How It Happens
Admission activities define the four seasons.
Traveling season
Admission officers:
- Travel 417 days to 33 states and 10 countries.
- Visit 522 high schools, connect with 2,500 students.
- Attend 135 college fairs, offer information to 4,100 students.
- Conduct 432 interviews across the nation and around the globe.
- Travel with colleges featured in Loren Pope’s book “Colleges That Change Lives” and with two groups: one with Colorado, Oberlin and Occidental colleges; another with Lewis & Clark and Reed colleges, Willamette University and University of Puget Sound.
- Admission support staff members process applications, enter data, and provide the backbone to schedule and confirm visits and coordinate follow-up with prospective students.
- At Fall Visitors’ Days, faculty, staff and current students talk to prospective students about the curriculum, research, experiential learning, popular majors, off-campus studies and athletics.
Reading season
- Begins with Early-Decision I deadline in November.
- Continues into January with Early-Decision II and regular decision deadlines. Roughly 25 percent of the final class of 400 will be admitted now through the Early-Decision process.
- More than 4,000 students submit their application pieces by mid-January.
- Admission support staff members record, compile, audit and prepare application credentials.
- In a 10-week period, admission officers read 70 applications a week. Each application is read at least two times.
- Work begins on the class of high school juniors and sophomores as about 100,000 students receive their first mailing from Whitman as part of the student search process.
Evaluating season
- Over spring break, admission officers huddle for two solid weeks to review applications again and narrow the pool to the 1,500 students who will be offered admission.
- Financial aid staff members crunch numbers so in mid-March they are ready to create financial-aid packages for the admitted students.
- Admission support staff members prepare the admitted student packets and mailings.
- It’s a marathon to April 1, when students will be notified, and a sprint to May 1, when about 400 students accept their offers to attend Whitman.
- During April, more than 750 students and their families will visit campus as they make their final decision.
- Admission support staff members process the 15,000 respondents to Whitman’s student search efforts, part of the eventual 32,000 inquirers for the next class.
Planning season
- Admission officers e-mail and call students who plan to attend in the fall. It’s not over until they show up for classes.
- Penrose House visitor board lists student and family visitors from around the country and the globe.
- Admission officers begin and/or continue their communications with high school sophomores and juniors.
- The admission staff evaluates the previous year’s activities, makes adjustments and improvements, and plans for the coming year.