Interview with Columbia's Director of Undergraduate Admissions

it's great to have you and I think I've been talking with some people about it and they're very interested in what you have to say so obviously Columbia is a great school thank you very much um so they're really I guess three main questions that I had as part of this interview the first was if you could give three tips to any prospective Columbia student uh you know what would you say that would be the top three tips for them for the Columbia application well of course as most students know we are part of a common application group and the common application is exactly that that's incredibly common every school you apply to and submit it to is asking the same questions in that part of the application however the application is in reality and instrument of evaluation and highly selective colleges like Columbia have the opportunity to create their own sub application and those are the institutional questions the institutional questions go to the heart of the values of an individual college so if a student wants to figure out what's important to us you go to the institutional questions if we ask we as in a as an admission staff if worked really hard to create those questions to elicit the kind of information that assist us in determining whether or not as a good student is a good intellectual and social fit for Columbia those the questions in that part of the application that are really key okay that's what this is that one yeah okay - I think one of the mistakes that students make in choosing where to apply is that they look at those rankings and make a determination that this is a great college this is a you office scholars this is not a very good college and those rankings are absolutely ridiculous no I wouldn't like to brag about the fact that recently a ranking came out that listed Columbia number two in the country out for now if food is that important you should probably go to a culinary impressive ax but is not a good reason to apply through college I think there's a lot more that should go into that that consideration and what I suggest as students think about you every college has its own way of educating yeah its own kind of requirements and some are general education requirements or distribution requirements or in the case of some colleges no requirement Columbia has a very distinct set of required that come together under the rubric the core curriculum and I think is important for students thinking about Columbia to really investigate the composition of the core the content of the core the the educational approach taken by our faculty and teaching the core and students and learning in the core and if all of that stuff works for that's something that excites them intellectually and that's a good reason for applying there are those students who will apply aside from the ratings and educational philosophy because of this Athletic Conference of which were a part and that's the Ivy League and there's this general belief out there in the world that if you're an Ivy League college you're a very special place we'd like to think so but the reality is that the irony of just an Athletic Conference like Big Ten the pac-10 big E's the ACC the SEC and Athletic Conference that's not a good four five to a couch so I think you have to look beyond that book beyond the sense of prestige history and look at the real reality of the educational and social experience so this is Miami campus and those three things that you're credited for education all right very good answers thank you so the next question is how can students succeed at writing the college essay what kind of things are you gonna look out for them what's the way they can wow it yeah first of all they shouldn't be aware that you don't have to have suffered in your life to get the attention of an admissions officer reading your essay so don't burn down your house kill the bed board with your little brothers and sisters that then write what we call the drama drama essay in fact the you know some of the best essays that I've read have been celebratory as a written by students who love their parents it get along with their younger siblings enjoy school and it lived a pretty good life and and trust me after you know a whole day of reading sake 30 or 40 application for sob stories it's kind of nice every happiest but what the essay should really do or what a student you do get composing an essay let's think about what we learned from the application you ask questions about activities and academic interests not number of other things do we not know about from the application would you like to add through the essay and that broadens our picture the other thing that as we subscribe to the common application there are a set of essay prompts that have already been determined I like students who subvert that so if they want to say something that's not included in the essay prompt no get creative answer the essay prompt let move off into what you really want to say have to tie it together really take advantage of it and use it for your purpose but you think we really didn't know that that's that's an interesting tip I might have to go rewrite my essays that I'm thinking yeah I'm working on the admissions process right now family affair okay I'll try not to yeah okay so the final question I have is how do you review the application so you get all the applications in what's the process you go through just yeah fairly complex process we among all the admission officers at Columbia divide up the country and the world and each of us are given certain territory and we kind of try to create those territories such that everyone has roughly a similar reason so once an application is complete since we do everything electronically now that application comes into an individual officers meeting will open up the application and start reading now their various approaches I always start out reading the first part of the application settle to me about the students back for out their family their founders history where they live where they go to school so I look at all that general information of the distance of the street and then go to the transfer and the transcript requires a very careful reach so we're looking course-by-course semester by semester year by year that how a student is put together an academic program and make an assessment what is the degree of rigor of super really challenged we're not counting the number of eight courses number of IP courses that that's not so even in terms of performance certainly we're looking for students that really good grades but we're not going to rank us as a three nine nine over a stupor who has a three nine seven not much opinion that we might end up thinking this week nine seven and denying goes to who is three nine nine but we look very carefully at a suit performance in that academic or bring in because grades are merely symbols of a change they don't really expose much more than did well yeah and you know my sense is that probably you know students who were straight-a students we wouldn't want to be trapped in a classroom with for more than a semester okay yes we want to be what a campus with them don't look the I agree and how a student functions performs the tributes in a classroom are they the kind of people that make the classroom a more interesting place for themselves their peers in their teacher to learn about that to recognize we read those teacher recommendations incredibly closely read every line you read between the line and your comportment in the classroom you're the kind of person that asked challenging questions or you know find a person that encounters something interesting in a class bring information from the outside they've got a little in a magazine or a book or a website or a journal that adds to interplay in the classroom those are the kind of students who in some way demonstrate a content independent intellectual curiosity that sets them apart from the ones were the great lovers though so the application the transcript and the teaching recommendations general stuff on about that we're also you're a residential college so in 97 98 percent of our students live on campus we want this to be an interesting can sometimes in an exciting campus sometimes a frustum so we want to bring you are going to perpetuate the kind of energy electro bigger that already exists one thing can perpetuate your counselor should be the person that writes about the impact that you've had with it this is an important thing for students they have to educate their counselor sometimes particularly if they go to us in the school it is large it may be the counselors can't get the newest piece of it it's your job to let that counselor know what your impact has been in the school or you know for leaving what your legacy and that allows us to get to the inside you as a person within what might you and that's very important so we're going to look at that carefully then there are those member questions the supplement to the application again our questions go to our values and tell us something about how you started to explore the world ideas interest that you have and we'll look at your responses to those individual questions but in the template what questions is what books have you read over the past year of your own shoes require books books that you chose but all you present to us are the series of seven Harry Potter novels that says one thing but give among your books they don't have to all be that's but it will bum your book there's some really interesting ones of challenging ones rape fiction nonfiction some that reference your interests doesn't mean that's what you're going to major in but trusted you look at your responses to those questions here's where something I think sometimes because her father so many colleges they don't think about import of those individual questions but those questions tell us again back to that reasoning this world tell us about your level of independent intellectual curiosity on what your school is required what have you done to explore the world and that that's important is finally is it would be best if you think you want to go to Columbia to have an idea that you want an education that takes place in urban fire dreariness it we're in a major we're in a world and even though there's a real rich vibrant campus life well undergraduate residential experience I think the students who are happiest the state hospitals are those will actually take advantage of our location get through participating in the social cultural and intellectual life that the city provides or internships and students can take advantage of so embedded in that supplement in our application are some questions that give us a sense of how you have used the cultural educational resources where you live now we understand that that experience is going to be very different for someone flying from Philadelphia as opposed to applying from Lima Hawaii but even in Lima Ohio there think yes the NOx real high other things you could do and we look at how you use where you live as a resource to develop your interest and explore your apps

Channel: Columbus Kidspatch

Views: 72,351

Rating: 4.9530463 out of 5

Keywords: Columbia, college, university, admissions, application, interview, essay, common app

Id: 4PRM1CCZChk

Length: 16min 13sec (973 seconds)

Published: Mon Aug 31 2015