Prospective Freshmen Due To Visit Campus

Approximately 1,310 eager prefrosh will surge through Harvard’s gates this weekend for Visitas, Harvard College’s visiting program for admitted students.

Thanks to a number of new programs and policies, these prospective students will benefit from a visit that immerses them in the Harvard experience.

“This Visitas is more a Harvard experience than a showcase of what it could be,” Undergraduate Admissions Council Visitas Coordinator Jayshlyn D. Acevedo ’14 said.

Attendees this year will have the ease of being able to swipe into all freshman dorms and upperclassmen houses.

“We’re hopeful that having prefrosh have swipe access will make life more pleasant and easier for everybody,” said Director of Visitas Valerie A. Beilenson ’07.

More than 800 students agreed to host prospective students, but hosting is still seen as a chore by some.

“One of the long term goals is to make hosting a privilege, instead of making it a burden,” Acevedo said.

Additionally, to showcase an important aspect of Harvard life, regional receptions will be held in upperclassmen houses, rather than the common rooms of freshmen dorms.

Beilenson said she hopes this will help give prospective freshmen a better taste of the houses.

“We hadn’t really shown off the houses as much as we wanted to in previous years,” she said.

Additionally, larger regions have been broken down into smaller areas to create more intimate events for prospective students to get to know each other, as well as upperclassmen.

A number of new events can be found on the schedules in the notorious red prefrosh folders, including Visitas Thinks Big.

The event features professors, such as psychology professor Daniel Gilbert and computer science lecturer David J. Malan ’99, giving ten minute lectures on a topic of their choice. It was inspired by Harvard Thinks Big, an annual event now in its third year.

Peter D. Davis ’12, who hosted Harvard Thinks Big, will emcee the event.

Visitas falls one week later than last year’s program, which coincided with Yardfest, the spring concert for students at the College put on by the College Events Board.

Beilenson said that Visitas, which is scheduled over a year in advance, has never been purposefully planned to coincide with Yardfest.

Beilenson said that though the two events falling on separate weekends was not intentional, their overlap received mixed reviews last year.

“From the survey that we did, prefrosh seemed really excited about Yardfest and current students felt that it maybe took away from what the original purpose of Yardfest was,” Beilenson said.

The program will officially begin on Saturday and continue until Monday afternoon.

Visitas falls towards the end of the college visiting program season.

Princeton breaks up its visiting program Princeton Previews into two sessions, with one beginning on April 19 and another on April 26, while Yale’s Bulldog Days began on April 16.

Students have until May 1 to respond to Harvard regarding their offer of admission.

—Staff writer Elizabeth S. Auritt can be reached at eauritt@college.harvard.edu.