McCombs 2012 - Calling All Applicants

This might be too late to help you, maybe some later R1 interviews and people from R2 can benefit from this - the interviews are blind. The head of the admissions committee announced this to the Women's Forum group so I don't think it's a secret - a lot of schools do it that way so it's pretty standard.

My interview was even more blind than I was expecting, my interviewer hadn't seen my resume. He explained that the admissions committee thought it was more fair that way, that the interview is a second opinion on you (that is unbiased by having already reviewed your application) from someone that knows the program about as well as anyone (a 2nd-year student if you interview on campus). They're basically trying to assess whether they think you're a good fit, whether they can easily see you fitting in to what they know are the culture and demands of the program.

Good luck to everyone that has yet to interview for R1, and all you R2 people that have your deadline coming up! And for those of us waiting for decision week, just try not to dwell on it.

PS: Don't forget to update your profiles to reflect whether you've applied, received an interview invite, interviewed, etc. The stats at the beginning of the thread are only interesting to the extent that they're accurate.