I applied early action for Harvard and was deferred. I interviewed in November. What is strange is that I got an emailing requesting another interview in March. The way the worded it is weird and makes me think it means more than just the regular process:
The Harvard College admissions committee has been meeting for the past several months and will be making final decisions soon. (Name), Admissions Officer at Harvard College, has requested that fourteen Long Island students have a second interview on Saturday morning, March **, 2015 at location."
Everything is verbatim; I took out name date and location myself.
Sometimes second interviews are given by Admissions Officers when further information on an applicant is needed. The AO is basically fact-checking, or gathering more information, trying to decide if an applicant merits bringing before the whole committee. Sometimes second interviews are given by Admissions Officers because the first alumni interview was inconclusive or somehow lost.
From the sound of the email – “fourteen Long Island students have a second interview” – it sounds like a localized issue, meaning the alumni that interviewed you somehow messed up and the Admissions Office wants to make sure they don’t over look anyone. That would be my take on it. I wouldn’t take it as a positive sign, but another chance to sell yourself.
Best of luck to you and the other 13 students from Long Island!
Based on post #22 in that thread, no my opinion hasn’t changed. How much can an Admissions Director (in this case Dara) assertain in a 5 minute interview with a few select kids. The students reinterviewed spent most of the time with alumni interviewers. Second interviews with AO’s generally last a half hour to an hour. So, unless the AO is going to spend that amount of time on each kid, it seems like first interview was lost of inconclusive. I suppose the answer lies in whether the kid who wrote post #22 and was interviewed by the AO for 5 minutes was admitted or not.
^^ The other kid (batman) on that thread that said he was in “the same boat” and he was waitlisted so it may not mean that much being in the second round of interviews done en masse.
"^^ The other kid (batman) on that thread that said he was in ‘the same boat’ and he was waitlisted so it may not mean that much being in the second round of interviews done en masse. "
Actually, that’s a fairly meaningful result. Although it’s only a single result, if it were to turn out that a disproportionate number of these students were waitlisted, it would mean that it’s more likely that being re-interviewed means that you’re “on the bubble” than that Harvard messed up some interviews and had to re-do them.
Of course, the data needed to really figure that out are not available to us, so we can do no more than speculate.
I think it’s inconceivable that Harvard Admissions would devote time and attention to a re-interview in March unless it could actually make a difference – i.e., the students are “on the bubble.” They are not just going to waste the time of interviewers and applicants to re-interview people who have been accepted or rejected already for all intents and purposes.
it seems like they’re kind of thinking, okay we have fourteen great students from long island but we only want to take 10 of them. (10 is an arbitrary number, by the way) Let’s do a second interview to see if we can come to any conclusion. In other words, this interview is very important for you. Make it count.
This may be too late for the OP, but here are my thoughts:
I’m a Harvard alum and have been interviewing for about 17-18 years now. I’ve never been asked to re-interview a student. However, I have been asked by the admissions committee to “fast track” a couple of interviews— meaning, “please interview this person as soon as possible.” My interpretation of this is that they only ask this type of thing when the student is being strongly considered and they need that information to make a decision.
That being said, I would suspect that Harvard asking for a second interview is a distinctly GOOD thing. All of us interviewers are VOLUNTEERS who have real lives and real jobs. Interviewing— and especially spending several hours writing up each interview report— is very time consuming. In fact, in our area, we don’t have enough volunteers to interview every single applicant, though we all work very hard to try to do that. Given all of that, the fact that they are asking for a SECOND interview for you should be taken as a positive— they think highly enough of you to devote time and resources to interviewing you AGAIN.
@GregB77777 and @JHS , GregB do you agree with JHS that these students might be on the bubble and what is it that would put them there? Would it be something in their application, or that H is looking for certain types of kids to round out the rest of their class with at this point?
By the way, I don’t believe that Harvard is looking for “certain types of kids.” At all. Not in the way you mean it, anyway. I think you have a misconception of how this works. It’s not like they sit down and go “Hm. We only have one Hispanic clarinet player this year. Let’s find another one!” No, it doesn’t work like that.
The only thing I’ve been able to discern about what Harvard is “looking for” is this: dynamic, enthusiastic, intelligent people who will make a positive difference in the world in some way. Oh, and that aren’t sociopaths.
That can look like a lot of things.
Harvard doesn’t need to “round out” their class. The “easy” decisions have been made already— those obviously not qualified and those who obviously should be accepted. For the probably 70% in the middle, there is a lot of energy and focus to attempt to learn as much about every one as possible so the Admissions Committee can make the best decision.
This late in the cycle, asking for a second interview, my guess (just my guess, mind you) is that it’s getting down to the nitty gritty: they’ve probably made most of the decisions, and only have a few open slots left with a lot of worthy candidates to consider. Because, honestly, with only 1600 slots in the Freshman class and like what, 30,000 applications or something, there are a lot of REALLY GOOD people on the bubble, as you say. At this point, maybe they’ve narrowed it down to the last 500 applicants, but only have 100 slots left. They might want to learn more to help them make these final decisions. That’s my guess, anyway.
@tcb152 Just curious how you made out with Harvard admissions and if you know if any of the other kids at that mass LI interview were accepted. Thanks!