【升学指导】你说的fit是什么fit？对话耶鲁、布朗、爱默生招生官 | 2020 University Outreach

For college counselors, the summer is a time for college outreach. In normal times, conferences and tours are a good way to connect with colleges and admissions officers in the summer. This is an important part of our job because it allows us to build relationships with the universities our students like to apply to, it increases our professional knowledge, and it gives us a chance to promote our school and our students to top colleges. Like many things, the corona virus has changed our ability to do this. 

对升学指导来说，夏天是与海外大学建立联系的黄金时机。往常，我们工作的重要内容之一就包括：通过会议和访校结交大学招生官，这使我们与学生们想申请的大学建立关系，也增长我们对大学的了解，还能向大学宣传我们的学生和学校。然而，新冠病毒改变了这一切。

Now, much of the university outreach is online. I recently have been working online with admissions officers from three colleges; Yale, Brown, and Emerson. We are members of a panel discussion for the July IACAC conference. IACAC is the biggest international university and college counselor organization in the world. They hold a yearly conference, which is a networking opportunity for high school counselors and university admissions officers. This year it will be online. As the four panelists for a conference session, we have been having some interesting conversations about how students can successfully apply to highly selective universities.

目前，许多大学的外联都转为了线上，近期我与来自三所大学的招生官有过联系：耶鲁大学，布朗大学，爱默生学院。我们于7月IACAC大会的座谈会上相识，IACAC是世界上最大的国际升学指导组织，每年举办一次会议，为高中升学指导与大学招生官提供交流的机会。今年，IACAC也改为线上召开，我们4人探讨了一些有趣的问题，有关学生如何能成功申请顶尖大学。

Helping students use the application process as a learning opportunity.

帮助学生将申请过程变为学习机会

In our discussions, we have been united in the belief that as adults and educators, we need to create an education system that helps students grow and learn through the college application process. Ideally, students benefit from  the application process as it teaches them to understand themselves better and gives them an opportunity to learn how to effectively communicate who they are to the outside world.

在我们的讨论中，大家达成了共识：作为成年人和教育者，我们应当建立一个能帮助学生在大学申请过程中成长和学习的教育体系。理想状态下，学生们能通过申请大学来更加了解自己，并学会如何有效地将自己介绍给外界。

John Yi, Associate Director of Admissions, and head of China admissions for Yale, says students often have a misconception about what student Yale is looking for. They treat the application like a series of boxes to check off.  

耶鲁大学中国地区招生主任John Yi说，人们常常对耶鲁想要什么样的学生有错误的认知，他们以为招生是一张任务清单，招生官在候选人的每一项条件上打勾。

Yale, like most top universities, is not looking for and doesn’t expect perfection. They often reject students with perfect SAT scores and perfect GPAs. John mentioned that a Yale student has to be strong academically, so that they can thrive in the rigorous intellectual environment of Yale, but along with that, Yale is interested in who the student is and what their attitude is towards life and learning. They want to know what the student will contribute to the Yale community beyond academics.

然而，和其他顶尖大学相同，耶鲁并不想追求“完美”。反之，他们常常拒绝那些有完美SAT分数和完美GPA绩点的学生。当然了，John提到学生在学术上必须很强，才能在耶鲁严格的学术环境中茁壮成长。但是与此同时，耶鲁还关心学生是个什么样的人、对生活和学习的态度是什么，他们想知道除了学术以外，学生还能为耶鲁做出什么其他贡献。

Panetha Ott, Director of Admissions and International Recruitment at Brown, had an interesting response when I was talking about how I question the concept of `fit’. I was explaining that in China, like many countries, your university is mostly determined by a test score. You will go to the best ranked university that your Gaokao score allows.

当我询问何为“匹配（fit）”这个概念时，布朗大学国际招生主任Panetha Ott给出了一个有趣的回答。我向她解释在中国和很多其他国家，学生能上哪所大学主要取决于考试分数，你一般会就读你的高考分数所能达到的排名最高的大学。

I also mentioned that we have students that have gotten into a variety of very different top universities, and it sometimes seems like universities are all looking for the same student, despite how they emphasize their unique qualities. Panetha mentioned that students and counselors like myself should keep in mind that to universities `fit’ is not solely determined by the student but also by the university and what they want as they are building a cohort of students each year. Universities like Brown think about the personal qualities that students will bring to campus life. They want a diverse student body as opposed to a certain kind of student.

我还提到，我们七德的学生进入了各种各样的顶尖大学，然而他们都有一些共性，似乎大学们都在找寻相似的学生，尽管他们都强调自己有独一无二的特质。Panetha提醒我们必须牢记，大学所说的“匹配”并不仅取决于学生，还取决于大学的需求——每年想要招收一群怎样的学生。像布朗这样的大学会考虑学生能给校园生活带来什么样的个性，他们想要一个多元化的学生集合，而不是某一类学生。

John and Panetha cautioned me that emphasizing luck doesn’t give a fair representation of the application process. They both pointed to the careful thought and consideration that they put into each student selected. No random luck is involved. They know and appreciate many of the students they reject. There are internal university factors which affect which students they pick each year. No matter how wonderful any student is, there are considerations for the selection process that are not in the student’s control. The best thing a student can do is represent themselves positively and honestly. That will give them the best chance of being selected.

John和Panetha都告诫我，一位强调运气并不能公正地展现招生流程的严谨性，他们选择每一位学生时都经过深思熟虑，没有无缘无故的运气。他们了解并欣赏许多学生，但是依然不得不拒绝他们，因为总有些大学内部原因影响他们每年的选择。无论学生有多优秀，选拔流程里都有双方不可控的考量。所以，学生能做的只有：正面诚实地展现真实的自己，这是被录取的最佳机会。

Emerson is a small, unique liberal arts college in the heart of Boston which is highly regarded for their theater, film, and communications programs. Overall, they are not highly selective but Frederick Osborne, Associate Director of Admissions, cautions that if an excellent student doesn’t make a compelling case for how they would take advantage of an Emerson education, they can get rejected. To emphasize this point, Frederick pointed out that the admission rate while normally in the 40% range,  is only 6% for students who apply `undecided’. They want students that know what they want from Emerson.

爱默生学院位于波士顿腹地，是一个小而精的文理学院，以戏剧、电影、公共关系专业而闻名。总体来说，他们的录取并不严苛。然而，爱默生的招生副主任Fredrick Osborne告诉我们，如果一个优秀学生的申请无法令人信服，不能明确说出想从爱默生学院的教育中获得什么，他们会被拒。为了证明这点，Fredrick指出爱默生学院的录取率为40%，其中只有6%的学生没有决定专业，学校希望学生清楚自己想要什么。

Last year I headed a panel with Johns Hopkins, University of Cambridge, University of British Columbia and UCLA. Promoting QD’s excellent IB program is an ongoing goal for QD college counselors. With that in mind our panel topic was: AP, IB, A-LEVEL, NATIONAL CURRICULUM:  ARE ALL HIGH SCHOOL CURRICULA CREATED EQUAL? The discussion was around how universities fairly select students who come from so many different kinds of high schools with different curricula. QD students work so hard to earn their IB diplomas, we want to be sure that all university AO’s appreciate that fact. In the end, our students, who have been doing wonderfully in the universities they are attending, make the best argument for the quality of a QD education.

去年，我与约翰霍普金斯大学、剑桥大学、英属哥伦比亚大学和加州大学洛杉矶分校共同参加了一场座谈会。为了宣传七宝德怀特出色的IB课程体系，我的座谈会主题是“AP，IB，A-LEVEL，中国国家课程：高中课程都是平等的吗？”整场讨论围绕着大学如何公平地选拔来自有着不同课程体系的不同高中的学生。七德学生为了获得IB文凭那么勤奋地学习，我们必须确保让所有的大学招生官都认可这一事实。归根结底，七德毕业生在大学里取得的好成绩最终也证明了我们的教育质量。

Be yourself. Beyond having excellent grades, you need to use your interviews and essays to show your real voice.  Students get off track and add stress to themselves in the application process when they try to guess what a university wants and then try to be the person they think the university wants. Be the best you that you can be and hope that the university is looking for someone with your interests and abilities.

做自己！除了拥有优异的成绩，你还需要通过面试和个人文书来发出自己真实的声音。学生常常在申请季给自己太多压力而偏离正轨，他们会拼命猜测大学想要什么类型的学生，然后努力假装成为那样的学生。其实，这无益于你的申请。努力做最好的自己，并期待大学正在寻找与你的兴趣与能力相吻合的学生。