From the information within catalogs, student videos, and other materials coming from preparatory schools, it seems as if applicants who have rosy and outgoing personalities are the people selected to attend.
I’ve been worried about this, especially since my interviews are approaching. I’m not usually one to point out the possible biases of others, but I’ve been wondering if boarding schools prefer students who have cheerful and extroverted personalities.
If that is the case, what’s the chance of someone with a reserved nature getting accepted?
Is it just that the students who have these personalities are more likely to volunteer to be part of these events? Or even that applicants, in general, have these personalities?
There are plenty of shy kids at boarding schools. You do need to be able to look an interviewer in the eye, “shake hands”, and talk about yourself and what you like to do. The reason it seems like everyone is outgoing is because going away to BS is really really hard, I think it forces kids to come out of their shell a bit.
The images you see in promotional materials are the images that the school (or school’s marketing department) believe best represents the image that they want to project.
A high school classmate of mine during Covid lockdown organizing started posting photos from our high school in the 80’s. Even as a teenager she had a great eye as a photographer, and was a music photographer. People commented about how she really captured the 80’s at our high school, and how everyone at our school was so cool and attractive.
I am not cool. I have never been cool. I hung with other non-cool people. We did not smoke, we were not punk or Goth, our wardrobes included colors other than black and white, and none of us had the saving grace of looking like air brushed models, or at least being photogenic. So needless to say, my friends and I were not included in that pile of photo sheets from the 80s. (In my case, the same could be said for yearbooks; other than my senior photos, there’s little photographic evidence I was ever on campus.)
Schools are not going to use images of non-animated looking people in their promotional materials. That does not mean that they are not interested in quiet intellectually engaged students. The quiet intellectually engaged students might be the ones doing other things that maintains/improves the schools statistics.
Introverts are accepted to and excel at boarding school. The schools are looking for contributors, not a particular personality. If you’re not a bubbly, gabby person, don’t try to be so at your interview. Just have a conversation with the AO. Enjoy getting to know them and sharing a bit about yourself.
