At least they give us some breadcrumbs… After listening to the podcast, it doesn’t seem like they are the type of school to give absolutes when it comes to interviews. There are likely to always be some exceptions. To your point, an absolute admit may not need an interview but are they given one anyway as more of a “recruitment?” I have heard this. Athletes don’t seem to get interviews (my child’s friend is a recruited athlete for this class and isn’t interviewing). Are legacies, professors’ kids or feeder school students more likely to get an interview - not sure. Is it possible, probably.
Last year, about 6,700 applied REA. Does that include a lot of “Hail Mary” or “why not throw my hat in the ring” applicants. Yes, probably more than RD. Or students that think it’s an edge when it’s really not. Anyway, they admitted about 740 in REA last year. Internet data says about each class has about 200 recruited athletes and about 14% legacy (overall admitted class is around 2,300) so that’s another 300. Is there athlete/legacy overlap, almost certainly but who knows how much? Also about 66 questbridge and I think those applicants get interviews. So we are looking at ~500-550 students that are accounted for in the REA round. That leaves 250-300 spots for non priorities. They typically interview 1/5 applicants (maybe more for REA - we don’t know). So they may interview about 1,300 or so for the following applicant types: legacy, QB and the rest. So 1,300 interviews for about 540 non athlete spots. Which overall sounds pretty decent. But maybe they interview more than 1/5 in REA? And that also doesn’t account for the few that don’t need interviews. At any rate, Yale has to pick your kid. And you never know if you are one of the lucky few that doesn’t need an interview. Interview definitely seems to indicate an increase in chances but who knows?!?!
Another improvement in their process is they have stopped deferring so many students SCEA. Last year only 17% were deferred and 71% rejected. It used to be the reverse of that, which left too many kids hanging on to false hope.
Probably not a good sign if the applicant’s stats (GPA, rank, rigor, test scores) are below Yale’s median as reported in its CDS. Here is a link to the the class profile of the most recent class. chrome-extension://efaidnbmnnnibpcajpcglclefindmkaj/https://admissions.yale.edu/sites/default/files/yale_classprofile2029web.pdf
My dd was admitted to Yale REA last year (Class of 2029). When I attended our local admitted students event in April — which is likely from one of the states sending the most students to Yale — At least the students I spoke with there had received an interview. It seems that interviews are offered after an initial screening. At dd’s school as well, every student who didn’t get an interview was rejected.
There used to be the idea of a “courtesy” interview of legacies. With interviews down to less than 10,000, I think a legacy will still have to pass the initial screen to get an interview. I also don’t see a legacy who is in serious contention not get an interview unless they are a “no doubter”.
Just had quite a poor interview experience. Was contacted Nov 18 and given the option to schedule on Nov 19/20, interviewer only responded to scheduling and follow-up confirmation emails by sending a zoom link at 1 am the night before, and seemed distracted at first having to pause the interview midway through the first question to get something. The entire thing was a Q&A with minimal back-and-forth and I got cut off at 40mins, with no chance for me to ask the interviewer about herself or her experience at Yale… really worried this might reflect negatively on my report. Would people suggest contacting Yale to explain circumstances, or just leave it?
Sorry to hear about your experience. I would guess the interviewer was busy and distracted by whatever else is going on with his/her life. Hopefully this will not affect the evaluation. I would wait for the decision to complain if you feel you must. Complaining now may actually backfire.
If you read this interesting article, you will see from the first writer’s piece that you can get in even with a very negative interview report. I wouldn’t worry too much. If your interviewer was that disengaged with you, it probably wasn’t the first time they’ve done it. I am guessing at the most you will get a boring report. If they put that little effort into it I can’t see them putting that much effort into writing the report. I think you will be fine. (Also, I wouldn’t contact Yale about it as there are no real red flags for you to cite- just my humble opinion) Why Did Yale Choose You? - Yale Daily News
I agree with the advice given to you. There isn’t a whole lot you can do. I would follow up with a warm thank you email to the interviewer and leave it at that. My husband interviews for a top MBA program and works in consulting and his schedule is slammed all day everyday. I can absolutely see this happening to some professionals and it’s not necessarily going to be reflected in a bad way for you at all.
I’m not an expert but from what I’ve read, the interview can sometimes help and rarely hurt. They are looking to see if the interview complements the rest of the app. There is absolutely going to be a range of how interviewers handle things and their own approach/personality/schedule etc. varies. My own child’s interview was nice, kept to 45 mins, interviewer said it was clear my daughter was passionate and said she would submit a good review by that evening. It was good but she didn’t leave thinking - this is going to tip the scales. I think it probably does the student a disservice to be overly optimistic with the student bc it gives a false sense of hope. Don’t worry.
Thank you so much guys! Yeah I was just a little disappointed as I thought the interview would be a chance to showcase my personality and also have a fun conversation and learn more about Yale, but I understand my interviewer probably just had a lot going on and couldn’t put her full energy in. I sent her a thank-you note and will just leave it at that.
hi there, i’m applying to yale rea and have not received an interview yet. for context, i am high stat (my SAT is in the high 1500s and i have a 4.0), and i also have some pretty impactful and unique ECs. i reviewed my essays with a former AO at another selective school and he said they were very strong. i’m definitely not expecting to get into yale, just based on how competitive it is, but i think i have a shot and i went into the process thinking i’d at least get deferred. now that i haven’t received an interview, i’m pretty scared that maybe i overestimated myself a bit. i don’t think i’m at the level of an exception student that could automatically get in without an interview. is there still hope for me, and if so, do you think my chances are lower assuming i don’t get a last-minute interview?
S26 has applied REA and has not been offered interview. He is a strong candidate, like you, but I won’t consider him ‘auto-admit’ by any means.
My thinking/assumption is that AO felt they had sufficient info about him from his application to assess him; so interviewing him was not a priority (they can only interview so many). One of his school friends did get an interview, but his is a bit different case.
I think you can still be hopeful, keeping in mind that the likelihood of acceptance is low, even for those who get interviews.
I’ve heard of people getting interviews into early December in the past, and I believe their official deadline is 12/6 to submit reports (https://apps.admissions.yale.edu/www/documents/ASC%20Orientation%202526.pdf) so maybe don’t give up hope. I believe ~90% of admitted students got an interview and I suspect many of the rest are athletes so it probably is a strong indicator, but regardless there’s no point in stressing over something you can’t control!
Hi @BKSquared! How worried should I be about not getting an interview at this stage? I’m almost sure that I’m not an auto-reject (above Yale’s median stats, unique ECs, good awards), but I’m also sure I’m not an auto-admit. From Southern California, none of the other students applying from my school have received one either.
You can’t worry about something that is out of your control. The local alumni schools committee may be short of volunteers relative to quality applicants. Have you checked your spam filter? In any event decisions will come out soon enough. Best of luck!