<p>The people who would refrain from applying to Tufts because there is one extra, optional essay would probably not be the people who would end up choosing Tufts out of all the schools they get into. Sure, maybe they ‘push away even some great candidates’ but on the whole most of the ones they lose probably wouldn’t pick Tufts as their first choice</p>
<p>I know that at my high school there were people who thought about applying to Tufts but just got overwhelmed.You want to addd a hurdle but not too many hurdles. You’re right that if Tufts is someone’s first choice they will write the essays. But there are a lot of great people, high school friends of mine, who would have loved Tufts but when they were in the thick of the application process could’t handle all those essays. I’m just suggesting that one gets dropped. You will still get a picture of the person. And saying its optional doesn’t work. High achieving people know that optional means you do it.</p>
<p>I find the posts commenting about Tufts marketing itself as having tons of “quirky” students to be very interesting, and it should give the AdCom pause (as it has given me).<br>
I recall being at a Tufts event a number of years back, and Dean of Admissions Lee Coffin floored the audience with a marketing-oriented description of the school. The overwhelming response from the audience was that it did an excellent job of describing Tufts and what made it appealing. Then Coffin dropped the bomb: the description was of Brown! He talked about Tufts having to develop its own brand. If the perception of the audience on the other end of this brand marketing is that Tufts sells itself as the home of the quirky and nerdy, then I think Tufts has done itself a disservice. I wholeheartedly agree with those who have said that Tufts is a home for all types - the outgoing, the shy, the jocks, the musicians, the artists, the science/math/engineering folks and the English lit/classics/philosophy lovers. Yes, there are some quirky kids at Tufts, but they are not the majority of the student body; they just make it interesting. (Just like Harvard, Yale, Princeton, MIT, Brown, Williams, Amherst and Swarthmore all have quirky kids, but are not defined by them. They are defined by the excellence of the student body and the desire of their students to learn and achieve.)</p>
<p>P.S. Per my previous post, I do agree with Dan that Tufts shoudn’t be focusing on driving up app numbers; dropping the essays would surely do that, but I’m not sure it’s the best idea. Not right now anyway. The AdCom does a masterful job of “building” an interesting class each year, and dropping the essays would impede them in that objective.</p>
<p>btw, take a look at the video on the admissions site of an accepted student telling applicants why they should come to Tufts. Naturally, he says what he likes about Tufts is that its “quirky” and he describes himself as “quirky”. Can we ban that word from admissions materials?</p>
<p>As an applicant, Dan, that is really heartening to hear. We learn from almost every info session, “We evaluate you holistically!!!”. But, do they really when they don’t have a supplement and I am one of 30/40/50,000? And with all this talk of quirkiness and branding, it seems like a lot of Tuft’s identity, as myself and my peers see it, is that they have this interesting, fun supplement, which conveys that it is an institution that cares much more about the people and their stories than their numbers. And as somebody who left my home-town public school because I was sick of being little more than a number, I find Tufts much more appealing than say, Harvard.</p>
<p>Your points are well made, Smartgrad.</p>
<p>I’ll offer that you may be assuming a level of cynicism that isn’t part of my admissions experience. Optional does mean optional (though I know that runs contrary to widely held conventional wisdom on CC), and the phrase “marketing strategy, plain and simple” isn’t consistent with my experience either. </p>
<p>We did a comprehensive survey of Tufts students, and the words they would use to describe themselves. Here are the top 5 most commonly used adjectives to describe Tufts students, as articulated by current students at Tufts:</p>
<p>Fun
Friendly
Quirky
Diverse
Intellectual</p>
<p>These words weren’t developed as part of a marketing strategy. This is what we got when we asked out students to self-identify. I recognize not everyone on campus would use these words, but you’d be amazed at how high the percentages were for these sentiments (or for synonyms, like welcoming or smart). When we use the word quirky (which isn’t that often, as I discovered in a Google search), it’s most commonly in reference to how Tufts students use it to describe themselves. </p>
<p>If you watched the video of Ed, and wouldn’t want to apply to Tufts because that video turns you off, then we’re going to have a tough time attracting you regardless of what the admissions office says. Ed’s sentiments - he talks about the fun, friendly, intellectual vibe he got on campus - are going to be echoed by our students when an admissions officer isn’t around. What you see in the video is a completely authentic representation of excitement - no veil of admissions propaganda or message crafting. Personally, I find Ed to be completely charming. He’s smart, he’s passionate, he’s people-oriented, and it’s hard to come away from the video with the feeling that he isn’t a socially apt individual. Very little of what he’s expressing falls into the complaints expressed above about how the admissions office portrays Tufts.</p>
<p>Smartgrad, I think I agree with most of your sentiment: pigeonholing Tufts as the ‘Nerdy’ school would be a very bad thing; it wouldn’t be honest and Tufts is far more multifaceted than that. And hearing your comments gave me, as it did WCASParent, pause. Our difference is that I finished that review and didn’t see the uni-dimensional representation that’s causing you worry.</p>
<p>This will be my last comment on the matter for a while - I actually really want to continue to participate in the discussion, but the applications are life-consuming. I won’t have time to write a post this long again until the end of March.</p>
<p>My older daughter is a freshman, and her interpretation of “quirky” was very much that it meant a mix of fun/friendly/diverse/intellectual/interesting. “Weird” didn’t figure in so much, except in the general sense of some people having interests outside the mainstream but that being just fine. </p>
<p>Diverse here has diverse meanings. 
It generally means people from a variety of socioeconomic backgrounds, from different countries, with different religions and skin colors. But it also can mean that each person is themselves diverse, that their interests span unexpected ranges of human endeavor. Just look at the typical self-description of Tufts applicants, which often sounds like “I’m a redneck sociologist who enjoys ballroom dancing and cricket” or “My research in string theory ties in to my love of lacrosse, macrame and slackline” 
To my mind, that’s the type of “quirkiness” that Tufts embraces and attracts. But if the very term “quirky” is really a turnoff for applicants (and it’s not clear to me that that’s the case), then it’s something the admissions office can rejigger.</p>
<p>There was a big article in the NYT education section a year or two ago about how a number of colleges use demanding essay prompts for all kinds of good reasons: providing material for more holistic admissions decisions, cutting down on casual low-yield applicants, etc. If the caliber of the admitted and matriculated students remains constant (or improves!), then the strategy proves its worth. Sheer number of applicants is nice ego-boo, but it’s not a proxy for all sorts of other indicators of quality.</p>
<p>All very interesting points Dan, I really appreciate you taking the time out of your schedule to talk to us. </p>
<p>I certainly don’t remember the self-description survey, but that’s possibly because every other post on Tuftslife is about “fill out this survey” so it’s easy to see that it could have been lost in the mix of my memories. And also, I’m extremely glad that Tufts has not compromised its position, by eliminating the supplement. I agree with your office’s decision 100%. I remember a few years ago, I had friends at Trinity College who were bragging about an absurd increase in applicants- something like 40% if I remember correctly. It only took a small investigation to realize that Trin had eliminated the supplement, in order to generate this huge pool! That’s so disingenuous to the applicants!</p>
<p>One last question, back to the root of this post (which was, in fact, about the number of tufts applicants, not “quirkiness” despite my rants)… Is it really fair to say that Tufts Admissions doesn’t measure itself somewhat based on the number of applications received? Go back and look at the article I posted a few comments ago, the one from last spring about the number of 2015 applicants. I remember reading that when I was abroad last spring and getting excited about how many more kids were applying to Tufts 2015 than even my class or 2014. It’s also clear that Dean Coffin was also excited by this growth. (Dare I say he considered it a measure of success?) I just want to make sure that we’re all keeping an objective point of view to this whole thing. Would admissions admit to caring more if it had been a 4.47% increase, instead of decrease? I dare say the answer is yes.</p>
<p>Dan, Thanks for your thoughtful response. I don’t think polls prove anything -was there a set menu of responses that students could check off? Did they write in quirky or was that your word?. Not one of my friends would describe him or herself as quirky. I think its possible that adcom people are part of a closed loop–looking for evidence that supports preexisting beliefs and strategies and rejecting dissonant information. But I really think you have to try to find out how high school students really view Tufts and not reinforce any negative stereotypes. There’s some negative stuff about Tuft’s social life out there–it would help if Tuft’s students didn’t bash their own school but that’s another issue–and it doesn’t help to have a blog from a student talking about how she had no friends in high school or how their favorite thing to do is play chess in star wars outfits. The party scene is great if you want it. I think its a huge mistake to take the view that we don’t want people who don’t like our image. It is an image after all and Tuft’s reality is far more complex and better. All I’m saying is it wouldn’t kill Tufts to feature an athlete, a fraternity president or someone from the social mainstream on a panel or website. Many of my friends who visited just thought it was weird how much Tufts focused on a cappella, for instance. And not a word about Lacrosse. Why? A lot of great people aren’t quirky–I doubt Bill Clinton or President Obama were quirky in college.</p>
<p>I’ll weigh in again - honestly I don’t think any of the so-called “quirky” colleges are very quirky. My son felt that the Chicago application in particular attracted quirkier more creative kids than perhaps it’s curriculum warranted. When he visited it still seemed pretty serious though not a place where fun comes to die. I think his main issue with Tufts is that he came from an extremely diverse high school - there are very few if any colleges in the US that offer the same rainbow of color, religion and socio-economic status. There was no ethnic group in the majority. He had friends who were athletes, others on the literary magazine and others heavily into music and he was also in Science Olympiad so he was friends with all the science nerds. Tufts is considerably whiter and more middle class.</p>
<p>I’m a fan of the supplement. I think it’s a particularly good way for someone whose grades or scores have some bumps to be able to show what they can do. And anyone who reads CC knows Dan says that optional means optional.</p>
<p>Laughing at Slithy Tove’s description of a typical Tufts kid. My son’s who am I essay sounded pretty much like that.</p>
<p>I agree that the quirky focus seems to be a trend. But I made my point–for all you seniors thinking about Tufts…the best thing anyone ever wrote–think it was in a student review-- was that Tufts has ivy league academics without the pretense…very cool place.</p>
<p>Dan, know you’re busy but if I as you sort through applications, and then try to get those accepted candidates to choose Tufts just two things I found in a one second search…Dena Coffin in blog, July 1 2010 “It’s a sunny day in Medford and Tuft’s quirkiness is on full display” and in interview on college admissions website on Nov 1, 2011 he described Tufts students as “thoughtful and quirky” This is an idea fixe and the promotion of the idea that excellence is an amalgam of weird hobbies and odd traits. even the matriculation speeches seem kind of phony–like everyone is a flame thrower from idaho. Its time to expand the brand! because it can become a self-fulfilling prophecy and then you’re’ not in a niche, you’re in a hole.</p>
<p>@Smartgrad I agree with you 100%!!! My daughter applied ED and will be a freshman next fall - Class of 2016. She is an athlete (she will play for Tufts), really cute :), fit, outgoing, friendly and very social, I mean, really social. The reasons she applied to Tufts besides amazing academics are: 1) NESCAC 2) Location close to Boston 3) Campus Size 4) Great feeding schools to top Law schools 5) Students seemed connected to the world around them, open minded, friendly, diverse and unpretentious 6) the food 7)The new athletic building 8) The coaches 9) Hands on experience, real world projects 10) Flexible study abroad program and being able to study abroad in the spring being an athlete </p>
<p>Things that she was concerned about Tufts while applying are: 1) Academically isolated from other campus in the Boston area meaning other schools around Boston can take classes in other campuses
2)students not going into Boston enough 3)students not attending athletic events 4) Not enough social life aka parties 5)Not that many good looking boys 6) Tufts hook up culture (she is more like a dating/relationship type of person)
I know people will criticize some of her concerns, but honestly, we are talking about a 17 years olds. Also, there is a post on her facebook from of one of her friends who was applying to Tufts , asking her to “call” Tufts admissions to reduce the amount of essays on its supplement! It was a joke, but when a senior in high school is under a lot of pressure and has to complete in average 10 regular applications, Tufts supplement can be just way too much. I agree in having a supplement, but make it more friendly and shorter.
Also, numbers matter. Of course it does! I also agree that Tufts as a whole needs to be open minded about how to convey its identity and give less emphasis on the quirkiness side of it. Tufts should not be so limitted in its message. </p>
<p>Disclaimer: English is not my first language. So my apologies about my grammar. :)</p>
<p>I would tell your daughter that people like her find each other. I don’t think those concerns are trivial. They’re normal. There are plenty of people who like sports and frats and going to parities. Athletes often hang out with their teams. Some people join a sorority or fraternity freshman year to meet other people on the same wavelength. I never felt the campus was isolated at all and went into Boston and Cambridge pretty regularly-- especially after freshman year.</p>
<p>Many of these posts reflect some of my hesitations as well. I struggle finding clarity as to who they are, and moreover, will my daughter thrive and feel comfortable at Tufts. For example, diversity is stressed so much, yet the prompt in one of the essays reads," Why does Rapunzel work at Saks?" Saks, really? Admissions could not have just said, “Why does Rapunzel work at a department store” It may sound trivial to some, but my daughter has no frame of reference to Saks (there is not one within a 600 mile radius) nor could we afford to shop in one. There is a connotation associated with Saks, and I’m not certain it is one of diversity!</p>
<p>I understand how you feel about the essay prompt, but Tufts is a friendly place.</p>
<p>besquared- i think you should reread the application. that was one idea of a response to one prompt in the optional essays. it’s supposed to be funny. “Why does Rapunzel work at a department store” just doesn’t carry the same humor. don’t read so much into things.</p>
<p>You may think it’s humorous , I think it’s elitist. Regardless where it is positioned on the application, it is a suggestion made by representatives of Tufts.</p>
<p>I’m sorry, you sound like such a conspiracy theorist. I’ve actually never been to Saks either but I know what it is because it’s a piece of American culture, and I live in America. Your daughter could even have written an essay on that one (if she chose that prompt, which she didn’t have to) and made it about how Rapunzel hates the elitism of Saks. She could have made fun of Saks. I’m sure they would have loved how original that would have been. Also, it’s one essay prompt out of a bunch. It’s not even the prompt! It’s an example of something kids could use to answer the prompt!</p>
<p>"The human narrative is replete with memorable characters like America’s Paul Revere, ancient Greece’s Perseus or the Fox Spirits of East Asia. Imagine one of humanity’s storied figures is alive and working in the world today. Why does Rapunzel work at Saks? Would Shiva be a general or a diplomat? Is Quetzalcoatl trapped in a zoo?.. "</p>
<p>I mean, someone could throw a fit because they come from a family of pacifists and they don’t know anything about what a general is. This is so silly.</p>
<p>I don’t think you are totally off base–it is an odd reference. But the good news is that if your daughter is as pc as you are she will love Tufts.</p>