I’ve been following CC for a while but this is my first post. My son is a senior in Vancouver, Canada. He just received an alumni interview for Princeton with a very recent grad (class of ’18) who lives on the East Coast. The interview will obviously be via Skype or Google Hangout etc. I find this quite strange. I’ve never heard of alumni Skype interviews being scheduled from across N. America. If there aren’t enough Princeton alumni interviewers in Vancouver, wouldn’t it be easier for Princeton Admissions not to schedule the interview? Fyi…my son has already interviewed in the regular round with a bunch of other Ivies. And no one else at his high school (competitive, sends 10-12 kids to Ivies every year) has received a Princeton interview. I find the whole thing a bit weird…in a good way?! Or am I just trying to read non-existent tea leaves?
I was wondering the same. I was offered an interview with an alum living in the States, while I live in India. Are Princeton interviews for international applicants selective by any chance?
When it comes to alumni interviewers for the Ivies, sometimes they really don’t have enough people in a region to actually do in person interviews, although they want to offer the opportunity to everyone. I was lucky and got a Princeton interviewer from my region who even was familiar with my school, but he told me he was the only alumni interviewer in the entire area of about half a million people. I also don’t live very far from Princeton (I’m in PA). For another Ivy, I got offered a phone interview. They’ll at least try to offer it to everyone in some way if they can.
Also he interviews are really two-fold in their purpose. It’s to see if there are any definite red flags, but more importantly to make both the applicant and alumni feel connected to the school. It’s an easy way to get alumni involved, and it’s great advertising for the school since the interviewers usually try to sell the school. Don’t sweat it too much, they’re usually pretty relaxed. My interview I did over the phone lasted a while just because we got on so many tangents about some of our combined interests. I’ve been told that they have almost no weight on your admission status, and they can usually help marginally (unless you’re downright rude).