caltech's admissions policies are ridiculous

Colleges and Universities A-Z California Institute of Technology
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<p>^^ Well, to be fair to the OP, I think “caring that much” is OK, because Caltech is such a huge name in the technical world that I myself, not attending the school, just out of pure respect for the school, want its admissions policies + overall school structure to be attractive and effective. </p>

<p>Nevertheless, I can certainly agree that bringing sports into the picture of Caltech admissions is misguided, because it misses the very point of the kinds of students Caltech strives to admit. I believe Caltech has one of the most admirably focused goals in admitting its students, which makes for a great process, though like any other school, it can be improved. </p>

<p>I am glad that some presumably technical graduates see what I see in this idea of interviewing students while actually throwing down technical terminology. Many schools try to gauge through interviews and essays what kind of a personality or spark one brings to the school. Well, I would strongly contend that when the goal is to find a spark for math/science, having them talk about their interests face-to-face is one of the best ways. If such an interview were conducted in a more abstract sense without any technical terminology exchanged at all, I think something definitively would be lost.</p>

<p>How hard this is to arrange is another thing, but such an interview would give a great sense of what this student, if admitted, would bring to the school atmosphere – what they’d be like when sitting with a group of people discussing a difficult problem, for instance. </p>

<p>I found that certain technical schools instead ask questions like: “What was a difficult problem you faced, how did you overcome in?” Too abstract in my opinion. It’s good in its own way, but definitely does not bring close to a complete picture of the given applicant.</p>

<p>I would extend this and say that many, many decisions in admissions at all schools could be cleaned up if one could hear students talk to people knowledgeable in the given fields about their interests – i.e. whether for English, history, math, or engineering majors.</p>

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<p>I think this would only work if the students were only judged on interest rather than knowledge (during the interview). I would have been perfectly happy to talk about the math story I wrote about in my essay. Things may not have gone so well if I were essentially tested on various areas that I may have forgotten because of disuse or was barely taught at all on a teacher’s whim (matrices and related to topics come to mind for both).</p>

<p>Also, I think interview skills would be a significant factor if there was some form of oral test.</p>

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<p>^^Even if you can’t remember something enough to actually do a problem, you probably could talk about it in conceptual terms. And that would perhaps tell me more. </p>

<p>Like, for instance, I’d be interested to know what someone felt were the differences in thinking styles between number theory and abstract algebra (assuming they have seen both.)</p>

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<p>Yeah stuff like that – it doesn’t have to be quizzing applicants, but simply about what they think of various subjects, what they like, where they see the subjects being important to them/their courses of study, anything of that sort. </p>

<p>Tricky question, I think it’s hard to define “number theory” for me :wink: – only had exposure to algebraic number theory myself and that was really a special blend of commutative algebra, Galois theory. </p>

<p>But definitely, it’s about throwing around concepts to me – one could even ask about what some interesting problems that have been seen before are. Open-endedness is good, given it forces an applicant to actually come up with something on his/her own, rather than answering something pre-prescribed – tough to come up with something technical on your own and talk about it and fake passion about it, no?!</p>

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<p>Not true. I was accepted with a mere 2010 SAT scores (counting the best thing out of every test). I had an 800 in math though. This just sounds as a rant of someone who was not admitted.</p>

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<p>It’s tough to fake passion, but it’s unbelievably easy to fail to show it in an interview due to a combination of being nervous/being unfamiliar with the procedure/ not knowing the interviewer. People are much better prepared to express themselves in writing through our school system, and it’s easier to cast off the awkward-I-just-met-you (or don’t know you) attitude if you are writing. This is especially important given that many of the students Caltech wants are somewhat deficient is social skills. Also, passion doesn’t necessarily indicate knowledge, or vice versa. I’m sure every year Caltech accepts a handful of people who, for whatever reason have not had the opportunity to be exposed to certain problems, but can still demonstrate, through passion that if they had the opportunity, they would.</p>

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<p>I had a 2190 composite in 1 sitting, the only time I took the SAT. My math score was actually 670, and my highest was my 800 in Critical reading. So the OP’s statement isn’t categorically true.</p>

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<p>Then again, there are those of us which feel their interviewing skills far exceed their writing skills.</p>

<p>Does Caltech do alumni interviews? I started doing alumni interviews for my undergrad institution this last admissions cycle, and I think it’s certainly a situation where some students that don’t look as solid on paper can really shine.</p>

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<p>Well, that’s why I favor having both writing and speaking as part of the process. The purpose of a Caltech interview need not be to figure out who’s a slick interviewer, it can simply be to get a feeling for what this student really is like when he/she talks about math/science.</p>

<p>I’m not talking about an interview where the student is forced to solve math problems on the spot. We have high school grades, standardized tests, math competitions, whatever, for those purposes. If a goal of Caltech is to select people who’re intelligent and genuinely intrigued by math/science/engineering, I think having them actually talk about what they’re intrigued by is quite a nice thing.</p>

<p>For instance, if someone could give a really mature answer to collegealum’s question, I’d think that’d be a plus point. Remember, the fellows with less than adept social skills may also have less than adept writing skills, regardless of how less stressful it is to write to someone you’re far away from. I firmly believe there are aspects to any application process students will fumble up on, and very smart, potentially better qualified, more driven individuals can get weeded out on accident – I personally am looking to produce as many means to achieve Caltech’s mission as possible.</p>

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<p>I think you can talk to alumni if you want, but it has no effect on admissions.</p>

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<p>“It’s tough to fake passion, but it’s unbelievably easy to fail to show it in an interview due to a combination of being nervous/being unfamiliar with the procedure/ not knowing the interviewer”</p>

<p>I definitely agree with this…</p>

<p>Another problem with interviews is that the interview reports have got to be incredibly subjective- I don’t see how it’s a useful part of the application process, since teachers should be able to write in their letters what students are like in person, and that’s based off a year’s interaction rather than less than an hour.</p>

<p>haha, sorry, expressing dislike of things I’m bad at (interviewing) is fun :)</p>

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<p>Well, for one thing, MIT supposedly has interviews <em>and</em> the questions I heard are pretty less than straightforward. On the other hand, there are other interviews where the process is very open-ended, and the student is allowed to somewhat dictate the flow. In this case, I don’t think the student would freeze up – unless this student were <em>SEVERELY</em> challenged in some way, but I think this would be an extreme case. I don’t like “strange” interviews either, because then it becomes more about interviewing skills than passion or academic maturity. </p>

<p>The reason I think there’s something missing is that while the teachers are a great resource, I think most teachers will write most based on what you were like in their classes. That tends to rather limit their perspective, I think. There are some who’re decidedly more talkative in class, know what I mean? I feel like being forced to explain what you’re about, and actually talking technical shows a lot about you. While many Caltech students may find it tough to talk about certain things in interviews, I’m pretty sure an interview really really focused on math/science/engineering would even be fun to the ones who’re really interested.</p>

<p>As a note, I don’t even know much about interviewing myself, barely ever had one!! But I think certain kinds of interviews can be helpful. :)</p>

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<p>You guys might want to continue this discussion in a new thread that doesn’t start out so… controversially. I think this one might be good dying a peaceful death.</p>

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<p>I’ll bet that a bunch of people responded to the new discussion only because of the oh-so-controversial nature of the old one!!! But you make sense as always Sir Lizzard!</p>

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<p>We all bow down to thee, Sir Lizzard.</p>

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<p>Caltech is doing just fine. And I have heard of underrepresented minority students applying to Caltech and getting in strictly on their own merits. (I know one of the students quite well.) Where people enroll when they have more than one choice of where to enroll is a different issue, but Caltech is quite happy to use its holistic admission process (remember, it is a Common Application college, so it must have a holistic process) to identify applicants with strong ability and interest in math and science and admit them. It doesn’t attempt to have a strong football team, but then again many other colleges don’t have very strong football teams either.</p>