Oh interesting re Harvard - was that this round? DD wasn’t asked for a form or transcript
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i was asked to forward my resume ahead of time
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Hi, yes, the Harvard pre-interview form was for 2024 (RD). The form was noted as “optional, but highly encouraged”. It was requested by a regional coordinator and submitted via an “Interview Assignment and School Liaison Website”. This site and form may be specific to our populous area.
A transcript was not requested, but my daughter brought it to supplement the form, which focused on EC’s and didn’t ask about coursework. She thought it might be useful to the interviewer given her particulars and that language on the form highlighted that “As a reminder, your alumni interviewer has no access to your application materials”.
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My spouse interviews for Harvard and never requests or receives a transcript. He views the interview’s purpose as learning about aspects of the applicant that might not be reflected in the other information the admissions office has. I believe he is only given their name and high school name.
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Ok so quite different - DD’s experience was as set out by @Baltmom23
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It sounds like the pre-interview information requests vary significantly by region. S24‘s interviewer requested a resume ahead of time, but he did not need to fill out a form or provide a transcript.
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My DS was sent a pre-interview form for his Harvard interview last month as well. Nothing was requested or sent before his Yale interview.
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The request for resume is dependent on the Alum. Some will ask for some don’t. For my school I usually ask for one as it helps in understanding the kid more and also helps in giving more information pertaining to their interests. ( long time since I was a student)
Also this year I had to recuse since my DC is applying. Some alums asked her for resumes and some did not. Most were over zoom since we live in a semi urban area.
Either way the kid should be prepared to talk about their interests. Why the school and why the field of study. Transcripts are not needed
Thanks for the additional insight!
Are all admitted students interviewed? Or in other words, if no interview was scheduled, would it limit the student’s chances to be admitted. Most universities schedule interviews based on alumni availability, is it true for Yale too? Thanks!
One of the reasons the Alum interview is not as important is because the schools dont have the Alums to interview 40-55000 applicants in the test optional world. So the interviews are done only if they have the personnel. Also if the applicant makes a blunder it can count against them otherwise interview is more for the student than the school. Hope this answers. For Yale it may be different since I read that they try to schedule interview if they need additional info about student
You can look up Yale’s interview policy on their website, and they also discuss interviews quite a bit in their Admissions Podcast. But short answer, they admit many people without interviews, and it really doesn’t mean anything for your chances either way.
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We too. Harvard interviewer gave form and he said that he would give notes to admission office 2 days later so he wanted to get more information about my son by email before he would submit note to admission office.
If any students in your region got interview but you, you may not be strong candidate to yale. But nobody in your region didn’t get interview, you are fine.
My child never got interviews from the schools where accepted other students already in our school.
I’m a little surprised at the number of people who applied to Harvard And Yale. They’re so different!
Yes, in our feederish HS, it is pretty common to only apply to one or the other (or of course neither). So my S24 only applied to Yale and not Harvard.
But of course there are some people who seem to be more driven by rankings, exclusivity, or perceived “prestige”. And these people sometimes just apply to all the Ivies, or all of HYPSM, or (almost) all the “T10s” or “T20s”, and so on.
I obviously don’t think that is a good way to go about building a list, but it is common enough these days.
That said, there are sometimes actual good reasons to apply to both. Like, they both have strong departments/programs in some fields. So if that leads you to both, of course that is fine.
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Delated. Never mind
Interesting, I have always felt that these 2 schools are the most similar of the Ivies. They both are strong in the humanities and natural sciences, they both have residential college systems, they both are in an urban setting in the NE. My friends who attended Harvard seem to have a very similar college experience as me.
The Ivies on my kids’ lists were Harvard, Yale, Brown and Dartmouth. Based on their tours and research, Penn was too pre-professional, Cornell too rural, Princeton too preppy (Eating Clubs really turned them off) and they did not like the Columbia emphasis on their core. Gross generalizations of course, which may or may not be accurate, but that is what they thought.
D23 is at Princeton. She had the same impression (too preppy) BEFORE she went there. Not anymore. The crowd is very diverse, although not too laid back like Brown, but definitely down-to-earth (for the most part). She didn’t join the eating club yet 
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That’s definitely a subject on which different people can have very different impressions.
Personally, I think the most similar Ivy to Yale is actually Penn CAS. This gets confusing because Penn Wharton is arguably the least similar Ivy to Yale (except maybe parts of Cornell, and no one really counts those parts of Cornell, right?). But if you focus on Penn CAS, you’ve got a lot of very similar academic strengths, similar vibe, both are urban, and so on.
The next school I would place in the Yale/Penn CAS family would be Brown. Again, Brown has an independent branding as a very liberal, very arts school, all of which can be true. But it can also just be a really strong academic experience in the same way as Yale and Penn CAS, at least with a closer vibe, and again is urban.
To me, Harvard is more similar to Dartmouth, Princeton, and kinda Penn Wharton, than it is to Yale, Brown, and Penn CAS. Actually, I kinda feel like if you just smooshed all of Dartmouth, Princeton, and Penn Wharton together, you would basically get Harvard.
And actually, I feel in many ways Columbia is that same sort of smoosh.
Admittedly, though, this is less about academics than about what sorts of students I think they typically attract. So, like, if you are super into Classics, say, you absolutely might apply to all of Yale, Penn CAS, and Harvard. And in fact Columbia.
Cornell is then a Stanford-like modern university that plays football with these former colonial colleges because Army and Navy were out and Cornell could be reached by bus. I actually think being more Stanford-like (actually, Stanford is Cornell-like, but that is a whole other topic), makes it in some ways obviously preferable for some students, but it really has a comparably weak connection to these other colleges.
But that’s an opinion of one. I think some other people share a similar view, but I know many people would see it differently. All part of the fun!
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