<p>LAgal: I know lots of kids at Harvard, including a couple from right here in the Bayou state. They are generally as happy as clams and they are as diverse as could be. To more than a few, their interest in politics is akin to their interest in Harvard football: once per season for "The Game" (annual H-Y game) and then not so much in the odd-numbered years when the game is played at New Haven.
To be fair, there are lots of kids who just adore politics and they participate almost continuously.
But as for you, you just have to be yourself. Relax, don't try to talk about things you aren't really interested in and do try to talk about your passions. Someone else mentioned turning the political discussion toward the aspect of it that interests you, i.e., stem cell research. I think that's a fine idea; just be sure you know that topic well enough to launch it.
Lastly, let me say this: wherever you go the odds are in your favor that you will be very happy. Kids don't find themselves at Yale or at Rice weeping for 4 years because it's not Harvard. This is an awesome time of life....don't stress yourself about it too much. Good luck!</p>
<p>Thank you, PSedrishMD...I plan on just being myself. I do not adore politics, and I have logical reasons not to, though I do not seem to be conveying myself adequately on this board. I have followed the issue of stem cell research closely and that is one of the reasons why I favor the candidate that I do.</p>
<p>LAgal:</p>
<p>Relax, be yourself. It's okay not to want to discuss politics and to be more interested in new discoveries in math and science. Personally, if I were an interviewer, I would steer clear of hot button issues, especially considering the unequal power relationship inherent in the interview context. It's also not appropriate for anyone to ask how someone else voted. </p>
<p>If you followed the presidential debates, you saw that the candidates seized on questions as launching pads for their own messages; it's a common trick, and one you might want to consider. A good interviewer will welcome the chance to let you present yourself and will not mind that you did not quite answered the question; it can always be asked again. Try to steer the conversation toward issues that interest you, whether they are academic or non-academic. There's a list of student clubs somewhere on the Harvard website. It might inspire you to think about how you could contribute to some of these.
It may be too cold for someone from LA to wear a skirt.</p>
<p>marite, i have looked at the list of clubs...actually, seeing them was just another major reason why i want to go to harvard! every club i've ever imagined to exist (and so many more!) are at the school...and if it doesn't exist, i'm sure it could easily be started and tons of people would be excited to join (the students are so passionate about everything!)
yes, i did notice that about the presidential debates, and i think that's what ticked me off...and what turned me off about politics...i hate how everything is about getting votes...i wonder how many promises all of these newly-elected officials are going to uphold now that the election is over...i doubt that they'll keep anymore than they have to to insure that they won't be removed from office...and i hate that the candidates have nothing concrete to base their views on and the fact that their views are so paradoxical...but enough about that
i, too, thought and would greatly hope that interviewers avoid politics as an issue...bringing it up, to me, is almost as bad as letting something like the validity of the vietnam war or euthanasia dominate the hour of conversation
i guess i'll find something else to wear, then...you're right though, i've never been to massachusetts in november, but i can only imagine how cold it could be</p>
<p>"would greatly hope that interviewers avoid politics as an issue...bringing it up, to me, is almost as bad as letting something like the validity of the vietnam war or euthanasia dominate the hour of conversation"</p>
<p>I disagree. Bringing up a major event in the world like the presidential election is a wonderful way to find out how students think. It would be wrong to bring up a subject like politics in order foritnterviewers to discover applicants with views most like the interviewers'. It would be perfectly appropriate, though, to bring up politics to find out how students analyze information.</p>
<p>In your case, since you have expressed an interest in history, an interviewer who knows of your interest might bring up politics after assuming it's a subject that youj're passionately interested in. Typically, an interest in history does go hand in hand with an interest in politics. Many politicians were history majors as is the case with lawyers.</p>
<p>Other than Indian dancing, what are your interests? What do you want to talk about in your interview?</p>
<p>NSM, this quietboy does not mean to offend, but i wonder: why do you ask what his/her other interests are? do you want to knock those down, too? or are you sincerely trying to help? i would feel very skeptical right now, LAgal, since nearly all of these posters have completely chewed you out for not being interested in politics...
i too do not have a sincere interest in politics and like you have taken every bit of info about the election with a grain of salt</p>
<p>Quietboy, taking an interest in politics doesn't mean one agrees with everything that's going on. It simply means that one follows politics, which IMO is wise for everyone to do since whether we like politics or not, we all are affected by politics.</p>
<p>As for my question to LAgal, as I look back on her original post, what stands out is that she posted about fears about being asked about a subject that she stated she has no interest in. As a result, she got lots of responses that focused on what she doesn't do. </p>
<p>Meanwhile, the purpose of the interview actually is to find out about the applicant, including their interests. My thoughts are that she's so focused on what may be wrong with her as an applicant that she isn't taking time to focus on what she has going for her.</p>
<p>IMO it's likely that an interviewer will start the interview by asking her a general question designed to have her open up about herself and her interests. Whether or not this is directly asked at the interview, she needs to be prepared to talk about this. Figuring out how best to do that IMO would be a far better use of the message boards than her continuing to fret about her lack of political knowledge. She needs to spend more time figuring out how to reveal her strengths and what she has to offer Harvard.</p>
<p>Quietboy, I'm not sure about being skeptical. In many posts before this one, NSM has helped me greatly. Even in this post, I understand where her views are coming from. I agree with her completely and only wish that there were some way I could refute my original post that I am completely apathetic about politics.<br>
NSM, my interests...I don't even know where to start. You know the major ones: biology, history, and dance. If asked about politics, I will honestly state the facts that I do know and the opinions that I have formed based on those while clarifying that politics is not my passion. I hope, however, to be confident of myself. I am naturally shy, but I'm trying very hard to come out of my shell, especially around people I have never met before. I seem to communicate well with new acquaintances, especially when he/she is the only person around that I have to talk with. Do you have any suggestions on how to decrease my nervousness? Also, as an interviewer yourself, is there anything that completely turns you off, other than the obvious skanky dressing, chewing gum, talking on cell, applying makeup/brushing hair, etc?</p>
<p>Some general suggestions that I think are pretty uniform</p>
<ul>
<li>be you. don't fake it</li>
<li>relax. go out with your friends to the movies the night before an interview. taking your mind off stressful situations I have found to be more beneficial</li>
<li>learn some yoga, stress relieving techniques (not that you need them), but I have found them to very beneficial in calming me down in stressful situations</li>
<li>joke around and lighten up. call a friend and crack some jokes.</li>
</ul>
<p>just some suggestions.</p>
<p>i do have some public speaking experience and i might add to anyone who is extremely nervous about going to interviews</p>
<ul>
<li>during the dinner table. over a mouthful of steak or anything else ask your parents to just throw a question or two that an interview might ask. just one or two for over the course of time should really help to calm your nerves down and make you more relaxed (if you tend to be shy) in an interview based environment</li>
</ul>
<p>IMO it is very hard to completely bomb a Harvard interview. I have interviewed over a period of 20 years, and think that at least 80% of the students whom I have interviewed seem well qualified for Harvard. This reflects what Harvard says about its applicants in general.</p>
<p>It is very rare for an applicant to do something so horrible that it is a complete turnoff. </p>
<p>The only things that completely turned me off were the applicant who burst into tears for no reason, and the applicant who had snot running down their face during the interview. </p>
<p>I mentored the former for several years afterward, and that person really was not qualified then for Harvard admission (board scores hundreds of points below the median for Harvard, though the applicant probably had the top board scores in their low-performing h.s.) and also was very emotionally fragile (ended up needing major therapy for a suicidal depression). The person with the snot problem was a nice person, but was sorely lacking in social skills.</p>
<p>A list of possible turnoff behavior. Most, however, are not fatal turnoffs, just things to avoid:</p>
<ol>
<li><p>Generally rude behavior which includes arriving at my door 1/2 hour early. I fully understand that thoughtful applicants will want to arrive early just to make sure that no emergency or other problem prevents their being late. However, to knock on someone's door 1/2 hour or more before their appointment is rude. </p></li>
<li><p>Not leaving at the end of the interview. Please do not try to squeeze extra time out of the interview by arranging things so that you have to call your parents to pick you up. I have other things to do, which may include interviewing another student in the same place that I interviewed you. If your parents must drive you to the interview, have the courtesy to ask me how long the interview will last, and then ask your parents to return then to pick you up. </p></li>
<li><p>Bringing your parents into the interview. Fortunately, I have not experienced this one, but some alum interviewers have. The interviewer wants to talk to the student, not the parents. Interviewers also may conclude that students whose parents sit through the interviews aren't students who are ready to go off to a distant college.</p></li>
<li><p>Allowing snot to run down your face and not asking for a tissue. I kid you not: This actually happened. By the end of the interview, I was looking anywhere but at the student's face. If one needs a glass of water, a tissue, to use the bathroom, etc., just ask. The interviewer will understand that needing those things are part of being human.</p></li>
<li><p>Students who are completely passive. They ask no questions but just follow my lead. They carefully choose their words while watching my face to see if they can figure out the right answer. Meanwhile, the right answer is that I love to see students with the confidence to be themselves and to state their opinions and passions. </p></li>
<li><p>Students who misrepresent themselves. If one hasn't read a certain book, don't name it as your favorite book. It may happen to be my favorite book. I might even have met the author. </p></li>
</ol>
<p>Don't act as if a very superficially done paper for a class was major research. It just might end up that the interviewer is familiar with that obscure topic. Yes, that does happen, and it has happened to people whom I interviewed. I was thrilled to learn of the students' apparent interest in a subject that I also was interested in. When I asked them questions about their research (questions designed to give them a chance to show off their analytical skills, not questions designed to trap them), it ended up that their research appeared to have been reading one article on the subject in a popular magazine.</p>
<p>Lesson: Just tell the truth about yourself and your accomplishments. Don't inflate things. If the club that you're president of has just 5 members, don't act like you are president of a large regional organization. The interviewer may happen to be very well acquainted with the club. The interviewer might also think a great deal of the club and of people with that interest. The interviewer, however, is unlikely to have a high opinion of liars who belong to the club.</p>
<p>As for your shyness, I agree with the person who suggested that you role play interviews. Also check your library, Internet sites and bookstore for information about how to handle interviews. Often one finds good info in books/sites designed to help people find jobs.</p>
<p>NSM, THANK YOU SO MUCH!!!! That really helps. I'm cracking up trying to imagine an interviewer professionally dressed, etc. trying to talk to an interviewee, also professionally dressed, etc. who has snot running down his/her face. LOL! Thanks for taking the time to answer.</p>
<p>Thanks, Northstarmom--that will help me, too. (I've got a Princeton ED interview in the not-too-distant future.)</p>
<p>Lagal,
From looking at your other posts, my impression is that you are an Asian Indian American who lives in a small Louisiana city where most people are not that sophisticated or informed and where not too many students are applying to Ivies and top 25 colleges.</p>
<p>If this is the case, you actually would stand out in the application pool in a good way. It is very hard for places like Harvard (and other top 25 nonsouthern colleges) to attract people from small areas in the Deep South. This could tip you in to a top 25 college. (Please, though, don't count on that tip, however, as admissions is incredibly competitive. Just realize that you do have a definite chance.)</p>
<p>Concentrate on your strengths. How have you decided to apply to colleges like Harvard? What exactly do you want from that kind of college experience? What efforts have you made in high school to obtain for yourself the kind of academic and extracurricular environment that you want. Your teaching yourself Indian dance could be an example of how you assertively create opportunities for yourself even when your area doesn't have those opportunities.</p>
<p>From another thread, I saw your concerns about whether to send a copy of your tape to Harvard. I don't think that the quality of your dancing will be as important to adcoms as will the fact that you cared enough about it to teach yourself. If in doing this, you also went out of your way to learn about the culture related to the dance, then that would underscore your interests in intellectual activities (and for that matter in history). </p>
<p>There are students of all races who do Indian dancing at Harvard. It would be wise for you to connect with them -- not to have them to evaluate your dancing -- but to have them tell you about what you could do with Indian dancing at Harvard. If you can't find any links to such students on Harvard's website, I am sure that if you e-mail the alumni office, they could help connect you with such students.</p>
<p>If you do correspond with such students, that would be something to bring up at your interview. Harvard really likes students who are active and take advantage of the university's myriad EC and academic opportunities. </p>
<p>Even if you don't get into Harvard (and Harvard is a reach for anyone), the information you gain from such students would help you in your other college applications and in taking maximum advantage of whatever college you end up going to.</p>
<p>One last thing: Even though 1 of 3 Harvard EA applicants is accepted, that is not because Harvard lowers standards for EAs. EA applicants tend to be much stronger than RD applicants, and as you know, virtually all Harvard applicants are very strong when compared to other colleges' applicants. </p>
<p>Do not count on getting in EA or RD. I have seen amazing students deferred EA and then rejected. It's simply very hard to get admitted to Harvard. Make sure that you also have carefully looked at some other top 50 colleges, and are submitting thoughtful, strong applications to some that you feel would also meet your needs. Harvard is a wonderful place. There are, however, many other wonderful colleges, too.</p>
<p>NSM, you are completely right. I am very skeptical about getting in but hate the fact that just about everyone I talk to is like "You can go to school wherever you want because you're smart!" I wish everyone else would understand that grades and test scores are not everything and that admissions at just about every top school is incredibly subjective, but alas. Such is not the case.<br>
I definitely understand that the EA pool is generally stronger than the RD pool. Actually, that's why I was a little scared to apply EA. Is it true that students who are deferred have a harder time in the RD pool?<br>
Thank you for taking so much time to help me out with this. My college counselor is overwhelmed with work, so I feel like there's no one I can turn to. Though college apps are so stressful, people like you make the process more bearable and give it a sort of magical touch. Thank you so much for everything!</p>
<p>I think the EA admit rate is only 14% now.
<a href="http://www.admissions.college.harvard.edu/prospective/applying/stats/%5B/url%5D">http://www.admissions.college.harvard.edu/prospective/applying/stats/</a></p>
<p>I am from the mid-Atlantic region in which fewer students are admitted percentage wise. Of course the bulk of Harvard's applicants are from that area and form a plurality of the entering class.</p>
<p>I could have increased my chances by applying to three or four colleges early. I thought about applying to Princeton early because very few people at my school were applying there and I liked its focus on the undergraduate. However, after I visited my friend at Harvard, I decided to apply to Harvard early. Harvard was the only college at which I could have a conversation digressing from Kant to game theory to Robin Williams. It was a great intellectual experience to say the least.</p>
<p>There are many other wonderful colleges, but Harvard is peerless.</p>
<p>(note: my school is strongly pro-Yale)</p>
<p>This post is out of sequence, but here goes. Harvard alumni interviewers are led to think their opinions matter a lot. They don't. Sorry, Northstarmom et al. My advice to an applicant is to read a book outside your high school's curricular requirements and steer the interview in the direction of the book. Emphasize one extracurricular activity. Relax, act mature, maintain a pleasant countenance, be politely assertive, and ask questions whose answers are not easily ascertainable from the college's published documents. Goes for any interview for that matter. The interview does matter when the applicant is not in real life the pretty picture portrayed in the app and recommendations. I speak from personal knowledge as an interested party.</p>
<p>...who lives in a small Louisiana city where most people are not that sophisticated or informed and where not too many students are applying to Ivies and top 25 colleges......I think she means we come from a "red state". Get a grip Mom, you're an awful snob.</p>
<p>PSedrish,
I think your comment to me was rude.
1. It is fairly well known that most small towns in places like the Deep South aren't known for having a lot of college grads. (That's also true in small towns in many other parts of the country). They also tend not to have things like easy access to NPR or to hard copies of big city newspapers. In addition, they aren't likely to have very sophisticated GCs or lots of students setting their sights on Ivies. These are facts, not my prejudices. It is much harder from students from such environments to get good advice from GCs, teachers and acquaintances about how to apply to places like Harvard. </p>
<ol>
<li>It also is a fact that being from such a place can increase an applicant's chance of getting into a place like Harvard. Harvard doesn't get those many applicants from such places. In fact, a fellow alumni interviewer told me that one recent year, there were only 2 applicants to Harvard from his Deep South state. Since the university takes pride in having classes that are truly diverse, including having students from all 50 states and many foreign countries, if one is in a state or region that provides few applicants, one has an advantage. Harvard (as is the case with some other Ivies, particularly those in big cities) also has an interest in attracting applicants from small towns and rural areas, places where students usually prefer to go to college very near their homes, not to big cities like Boston.
. </li>
</ol>
<p>Zuma,
If you take the time to search for my posts, you'll find that I have never said that the interview is a strong factor when it comes to admission. It is, however, a factor. A wonderful interview won't guarantee admission. I would, however, bet that if an alumni interviewer documents that an applicant lied in their interview, that probably would end the students' chances for admission.</p>
<p>I also know that adcoms read the interview reports since I have gotten follow-up questions from our regional adcom in response to a couple of my interview reports. My guess is that the interview reports are scrutinized more when the admission committee is split on admitting a candidate or when the report strongly conflicts with the committee's impression of the candidate.</p>
<p>Lagal,
Students who are deferred EA are treated just like the RD applicants are treated. I have seen very strong applicants get deferred EA and eventually get accepted. I also have seen very strong applicants get deferred EA and then get rejected. I personally have not seen any kind of Harvard applicant get rejected and not end up at least at a top 50 school. The rejected applicants who ended up in a school near the bottom of the top 50 rejected higher ranked schools in favor of accepting merit aid elsewhere. Even the applicant who burst into tears during the interview and the applicant who failed to ask for a much needed tissue got into top 50 schools.</p>
<p>I have been so impressed with this site and the great resources and advice available here to students and parents alike.</p>
<p>Therefore, reading this thread has been somewhat of a surprise. Can someone tell me if this thread representative of the manner in which adults on the forum interact with students? </p>
<p>Dizzymom</p>