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The Tufts Daily
Where you read it first | Friday, March 29, 2024

Admissions decisions by email

As the days get longer and longer, flocks of prospective students trod the sunny quads, anticipating the onset of their college years. Those visiting campus this spring just recently received word of their acceptance to Tufts - but not necessarily through the mail.

Now, nervous fingers can click on "You've Got Mail" before the traditional white envelope even arrives, and read either good or bad news on the monitor. All students who supplied a valid email address on their applications received either acceptance and rejection emails from the Office of Admissions.

This admissions endeavor is a work in progress, and its future remains up in the air. Andrew Sonnenschein, the assistant director of technology at Dowling Hall, said that 13,000 emails were recently sent out to applicants.

"Up until this point, we only sent out acceptance emails to applicants from other countries or on the West Coast," Sonnenschein said. "This is a pilot year - the first time that we emailed all applicants - and we are still assessing the method."

Paul Vandenberg, a high school from Atlanta, GA is one applicant who experienced email admission Vandenberg's friend was regularly checking his email last week when he found he had been "politely" rejected from Tufts, and then suggested Vandenberg check his own email. Vandenberg's email contained the opposite response, congratulating him with an acceptance.

"I had no idea that they were going to send emails," Vandenberg said during a visit to campus. "It was official, exactly like the actual letter which arrived a couple of days later. I can't complain about the email because the information it conveyed seemed more important than the form."

According to Vandenberg, however, his friend felt email too impersonal a manner by which to deny a student. Julie Crudele, a high school junior from Florida, is shocked that admissions would even consider such an "inhumane" way to notify its applicants.

"I would hate to be rejected via email. It would crush me. And to be accepted in an email ruins the anticipation that getting into college is all about," Crudele said.

Though it may seem Tufts is saving time with emails, that is not admissions' goal. The truth, according to Sonnenschein, is that the emails are intended as a student service, with the intention of saving applicants a chunk of time.

"It doesn't make our job any easier at all," he said. "Unfortunately, many are convinced that we are attempting to distance ourselves from our pool of applicants. I think this is a very useful and necessary step that pushes Tufts to be more technologically advanced. The letters are still sent out regardless, but with the emails, we're only trying to facilitate the applicants' decisions."

Since email admissions is a potentially contentious endeavor, admissions has teamed up with the Systems Department at Dowling Hall to devise a balance that pleases as many people as possible. "Maybe we'll create a log-in to a secure database for next year. Who knows, but it would certainly be a shame not to try something," Sonnenschein said.

Meanwhile, other universities in the Boston area are sticking to the traditional method. The admissions office at Boston University said it is policy to only notify students by paper. Marlyn McGrath Lewis, the Director of Admissions at Harvard, asserted that "while we occasionally send out a few emails, we currently have no plans to change our present system. We always consider alternatives, but so far a regular letter does it well enough."

Does this mean Tufts is racing ahead the times? Sophomore Angela Lepore, whose little sister was recently admitted to Tufts, certainly thinks so. Lepore shares an America Online account with her sister, and found something from Tufts that "looked official," she said.

"[The email] was about the whole 'acceptance' business, but we didn't expect to get it online, so I was sure it was a fraud," Lepore said. "Who would have thought? I remember getting my answer in the mail and that was only two years ago. But email is becoming professional so quickly. I'm glad Tufts is not planning on falling behind."