As 1,245 of Yale’s applicants celebrated their regular-decision admission last week, admissions officers were already gearing up for a frenzied period of outreach.
The admssions office will use phone calls, emails, mailings and even instant-messaging chats this month to provide its admits with a personalized account of Yale life as they decide where to matriculate. But, instead of attempting to convince prospective students to attend, officers said, they try to use the month of April to share information about the school and connect admittees with people at Yale.
Jeremiah Quinlan ’03, deputy dean of undergraduate admissions, added that the recruitment period is especially compressed this year because of religious holidays — including Good Friday, Easter and Passover — that fall in the middle of the month. Since people may be traveling and not in school at those times, he said, the admissions office is trying to communicate with them as early as possible.
“[Our outreach efforts] are really all channels through which to funnel the Yale student and faculty voice to allow admitted students to connect to people on campus,” said Liz Kinsley, associate director of admissions and director of outreach and recruitment.
To help tailor recruitment efforts to each admit, she said, this year’s admitted students have been asked to complete a survey form in which they prioritize their interests, which the admissions office will use to match them with current students to host them for Bulldog Days or call them.
In the past two days, Adopt-a-Prefrosh — an admissions office program coordinated by students — has kicked into high gear as current students place calls to new admits to discuss life at Yale.
“I think the experience of talking to a real-live student on the phone is much more personal than our other outreach efforts like mailings and emails,” said Harrison Korn ’11, one of three student coordinators of Adopt-a-Prefrosh, in an email Tuesday.
(Korn is a former associate managing editor for the News.)
The University has also altered some of its mailings to provide a more personal view of Yale. A new feature of the admission packet this year is an insert entitled “Thoughts for the Class of 2015,” written by Dean of Undergraduate Admissions Jeffrey Brenzel. In the insert, Brenzel — who is identified in the literature as the dean of undergraduate admissions, the master of Timothy Dwight College and a lecturer in the Philosophy Department — shares his thoughts on what the class of 2015 will experience at Yale.
“I know who your fellow students here are going to be, and you will not find in one place a more diverse, talented, thoughtful, aspiring and collaborative company of friends,” Brenzel wrote in the insert.
Kinsley said the piece is a way to “sit and immerse yourself in a voice that is very much ‘Yale.’”
In addition to the admission packet, Kinsley said, the admissions office emails potential freshmen with information about Yale and facilitates scheduled “chats” on the admitted students website, where admitted students can ask questions of current students and admissions officers. She added that the admissions office is trying to call all admitted students who have not registered for Bulldog Days to congratulate them on their acceptance and encourage them to attend the event.
If students can’t attend Bulldog Days, Kinsley said, the admissions office will arrange individual visits to campus — providing a host, suggesting courses to visit and setting up dinner, lunch and coffee with students on campus. She also said Yale is able to financially assist students to come to campus when they qualify for travel assistance.
Quinlan said he expects the yield for the class of 2015 to be about 67 percent, as it has been in past years.
Today is the last day for admitted students to register for Bulldog Days, which will take place April 13-15.