Meeting faculty members raises your admission chances?

[ambitiousfolk]

This has been a prevailing idea going amid us as international applicants. I have heard lots of times, that visiting the university -traveling for instance from your home country to the US school- to meet faculty members, show some interest in their program -after fulfilling their requirements for sure- prior your application process or during, and discuss your academic experiences..etc to a faculty member who is in the admission commitee may raise your chances of admission.

 

The reasons behind the visit vary, and can be stated as:

 

A- Your visit from your home country will give a positive impression of being a serious committed applicant.

B- As int'l applicant you must provide surely an english proficiency test as an eligibility evidence, however, the discussions which will be done with a faculty member will basically reflect your english abilities, If your english was efficient enough, it will be taken into consideration as an advantage factor.

C- Providing writing samples, discussing them personally, and also show some interest by being directly in touch with a faculty member will lead to some positive results. Specially when he/she (faculty member) becomes interested in a thesis topic that you may come with.

 

Now some may disagree with this, but I have to clarify that it happened with one of my close friends (International student too). He actually got admitted (in several schools) including one of the Very good, reputable schools in the US. I couldnt believe that one day he may be admitted in such a school until he handed me his acceptance offer and he will be starting this semester. Visting changed everything to him, to an extent that when he relied on applying online solely, he was rejected many times. but when he started the visiting approach, the results were different. He suggested that I should directly head to the US and shcedule meetings with faculty members, Based on the visiting approach, he  and actually the graduate director of the program he applied to himself recommended admitting him based mainly on the visit. His GPA was not stellar (around 3.15ish) his GRE scores  are quite low, his research experiences are almost none, he has no job experiences. But apparently, the meeting was effective enough. Note that this approach is beneficial to mainly int'l applicants.

 

What do you guys think?

Edited September 3, 2014 by ambitiousfolk

[ImHis]

I'd also be interested on what others have to say.

[Catria]

Even though one of the POIs at one of the schools I'm applying to warned otherwise (in the specific context of his school; he said that few applicants actually visited that department prior to admission), I still feel that visiting demonstrates some level of commitment on the applicant's part.

[bsharpe269]

If you want to know whether or not visiting can help then my guess is that yes, slightly. If you are wondering whether the visiting will help enough to justify spending a few thousand dollars (minimum) and taking a couple weeks of time off school or work to travel around to the schools then my guess is no. That is a ton of money! I think that skyping with professors, if possible, and using that extra money to apply to twice as many schools would be more advantageous.

[ImHis]

Even though one of the POIs at one of the schools I'm applying to warned otherwise (in the specific context of his school; he said that few applicants actually visited that department prior to admission), I still feel that visiting demonstrates some level of commitment on the applicant's part.

 

Catria, when your prospective POI "warned otherwise" what do you mean? Is it bad?

[Catria]

Catria, when your prospective POI "warned otherwise" what do you mean? Is it bad?

 

Here's the excerpt from the last email with that POI with anything pertaining to visits at his department:

 

 

 In my experience, visiting like that doesn’t increase a student’s chances of admission (hardly any potential applicants visit)

[lyrehc]

I am a firm believer that making contact with potential advisors/committee members and building a rapport beforehand increases chances of admission.  If a school has two applicants weighted equally the one who has interacted with faculty is most likely to be offered the spot.  However, you can do that without visiting the school.  I lived 1500 miles from where I applied and did not travel, but I did have a professor who I corresponded with beforehand who I am convinced wanted me as a student.  I took the time to send emails and converse with him by telephone and specifically mentioned my desire to work with him in my letter of interest.  

[beccamayworth]

Here's two main things, based on my experience applying last year (I'm an international student):

 

1) Initial contact with faculty/potential advisors before/during the application period is really important (although, as it has been discussed here, this varies a lot from field to field: make sure this applies to yours). This can be simply done over email, and it will allow you to find out more about whether that Professor is looking for students or not, if they have funding for international students, etc. But more importantly, it will give you an opportunity to start a dialogue through which professors can get to know more about you (and you get to know more about them). 

 

I'll exemplify this with my own experience: I emailed all POIs I was interested in; one of them replied saying he was in the process of retiring, which obviously influenced my application. Some asked for more information over email, and three asked for a skype meeting/interview. 

 

2) Visiting is great, but I only visited the ones I got invited to. In this aspect my situation is different because I was living in the US, and that facilitates things tremendously. Many schools don't invite students from out of the country to visit because the international tickets are too expensive. However, I don't think it would hurt to ASK the school whether it's okay to visit or not. If it were me, I would probably contact them (depending on how that initial contact went) and say I was planning a trip to the US, and whether it would be possible to visit the department and meet with them.

 

If visiting is a possibility (and won't be TOO costly for you), I think it does help your chances - but only if your application is already strong.

[moody]

 

 

If visiting is a possibility (and won't be TOO costly for you), I think it does help your chances - but only if your application is already strong.

 

This part is crucial.  I have seen visiting the department before admission go both ways.  If you make a good impression, that's great and can only help you.  If you seem like you are unsure or underprepared, however, it can actually backfire.  You should realize that the faculty members will be assessing your potential for success in the program, every bit as much as you are assessing them.  So, make sure that you are able to talk about your research interests in a detailed way and that you show interest in your POI's work.  And ask questions – especially about research!