History of College Admissions Interviews
How a century-old admissions tool evolved from exclusionary gatekeeper to endangered species
If you're applying to selective colleges today, you've probably wondered about the interview: Should I do one? How much does it matter? Why do some schools require them while others have dropped them entirely?
To understand where college interviews stand today, and where they're headed, we need to look back at how they started and why they've changed so dramatically over the past century.
The Origins: Character Assessment as Social Filter (1920s–1930s)
In the early 1900s, college admissions was straightforward: most institutions admitted students based on entrance exams and completion of classical high school subjects. Formal admissions offices barely existed, and even elite universities drew heavily from nearby feeder schools.
This changed in the 1920s when Harvard, Yale, Princeton, and other highly selective universities introduced something radical: the personal admissions interview. Along with recommendation letters and personal essays, interviews became part of a new "holistic" review process meant to assess a candidate's character, background, and "fit" beyond pure academics.
But here's the uncomfortable truth: these early interviews weren't designed to be inclusive. They were explicitly created as exclusionary tools. In the 1920s, Jewish students were excelling academically and gaining admission to elite colleges in growing numbers. The interview became a mechanism to identify and limit "undesirable" candidates, students who didn't come from the "right" kind of family.
As historian Jerome Karabel documented, "the personal interview became a key component of admissions in order to assess important but subtle indicators of background and breeding." Admissions officers evaluated traits like leadership, speech, dress, and demeanor as proxies for social background. The interview allowed them to screen out those who, despite academic excellence, didn't fit the preferred demographic and social profile.
These early interviews were highly unstructured, often just informal chats with a dean or professor. There were no standardized questions or evaluation criteria. The "purpose" was to assess intangible qualities: personality, character, whether an applicant would be a good social "fit." In short, the interview began as a subjective filter reflecting the biases of early 20th-century elite admissions.
It's important to note that this was limited to a handful of elite private institutions. Most colleges, especially public universities, still admitted students based on straightforward academic criteria without any interview component.
Post-WWII Expansion: Enter the Alumni (1940s–1960s)
World War II changed everything about American higher education. The GI Bill and post-war economic boom created a surge in college enrollment demand. Institutions that previously had tiny admissions operations were suddenly overwhelmed by applicants from across the country and around the world.
Selective colleges could no longer rely only on local prep schools. To handle the volume and geographic spread of applicants, they turned to an innovative solution: alumni interview programs.
Princeton University formalized this approach in 1946, setting up an organized network of alumni to interview prospective students nationwide. Other colleges quickly followed. The Daily Princetonian announced that while "the Admissions Office will make the final decision, the reports of alumni who have had an interview with [candidates] will be of invaluable assistance."
Through the 1950s and 1960s, these alumni networks grew dramatically. Volunteers interviewed applicants in their hometowns, often at the alumnus's office, a coffee shop, or even the student's home. They also served as recruiters, encouraging strong students to apply to their alma mater.
The format remained informal and varied wildly. Some interviewers focused on intellectual interests, while others might quiz students on current events or simply chat about background. There were minimal structured protocols; the interview was seen as an art, reliant on personal impressions.
For colleges, alumni interviews offered two major benefits: they extended the reach of the admissions office to students who couldn't afford campus visits, and they strengthened alumni engagement. By the 1970s, some colleges had hundreds or thousands of alumni interviewers. (Today, Princeton has over 7,000 worldwide.)
The Holistic Era: Repurposing the Tool (1960s–1980s)
The civil rights movement and changing social norms prompted many institutions to reconsider who should have access to higher education. Affirmative action policies emerged in the late 1960s to increase representation of underrepresented minorities and women.
Interestingly, the same holistic review framework that Ivy League schools had pioneered to maintain ethnic quotas was now repurposed for a more progressive goal: promoting diversity and equity. Greater emphasis was placed on understanding each applicant's background, talents, interests, and challenges.
Within this context, the purpose of interviews began to evolve. Rather than screening students out for not fitting a mold, interviews could help include students by allowing them to showcase personal strengths or explain life circumstances not obvious on paper. An interviewer might discover a student's passion for community leadership or the resilience they showed overcoming adversity.
That said, old attitudes didn't vanish overnight. Well into the 1980s, elite colleges placed heavy weight on subjective "personal" ratings that sometimes introduced bias. A federal investigation in the 1980s found Harvard admissions files where academically superb candidates were noted as "shy" or "a tad frothy" in personality, comments that likely hurt their chances. Interviews could feed into such judgments: a quiet, nervous interview might be tagged as lacking confidence, while a polished extrovert left a glowing impression.
This raised concerns that interviews might replicate societal biases, privileging the articulate and affluent over the reserved or less polished.
In response, admissions professionals gradually pushed to standardize and professionalize the process. Starting in the 1970s and 1980s, many colleges developed training manuals for alumni interviewers, clarifying what to cover, what to avoid, and how to evaluate candidates. Report forms with specific questions or rating categories were introduced, scoring applicants on communication skills, intellectual curiosity, maturity, or institutional fit.
Still, interviews remained semi-structured at best. Alumni were encouraged to have natural conversations rather than following rigid question lists. The philosophy shifted toward viewing the interview as one piece of a holistic puzzle, ideally a supportive one. The old "gatekeeper" mentality gradually gave way to an "ambassador" approach, exemplified by Princeton's 2019 "Positively Princeton" training emphasizing that interviewers should welcome applicants and bring out their best, not grill them on weaknesses.
Questions of Access and Equity (1990s–2000s)
By the 1990s and 2000s, interview practices varied considerably across institutions:
Small liberal arts colleges often encouraged on-campus or regional interviews conducted by admissions staff or trained students. These evaluative interviews aligned with their personalized admissions philosophy, revealing a student's enthusiasm, communication skills, or alignment with the college's mission.
Large universities and Ivies faced logistical limits with tens of thousands of applications. Many turned almost entirely to alumni interview programs. Some attempted to interview the majority of applicants (Princeton reaches about 93%), while others could only offer interviews to a subset.
Large public universities (like UC schools or Big Ten flagships) generally didn't include interviews, they deemed it impractical and potentially unfair unless every applicant could be offered one.
Fairness concerns gained more attention during this period:
How do we ensure an alumni interviewer in rural Idaho evaluates students similarly to one in Manhattan?
Are some interviewers asking improper questions or letting unconscious biases influence their reports?
Schools increasingly standardized training and guidelines. The National Association for College Admission Counseling (NACAC) developed best practices emphasizing equity. One guiding principle: not having an interview should never hurt a student's chances.
Colleges began stating more clearly: "Interviews are optional and not having one will not be held against you." Yet students often feared missing an interview would disadvantage them, and data at some schools suggested applicants who interviewed had higher admit rates (though this may reflect self-selection).
During this period, the function of interviews in admissions decisions continued to be debated. While a strong or weak interview could theoretically tip a borderline case, NACAC surveys found that interviews were usually among the least important factors, ranked well below GPA, test scores, essays, extracurriculars, and recommendations. By the 2000s, about half of colleges said interviews were not important in selection.
The interview's value was often more in public relations than evaluation. Offering an interview made applicants feel seen and heard in an increasingly competitive process. Many alumni interviewers privately understood they were more goodwill ambassadors than deciding factors.
Technology Transforms the Process
Technology has continually reshaped how interviews are conducted:
Telephone interviews (1990s): Made it possible for students in remote areas or overseas to have substantive conversations without traveling.
Video calling (2000s–2010s): Skype, then Zoom, allowed "face-to-face" interactions across distances. By the late 2010s, many alumni interviews were conducted via video, especially for international candidates.
COVID-19 acceleration (2020): The pandemic forced virtually all admissions interviews online, proving the viability of video conferencing as the new normal. By 2025, the majority of Princeton's alumni interviews take place via video chat rather than in coffee shops.
Asynchronous video submissions (recent): Some colleges have begun asking applicants to record short videos responding to prompts rather than having live conversations. The University of Chicago (Class of 2023) dropped alumni interviews and invited applicants to submit optional two-minute video introductions. Brown University replaced alumni interviews with brief "video portfolio" uploads, explicitly "in the interest of ensuring equity of experience and opportunity."
This trend addresses the scale problem, it's easier to review hundreds of short videos than coordinate hundreds of one-on-one interviews. Asynchronous videos ensure every applicant has the same task, which can feel fairer than the luck of the draw with alumni interviewers.
The move toward video essays comes at an interesting junction: they're seen as a guardrail against AI-written essays, since it's harder to fake a spontaneous personal talk. However, critics worry video submissions might exacerbate inequities, students with resources can create well-lit, well-edited presentations, while others struggle with access to quality equipment or quiet recording spaces. There's also concern about appearance-based biases or biases related to speech, accent, or background visible on video.
The Current Crossroads (2020s)
The last few years have seen major shifts in how colleges view interviews. The soaring number of applications at selective universities, it's not unusual for an Ivy League school to receive 30,000–60,000 applications a year, has made coordinating interviews via alumni networks a herculean task.
Alumni volunteers started voicing frustration that their efforts weren't yielding proportional results. An alum might interview 20 students in a season and see zero admitted, leading them to ask: "Why am I doing this if so few of these kids get in?" Admissions offices recognized the burden: tens of thousands of logistical steps to set up interviews that rarely swayed decisions.
The Great Retrenchment (2020–2024)
During COVID-19, when so many processes were re-engineered, several universities took the opportunity to rethink interviews:
Brown University (2020): Ceased alumni interviewing, switched to video introduction model
University of Pennsylvania (2021): Redesigned alumni interviews into purely informational conversations, no evaluative report, explicitly not part of selection
Washington University in St. Louis: Ended alumni interviews entirely
Columbia University (2023–24): Suspended alumni interviews, citing inability to reach the vast majority of applicants
Cornell: Now offers non-evaluative "conversations" on limited basis
Harvard and Yale: Only arrange interviews for a subset of applicants when the admissions committee needs more information
Among traditional "Ivy Plus" schools, Princeton, Dartmouth, MIT, and Georgetown stand out as still investing in broad alumni interview coverage for nearly all applicants. Georgetown in particular has long required an interview for every applicant, viewing it as part of their personalized admissions ethos.
The Debate: Value vs. Fairness
Arguments for keeping interviews:
Illuminate an applicant's passions, maturity, and sincerity in ways grades might not
Allow students to ask questions and connect with someone from the institution
Signal that the college cares about meeting applicants as individuals
Provide public relations value and maintain goodwill
Arguments for eliminating interviews:
Unstructured interviews have low predictive power for college success
They inject subjective bias and reward students who are articulate, extroverted, and coached
They correlate with socioeconomic advantage, affluent students have more experience talking to adults and may hire interview consultants
Consistency problems: with thousands of interviewers, can colleges ensure uniform evaluation?
Implicit bias: any interviewer might unconsciously favor candidates who share their background
Legal sensitivity: post-affirmative action, there's risk of volunteers asking about or noting race/ethnicity
The Legal Landscape
The U.S. Supreme Court's 2023 decision (Students for Fair Admissions v. Harvard/UNC) ended race-conscious admissions. This has made colleges extra cautious about any aspect of admissions that could be seen as circumventing the ban.
Universities like Princeton quickly updated interviewer training: alumni must not ask about or record information on race, ethnicity, or national origin. If a student brings up their own background, interviewers are told to steer toward how experiences shaped them rather than demographic details.
Some observers note this could be an additional factor pushing colleges away from interviews, the more moving parts (especially untrained volunteers), the higher the risk of someone saying the wrong thing in an era of legal scrutiny.
What This Means for Today's Applicants
If you're applying to college right now, here's what you need to know:
1. Interview policies vary dramatically. Some schools still offer interviews to most applicants (Georgetown, Princeton, MIT, Dartmouth). Others have dropped them entirely or made them purely informational. Always check each school's specific policy.
2. When offered, interviews rarely make or break your application. They're typically among the least important factors in admissions decisions. A strong interview can add positive color to your application, but it's unlikely to overcome significant weaknesses elsewhere.
3. Not having an interview should not hurt you. If a school says "interviews are optional" or "not having one won't be held against you," believe them. With so many applicants and limited interview capacity, most schools genuinely mean this.
4. If you do interview, be yourself. The best interviews are authentic conversations, not performances. Prepare by thinking about your genuine interests and experiences, not by memorizing scripted answers.
5. Video submissions are likely the future. More schools will probably adopt short video responses rather than traditional interviews. Practice speaking naturally on camera, it's a skill worth developing.
Looking Ahead
Sara Harberson, a former University of Pennsylvania admissions dean, wrote in 2024 that "the original college interview is becoming extinct" and predicted that within a few years most elite universities would phase it out.
What might take its place? Possibly more written short-answer questions assessed by staff, innovative interactive online questions, or perhaps nothing, some suggest that dropping interviews could make admissions less stressful without any real loss of informational value.
The history of undergraduate admissions interviews is a story of changing purposes and philosophies, mirroring broader social shifts. Introduced a century ago as an instrument of exclusion, the interview was transformed into a tool that could personalize and humanize admissions. Yet it has always carried the intrinsic subjectivities of any human interaction, raising persistent questions of fairness and efficacy.
Whether the undergraduate interview survives in the long run, and in what form, will depend on how colleges resolve the twin pressures of hyper-competition and the aspiration for fairness. If nothing else, the ongoing conversation about interviews is prompting a healthy re-examination of what truly helps predict success in college and how to balance human judgment with equitable treatment in admissions.
If you need help with prepping for an interview or any other aspect of the college admissions process, click on the button below to schedule a complimentary consultation with an admissions expert today.
