Advent of the On-Line Application

You log into your home computer, open an Internet browser, access Harvard's World Wide Web site, fill in some personal information on an admissions form and click the 'send' button.

Voila! You have just applied to Harvard.

The admission office is already looking into this scenario, and it may not be far off.

Harvard made applying to the College easier by adoption of the Common Application last year. And now, technology may further simplify the process.

the dramatic growth in use of the internet--a global data communications network--by students over the last few years has led to two basic ways for a university to incorporate on-line technology into its application process.

The first is by making the application available over the Internet, such as the Common Application which is available by file transfer protocol. A student can print the form off the Internet and mail it in.

But Harvard has supplemental questions for prospective students which are not available on-line.

"Making an application available on-line is an excellent idea," says Evan G. Stein '95. "It makes it possible for a student to receive an application instantly without any bureaucratic hassles."

But Ishir Bhan '96, the co-president of Digitas, a student group devoted to emerging technologies, says such a version would not be very useful.

"This would simplify the distribution process, but would be of little aid in other areas," he says.

John E. Stafford '96, the president of the Harvard Computer Society and a Crimson editor, believes that this version would be an enormous help to international students.

"Instead of sending expensive guidebooks around the world, schools just put the information on the Web [Where students can access it]," Stafford says.

Stein says that the Yale Medical School application is on-line.

"The university actually prefers if you use this application," he says. "You still have to mail it in, but it is much quicker to receive."

Web Version

A second form of the on-line application is one that can be filled out on computer and sent to schools electronically via a 'net connection or modern.

Bhan says such an application will benefit the admissions office and equalize all candidates.

"The program [would] print out data in whatever form the admissions office desires," he says. "This simplifies the application process and allows the admissions office to be assured of a neat, legible application."

"It also equalizes candidates to some degree, as all applications will look more or less the same physically," Bhan says.

Stafford agrees that the process would benefit the admissions office.

"It would be vastly easier to have everything on-line since officers could retrieve any file with relative ease," he says. "This would allow massively useful correlation, greater safety and greater privacy."

But Assistant Dean of Admissions Warren C. Reed is not so sure and online application would benefit the admissions office.

"All of the information is put on a computer anyway and I don't think we would change....our style of operation, which is very much uncategorized and has more to do with exchange of ideas about a student than their particular ranking on a scale," Reed says.

Dean of the Division of Applied Sciences Paul C. Martin agrees that the on-line application might not benefit Harvard's admissions office tremendously.

"Unless colleges like Harvard drastically alter their selection processes-currently the one hard copy of the application and authenticated hard copy supporting materials are passed around at meetings at which applicants' qualities are discussed--a hard copy of all materials will be needed," Martin says.

Benefits to Students

Students also say the on-line application will likely benefit prospective applicants, particularly those from outside the United States.

"The students who would most benefit are those overseas for whom it would be significantly cheaper to send in an application electronically," says James S. Gwertzman '95, the student representative on the Faculty of Arts and Sciences Information Technology Committee.

Other students would benefit by not having to mail in applications and by not having to type up complicated forms, Gwertzman says.

But the on-line application is not without its costs, one of which is security.

"A high level of authentication and security would be needed to assure that transcripts and letters of recommendation [are] genuine," Martin says.

Students say that encryption can solve the security problem.

"Once public-key encryption is in wide use, applicants will be able to use digital signatures to authenticate their applications, thereby guaranteeing that they are who they say they are," Gwertzman says.

Stafford agrees that encryption will solve the security problem, but says that the College must also find some way of dealing with the application fee.

"As long as there is an application fee, there will have to be a portion mailed as well," he says. "Electronic cash is ways off."

But Bhan says the problem can be solved "by having the student send an application fee to get an individualized password which would be necessary to send the data to an admissions office."

Another problem that students raise is that an on-line application would make the process too easy.

"The on-line application might make the admissions process so easy that a school like Harvard would be overwhelmed by applications," Gwertzman says.

"I think Harvard's interests are best served by keeping the admissions process rigorous enough that only those students who really want to go to Harvard will complete it," he says. "Let other schools that are scrambling for students make the process as easy as possible."

Franklin M. Steen, the director of the Harvard Arts and Sciences Computer Services (HASCS), also says the on-line application might make the process too easy.

"One problem is that with the ease of application there may be an increase in the number of applications," he says. "The paper process does put up a small barrier that requires students to be serious before they fill out the paper and send it in--even for common applications."

Current Usage

The College's admissions office hopes to have its supplement available on-line by the end of the summer, Martin says. The Graduate School of Arts and Sciences also expects to make an on-line application available soon, he adds.

Harvard's Division of Applied Sciences already uses its Web site to receive admissions information for its graduate program, Martin says.

While the application itself must be filled out and mailed in, the Web site has a supplemental form which can be sent to Harvard electronically.

This form asks applicants for their research interests so that they may be properly matched with faculty members.

The FAS web page also has an online request for information about undergraduate admissions, Reed says.

"A student enters [his or her] name and address and we put that in our database, and they get sent application materials through the mail," Reed says.

Other schools such as Georgia Tech have taken the initiative in utilizing the Internet. Reed says he thinks the school receives most of its applications by modem.

But Harvard is not moving too quickly on this front.

"We're not putting a lot of resources into developing an on-line application [which can be filled out and mailed in electronically] in the next year or even two years," Reed says. "I do think that it will happen eventually."

Martin emphasizes that an incremental approach is the best one.

"One thing is clear: neither a macho 'let's do it now' nor a passive 'let's wait' is the right answer," he says.

Reed says developing an on-line application is not a major priority because students can already submit applications electronically through other means.

Students can obtain a set of disks from their school or a commercial service with the images of applications from various colleges, which the students can then fill out, Reed says.

"[The students] either print it and send it directly to us or sometimes they send the completed diskette back to the commercial service, who then forwards the information to us," he says.

"Last year through all sources, I'd say we received about 200 applications from some kind of electronic service," Reed says.

He estimates that Harvard might receive 20 percent of its applications in electronic form in five years and 50 percent in 10 years.

He emphasizes that Harvard will always retain the paper version of the application for people who don't have access to technology.

And Reed cautions that the application itself is still the most important thing.

"In the enthusiasm for electronic versions of application, high school students shouldn't lose sight of the process of admissions which is probably not going to change," he says.