Thank you for your comments, @espressomac , @Coloradomama and @HPuck35.
Is short duration of the interview (say less than 25 minutes) is generally an indication that the student is considered to be a poor fit by the EC? 
@Tamarix. Not necessarily. I think sometimes ECs are just busy. Remember, what you say is more important than what the EC says. ECs are volunteers. They do the best they can. Its a way to have a personal face to MIT but sometimes this does not help the student so much. Most ECs try to give every student 45 minutes and some go way over an hour, but most keep it to one hour including questions, and small talk. Don’t draw any conclusions from your interview. Just try to forget it in fact, as brooding will not help. Find schools that are matches beyond MIT for certain though.
Remember, its totally random, which EC you get , that ECs experience at writing up students, and your interaction with that person. I hope in general its a positive interaction. I try to suggest that ECs give students old copies of MIT Tech Review if they have them on hand. Its supposed to be a friendly face, but students seem to make it into a huge ordeal, it should not be that. Relax and ask this person some questions, two or three, and that will help. What questions you ask are at least as important as what questions the EC asks you. Part of your job is to assess for yourself “Is MIT a fit for me?” Approach all college interviews like this, MIT is being reviewed by YOU as much as an EC is assessing you. Its a two way street.
Thanks vm @Coloradomama. Appreciate your responses. It is meant for my daughter as such!.
Number 2 in my list of suggestions refers to students who are at high risk of not graduating from MIT. I’m guessing many of the applicants who get rejected in the early round fall into this category. Getting through the curriculum requires a certain threshold of intelligence and hard work. Surely there are candidates whose records show they aren’t a good fit. My question is why interview those students when there are applicants who do qualify and are waiting for an interview. This practice of interviewing almost all applicants was implemented when the number of applications was manageable. Since it no longer is, I think only students who make the first cut should be assigned an interview.
From talking to ECs, I sense that they stop interviewing because a great majority of interviewees get rejected, no matter how much the ECs support them. At a certain point, they believe their effort makes no difference in who gets accepted. Coloradomama’s comment that it doesn’t play a big role confirms that reason for dropping out as an EC.
Tamarix, a short interview isn’t an indication of poor fit. My child’s interview lasted 25 minutes, but went very well. The acceptance came on Pi Day. Best of luck to your daughter.
This isn’t unique to MIT. Many many alumni at my alma mater stopped doing student meetings when they became non evaluative. They felt it wasn’t worth the time/effort if their report “didn’t matter”. I look at it differently as I enjoy talking to students and answering their questions. It is hard though when the majority of these exceptional students are rejected but that’s the way it is at highly selective schools.
It’s not a good combination though as more and more students apply, and alumni volunteers are dropping out.
I’ve interviewed quite a number of applicants and only a couple were accepted. It is disheartening for me to see applicants who I think would be very good MIT students and have them get rejected. ECs don’t see any of the rest of the application and so we don’t have a handle on why or why not they are accepted.
As part of every interview I have done I talk about the low acceptance rate. The applicants are quite aware of this and all have had a “plan B”. I also talk about my professional career in that I worked with very good engineers from just about any engineering school you could name. The goal here is to prepare yourself for that career and MIT is “just” a stepping stone to that. A good stepping stone to be sure but what one gets out of college is dependent on how much one puts into it. If you are a viable candidate for MIT, you will probably do well wherever you go.
It is fun to talk to students, is why I keep up doing this. I enjoy the interactions with students. I feel students become aware of MIT for graduate work, or an MBA at MIT’s Sloan school of Business, and thus its not a waste of time.
@brassratter In general I agree with your comment, that MIT is very rigorous, but MIT does not ask us to sort applicants at all. We interview everyone who applies. During EA round, there is no time to sort that out, given the deadline is Nov 1st and the answer comes the third week in December. MIT used to not allow international student to apply EA, and thus did not interview any international students for EA, and and now we interview everyone for EA. Note a lot of international students live in the USA, but also we have a huge network of alumni abroad that serve as ECs.
Over the years I have interviewed, only a few students seemed to not have the right high school background to apply. Most students I see are very strong, some have gotten into a lab at Colorado State or U of Colorado, a few have gone out of state to do research work, have published a paper, or got some other national award in music, debate, science fair, math olympiads, or at least have super rigorous classwork. I rarely interview rural candidates, which I think is too bad, but they do not tend to apply to MIT. Colorado Springs students have access to college level math programs. I am in a highly educated state with strong K-12.
MIT does not have space for all the qualified candidates who apply. Thus they land at many other good schools.
Thats OK, they still get a good impression of MIT from me, and thats part of the point. Friendly face, impression
that the school really is a very top research and education institution. Its easy to sell MIT. Maybe some day some
of my applicants will donate a building to MIT after graduating from Carnegie Mellon, and Sloan school of business, right?!
I also talk about majors with the students, so thats applicable to life in general. The EC interview is more than just a look for MIT, it helps the student too, if the EC has time for that. If students are unsure of a major I suggest they look at detailed curriculums in two or three majors, and compare them. Sometimes we do that during the interview too, if there is time.
I don’t see the harm in opening applications and moving the deadline to file a week or two earlier so that there’s isn’t a rush at the end. Also, interviewing athletes on campus when they do their official visit could reduce the burden on ECs. I think Harvard does this.
My interviewer contacted me yesterday, I am confused because I was under the impression that interview notes were already due
@Fibbonachi10 Yes, interviews are still happening even though officially the reports were due Nov. 8. They sent us a reminder a few days ago to remind us to send in all reports. However, today we were still coordinating interviews. I will be interviewing someone this weekend and I reached out to two other EC’s to see if they could as well. Case by case basis I guess, since they were all requested directly by MIT.
@Tamarix I’m guessing every EC is different. I’ve had everything from an hour to 2.5 hours (yes, we did) but most last about 90 minutes. Other EC’s may have a different approach and therefore different average times.
@momofsenior1 The happiest and saddest day for me as an EC is the day we get the report of who got admitted and who didn’t. I feel great for those who got in and I do get validation that only those who I thought were really good were offered admission. Maybe I just have a good radar, but none of my weaker candidates have been offered admission, so I like to think I do help confirm MIT’s decision. That said, yes, many of my strong applicants do not get offered admission. I still love meeting the applicants and ironically, even though they are not students there, the process still helps me stay connected to The Institute.
@brassratter. The large majority of MIT athletes walk on. I walked on. Many other do too, so no, its not possible to interview athletes on campus. and only a few students are interviewed on campus, usually Boston students who are there under special programs, may get interviewed on campus. MIT does not focus on athletics for admissions. I have seen a division 1 rower get REJECTED. (MIT is division 3, except for rowing ) She was recruited by the rowing coach but that did not overcome other shortcomings in her application. Athletics mean almost nothing in MIT Admissions although it all depends on the student’s entire package, the sport, and whether the student has other things MIT needs for that particular class.
I don’t believe MIT is short of ECs at all by the way. We have no shortage of ECs, we just used to have September to November to interview EA candidates and this year we had two weeks, thats now been stretched into five weeks, thats the only problem this year. Typically I start interviewing students in September, thats easier on everyone. MIT is still interviewing EA candidates for another entire week, or so, and encouraging ECs to hand in reports late. The Admissions officers are going to be really working hard in December I bet to pick out who is deferred and who is accepted EA. This sounds tough to me, if interviews are still happening in December for EA candidates. I bet we see some changes next year.
I received an email yesterday, from MIT, that they were asking ECs to conduct Skype interviews of students outside their area after the deadline. The email stated that they were trying to interview as many of the EA applicants as possible. It also stated to hurry up and get the reports in. So they did extend the deadline after all.
There is more recruiting going on these days, and MITs athletic admissions position is pretty unique. I understand why they do it but as a parent with an athlete who is turning down coach support for admissions to other schools it will be gut wrenching if MIT decides against my kid.
And just to be clear, I do not think MIT should be considering lowered admissions standards for athletes. One of the things we like best about this school is their “you need to prove that you belong here on your own merits” philosophy. But D1 schools have the opportunity for kids to lock in earlier with the NLI. Other strong DIII schools we spoke with could practically guarantee an athlete admission after an academic preread. Having none of that here means we have to choose to give up a sure thing at other schools for a “maybe” here and that makes this process even more uncertain.
@jmtabb This thread is not about athletics, but I felt compelled to respond as a parent of an academically high-achieving kid who doesn’t have a “sure thing” anywhere. I respect athletic achievements very much, but with UChicago and possibly Caltech moving towards greater athlete recruitment, I hope there’s at least one school left which values academic success more than “comparable” athletic success.
What percent of students playing varsity sports at MIT walks on? I’m surprised you say it’s the majority. I find that hard to believe. I also doubt athletics make little difference in being accepted. There are numerous posts claiming athletes have 50-80% probability. That’s compared to 7% for the general applicant pool, but probably 2% for unhooked candidates.
I was afraid my comment would go there, and you’re right. Again that’s one of the things that we like about MIT. Athletics recruiting is handled differently at most schools, and to make MIT your top choice means dropping others with far fewer opportunities to pick it back up in the RD round of admissions. That’s the uncertainty I was referring to - on the athletics side.
MODERATOR’S NOTE:
Let’s move on from athletic recruiting/athletics, please. That’s not the purpose of this thread. There have been many threads on that topic that can be searched or a new discussion can be started if there’s a question that has not been covered.
Well, a few hours ago I did my last, last, last interview for this EA cycle. I know other EC’s are interviewing today as well. So assuming that has concluded, I know a question out there is if someone who didn’t get an interview is deferred, will they be able to opt for an interview during the regular cycle. I will try to find out and let people know.