Should we (gently) tell school about a lousy admissions officer?

<p>My d has been trying for over a month to arrange an interview with a California-based admissions officer who works for a small LAC located in another state. My guess is that the admission’s officer is an LAC alum now attending a California graduate school. Without getting into details, let me just say that that the off-site admission’s officer has been very, very flakey and is giving us a terrible impression of the LAC.</p>

<p>This brings up two questions. First, we are thinking of sending D (a Senior) to visit the LAC late in February. Should she just say “never mind” to this California-based admissions officer and tell him that she’ll interview on site in late February? This would give her the benefit of an interview with a (probably) much better admissions officer, but it would be much later in the admissions review process. Second, do we say anything to the LAC later in the spring along the lines of “Oh gee, we think that a lot of kids from California might be interested in your fine school. You might want to work on the process for getting these kids interviews. D sure ran into a lot of troubles. . .”</p>

<p>I'd have your daughter email the director of admissions and say something along the lines of "I have been trying to line up an interview with Ms. XYJ, your California admissions representative, for some time but have been unable to find a mutually agreeable date. I plan to visit campus in February and wonder if I could interview on site then if it would not be too late to affect my admissions decision." </p>

<p>This doesn't directly accuse the rep of anything, but subtly lets the director know it's not due to lack of trying on your daughter's part that she hasn't been able to interview. Additionally, it will also verify if February would be too late to interview. It also probably will eliminate any chance that the director would call the rep on the carpet for not doing her job and then insist that she rectify things by interviewing the student who complained, i.e., your daughter, ASAP. </p>

<p>Of course, if the director lets your daughter know that it will be too late to be considered in the decision, she will have to either continue to work things out with the rep. She might try asking the rep for a telephone interview instead of a face to face interview and see if that speeds up getting a date scheduled.</p>

<p>After your daughter has received her admissions decision, if you still feel so inclined, you can then drop an email to the director describing the difficulties your daughter experienced in making contact with the representative and how it influenced your daughter's opinion of the LAC. I think most schools would want to know this sort of thing.</p>

<p>We also had a problem with a local "admissions" liaison. She gave us much incorrect information, and was too busy with her kids and all to truly assist at all. It was kind of a strange situation. We just stopped working with her altogether and went directly to the school.</p>