Harvard Outreach Newsletter

The Ivy League is an athletic conference formally established in 1954, and is made up of eight universities in the eastern United States: Brown, Columbia, Cornell, Dartmouth, Harvard, Pennsylvania, Princeton, and Yale.  The term is often used to refer to the universities themselves, but strictly speaking, it is an athletic league where the eight colleges play each other in a variety of different sports.

Commenting on its foundation, the Ivy League website states that:

“…one of its defining principles was a commitment to access and opportunity exemplified by need-based financial aid.  Another was that its recruited athletes be academically representative of each institution’s overall student body.”

In Harvard’s case, this means that all admitted students – whether they are athletic recruits or not – automatically get access to financial aid if they need it, and the amount they receive is means-tested against their family’s income and assets.  It also means that athletic recruits go through the same ‘whole person review’ (see above) as other applicants, and have to be able to offer both academic excellence and significant achievement outside the classroom in their applications.

Student athletes must be of a very high calibre.  The rule of thumb is that they need to be playing their sport at a national, rather than regional, level.  High-calibre candidates are encouraged to contact the head coach of their sport (details on the college websites) with details of their athletic achievements, and to ask the coach directly about the level of interest in them as potential athletic recruits.  The coach might then invite some candidates for a trial, and may decide to support some of the applications.  However, only the Admissions Office at each Ivy League school has the authority to admit an applicant and to notify the applicant of admission.

Under certain circumstances, the Admissions Office may issue a letter prior to the final admissions decision indicating that a candidate is ‘likely’ to be admitted.  This means that, as long as the applicant sustains the academic and personal record reflected in the completed application, the institution will send a formal admission offer on the appropriate notification date.

International athletic applicants are treated in exactly the same way as US citizens, both in terms of recruitment and financial aid.

For further details, see the Ivy League website.

Standardized test scores. 

For the next three years (graduating classes of 2027 – 2030) standardized testing is to remain optional at Harvard.  Please read this Admissions Update for the 2023-26 Application Cycles.

Application forms. 

Harvard accepts the Common Application or the Coalition Application – it doesn’t matter which you use.  If using the Common App, note that you must submit your own sections of the application before your supporting materials (Secondary School Report, Teacher Reports etc.) will be transmitted to the Harvard Admissions Office.  Be sure to study the Application Tips on the Harvard website.

School reports and teacher recommendations. 

As you will be submitting your application before you have taken your A Levels, Advanced Highers or IB exams, your school should provide your predicted grades in your School Transcript and submit the actual grades as soon as they are released in July or August.  School Transcript templates may be downloaded from the ‘Applying for an undergraduate degree’ page on the Fulbright Commission website. Scroll down the page until you reach ‘School Documents’ and then down a bit further to ‘Transcript.’  Then download the appropriate template for the type of exam you are taking. 

Applicants must ask two teachers in different academic subjects who know them well to complete the Teacher Evaluation forms – these are in addition to the character reference supplied by your Head of Sixth Form or teacher in charge of university applications.  In your application confirmation email, there will be a personalised link to send to your recommenders (referees).  Examples of what we consider to be helpful teacher reports can be found on the Harvard UK Admissions website. 

Supplementary materials. 

At the discretion of the Admissions Committee, supplementary materials – such as music recordings, artwork, or selected samples of academic work – may be evaluated by faculty.  These materials are entirely optional.  Scholarly articles, research, creative writing or other documents of which you are the primary author should be submitted in the ‘Upload Materials’ section of the applicant portal.  You may submit optional supplementary media materials (e.g. videos, audio recordings, or images) electronically via Slideroom.

Extracurricular activity. 

We recognise that social distancing restrictions during the Covid lockdowns meant that most students were been unable to follow their usual activities outside academic study.  You will not be disadvantaged by this – everyone is in the same boat.  But do tell us about activities of note which may have occurred during lockdowns, such as starting a blog, setting up a special interest group on the web, looking after a sick relative, or helping your local community in some way. 

Interviews. 

As many candidates as possible will receive an alumni interview depending on the number of UK applications received this year.  In 2023/24, interviews will take place either face to face, or remotely by Zoom, WhatsApp or telephone.  Your interviewer will contact you directly to fix a date and time after you have submitted your application.  Interviews are not required and not having an interview does not disadvantage your application review.