Weird interviewer?

Parents Forum
81

Wait. In another thread, you said your child attends a high poverty, inner city, highly diverse high school? Now I’m curious but of course it’s none of my business of where you lie on the low/middle/high class spectrum. Are you imagining that Ivy alum are all upper class, affluent people who would meet in places “above” McDonald’s and Burger King? Let me say, there are quite ordinary Ivy alums (me, for one). I don’t go to McDonald’s or BK either, but I don’t judge people who do. I’m a Panera person but I can easily do Dunkin Donuts as well as MCDonald’s or BK.

To be honest, “class” just doesn’t matter.

The important point of the canceled interview has been lost. In essence, your child should have says the appointment did not take place and she wants to set up another interview, possibly with another person. All else is just fluff.

82

I interviewed for my alma mater for many years.
My criteria for interview location was pretty simple:

1- on public transportation- preferably near or adjacent to the bus or subway stop in case a kid was coming in the rain
2- Located somewhere near either my home or office so I didn’t chew up hours heading out to a distant suburb- I’m a volunteer, remember. The hours I “gave” to my college I wanted to be interviewing, doing prep and communicating with my regional rep, not stuck in traffic.
3- Public, well lit, quiet enough for a conversation but not secluded (both for my own safety and that of the kid).

That’s it-zip. No thought whatsoever given to class/brand/type of clientele. I interviewed in diners- they might have been pretty ratty but they were centrally located and usually filled with respectable people. I interviewed in the coffee area of the public library. I interviewed in - gasp- fast food chains. One kid asked to come to my home (lived nearby) but I declined. I felt the parents would find it creepy. One kid asked to come to my office but I declined- this was a non-company activity and I did not like doing my volunteer work during work hours.

OP- you are way overthinking this. First and foremost is finding a place which both parties can get to with a minimum amount of hassle. Second is striking the balance between a public place and somewhere with a roof/heat/bathroom (i.e. most public parks don’t work in cold or inclement weather).

Dial it back.

83

Perhaps less than beating up on her ad nauseum at this point, sseamom’s contribution of an older statement by OP could lend a new perspective to the OP’s statements here in this thread about McD’s. Perhaps the new perspective could lend itself to a new slant on the discussion.

Perhaps OP is concerned that those who perceive the best a child who is not to-the-manor-born can do is to meet in, eat in, and find familiarity and comfortability in a place that is daily derided in the media and by Whole Fooders as a main culprit in the poor diet and health outcomes of so many in our nation.

If she has raised her child to understand and accept that the child is worth every good thing in the world, and is not to accept the least that the next person would tell the child is her portion (of dignity, of access, of inclusion, of respect), then she is reacting to what she may have felt was the reflection of a lowly expectation on the part of the interviewer.

There is that, and the OP’s own reasons for avoiding the culinary choices at McDonald’s, which were perhaps worded here in a manner that has left a bad taste in people’s mouth, which ultimately rubbed many people the wrong way.

84

“Perhaps OP is concerned that those who perceive the best a child who is not to-the-manor-born can do is to meet in, eat in, and find familiarity and comfortability in a place that is daily derided in the media”

This is entirely a product of fantasy, though. There is zero evidence that the interviewer thought - oh, this child attends xyz school, she must not be to the manor born, the only place she could really fit is McD’s so I’ll set the interview there. There is zero evidence that the interviewer picked McD for any reason other than his own schedule / convenience.

Clue: if the fancy school alum felt that a child from xyz school could only be comfortable in “poor people” settings, he wouldn’t interview them for a spot in a fancy school in the first place.

85

I believe the alums who do the interviews are sometimes obliged to do the interview if they are the only one in the area. My daughter interviewed with someone from the next state because that is who was available.

The interviewers are given some basic information about the student, just as the student learns some very basic information about the interviewer.

These are possibilities, and I do not know the OP, just gleaning that something along these lines could be on the table.

My daughter has interviewed at Panera, Starbucks, a small cafe, and a nationally known and respected museum. My son interviewed in lawyer’s offices, coffee shops and in the homes of the interviewers when local events and traffic made meeting at a public place problematic. Not one of them has been asked to meet at McDonald’s, though that has certainly been an option, I suppose.

In light of never having heard of anyone interviewing in a McDonald’s, as it sounds this mother never had, I would think it “different,” and a first. I would think it busier and perhaps louder, but then we’d have that under our belts.

But maybe OP is a newcomer to this thing, which I believe she has given voice to being.

86

I seriously doubt that the alum passed any judgement at all on the location of the proposed interview. I’m not sure the student did. But the parent of the student definitely did!

You know…if many of us were taken aback at the McDonalds reference…you have to think the folks at the college will be too. It was an unnecessary addition to an unnecessary letter.

There was NOTHING weird about this interviewer at all.

My DD had a phone interview with the director of enrollment management that had to be rescheduled three times. We didn’t give it a second thought…just rescheduled. Stuff happens.

87

Got that, thumper1. But we never know how someone else enters a moment, and what they may perceive.

The McDonald’s reference took her off-track to be sure, but it is too late now, and plenty of people have expressed that to her. I think she has even come back in a few times to say that she has benefitted from the comments that had been given up to one of jym’s posts. I think she gets that.

I’m just looking for a greater context, trying to suggest that there is context and maybe she showed too much of EDIT: [her hand] in her letter, but I think she gets that from all the comments.

88

yes redpoodles and 8bagels. According to the Op, the Op did sent the letter by email.

89

OP, given your apparent unfamiliarity with common customs involved with the college application process (hence the inquiry from one poster about whether you were foreign-born), I suggest that you come here to get input before communicating with any more colleges and before your offspring makes a decision about where to attend, what dorm and meal plan to select, what personal items to bring, etc. I’m not being snide, truly. Your admission that you don’t ever go to shopping malls or fast food outlets and your language about class differences suggests that your everyday life experiences may be rather circumscribed, and some hand holding by the CC community could be helpful. I’m aware that of course “you don’t know what you don’t know”, but for the sake of your child, please be liberal in seeking advice (in advance!). Most here are happy to help.

90

Whether MCD’s would be busy and loud wound vary a lot by time of day, and of course every location can vary. There’s a McD’s nea my office that I’ve occasionally been to right after work for one reason or another. At 4:30-5 it’s pretty empty. Wouldn’t be a bad meeting place at all.

91

I don’t think I’ve ever been in one that was not busy. Some of them have had music playing over the loud speaker, which would be entirely distracting. Time of day could make a big difference in some areas, sure.

I thought the most recent Starbucks interview should have been moved, due to it being highly trafficked and smaller than a stand-alone, as well as the layout of the particular venue. I didn’t press the issue at all, though, which allowed my daughter to put her best foot forward when she walked in.

92

Wow-What a doozy of a thread. To the OP- you start your letter to the college by saying that the incident made you uneasy about the school, reputation notwithstanding. That line, to me was a bit overboard in the judgey department. Whatever school your D attends, she will be sure to encounter a teacher, an admin, a cafeteria worker, a bookstore employee, etc. who may make an error or do something not to your d’s liking or preference. That is just part of life and certainly does not mean the school is not deserving of its reputation. And in this case, the person was a volunteer, not even employed by the school. You need to cut the school some slack on this one. Next time, before you push the send button, take a few hours and reassess, and then edit, edit, edit, paying attention to tone and dropping all the judgmental, self righteous hysteria.

93

Thinking of the closest Starbucks and McD’s to me, the SB is inside a grocery store and is ALWAYS busy. It’s a prime meeting place for different people at different times of day-early mornings it gets the older men and their coffee buddies, mid-day it’s the SAHM group, after school gets out it’s the teenagers.Evenings it’s the working guys coming off shift. OTOH, the McD’s just down the street is often busiest with drive through in the morning as I pass it for work, then again with walk-in teenagers at lunchtime. At dinner time it’s actually not very busy at all. D sometimes has me stop there for a chicken wrap in between activities. So a meeting there would be quiet enough.

I suspect OP is long gone, but thinking of my neighborhood and the “specific demographic” that inhabits it, and both the SB as well as McD’s, I’m guessing I know what demographic OP means, though I can’t be sure. OP would probably rather have a meal, or a meeting, at the nicely gentrified neighborhood a few miles north of us. Not a McD’s in sight and the “specific demographic” has been priced out.

94

Talking about a place being noisy, reminded me of another thing about my daughter’s strange interview in Starbucks that valentine night. The place was empty - just my daughter and the interviewer and he went up to whomever was working and asked them to lower the music. He also did not purchase a drink (I always told my daughter it was rude not to buy a drink when doing these interviews at a Starbucks or Panara - so she always did).

95

Yes, kiddie, I understand your instructions to your daughter.

My husband and I went to the desk at the museum to make a donation once my daughter and her interviewer were out of sight. (The interviewer had chosen a day when the museum visit was free to the public, so there was no obligation on my daughter to submit an entry fee. I thought that was in incredible good taste. My daughter came to find us when she was done, and let us know immediately how “cool” the art was in the museum.)

sseamom: I think we all have formed ideas of the “demographic” that may be envisioned as frequenting the McD’s in question, though I wonder that the OP may also be a member of the demographic. On its face, anyway.

96

lol … where to begin? For one, I would like to be “long gone”, so immensely unpleasant has this outcry been. I appreciate the intentions of MommaJ to help in the future with Big Decisions like – don’t remember them all because ‘not knowing what I don’t know’, these hadn’t seemed to me to be decisions of such import as to need help with; issues of meal plan choices and dorms, etc. So thank you for the offer, but I will politely decline, I think. In part because wishing to avoid the reality or appearance or unpleasantness of “helicopter parenting”, I would not be spending time researching these questions, I don’t think. But, I think the offer was meant kindly and it is therefore appreciated. However, I will not be subjecting myself to this community’s response again. I feel like I strolled in front of 50 flame throwers. The response here has been breath-taking.

I appreciated comment #82 by waiting2exhale. It is a bit convoluted but I agree with the first part of it I think: …“Perhaps OP is concerned that those who perceive the best a child who is not to-the-manor-born can do is to meet in, eat in, and find familiarity and comfortability in a place that is daily derided in the media and by Whole Fooders as a main culprit in the poor diet and health outcomes of so many in our nation.”… but not the second. That is, I’m concerned that kids from a poor school are considered - as exhale says - likely to be comfortable only at a low-scale place like McD’s (or rather, a place that an interviewer from a higher-manor-born might consider an appropriate match for these interviews) . I lose exhale when adding the bit about daily media derision. Not to mention Whole Fooders. Mostly because it just becomes too complicated. I think I may agree and worry in a second-pass at that level, just not at this first pass.

Why is this so hard to articulate? Again, let me try: It feels condescending, like the interviewer is trying hard (and considerately), to find a place that “poor” kids would be comfortable in, and that is McD’s while I suspect this concession is not made for kids from different, more selective schools. WAIT - before you-all explode in anger at this, I’m just trying to explain my thinking: I totally get it that you-all think this feeling of mine is 100% nuts-o.

As I said, I don’t believe the kids from the tony schools are being asked to have their interviews in McD’s. And others on this thread have confirmed this to some small extent at least. Several have mentioned this has not happened, and several have mentioned a variety of locales from private home to offices and various public spaces in between. With several interviewers chiming in about the limitations they’ve operated under to keep one and all safe and professional, etc. It seems to be a complicated problem, where to hold these interviews, and also one that is not approached by convention across the board between schools, states, etc.

Many seem fascinated by my own demographic, I believe imagining me to be saying I’m (or rather, my kid’s) too high and mighty to rub shoulders with any who might be forced to such a lowly spot as McD. This couldn’t really be further from the truth. But exhale’s interpretation is again, pretty close to it. I apologize for the umpteenth time here to have so incredibly misstated my feelings. It’s fascinating seeing how really wrong things can and do get construed when there’s an attempt at anonymity. I don’t myself disdain contact with McD customers. I happen to dislike that business for political-nutritional reasons and have probably confused my own public health concerns with one of interview-etiquette that I fear makes presumptions about public school kid’s dietary and fast food choices. As it happens, the preponderance of families at my kid’s school also avoid McD their class notwithstanding, for cultural-nutritional reasons I suppose… in truth I’m not really sure why. It’s just empirically not all that popular among them but I’ve never inquired as to why. I’m guessing as the article I referenced notes, McD’s isn’t actually all that inexpensive; there are far cheaper (healthier and tastier too) options around that seem to be far preferred too.

Anyway, no question whatsoever this is all tempesting way way too much around a molehill. As others have noted, I do agree and see thanks to you-all, that I have over-thought this. I do believe the McD to have been chosen precisely because it was quieter than starbux, etc. Again, this is likely a difficult sort of decision to make for all the reasons sketched so far. After all the ink spilled here, I have far more appreciation for the interviewer’s dilemma and sympathy for the decision to settle on McD. It’s certainly possible there was no class-presumption made and just simply an expedient decision about noise. Certainly the restaurant seemed quiet (i.e., “sketch”) and relatively conducive to talk from the parking lot. I can believe this reality is more important to an interviewer than any vague association with the corporation.

I also want to agree with someone’s observation way back that this information is coming primarily from a HS’er and it is very possible to have lost quite a bit in translation to me.

Last point is that kid’s feelings about McD are very much close, I think, to exhale’s bit about …" derided in the media and by Whole Fooders as a main culprit in the poor diet and health outcomes of so many in our nation…" Kid is very upset by McD as iconic of a fast food industry that has contributed to trapping folks in an underclass of dietary problems (see, for example, the series of documentaries called something like “Weight of the Nation” I think). So there’s this layering of class-presumption and irony that is a little – just a little, mind you, hard to take. NONE of this is to say that either kid or I ever did anything but say “yup”, “sure” “fine”, “whatever” up to and including following through on this meeting that didn’t happen (even after it seemed unlikely to)! Kid is well-schooled, as am I, to smile and do what’s needed and desired by another. It’s called cooperation and we’re quite cognizant of it. Its absence is what tested the scales of suspicion for me about this whole affair.

97

Are you referring to my post # 48?

98

Merry Christmas everybody! @sirila I’m genuinely sorry you feel unable to turn to CC anymore when it’s really full of quite helpful advice. I’m sorry my comment played a role in that - class + prejudice is just something I feel quite strongly about and I definitely should have phrased it in a way that was more constructive. Anyhow at the end of the day you’re just a parent who cares a lot about your child’s education and future. Which is to be respected :slight_smile: Hope this doesn’t ruin the holiday cheer xx

99

I think this is an example of where someone sees a microaggression in a choice that everyone else sees as neutral. I know you are no longer reading this, but there are enough macro aggressions in the world - don’t go looking for things to be offended by. Best wishes to you.

100

@sirila I’m sorry you feel you can no longer participate on CC. I agree it can become a bit rough but it is also very helpful.

But keep in mind what’s important. THIS^^ Congrats!