And if so, how should I go about it? It’s too late for any site visits (I’m a foreign student with US passport).
I did however register to and attend a presentation given by Dan Warner, the Admissions Director. Unfortunately, I didn’t manage to talk to him personally or obtain his contact details. The email I used to register is also different from the email I’m using on CommonApp, so I’m not sure if it’ll be counted during application.
@CollegeHunter69 Rice does track interest. My son went to a presentation in his state in October it is call rice in your state it looks like they are not coming to maine this year. There are usually things to fillout and leave there showing your interest. Usually there are tables set up to talk with people when it is over. There is also a program Rice vision i believe it is a fly in program. if you get invited to that it means they are really interested in you.
Rice does track interest. I heard this first hand from an admissions officer during a presentation recently.
Depends upon the college. If a college considers interest, like Rice does, it will say so on the college’s Common Data Set:
https://oir.rice.edu/uploadedFiles/Office_of_Institutional_Research/Content/Common_Data_Set/3.%20CDS_2016-2017_WEBSITE(1).pdf
On the flip side, other colleges do not consider interest, and will indicate it on their CDS as well
It’s slightly more challenging as an international due to distance, but certainly not impossible. Due to Terms of Service for this site, I can’t provide links, but if you google “colleges how to show interest” you will find some links to assist you.
FYI, in which case you are a US student living abroad, which will help you in the admissions process. It won’t halp any more or any less than a US citizen or green card holder living in the US, but much more than an international applicant without a US passport.
“Demonstrating interest” through things like campus visits, hitting their website, sending intelligent questions to the AO, going to fairs, etc… will not get a mediocre applicant in. The lack of demonstrated interest may well keep a qualified applicant out. Perhaps as between 2 candidates on the fence, the nod would go to the one more clearly interested.
The most effective way to show interest of course is to be knowledgeable (and not just superficially so) in your application. In addition to the “Contacts” section (you can list attending the presentation there plus all your other contacts), three out of the four Rice specific questions in the writing supplement give you an opportunity to personalize Rice to you. So, avoid the generic essay that is easily seen as a cut and paste job, and really show why Rice is uniquely special to you (and vice versa).
@BKSquared how do colleges know that you are checking their website?
I have read this in different places https://qz.com/513622/colleges-are-spying-on-prospective-students-by-quietly-tracking-them-across-the-internet/ as an example and my son’s friend’s paid consultant told him to visit the websites of the schools he was interested in, often. I thought this was pretty creepy and I am sure not all colleges do this, but some presumably do. The technology is certainly there. That is what the business of internet data mining is all about. If schools ask you to create an account for admissions purposes, they can certainly easily track that. But my point was that all these little things which can be easily gamed don’t carry nearly as much weight as actually demonstrating knowledge of the school and why it fits you and vice versa in your essays/questions.