As you know, I engage in 1,000 or so phone call “chats” with applicants who are strong candidates for admission. I thought I’d pass along some of my favorite quotes, while protecting our applicants’ anonymity of course.
First, I ask applicants to give me some available times for our chats. I would advise you to be liberal in your availability, by the way… This applicant, after giving me a list of times, ended with the following:
“Thank you very much for this opportunity. I will try to anticipate your call with the appropriate degree of anxiety.”
What is the appropriate level of anxiety, I wonder? I’m a pretty nice guy, after all.
Someone else answered that question:
“Dear Dean Stock– I appreciate the opportunity to chat with you next week and look forward to your call. Meanwhile, I will be enjoying a weekend of abject terror!”
Another applicant was a bit worried about conversing from her office:
“Would it be possible to set a day for our conversation? The reason I ask is because I work in an office that is both busy and open-plan, e.g., there are frequently refugee children running around the office…”
I don’t think she was working for an accounting firm.
Another applicant led off with:
“Whew. Sorry I’m out of breath. I just got off my trampoline.”
I always wanted one of those.
I like to find out what people are doing outside of class, such as extracurricular activities, jobs, etc. One applicant, when asked, “So what takes up most of your time these days?” answered with “Well, to tell you the truth, Dean Stock, my girlfriend.”
At the end of my calls I usually ask the applicant if he or she has any questions about Harvard. One applicant after asking several questions about life on campus said,
“Well, if I ask anything else, I’m afraid God might smite me for my hubris!”
I think she figured God might think she was assuming she’d get in…
Now most applicants, I assume, wait patiently by the phone for hours for my call, but every once in awhile, I get a voicemail message. I think some people forget this and have rather odd greetings. This one wasn’t so odd, but I did find it amusing:
“This is [ ]. I’m not here right now. Please leave your name, number…and what you like best about me.”
Not his LSAT score, to be sure…
Finally, I usually make another phone call to applicants when they are admitted. The reactions range from screams to tears to seeming indifference. (Is “blase-ness” a word?) This was my favorite:
“Wow! You must have the best job—you just gave me the second-best news I’ve ever gotten!” What was the first? “[W]hen my mom came in and said ‘We’re going to Disney World!’”
