Juno left us with not that much snow and an unexpected day off. So of course I did some diligent research to find an open coffee shop (though they are closing a few hours early, I’ll forgive them because it took me 4 tries to find one that was open at all) and traveled to Tribeca to “do homework.” And instead I’m remembering the snowstorm that hit Providence right after I flew back for my final semester at Brown, and how I had to step in other people’s footprints on my way to the Coffee Exchange, because when I stepped in fresh snow I sank to my knees, and how the snow that was piled by the side of the street easily reached my elbows.
On Saturday, I got to be an interviewer for this year’s New York City area Brown applicants. Saturday’s interview day was designated for residents of Long Island, Staten Island, and Queens, so probably 100 kids (and their parents) took the train into Manhattan so they could interview with an alumnus. After the interview, we were to write an evaluation for the student for the admissions committee to read along with their applications.
I have imagined myself doing a lot of far-fetched and preposterous things, but I had never imagined myself in a high-rise office building in the middle of Times Square introducing myself to a teenager who wore a blazer and tie, shook my hand, addressed me as ma’am, and handed me a resume (So not necessary, buddy. I can’t admit you.). I’m supposed to be the one trying not to let my hands shake when I hand someone my resume. You’re too young for this, I kept thinking. I was wearing jeans (It’s okay— so were the other interviewers), stood a foot shorter than the kids, and picked the raisins out of oatmeal raisin cookies in our break room when things got too intense. Which these kids were.
I interviewed 7 students, and even though I had to keep the interviews around 20-25 minutes, I could have kept going for hours. Do you sleep, ever? I wanted to ask. (No.) What do you mean exactly when you say you “conducted medical research?” Yes, Brown will let you take 4 math classes at once if you want to. I had free reign of what I asked, so I got creative. Some of the kids were so nervous they sounded like robots, and some sounded like 30-something-year-old professionals. I thought about my own Brown interview 7 years ago. It was in a new gym complex in Biloxi (my interviewer was the owner), and he gave me a tour of the place once we were done talking. What the heck did that man write about me? When I got in, I called him to let him know and to thank him. “I knew you’d get in,” he told me, but I know now, even more than I knew then, that that wasn’t true. No one can know that. All of those kids sat together waiting for their turn, knowing that of the 10 students sitting closest to them, only one might get in. That of the 100 students in that room, maybe 8 will get in.
Most of those students have spent the last 15 of their 18 years 100% devoted to this task— getting into an Ivy League school, and some of them Brown specifically. Is it worth it? I wondered. Is anything worth it if it dictates your life for 15 years, whether you get in or not? Maybe. But maybe not. I wanted to apologize to every one of them. To tell them, you all deserve this. Some of you aren’t a good match for the school, some of you will be happier somewhere else, even though you don’t know it yet, and some of you will just not be quite as lucky as the person next to you. But don’t let this decision make you think you don’t deserve this.
I wrote my evaluations with the horror and awe that comes with knowing you might be directly impacting the rest of someone’s life. I’m at a loss as to how admissions narrows over 30,000 applications to about 2,500. Why would you put yourselves through this, I’d think for a second, and then I’d remember.
I’m planning to visit Brown in a couple of weeks. It’ll be the first time in nearly 3 years— since the day after graduation. I wanted to tell those students that they’ll end up at the school where they belong, as cheesy and cliche as it sounds, and even if they don’t believe me right now. It may be Brown, or it may be somewhere they didn’t even know they wanted to be. What I thought was my first choice turned me down, I wanted to tell them, so that something better than I ever imagined could happen instead. And one day you’ll buy a bus ticket back to that place just so you can see it and sit in a coffee shop and visit with old professors that you now call by their first names. And you’ll get to interview students who you want to be able to reassure, too. You’re gonna be fine— I’m sure of it.
But I didn’t say that. Instead, I wished them all the best of luck, ate more raisins, and thought about jobs that I’m waiting to hear back from and the essays I plan to submit for publication, and how the series of rejections and acceptances never really ends, and I’m not even sure they get much easier. But I’m still pretty sure we’ll all be fine anyway.
