Reply to Alumni Interview (Stanford)

Forum Index » College and University Discussion

Reply to "Alumni Interview (Stanford) - How important is it? "

Subject:

Emoticons





More smilies

Text Color: Font: Close Marks

[quote=Anonymous]Another Ivy interviewer here. Our rule is under an hour with the goal of giving a sense of personality and intellectual orientation.  It's not supposed to be a test of knowledge. The topics should flow from the applicant's interests. If someone says they went on a service trip to Haiti and really care about international development, I will ask about the debate about whether aid and philanthropy has helped or hurt to check if they have bothered reading and thinking about the issue. Con law and economic policy would only come up if the applicant said those were her interests to make sure she didn't just pick those subjects to seem prestigious.  It's better to say your passion is cooking than make up an interest in a serious, prestigious topic. We're generally able to see through all but the most sociopathic teenagers.

Lying just isn't necessary because the interview is super low stakes. A great interview will provide only a little boost for an applicant. However, declining an interview is a good indication that interest in the school is low and can't help. Recruited athletes, are sometimes told to decline interviews by their coaches to avoid giving admissions additional reasons to reject the applicant.

A typical interview confirms what's in the file - whether its average applicant/average interview or strong candidate/strong interview.  My sense is that a poor interview will do little to harm a strong candidate because it might be a reflection of the interviewer. But, a strong interview may give the admissions officer pause before rejecting a borderline applicant.

[/quote]

Options

	Disable HTML in this message
	Disable BB Code in this message
	Disable smilies in this message

Review message

Search Recent Topics Hottest Topics