She should go to Michigan or GT over Harvard for engineering. Or apply to MIT, Stanford or CalTech.
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My DD is also planning on doing Engineering and Government/Political Science at Harvard. She is passionate about racial and social justice and sees tech as a vehicle to create that change. I think if it is a clear hybrid interest (Engg+Humanities/Social Science) then Harvard is a winner. But if she is exclusively interested in Engineering, then there are other schools with a better variety of courses. Job placements are probably the same and if she wants to pursue higher education, U of M, Purdue, Berkeley, are all top notch for Engg, but Harvard is probably not too shabby either 
My DD loves the UofM program too, given their racial justice and design focus. Harvardâs CS program is growing rapidly, for what it is worth. I understand their Engg program leans more towards theory and research. Ask your DD to talk to some of the current students (you can find them via LinkedIn) in the engineering field. I think that will help a lot. Good luck to her!
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Do mean that they are never reviewed at all, or that theyâre never reviewed in their entirety, i.e., they may only review one of three tapes submitted?
At all
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Fascinating. I have no inside information at all, but I question why they would ask for a supplements if they do not plan to review them? So, how do schools end up with high caliber music programs if the supplements arenât reviewed? Are you saying the music recs and music resumes are the determining factors?
This is Harvard. Not a school with a conservatory-level program. And they donât admit by major.
Any student applying for the Harvard-NEC Dual degree program would have their credentials assessed by NEC
@skieurope was is the source of your information? Music department at HYP care A LOT about having good orchestras and getting good musicians admitted.
Harvard admissions themselves. As one published example:
At the discretion of the Admissions Committee, supplementary materialsâsuch as music recordings, artwork, or selected samples of academic workâmay be evaluated by faculty.
It is not a conservatory, thus, itâs a supplement rather than an audition. I am still wondering why Harvard would ask for tapes/rec/resume if they have no intention of ever listening to the tapes.
This seems to go counter to what @parentologist has said:
Maybe @parentologist or @compmom have some thoughts?
Thatâs not what I said; what I said was they only listen to the tapes of some applicants. Not all and not none.
My son just went through this. He applied to the Harvard/NEC dual program. He was admitted to Harvard and is waiting to finish the process with NEC. Iâm being a little vague to protect privacy, but my son was corresponding with a lecturer/director of a music program at Harvard. He said Harvard gets many submissions of music supplements. Admissions sends him selected supplements (not sure how they decide which ones). He doesnât think they always pick the right ones, so he asked my son to send the supplement directly to him. After listening to the supplement, this person said he gave a strong endorsement to admissions for my son. Iâm sure he would love to see my son participate in the extracurricular groups with which he is associated. How much did this help? Iâm not sure.
On a side note, I was listening to the Yale Admissions podcasts. In the episode on supplements, the AOs say that they send the supplements to the music department. The department experts then rate the student on a scale, with the highest rating being a student who could be accepted to a top conservatory. The AOs said that this level of skill will be positively factored into the admissions decision process.
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at discretion does not mean almost never.
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In our experience, Yale and Harvard were different in this regard. For one thing, Yale has a School of Music so faculty there are sometimes involved with undergrads,
For some applicants, listening to the actual recording may not be necessary to either eliminate or accept. The supplementary music letters of recommendation and resume may be sufficient, for instance, or possibly even ECâs listed in the regular part of the application.
One thing I do know: even if sent to faculty they may not listen for long. We asked if they would like us to cue the âbest three minutesâ and that offer seemed appreciated.
We never knew if faculty reviewed or not. And we did not make any connections with faculty or have any special back door through correspondence with a lecturer/director as described above, so no worrries if that was not done.
Noone is saying the music supplements are irrelevant. But whether they go to faculty would seem to depend, and if they do go to faculty, the review may not resemble the review at a conservatory.
That said, a music supplement can indeed greatly contribute to admission chances, depending on content.
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Nor did I say it did
didnât you write above music supplements are âalmost never listened toâ?
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No. And I am unsure of why you are using quotations. Please do not twist my words or misquote me
For the record, @compmom 's account provides another data point to what I did say.
@Cloudybay23 Not sure why the tone here, but what @skieurope has (actually) written is undoubtedly true. I tried to provide an explanation in my last post.
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Do mean that they are never reviewed at all, or that theyâre never reviewed in their entirety, i.e., they may only review one of three tapes submitted?
@skieurope I have seen you say this on other threads and I do not believe thatâs accurate and if you do, I would be curious your basis for saying it. thatâs all. students work very hard on these supplements and music department definitely review many.
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Did you read my post? Music supplements are not wasted. But students do not need to do a conservatory-level submission of playing or composition, in terms of length- but quality of course should be good. There are many reasons why a supplement might be reviewed only by admissions and not go to faculty at all, including an obvious acceptance, And also reasons why a faculty member might listen for only a few minutes too. If a student âworks hardâ on a portfolio of, say, three pieces from their conservatory-level repertoire, that might be wasted effort, yes. But the supplement itself is not a wasted effort.