<p>they mostly likely use the data to see if the program is actually working (if the people at the program apply to those colleges)</p>
<p>thank you all for the replies! =) i'm going to start calming down about all this stuff lol guess i just got too worked up and delved too deep into the whole process. =) lol will proceed with more care and calmness from now on!</p>
<p>Dude, you know what helps me calm down in situations like these? I remember that in the eyes of the admissions office, I'm a nonentity. They don't know who I am; they don't care who I am until I send that application. They take attendance at these things to know who they should send information/promotional materials to. They understand that people might not be able to make it, that there are a million kids signing up, each with a million factors in their life to allow or prevent them from coming.</p>
<p>Later, they will need to evaluate a million (figuratively) applications, which is work enough. They won't have the time or patience to compare these names to the roster of every info meeting Harvard ever held (which is probably quite a few). Different people handle these meetings anyway. In sum, your name means nothing to any human before you sign off that last page on December 31 and pray that your computer doesn't crash when you're pressing the "submit" button.</p>
<p>thanx for the advice! lol it really does put to ease lots of little qualms (yea oxymoron i know) i have. =) it's good to know i'm not alone either! lol i've really just been trying to put everything out of my mind. like, this is the app, i've got to do it, ok let's do it. don't think about anything else lol. are we all starting on apps already?</p>
<p>Oh and by the way, the presentation itself does not offer that much new information. However, I did learn this:</p>
<p>*Random girl asks: What type of essays are you guys tired of reading.</p>
<p>Harvard admissions officer (last name is Herrera): Doesn't matter what it's about, as long as we get to know you. Even if it's a generic topic, but we get to know who you are, then you've written a good essay. *</p>
<p>That's probably the best I got from the presentation. So I guess it was useful in the end.</p>
<p>wow, the sarcasm on this board slays me.</p>
<p>Harvard is the #1 university in the entire United States, they don't really care about "level of interest" in an applicant, since I guess they pretty much think "hah if we accept this person, they're soo gonna come cuz we are SO GOOD YO"</p>
<p>You can check their common data set, I believe level of interest is ranked very low compared to everything else.</p>
<p>Really? Could you provide a link to that common data set?</p>
<p>Oh whoa, this is interesting. A lot of colleges are listed, but some like Harvard U and Washington U don't make them public for some reason.
<a href="http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/showthread.php?t=145077&highlight=interest%5B/url%5D">http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/showthread.php?t=145077&highlight=interest</a></p>
<p>The "level of interest" factor was just added this year, so some colleges such as Princteon, Yale still haven't checked how high they rank it, but some other top universities:</p>
<p>Cornell -- not considered
Dartmouth -- not considered
Stanford -- not considered
UC Berkeley -- not considered</p>
<p>then you have
Brown U -- VERY IMPORTANT</p>
<p>But people have said they don't even have a sign in sheet when you visit their college . .
[quote]
I called Brown admissions out of curiosity, & received what I thought was a great answer to what they look for regarding level of interest.</p>
<p>First, noting the Brown application was not the Common App, the admissions officer noted that the "Why Brown" essay was very important to them. And this is where an applicant demonstrates their level of interest...by researching Brown & figuring out how they fit. In fact when I asked if "level of interest" could also be demonstrated by visiting, the admissions officer noted that they don't even keep track of who visits (as mentioned in posts above), and that wouldn't be fair anyway because the practice would favor those that could afford to visit.</p>
<p>So, I have been thinking all along about the tactical demonstrations of "level of interest", like visits & contacts, not fulling grasping that for some colleges, like Brown, interest can be (perhaps more appropriately) expressed as part of the application.
[/quote]
</p>
<p>Hmm, sorry I really thought Harvard posted their cds publically, guess not. I'm guessing it's not that high though, since the rejection % is much much much higher than the acceptance %, just an assumption though. And most of the other competitive colleges don't place it so high while you might have other less selective colleges like:
Bates -- VERY IMPORTANT
Kenyon -- IMPORTANT
Colorado Coll -- IMPORTANT</p>
<p>so yeah . . I don't think harvard really keeps track</p>