the value of Tuft's Interview

<p>So I had a Tufts interview a few days ago. The Tufts alumnus said that the interview was NOT an evaluation but a chance for the student to know about Tufts University and vice-versa. The alumnus did say that he had to write a 1-2 page report to send back to the college. In my opinion, I thought I had an above average/good interview overall, but I realize that the interview may actually be worth very little on the college application since alumni may make subjective judgements of different individuals and may not be the most reliable data to use.</p>

<p>My questions are:</p>

<p>How much of an impact would the interview have on the college application (for Tufts)? How much weight would the alumni report bear on the college application?</p>

<p>Are interviews given to everyone who applies to Tufts provided that there are alumni who live near the individual? Or are they given only to applicants that initially have strong applications at first glance such as high SAT scores, high GPA, etc...?</p>

<p>I’m pretty sure they are given to everyone. And from what I’ve heard, and what my interviewer said, they aren’t worth much.</p>

<p>She mostly talked about HER experience. It was a Tufts-convinces-applicant interview rather than applicant-convinces-Tufts</p>

<p>The interview may not be worth much, but the adcoms at Tufts do have to look at the 1-2 page alumni report, right? Given that the report is slightly lengthy, I wonder how much the report is valued to the college admissions decision. Could it possibly make or break your college admissions decision?</p>

<p>I really didn’t know that it was 1-2 pages.</p>

<p>I don’t have any idea how much it is valued, but I <em>thought</em> it was minimal…who knows now o.o</p>

<p>I doubt it would make or break, but if there were twin applicants, one who didn’t show interest during the interview and one that asked a lot of questions, they would probably pick the one who seemed more interested.</p>

<p>I didn’t get an interview at all, and I’m graduating from Tufts this year, so I can’t imagine the interview is really all that important.</p>

<p>I was poking around the internet and I found this… <a href=“Tufts University”>Tufts University;

<p>Some examples of interviewers’ reports to the admissions office. Some are helpful reports and some aren’t. It gives you an idea though. :)</p>

<p>does anyone know if it’s true that every email you send to you interviewer gets sent to the admissions office? (like, even a thank you note or something?) Or is it just a rumor…?</p>

<p>@syc652 No way that is true…I can’t imagine the admissions officers really care about the mundane details of the interview process. What are they going to do? Reject you if they don’t think your thank you note is gracious enough?! I highly doubt it.</p>

<p>Haha not true! Don’t worry. I’m an interviewer for Tufts and I assure you I don’t forward thank you notes to the admission office- it’s nothing as shady as that. On the other hand, I am a human being and am therefore prone to making judgments about people. So, if you’re rude to me, or you show up late, or you leave early (I actually had an interviewee say “are we done yet? I thought this would be done like 20 minutes ago”, that was pretty irritating), or you’re wearing sweatpants and a sweatshirt or something, it will probably bug me and it will show up in your evaluation. This isn’t rocket science. Your interviewers are alumni who have lives and jobs and who are doing you a favor by adding an extra human component to your file. We love Tufts and want to make sure the best people go every year- and yes, part of our job is to see how enthusiastic you are, which is more easily determined by telling you our experience and seeing if you get excited about it. So my suggestion would be to take it seriously. Show up on time, dressed neatly, be respectful of your interviewer, be prepared to talk about yourself and what you love about Tufts and why you’re applying etc. Definitely have some questions- it shows you’re enthusiastic!</p>