<p>How much weight does the interview carry at Harvard?</p>
<p>At Yale, it didn't seem to matter much, and Stanford doesn't even offer one. Obviously, each school has a slightly different policy, and I'm just curious if Harvard actually places any emphasis on the interviews (or if they're just a polite formality).</p>
<p>The interview can make a real difference at Harvard, which - uniquely - tries to make sure that <em>every</em> applicant is interviewed. If they didn't think interviews were important, they wouldn't go to the considerable effort of undertaking them.</p>
<p>Why is this so? </p>
<p>As test scores flatten, as inflated GPAs become meaningless and impossible to compare from one school to another, as schools refuse to rank candidates anymore, and as guidance counselor reports - often written by someone with no real knowlege of the student - become less and less helpful, the personal interview is the only reliable way to distinguish between statistically indistinguishable candidates.</p>
<p>Thank you very much for the answer/insight. It's just so hard to know how each college deals with interviews. Honestly it seems like they're just about protocol in some places, which I find disheartening. Either way, it is comforting to know that my interview might actually help me in this instance.</p>
<p>Thanks again.</p>
<p>My interviewer for Harvard said that it does not weigh in very much. She said something like, it's only to put in some human perspective to the paper and score admissions process. </p>
<p>But once again, she could have said this just to make me relax. i don't know. :)</p>
<p>Mine told me it couldn't make or break me, but I think that it could have more weight than he gives it. I think it's mainly to keep you calm. But, who knows?</p>