<p>Some colleges offer optional alumni interviews. I know Stanford (one school I'm applying to,) e.g., will add these more broadly this year. My question, both about Stanford and other colleges, is this: Are all applicant names released to alumni (or an alumnus in charge of a region) regardless of whether or not an applicant is interested in an interview? Because I live in a fairly small town, I would really rather people not know where I'm applying. Is that even possible?</p>
<p>In my experience interviewing for a LAC (i.e. not Stanford), we get the names of students in our local area who request an interview and who are assigned to us by the admissions office. That might be 5-6 kids per year. We have no idea of who other applicants might be from our town or anywhere else.</p>
<p>newtocollege, I think I may be a bit dense. What is your concern, specifically? I understand your question, but if we understood your broader concern, we may be more helpful.</p>
<p>An implied premise of your question is that you are not going to request any interviews. For Stanford, that decision may arguably be rational, since it is unlikely that interviews can make a big difference in Stanford’s admission process. But for almost every other college, you would be nuts to avoid an interview; doing that could materially weaken your application. And even for a college like Stanford or Yale, where it probably doesn’t matter much, you are still probably nuts for giving up a chance to make a good impression. </p>
<p>Meanwhwile, unless you are homeschooled a bunch of people at your school are probably going to know where you are applying. And if your town is that small, how likely is it that all of the alumni interviewers are going to live there?</p>
<p>I guess my question is where the interview assignments are made: Does the Admissions office divide the applicants among the available interviewers and make assignments directly, or is there an alumni group that gets the broader list and makes the assignments? In other words, I would definitely feel more comfortable if only one person (my potential interviewer) knew I was applying vs. some comprehensive list more broadly circulated among alums.</p>
<p>I do the assigning in my area - each alum only gets the name of the few applicants he/she is assigned</p>
<p>The regional alum person will know, and the interviewer will know about your application. They should have gone through some training about confidentiality.<br>
Is there a certain alum you are trying to avoid?</p>
<p>Brown handles it the way memphismom describes. There is a regional alum who has access to the names of all the applicants in his/her region. The interviewers get only the name(s) of the students they are assigned to interview. The regional director is told to keep information about the applicants confidential – we’re not supposed to share names of applicants at dinner parties or neighborhood picnics.</p>
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<p>What are you concerned is going to happen - that news of your application to Stanford will be broadly circulated? Because I would have to believe that the interviewers are told to keep the identity of who they interview confidential, and not blab it at the grocery store or tell other acquaintances.</p>