<p>Does anyone know about these information sessions that Harvard puts on around the country (with Georgetown, I think, and some other colleges)? And how do you arrange interviews – reps come to our HS, but is that the only interview you can get?</p>
<p>Information sessions and interviews are separate processes. I don’t know about information sessions. Interviews, however, are arranged after a student has submitted an application. S/he will be contacted by a Harvard representative, usually an alumnus/a for an interview. This happens some time in November for SCEA and in the spring for RD.</p>
<p>Call or write to the Harvard Admissions Office for the travel schedule to see when the “road show” will be near you. </p>
<p>Penn and Georgetown have travelled with Harvard in the past. I understand that this year Stanford will be joining the cast.</p>
<p>byerly - do you think that it would make a difference if i had my interview at the harvard campus or in germany with an alumnus? does the dean of admissions (from opal mehta book thing) really ever personally interview students? or other admission officers? (i would think it would create a great deal of bias)</p>
<p>The interviews that are taken into account during the admissions process are the alumni interviews or follow-ups. There is, I believe, no record kept of “courtesty” interviews for people who show up on the doorstep in Cambridge, for the very reason you suggest.</p>
<p>? i’m sorry, what are “courtesty” interviews? if you mean that i can’t just choose to go to germany, i didn’t mean that at all. my circumstance is that i’m going on a scholarship exchange program to germany next year and i’m debating whether or not to have the interview over the summer before leaving or in germany. i know that a harv rep (as you have posted on a previous thread) will call me to schedule after i send in my app, but depending on how early/late i can have some control over it, or?</p>
<p>I went to a Harvard information session in my town in the autumn of 2003, after seeing Harvard’s representatives at the NACAC national college affair event in my town. I thought the information session was useful, and I recommend such college information sessions to my local friends. I live in a large metropolitan area with enough strong students that it is visited by representatives of most colleges that recruit nationally, most of which are far away from here. So college information sessions are better than traveling to the college for a FIRST impression of what each college is like, and for gaining information to triangulate with other sources. (For example, I read CC posts to see how other people interpret the same official statements from colleges that I have heard at local information sessions.) </p>
<p><a href=“http://www.admissions.college.harvard.edu/utilities/travel_schedule/index.cgi[/url]”>http://www.admissions.college.harvard.edu/utilities/travel_schedule/index.cgi</a> </p>
<p>Yeah, go to the Harvard information session if there is one in your town. There will be an opportunity to answer questions and pick up printed information.</p>
<p>A “courtesy” interview is one that you have at Harvard, with admissions staff. They don’t count. Only alumni interviews do. Harvard doesn’t do alumni interviews over the summer (unless you’re from Australia or something, I guess); they do them throughout the fall, winter, and early spring, between the application deadline and the time they make a decision. You don’t have the option of having your interview conducted by an admissions officer in Cambridge rather than by a alumnus in Germany.</p>
<p>oooh… ok… ! so according to the general interview schedule, i Will be in germany then. yay!! and interviews are with alumni! thank you both very much for your help and information! =)</p>
<p>Unlike some schools, Harvard doesn’t interview every applicant. They review your application and decide to interview the applicants they’re strongly considering for admission. So basically, it’s a very good sign if you’re offered an interview but it’s not a guarantee of admission.</p>
<p>Sometimes they schedule interviews only a few weeks before decisions are supposed to be mailed out! They’re working until the very end.</p>
<p>No, that’s not the case. Harvard interviews every applicant except when it is humanly impossible to do so (e.g., you live in the middle of the Sahara Desert).</p>
<p>Sorry, Phenoixy. I guess my info’s a little off. For int’l applicants at least, in countries where there aren’t enough almuni/too many applicants (e.g. China, Korea, India, etc.), they only interview the strongest applicants. Of that I’m sure.</p>
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<p>I’m going to a seminar tomorrow with Harvard, Penn, Georgetown, and Duke… never heard anything about Stanford. Unless you’re talking about something else?</p>
<p>Harvard, Penn, Georgetown, and Duke is the USUAL mix, but colleges vary their traveling partners city by city, depending on which other colleges are available to split costs for a joint meeting. </p>
<p>Harvard also has solo meetings in my town. I have seen one solo meeting, and one joint meeting.</p>