Meeting Harvard Representatives before the Admission Deadline

Colleges & Universities A-Z Harvard University
1

<p>For class of 2008 high school students, the admission application deadline for Harvard under the new single-deadline system is 1 January 2008. </p>

<p><a href="http://www.admissions.college.harvard.edu/announcement/earlyadmission.html%5B/url%5D"&gt;http://www.admissions.college.harvard.edu/announcement/earlyadmission.html&lt;/a> </p>

<p>Between now and then, there are opportunities for many students to meet Harvard representatives in person and ask them questions about the application and admission process. For students or parents who find it convenient to visit Cambridge, Massachusetts, it is possible to visit Harvard in person. </p>

<p><a href="http://www.admissions.college.harvard.edu/parents/visit/index.html%5B/url%5D"&gt;http://www.admissions.college.harvard.edu/parents/visit/index.html&lt;/a> </p>

<p>I have never done a formal admission visit at Harvard campus, but I have had occasion, beginning in the 1980s, to travel to the Harvard campus on business. There are remarkably many tourists from all over the world who visit Harvard when visiting Massachusetts. </p>

<p>If you find it inconvenient to visit Harvard, it is possible that Harvard representatives will visit you. I met Harvard representatives at the 2003 Minnesota National College Fair, which I attended to do research for some pages on my personal Web site. When I saw the Harvard booth at the college fair, I mentioned to the Harvard representatives that I was surprised to see them at the fair, and they said that Harvard comes to the Minnesota National College Fair every year. The National College Fair events </p>

<p><a href="http://www.nacacnet.org/MemberPortal/Events/CollegeFairs/NCF/default.htm%5B/url%5D"&gt;http://www.nacacnet.org/MemberPortal/Events/CollegeFairs/NCF/default.htm&lt;/a> </p>

<p>are not necessarily visited by the same colleges in all cities, but you can check to see whether a National College Fair event near where you live will have representatives from Harvard in fall 2007. </p>

<p>When I was at the National College Fair event back in 2003, the Harvard representatives there were very friendly, and they invited me and my son (who was then in sixth grade, tagging along, and MUCH too young to finalize his college application list) to a regional meeting specifically about Harvard in Minneapolis a few weeks afterward. That was my first exposure to a regional college information session. That session included a detailed video program produced by the Harvard-Radcliffe alumni association of Minnesota, a very large and active group, and a talk and Q and A by the Harvard admission officer who usually handles applications from Minnesota. There were also several alumni there, including one man I recognized from professional acquaintance, to answer questions after the formal talk. That was a very good experience, and my friendly suggestion is that you keep track of Harvard in Your Hometown </p>

<p><a href="http://www.admissions.college.harvard.edu/utilities/travel_schedule/index.cgi%5B/url%5D"&gt;http://www.admissions.college.harvard.edu/utilities/travel_schedule/index.cgi&lt;/a> </p>

<p>events from time to time throughout the next few months to see if there will be a meeting like that in some place you can travel to. </p>

<p>Harvard is part of the Exploring College Options </p>

<p><a href="http://exploringcollegeoptions.org/%5B/url%5D"&gt;http://exploringcollegeoptions.org/&lt;/a> </p>

<p>consortium, which includes four other colleges, which has an extensive travel program designed to reach all fifty states and DC each year. Checking the Exploring College Options Web site is also a good way to spot Harvard meetings (held in conjunction with those other colleges) that may be coming your way. The Exploring College Options programs also offer general information on all the colleges and the college application process, specific information on each college represented, and opportunity to ask questions. </p>

<p>P.S. Under the new single deadline system, you have until the end of the calendar year to submit your application. But at the last Exploring College Options program in my city, the Harvard representative suggested submitting the first part of your application--the personal identification and contact information--as soon as you have decided that you are interested in applying to Harvard this year. That will give the admission office time in the fall to line up your admission interview through Harvard's extensive alumni network. Getting that part of the application process done early does yourself a favor, and helps the schedule crunch for the admission office and the alumni. </p>

<p>P.P.S. If you hear anything interesting about Harvard at any experience you have meeting Harvard representatives, I'd love to hear about it on this College Confidential Harvard Forum. Good luck in your applications.</p>

2

<p>If any of you have participated in an on-campus admission tour of Harvard, I'd be glad to hear about it.</p>

3

<p>The Exploring College Options schedule for fall 2007 meetings is now posted on the consortium Web site. </p>

<p><a href="http://exploringcollegeoptions.org/%5B/url%5D"&gt;http://exploringcollegeoptions.org/&lt;/a> </p>

<p>Have fun at the meetings. They offer a good opportunity to meet Harvard admission officers and admission officers from "peer" colleges in a friendly, informative atmosphere.</p>

4

<p>Harvard has begun posting its travel schedule on its Web site. </p>

<p><a href="http://www.admissions.college.harvard.edu/utilities/travel_schedule/index.cgi%5B/url%5D"&gt;http://www.admissions.college.harvard.edu/utilities/travel_schedule/index.cgi&lt;/a> </p>

<p>Entries are added to that page from time to time throughout the fall, so check back if at first your city doesn't show any meetings.</p>

5

<p>Those traveling Harvard shows are excellent ways to get info about Harvad including info that will help you submit the best application.</p>

<p>Do not view them as times to cozy up to the admissions officials and make an impression that way. From what I've seen (and I'm a H alum who has volunteered for a long time as an interviewer), the students who try really hard to ask the kind of questions that impress admissions officers simply irritate them (the admissions officers are too polite to show that irritation, but folks like me can tell or may hear about it later).</p>

<p>Be yourself at the sessions. If you've got a real question -- particularly one that's not answered on their web pages, which you should read before going -- then ask. If you have a real reason to approach an admissions officer after the session to ask a question, do so, but don't do this in order to try to have them remember you. They know the questions like, "I spent the summer doing research with a local university professor. Can that person send a recommendation for me?) are bogus -- just ways for a student to try to show off.</p>

<p>Save the showing off for your carefully-crafted application. The admissions officers have killer travel schedules, so asking questions in an effort for them to remember you, finding reasons to delay their departure after their presentation are all likely to have you remembered for the wrong reason.</p>

6

<p>Thanks, Northstarmom, for the specific tips about Harvard information sessions.</p>

7

<p>I see that William Fitzsimmons, dean of admissions and financial aid at Harvard, has mentioned that Harvard plans to travel with Princeton and U of Virginia, the other two major universities on a single-deadline admission system. </p>

<p><a href="http://www.thecrimson.com/article.aspx?ref=519210%5B/url%5D"&gt;http://www.thecrimson.com/article.aspx?ref=519210&lt;/a> </p>

<p>The University of Virginia has begun announcing some of those joint visit programs on its site. </p>

<p><a href="http://www.virginia.edu/undergradadmission/uvavisit.html%5B/url%5D"&gt;http://www.virginia.edu/undergradadmission/uvavisit.html&lt;/a> </p>

<p>(scroll way down for the joint visits with Harvard and Princeton) </p>

<p>It looks like there will be abundant opportunities to meet Harvard admission officers this fall. Harvard's own list of meetings </p>

<p><a href="http://www.admissions.college.harvard.edu/utilities/travel_schedule/index.cgi%5B/url%5D"&gt;http://www.admissions.college.harvard.edu/utilities/travel_schedule/index.cgi&lt;/a> </p>

<p>should be updated from time to time as more meeting details are set in stone.</p>

8

<p>The Harvard joint meetings with Princeton and the U of Virginia are now announced on the Princeton website. </p>

<p><a href="http://www.princeton.edu/admission/visitprinceton/on_the_road/%5B/url%5D"&gt;http://www.princeton.edu/admission/visitprinceton/on_the_road/&lt;/a> </p>

<p>Check Harvard's own Web application for finding Harvard information sessions </p>

<p><a href="http://www.admissions.college.harvard.edu/utilities/travel_schedule/index.cgi%5B/url%5D"&gt;http://www.admissions.college.harvard.edu/utilities/travel_schedule/index.cgi&lt;/a> </p>

<p>frequently for the latest updates on Harvard-only events and other joint events. Quite a few of the Exploring College Options tours start this weekend.</p>

9

<p>Tokenadult, we went on an on-campus admission tour in August. The information session was very good, with useful information presented well. The campus tour was hideous. Whereas the people in the info session were humorous and well-prepared, our guide for the tour was inaudible. They told us at info session that we could use the restroom and then join the tour. They took off immediately without people who did that, went to Harvard yard and starting talking near a lawnmower. Why they had to mow during this and couldn't wait ten minutes seemed like a total lack of courtesy and common sense. Pushy parents crowding to front made it even more difficult to hear. The "tour" then proceeded to standing right near a street outside of the science building, which our guide told us was "ugly" (this was true), and then I couldn't hear anything else as we were right by the road and buses kept roaring by. The one building he took us into consisted of the hallway in Memorial Hall. Proceeded to tell us how neat the cafeteria was but told us we couldn't see it cause people were eating. Gee, other schools actually let you go eat in the dining hall. We walked to see the outside of some building that is used for church services, and that was the extent of our tour. No library. No inside of a building except a very nice hallway. No dorms, or dining halls, or classrooms, or anything. We tried a few buildings on our own that were locked, On the plus side, our son really like the guys doing the information session. I would recommend skipping the tour altogether and going on the one that Harvard doesn't even run themselves.</p>

10

<p>Thanks for the report about the visit to Harvard. My experience on the Harvard campus has consisted of business meetings with various Harvard faculty members. I have never seen the student spaces at Harvard, but did have one trip during which I saw the main art museum and also the collection of Chinese Shang era bronze sculptures (VERY impressive) and other items of interest to a professional artist. It's interesting to hear what people get to see and what they DON'T get to see on tours of college campuses.</p>

11

<p>No problem. My son wasn't nearly as disappointed in it as me. We may have just gone at a bad time of year, but since the drive was 2700 miles round trip, it was disappointing. On the other hand, info session at MIT was very bad, tour was outstanding and went pretty much everywhere with an excited, energetic tour guide. Nice to hear that there are some wonderful facilities at Harvard.</p>

12

<p>Crazy Mom- If you never got a peek at the freshman cafeteria (Annenburg Hall), here is a photo-- <a href="http://www.fas.harvard.edu/%7Ememhall/annenberg.html%5B/url%5D"&gt;http://www.fas.harvard.edu/~memhall/annenberg.html&lt;/a> </p>

<p>DH and I took our only official tour on move-in weekend when S was a freshman (after we'd pahked the cah in the yahd ;)) We were surprised that we were the only people in our group with a connection to the University; the rest were regular tourists. I do think the constant stream of tourists can be annoying and at times perhaps a little disruptive to the students and faculty, though I would have expected better on an actual admissions tour.</p>

13

<p>"Gee, other schools actually let you go eat in the dining hall."</p>

<p>Other schools don't have the thousands of tourists Harvard has to try to accommodate every day. When Annenberg first opened in the spring of my freshman year, they did bring the tours in there (on the balcony). Needless to say if you saw the picture, it was a highlight of the tour and a huge selling point. But the freshmen complained that hundreds of strangers were taking pictures of them while they were trying to eat, and they felt like zoo animals. So the university closed Annenberg to visitors out of concern for the students' comfort. High schoolers on overnight visits can still eat there with their hosts. Much as I wished I could bring my tour groups into Annenberg, I would not think well of a school that prioritized its own recruiting efforts over the needs of current freshmen.</p>

14

<p>OK, how about taking us inside ANY building other than in a hallway and telling us how nice the building is? Really makes you feel like your 2700 mile drive was worth it when you don't even get to see an empty classroom.</p>

15

<p>By the way, 1moremom, thanks for a very "not stuck up" response. Although those at Harvard may not know it, there really are other colleges that get thousands of tourists every year, yet somehow seem to give actual tours inside buildings for those considering paying a small fortune to attend the school. Does your student think the food is OK, both for quality and diversity?</p>

16

<p>As a Harvard student, I can attest to the fact that the tourists are SUPER annoying. Now, I understand that Harvard is a big tourist attraction, but as a student the tourists are so distracting. I hate it when I'm trying to walk to class and I have to navigate between the hoardes of people snapping pictures of the John Harvard statue. </p>

<p>I mean, I can understand the desire to want to see the dining hall and the dorms and stuff, but we have to remember that students live here. Imagine thousands of tourists coming into your house and taking pictures everyday and that's sort of what it's like as a Harvard student.</p>

17

<p>Our Harvard tour was pretty bland though the info session was quite good. My daughter applied based on what Harvard offered, not on what she saw on the tour. In fact. we didn't really get to see the campus in its entirety until Pre-frosh weekend after she was accepted. (What a pleasant surprise once we actually saw it!)</p>

<p>Harvard is much more of a tourist attraction than probably any other campus in the country. The kids just want to be regular kids (and they are!) It's awfully hard to live in a fishbowl.</p>

<p>For the record, we visited lots of schools that did not show dorm rooms including Yale, Brown, Penn, Columbia, Tufts, and Wesleyan. And many, including Boston University, would not let anyone into their dining facilities either. I do think, however, that we saw the library in every other school that we visited.</p>

18

<p>How incredible that Harvard is so filled to the brim with students in early August that there isn't an empty classroom or library section one can tour while the students are eating lunch, even though school isn't even in regular session. More amazing is that the same people we saw at our Harvard tour in the morning were at MIT in the afternoon. Guess our lot was classified as mere tourists at Harvard, but because no other school could possible have tourists, we must have been prospective students and their families at MIT. I attended a nationally ranked university myself that would have three times as many visitors as could fill the football stadium on football weekends because people just wanted to be there for the game. As a nationally prominent religious institution as well, thousands flocked there for religious symposiums also. My first two months at school, not a day went by that I didn't get asked to snap a picture of someone near the church, the stadium, or a statue. However, both on my admissions tour and my son's, they somehow managed to take us in multiple buildings without tramatizing students by exposing them to the riffraff. </p>

<p>I have never bought a car without test driving it. Our current home, which was purchased seven years ago, cost less than ONE YEAR at Harvard, yet not only did we go in every room prior to purchase, we had it inspected. I have never spent one quarter of a million dollars on anything in my life, but apparently others willingly do so at Harvard without ever seeing the place. My son wants to go to college and learn about the world, not our small little corner of it. Hopefully, the school he attends will not believe in sticking him in an ivory tower and protecting him from the lower echelons who don't belong, but rather, help him become a productive and interactive member of society as a whole.</p>

19

<p>Here's the deal crazymom, people actually do live at Harvard over the summer as well (a lot of people)...but, all I'm trying to say is that from the perspective of a Harvard student, all that picture snapping is really annoying.</p>

<p>Now, should Harvard show the dining halls and the library when lunch is not scheduled or when there is very little student traffic? who knows. But they definitely shouldn't do it during the school year or when there are a lot of students around. Maybe you didn't mind having to snap pictures, or people asking to be in pictures with you (which has actually happened to me quite a few times), but to a lot of Harvard students it is annoying.</p>

<p>My final point, if your son wants to see Harvard (the library, the dorms, the dining halls, etc) then he can easily sign up for an overnight and see every part of the campus.</p>

<p>And, this obviously isn't the breaking point for a lot of people, because Harvard still gets thousands of tourists every week and thousands of applications every year</p>

20

<p>Actually, my son cannot easily attend an overnight visit during the school year. His school requires his attendance for his grades and he has a job, plus we can't afford to fly him there. We spent our available funds to visit Harvard already. It is almost 1400 miles away.</p>

<p>And no, I don't mind taking people's pictures and interacting with the world. I remember how happy I was to see little kids around instead of young adults and old professors all of the time when I was a student. Are the same students that are so fussed about picture taking putting every picture imaginable on Facebook and the like? College is a time to expose yourself to people who are different from yourself. It is really the only way to find out who you are. </p>

<p>This elitist attitude probably explains the lack of any student interest in being helpful to those from the evil outside. Also why Cambridge has no street signs, to keep people from finding the place.</p>