Good luck to all the applicants! I’m a Harvard alum interviewer, so please send over any questions I can help demystify/destress : ).
As an alum interviewer, is there anything you can tell us about the use of IVP in the interview scheduling process? Thanks!
As you may know, interviews are organized regionally by alumni Schools & Scholarships Committees. These committees are made up of alumni volunteers and are generally part of the local Harvard club.
Harvard charges these S&S Committees with the responsibility of assigning other alumni with interviews. Harvard tells the S&S they can use whatever method they want to use to get interview reports in expeditiously, but for areas with large demand, Harvard has developed a numeric guide to help telegraph to the S&S Committee what order would make life easiest for admissions officers. This is the IVP system or Interview Profile Number (why it’s not called IPN is beyond me!!).
Harvard has “subcommittee” and “full committee” gatherings of admissions officers in Cambridge to discuss all applications, first organized geographically by “subcommittee” and then all together in full committee. They ideally want to have all the interview reports in by the time the specific geographic committee meets, and they absolutely must have all the interview reports in by full committee. So the IVP system is used to manage the order folks should prioritize getting these interview reports done by depending on when they trickle in and when the subcommittee is supposed to meet. I’m guessing that the NY, Boston, and Bay Area S&S may have adopted the system but don’t actually know.
While it’s true that one could probably read between the lines in interpreting what an IVP number could signify, only the S&S Committee folks–and only those who have adopted this system – see these numbers.
Also for what it’s worth, decisions will come out December 13 this year. At least that’s the date shared with interviewers!
@hgrad2010 how much weight is given to the interview? Also do the interviewers know which students they interviewed got in before they release the decisions?
I guess my prediction was wrong for the release date, thanks for the info!
The weight varies but is usually important as an additional data point to help paint the total picture of the applicant. It particularly verifies what the LORs point out about an applicant’s strength of character, and can be used to highlight any severe braggadocio issues.
Due to the law suit, there’s been a wealth of tidbits that have been published about in the Harvard Crimson you might find interesting. You can see the impact of the interview report in these case studies-- https://www.thecrimson.com/article/2018/10/24/why-harvard-hits-pause/ and https://www.thecrimson.com/article/2018/10/29/how-to-get-in-to-harvard/ in particular.
@Robbyb If you do not mind me asking, where/whom did you hear the “Dean’s list” information from?
@tiffsworld: @robbyg misspoke or doesn’t know enough about what constitutes “the dean’s list.” See: https://www.thecrimson.com/article/2018/10/18/day-three-harvard-admissions-trial/
Specifically, “the dean’s list” is a list of important financial donors. Or, they are the children of important folks – think Malia Obama. The “dean’s List” however, is NOT compiled of students who have “a short time between application and interview” as @robbyg indicated. That’s just BS!
It is not BS. The time to interview correlates with being on the Dean’s list.Amost every legacy in my school has gotten interviews very quickly. Finally, this is from Harvard EA 2022 college confidential
Are interviews really chosen at random? I found this online in a Harvard chair handbook regarding interviews as well as the SFFA report
“In some areas, the increase of applicants we have seen in recent years has necessitated the development of new tools and processes to manage incoming requests. In an effort to aide S&S Chairs burdened by an increasing demand for interviews, we have developed the Interview Profile Number (IVP) system, which may be implemented at the discretion of the local S&S Chair and the corresponding admissions representative. Interviewers will not see the IVP of a candidate.
Admissions officers have the option to assign an applicant an interview profile of 1, 2, 3, or 4. The numbers correspond as listed below:
1 – Please have interview report in as soon as possible.
2 – Please have interview report in by the sub-committee deadline.
3 – Please have interview report in by December 1 (EA) or March 1 (RD).
4 – No additional information needed at this time.”
Does this make 1’s more promising candidates than 2’s, 3’s, etc. because their interviews are prioritized?
https://apply.college.harvard.edu/portal/docs/chairHandbook.pdf
So @gibby is mixing up (a) why people get in Dean’s List with (b) what are the signs one is on the list.
MODERATOR’S NOTE
Don’t conflate the Dean’s List with the Interview Profile Number;they are 2 different things. Yes, one can assume that those on the “Dean’s List” have an IVP of 1, but not all applicants with an IVP of 1 are on the Dean’s List.
Regardless, don’t debate the minutiae;it’s not the purpose of this thread, and is not allowed by the forum rules.
@hgrad2010
I have a friend applying to Harvard who’s already been interviewed twice. What’s the possible reasoning behind this?
He and I know that I’m a much stronger applicant, yet I haven’t even received an interview request. I’m guessing I’d be a 4 on that list.
We live less than an hour from each other
It usually means that the report from the first interview was lost, or that the notes from the interview report were inconclusive. I’d view it as a neutral to positive indication, but on the flip side, one can not read anything into not getting a second interview request.
@skieurope “one can not read anything into not getting a second interview request”
I’ve not gotten a first interview to begin with. If this helps: we live in a large city with a big alumni club.
yes. i agree. these are just associations/correlations. The point is that short time to interview correlates with IVP which probably correlates with Dean’s List. Is that fair? i am not either so it makes no difference
Well for future reference I assume it would then be helpful to put an example timeline together for prospective students. For example:
IVP 1: Submission date-interview xx number of days
IVP2: Submission date-interview xx number of days
IVP3: Submission date-interview xx number of days
IVP4: Submission date-interview xx number of days or no interview
@Arnkim yup I agree with everything @skieurope mentioned regarding a second interview. The majority of subcommittees have met to take the first pass at candidates, and so your friend’s interview report likely needed amplification.
As to why you haven’t received an interview, I honestly don’t know what that means.
@x2019x I forgot to answer your second question re: whether interviewers know ahead of time whether their interviewees got in or not.
No, only the S&S committee folks receive that information and it happens the day after candidates find out. Usually the S&S committee will then email out the results to interviewers so we can congratulate them.
@hgrad2010 thanks!
What are you guys considering a short time for getting an interview? A day? A week?
So I think the “time of submission to time of interview” metric isn’t meaningful as a proxy for admissions chances for the vast, vast majority of applicants–so please don’t stress about it!