Alumni Interview?

Colleges and Universities A-Z Lafayette College
1

<p>Has anyone been contacted for an alumni interview? I have not been contacted yet and am wondering whether I should be contacting Lafayette admissions to ask about this.</p>

2

<p>Not all high schools are represented by an Alumni Admissions Representative (AAR). It wouldn’t hurt to contact the Admissions office if you want to have an alumni interview. Meeting with an AAR is one way to demonstrate interest in the college, which can only help your chances for acceptance. Although an interview is not a requirement, Lafayette now “strongly encourages” them, either on-campus with the Admissions Office (preferred), or with an AAR. They may be able to get an AAR for a nearby school to meet with you.</p>

3

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<p>A (blown) interview can actually hurt your chances. But I think I get your drift - that demonstrated int can help your admission chances.</p>

4

<p>What are some of the questions that a LC alumni interviewer might ask? We’re from Chicago and have not been able to visit LC yet, so we’d get a remote site alum interviewer.</p>

5

<p>I used to be an AAR for Lafayette (many years ago). I would not worry about an AAR interview hurting your chances. I don’t thank admissions took our input too seriously. I think the most important thing an AAR interview does for a student is to show their interest in the college. The college viewed these more as a way to “sell” Lafayette to the student - not in a hard-sell, dishonest kind of way, but a comfortable way for kids to get answers to questions they might not have been comfortable asking an admissions officer (for example questions regarding social life). </p>

<p>After the interview we had a form we were supposed to send back to admissions. They wanted to know about the applicant’s level of interest in Lafayette. I recall asking questions about the activities the student chose to participate in in hs, why he/she chose them, what he/she liked about them/got out of them, did they plan to continue in college? What were their favorite/least favorite hs classes and why? If they had indicated a major, why did they choose that major? If not, was there an area of interest? Career plans (if any yet)? What attracted them to Laf? If they’d been to campus, what did they like/dislike and what were they unclear on? If not, what did they want to know about campus, social life, etc? By the way, there were no “wrong” answers. It was just another way for the college to get a more complete picture of the student.</p>

<p>(I take that back. One kid did give me the “wrong” answers. He only applied to Laf because his sister went there and his parents made him, he really wanted to go to Norwich. Every activity he had joined had been because that’s what his sister had done.)</p>

<p>AAR is a completely voluntary position. Because of that, Lafayette doesn’t have enough AARs (especially in certain areas of the country) to assign one to every hs. If you want an AAR interview, by all means contact admissions and ask if there’s a way you can get one. Not having an AAR interview because there is no AAR in your area will not in any way put you at a disadvantage. (Turning down an interview if an AAR contacts you may be construed as a disinterest in the college, however). </p>

<p>Again, I don’t think the college uses the interview results for much other than to get gauge a student’s interest level in the college, and maybe to get a more complete view of the applicant as a person.</p>

6

<p>thanks, LaF, for the good reply.</p>

7

<p>I happened to see this thread in the front part of cc just now and recalled my q and a re interviews. One of my concerns w/ the interview is that , unlike a student’s rigor of his or her HS curriculum, resultant performance in terms of gpa and rank, test scores, essays, ECs -which are all in the control of the student - an interview could be a bit of a risk, or a chaos factor that <em>could</em> screw up the app package.</p>

<p><a href=“http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/parents-forum/1077435-advice-disastrous-alumni-interview.html[/url]”>http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/parents-forum/1077435-advice-disastrous-alumni-interview.html&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/p&gt;

8

<p>Yes roderick, but the fact remains I don’t know of any colleges (Laf in particular, but any others either) who put much emphasis at all on the results of an alumni interview. The most important thing seems to be to DO the interview and show interest. Then the interviewer can provide info to fill in things about the applicant that don’t show up on the application.</p>

<p>Another alumni interviewer (laxtaxi) on that thread filled in what alumni interviews are supposed to be about even better than I did above:

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<p>The “disastrous” interview described in that thread is way out of the norm, IMHO, and most people seem to agree that that interviewer should be reported to his/her admissions office. I told the parent that since they were an alumni of that college themselves that they should call in that capacity to report it - this person is not representing the school well and they WILL want to know that.</p>

<p>At least in Lafayette’s case I do not believe an alumni interview could hurt. Turning down the opportunity for one, however, could definitely be construed as a lack of serious interest in the college.</p>

<p>Again, don’t overlook the additional chance for the applicant to ask questions of the interviewer and get some more answers (if your AAR is young, and graduated only a few years ago, you can get a lot of insights into the college. Or if your interviewer is like me and has a child who is currently a student at the college, you can also get some good insights into life on campus).</p>

9

<p>D had an interview on campus, recently notified for an alumni interview also, is this common?</p>

10

<p>Yes. My understanding is that if there is an AAR assigned to your D’s HS, the College will send the AAR contact info for all applicants, not only ones that did not have an on-campus interview.</p>

<p>If your D desires to meet with the AAR, it may offer her another perspective on the College that the Admissions Office cannot provide. If she feels that it is unnecessary, she should politely decline and inform the AAR that she already has had an on-campus interview.</p>

11

<p>thanks that was helpful, although I think my daughter replied to late and know cannot get a response from the alum. Hope they didn’t see this as a snub. She has already tried twice to get the interview scheduled…guess will see how it all pans out. Thanks!!</p>

12

<p>My son had an on campus and an alumni interview. The Alumni interviewer told him that he write up his comments (report? not sure what he called it) ASAP and that they would very favorable. No mention of how / if it would help. My impression is it can only help - even if it’s not high on the list of criteria, it’s one more piece of positive information.</p>