@tcb152 Yes, I agree with JHS.
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.