<p>okay, the question is pretty straightforward.
Is e-mailing admissions officers and forming a bond with them prior to sending my applications actually something worth doing?</p>
<p>uhh what? why would you do that?</p>
<p>in most cases, probably not.</p>
<p>Even if you wanted to, you can't find out their e-mail addresses anyway. It's not public information.</p>
<p>No. Unlike colleges that are concerned about their yield, and therefore are delighted when a student shows great interest, Harvard has the highest yield in the country and isn't going to be impressed by kiss ups.</p>
<p>If you've got thoughtful questions that aren't answered on the web site, that's a very different situation. But don't contact adcoms just to brown nose.</p>
<p>What I meant was exactly what you've just said,Northstarmom.
If someone asks thoughtful questions, does the admissions office actually remember you?</p>
<p>With 20,000+ excellent applicants, many of whom probably ask excellent questions, odds are long against adcoms' remembering a student's question unless the question was egregiously awful.</p>
<p>Put yourself in the admissions rep's shoes. If you were already overburdened with thousands of applications, how would you feel about some applicant emailing you in an effort to "bond" and get a leg up on his/her application?</p>
<p>Admissions reps will try to be helpful in response to legitimate questions and requests for information. But it's not going to create a "bond". And if they get the sense that you're bothering them to try to gain some bonding advantage, rather than out of a legitimate need for information that can't be obtained in any other fashion, you're far more likely to leave a negative impression than a positive one.</p>