits full-pay students), we’re going to offer extra-special-early ED for people who are willing to give us even more money. I stand by my opinion that it’s uniquely slimy.
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My sons did very similar programs for credit at an elite university and loved the coursework and the “college” experience. My point was, at least UChicago is willing to look at those summer program attendees as future candidates for admission. Whereas, other elite schools, will not offer to take a serious look at the students they entice for expensive summer learning camps.
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Yes, they’re willing to favor people who will give them more money. I don’t see how that’s a good thing for anyone except rich people who want their kids to go to UChicago. But yes, you’re right, for those people it’s a great thing!
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