<p>Since there’s no more Why Stanford essay as of a few years ago, what place is best to show why Stanford is your first choice for SCEA? I live in a state that doesn’t offer interviews.</p>
<p>Doesn’t applying SCEA already demonstrate that Stanford is pretty much your first choice?</p>
<p>By applying rea. And it would be too late to do that now anyway</p>
<p>@jdlace—I’m not a senior yet so I still have time to decide what I’m going to do in terms of EA, but I know a lot of people use EA merely as an admissions strategy so is there a way Stanford can tell who actually has the school as a first choice, i.e. from the amount of effort in the essays and supplements?</p>
<p>It used to be a strategic advantage, but now Harvard and Princeton have restored their SCEA programs, many cannot use Stanford as a strategy.</p>
<p>I think the fact that applying ea to stanford doesn’t allow you to apply early anyewhere else shows interest. And I don’t think many people would do that if stanford weren’t their first choice</p>
<p>Would applying to Stanford EA from an elite East Coast high school demonstrate particular interest, seeing as applying to Ivies early is more the norm on the East Coast? Also, does Stanford not ask “Why Stanford?” anymore because the answers were all the same, copied from their website?</p>
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<p>Yes, exactly.</p>
<p>In addition, being interested in Stanford doesn’t really do a lot to boost your prospects at Stanford. They can safely assume that just about everyone who applies is pretty darn interested. Stanford says in its Common Data Set that applicants’ interest is not considered.</p>
<p>@Sikorsky—I agree hat everyone shows interest in applying, but I guess that they still prefer to see people who have done their homework in reseraching the school i.e. mentioning specific courses for a major and don’t look too well upon people who rushed their application.</p>
<p>But is that any better than any other thoughtful, well written essay? If they wanted that, wouldn’t they just ask, “Why Stanford?” </p>
<p>Sent from my DROIDX using CC App</p>
<p>I guess. Actually I read an article about why they changed from the “Why Stanford” prompt tothe “What matters” one a few years ago because thy were getting overused, identical responses from everyone. Makes sense from that perspective.</p>
<p>They could have made the “Why Stanford” an optional essay.</p>
<p>^Right, but then people who were scheming would figure that choosing to do the essay would give them a boost, so they’d just end up writing the same boring essays.</p>
<p>yea whenever colleges make something optional everyone assumes you have to do it or get rejected</p>
<p>It’s like Harvard’s optional essay on the CommonApp Supplement, the word “optional” basically means “If you don’t do this, you’re not a serious applicant an shouldn’t even bother”.</p>
<p>There are 34,000 unique ways to answer the question “What matters to you and why?” Without going completely off the rails, there are not 34,000 unique ways to answer “Why Stanford?” They need another tool to differential highly qualified candidates, and the what matters prompt will likely elicit the most completely different responses of all prompts and short answer.</p>