As soon as a prospective student decides to apply to Dartmouth, the long and sometimes grueling application process where each application is carefully scrutinized by a team of admissions officers, begins.
The applications first arrive in the Admissions Mail Room, located in the basement of Parkhurst administration building. Files, which will soon contain teacher, peer and other recommendations, are then opened for each student, Assistant Director of Admissions Peter McHugh '93 said.
According to McHugh, 13 men and women from different racial, social and geographical backgrounds make up the highly accredited team of admissions officers in the Office of Admissions and Financial Aid.
The officers spend virtually every waking hour reading and rereading applications during the months between the submission of the applications and the deadline for notification of the decisions, McHugh said.
Dean of Admissions and Financial Aid Karl Furstenberg said each reading of an application takes about 20 minutes.
According to McHugh, every application is first read by the officer in charge of the region from where it comes. This officer generally makes initial comments about the student, which are then forwarded to Furstenberg, McHugh said.
Then the application and recommendations are passed along to another "random review" officer, who has no knowledge of the comments made by the first reviewer, and are read for a second time, he said.
"Although the College tries to focus all of its attention on the student, and what kinds of positive contributions this student will make to the Dartmouth community, it is important to remember that we carefully evaluate the quality of the students' academic background, because, this is an academic institution, above all," McHugh said.
At this point, the future of the student and the application are filed into categories based on their status of accepted, denied or undecided, McHugh. said.
The applications placed in the accepted and denied categories are considered completed, he said. But those placed in the undecided category undergo further review by a committee composed of five of the original 13 admission officers, he said.
McHugh said between 1,200 to 1,500 applications go through this committee review process. This year roughly 10,000 people applied for acceptance at the College.
After the decisions are made, the applications must pass through Furstenberg's hands before being mailed to students, he said.
This system of checks and balances is one of the strongest areas of the Dartmouth's admission team, McHugh said. Another beneficial aspect is the office's desire to extrapolate different perspectives of each applicant before making a decision.
