Webinar Transcript: Live Q&A with Emory University Senior Associate Dean of Undergraduate Admissions

Elton Lin: Good evening everybody. We are excited to have Giles Eady – whose, actually, proper title is “senior admissions director,” is that correct?

Giles Eady: “Senior associate dean.”

Elton Lin: Senior associate dean – which actually sounds more significant! You can get into that in a moment. But I'm excited to have our old friend Giles back on our webinar series! (We've traversed a lot of topsy-turvy years over the course of the last three or four.)

Certainly it's been a blessing and an encouragement to have Giles on the series to share insight on the admissions process at Emory – and also just to lend his perspective on what it looks like from the eyes of the admissions officer. We’re so excited to have Giles on.

If you have questions that you want to pose to Giles, feel free to use the Q&A; Anna Lu, who is also here with us… If you have been watching our webinar series for months or years, you probably were expecting me to say, “Anthony” – but Anna is subbing for Anthony. And I'd like to say that Anna is equally as adept as Anthony. He's not here to defend himself, but I’m gonna make that claim.

So I’m excited and happy to have Anna as well joining us to moderate – and she'll jump back in when it's time to do some Q&A in the last maybe 20 to 25 minutes of our time together. This is definitely an opportunity for you to ask whatever questions you want directly to Giles and hear what he has to say!

Let me give an intro to Giles – and share that with you all in the world. I am thrilled to introduce Mr. Giles Eady, the senior associate dean at Emory University (located in the vibrant city of Atlanta, Georgia). Emory is renowned for its commitment to outstanding academics, groundbreaking research, and fostering a community that encourages the pursuit of knowledge and the development of ethical leaders. Giles brings a wealth of experience and a unique perspective to the admissions process, guiding aspiring students on their journey to joining the Emory family. His dedication to nurturing diversity, equity, and inclusion – along with his passion for education and student development – has had a profound impact on shaping the academic landscape at Emory University.

Today we'll be delving into a variety of topics, ranging from Emory's approach to holistic admissions, the evolving role of technology in applications, and to the importance of fostering mental health and well-being among students. We're looking forward to uncovering the behind-the-scenes workings of the admissions process, and gaining valuable insights for prospective students and educators alike. So we’re excited to have Giles Eady join us today.

I do want to say – it's an introduction written by ChatGPT! My prompt was, “Write a webinar podcast introduction to Giles Eady from Emory University.” And I’m impressed by your dedication to nurturing!

All of this is certainly true. I think it's actually really rich, and I would actually agree. From my interaction with you over the course of many years, I would agree with everything. But certainly it's much more specific and richer than maybe I would have expected – even from ChatGPT!

And we're going to get into some of the generative AI and technology issues that connect into the emissions process, as basic as if students write their essays with ChatGPT. Do you see it? Do you care? Do you notice? Does it matter?

We'll get into it – but I want to give Giles an opportunity to add on to that introduction. Anything else you want to share (as a form of introduction for yourself) with the audience?

Giles Eady: Well, I'll tell you what ChatGPT can't do (and I think was definitely evident). All the stuff that you said was certainly true, but it missed the fine details of how I helped foster diversity and inclusion on campus. One of the things I do at Emory is I run our veterans admission process – and that's probably one of the more prominent efforts towards diversity that I lead. ChatGPT wouldn't know that. Also it wouldn't know that I'm the regional rep for the Bay Area. I’ve been doing it for quite a bit of time – so I’m very familiar with the area as well.

I think it did a very good general, overview job of introducing me, but just fine details that it certainly missed.

Elton Lin: Indeed. I’m encouraged to hear some of the other areas of your work that you're focused on. And it is an important detail that the Bay Area is your territory. Especially for the students and families that are Bay Area applicants, it's your opportunity for questions. (Use the Q&A box.)

Giles and I are gonna talk a little bit about some current issues in the admissions landscape, and then I'm gonna open up (maybe a little bit past the halfway mark) to whatever questions you might have. So go ahead and start posting at any time – and Anna will jump on a little bit later to join us. We'll get started; Giles, let's launch right into it.

It is 2023, and certainly what is at the forefront of the college admissions landscape is the Supreme Court ruling essentially banning affirmative action – or whatever procedures that universities are using to include some kind of race-consciousness/race-awareness in the admissions and acceptance process. I wanted to ask you, first of all with regards to Emory, prior to this year, how much race or ethnic background awareness was there in the admissions process. What sort of changes are being made for the 2023-24 cycle?

Giles Eady: The difference between last year and coming up this year is that last year (and in previous years) we were able to see the racial background of the student literally on the application. On applications to come, that will not be a thing that they'll be able to see.

I think that popular belief is that we at admissions admit people by race, and that's certainly not what we do! Never have. But taking that away from us now takes away some context. It never was the most perfect tool for getting context but it did add context. And now that's gone. We'll have to look for contacts in other ways in the admission process, because we want to get a total holistic view of the student – and not just rubber stamping any process.

I think that that's another place that maybe the Supreme Court got it wrong: that they want it to be, certainly, that – if you have certain test scores and certain grades – that should automatically say that you are admitted or not admitted. From my experience, I've learned that, if that's how we did college admission, colleges would be really homogeneous – and you would not have a diverse range of people. And, quite honestly, grades and test scores don't even tell the whole story of how the student will be at the institution.

So yeah, it's just a tool that's missing now that we use for context. But it was never a thing that if you were a certain race you automatically were admitted. You still had to be able to – no matter who you were – do the work at Emory to be admitted.

Elton Lin: Yeah, I think continuing that conversation – because I think there’s a whole, maybe, confusing aspect with awareness of race and context. What I hear you saying is that you're not admitting anybody because of their race.

At the same time there is an intentionality to want to create a diverse class. I would personally, on my end, agree with you wholeheartedly: that a diverse class with diverse perspectives and diverse backgrounds lends to a more rich learning and educational process. And there's actually plenty of research that backs that up as well.

But with that being said, this is where – if I'm a family listening on this webinar – there's always this default impression that either your race helps you or it hurts you. The school is like, “they want to be aware of race in order to create a diverse class,” and, at the same time, “my race doesn't impact whether I'm being admitted or not.” It sounds like it rubs up against each other a little bit. What are some of your thoughts?

Giles Eady: Again, it just provided context previously. We're going to be seeking that context in different ways. Again, race is not a perfect indicative context. It doesn't always say, because you're this race, you've had certain experiences – or you're a certain way. No one is a monolith. No race is a monolith. It's not a perfect indicator, but it was a tool – along with other things – that we were able to use.

What the Supreme Court did give us, though, is that we certainly can take into consideration students’ backgrounds and experiences in building diverse classes – and then that's what we're going to do. There'll be an essay question that students are welcome to answer that will give them an opportunity to talk about how their background experiences have affected them to where they are today and such. That will add another layer of context that we're able to use – hopefully to build diverse classes at the institution.

Elton Lin: Got it. I have my own students too, and I haven't dived into the Emory supplemental questions yet, but there is a trend where there are a lot of universities that are opting towards a single or multiple supplemental question that is asking students to share about their background. That could be an opportunity for students – if their background (as it relates to race) is a part of their story. They can include that as a part of their communication to the admissions office.

So, fantastic. What I hear you saying is that it is still Emory's priority – its goal – to really create a diverse class. If the Supreme Court’s decision is to perhaps block one particular way, the school is still intent on wanting to create that class. Is that correct?

Giles Eady: Absolutely. We at Emory are going to follow the law as stated; that’s the first thing we're going to do. And then, secondly, we're still committed to building a diverse class on campus. We owe it to the students who are at Emory now. We owe it to the students who are to come at Emory – to build a diverse class. We're professionals, and we're going to continue to do that.

Elton Lin: Got it. Let's get into ChatGPT, shall we, Giles?

[Giles laughs.]

Elton Lin: Let's do it. Here on our end we are working with students, providing input: some coaching to how they are presenting themselves on their college essay… and that conversation of whether to use ChatGPT. If I can just have ChatGPT write an essay that's 60% of the way complete, why would I not use a tool like that? And what sort of collateral damage might there be? If anything, it cuts the preparation/brainstorm process and allows me to get to where I need to be.

I, prior to this, have interacted with other admissions staff around the United States, and heard (straight from the mouth of babes, if you will) that there are different opinions on it. There are some schools that are very anti-generative AI as part of the essay process, and other campuses (including Georgia Tech, which is down the street from you guys) welcoming technology as a part of today's landscape: how students use it is really up to them.

I'd love to hear what the Emory team is thinking as it relates to students using a tool like ChatGPT, or other generative AI tools – and what that means as it relates to the admissions process. (Maybe broadly, then we can get into some details.)

Giles Eady: The short answer to the use of AI in the process (and how it's going to affect the admission process this year, and in the years moving forward) is that we'll see. There have been conversations, but they’ve not been any hard lines: “This is the policy set on AI use in the process.” I approach this as, really, we're going to see how it goes.

Elton Lin: Let’s get into some specifics. If a student were to use a ChatGPT-type tool to generate an essay, and literally to copy and paste it into the box, is it something that you would notice? There has been a rumor about schools running some type of plagiarism software (or some kind of generative AI detection software) – which is out there, which does exist. Are you running that type of software? Are you trying to pay attention to whether an essay is an AI-generated essay?

Giles Eady: Well, no. We're not running software to detect it. As far as looking for it, the best thing I can say is we'll just see what happens.

I think the introduction you gave me was a perfect illustration of what ChatGPT can do – and what it can't do. I think that it gave a very good general overview of me – and, honestly, I think you could have put any one of my colleagues’ names on that, with the same information, and it still would have been applicable to all of us.

I think that, if ChatGPT is giving students essays like that, they'll read just okay: nothing wrong about the essay, nothing bad about the essay… but what did I really feel after reading this essay? Did I learn something new about the student that I maybe couldn't have Googled before? I think it tends to be very robotic, in a sense – and that's how your introduction will be read.

From my playing around with it, I think to truly get a good essay from ChatGPT, it’s actually more you have to put into it. It's like the more you put into it, the better an essay you'll get. It almost seems the more you put into it, you essentially have written an essay at that point; you've written a good, proper essay.

I think it could be a good tool for helping one to get started with an essay. I know sometimes students have writing blocks and such to get started writing an essay. Even some people aren't as talented as others in writing essays. It's a great way to just get started.

But I do think that, as the writer, if that's what you're going to do to get started, you're going to need to add some of your own embellishments to it to make it your own. Without it, it's just gonna read very general. It won't be bad, but it won't be great. It'll just be what it is.

I've seen also, sometimes, that it can go off the rails a little bit. It'll start on the topic, and it'll stay there on the topic, but then gradually start going way off the rails – in a whole ’nother direction that you didn't quite ask it to go to! Certainly things that, if you're going to be using that, you need to be very conscious of.

I'll say to end it: really my goal in the process is: I don't want to see things in an essay that I can Google about you, or about my institution. Hence why we don't have a “Why Emory?” essay question: we always got answers cut and paste from the internet, and I didn't learn anything from that. My goal – after reading the essay – I want to get to know something about you that can't be Googled… or that, if it is on Google, you're filling in between lines on it. If it's an experience, you're going to talk about the things that you gained from that experience. You might talk about a belief of yours, and how it's affected you or how it's made you the person you are today.

I think that ChatGPT can't get to those fine detailed things about people.

Elton Lin: Got it. This is sort of a two-part: one clarifying question, and then maybe a response into it. Number one is, just to clarify, there isn't going to be a plagiarism issue – or an academic integrity issue – if a student were to use ChatGPT?

You're not using any kind of plagiarism software, or any kind of generative AI detection software. So there's nothing to where a student should not be using – for Emory – a generative AI tool in order to help write the essay. There's nothing in there – as of now. Is that correct?

Giles Eady: Nothing as of now. I think it's yet to be seen. I do foresee that – if we're reading a lot of essays that read the same way – then there certainly can run into issues.

You'd be really surprised. We read 33,000 applications last year – and, in times where there have been plagiarism issues, it was surprisingly very easy to pick up on it. You might not remember the exact details of essays, but you can read an essay and you're like, “Wait a minute, I know how this is about to end!” That's typically a tipping point to say like, “Okay, there might be some plagiarism issues here.” And it has actually caused us to do more research to see, “Where is it coming from?” Sometimes it's been, just, “Let's put this essay on the internet,” and we'll find it. We'll search for it on the internet, and we find it.

There are no policies against using ChatGPT… but if I think a student is going to use it, then it definitely does not need to be their essay. It needs to be maybe a starting point: think of it as the CliffsNotes of you getting started. CliffsNotes are never meant for you to study with! They’re always meant for you to spur more conversation: to delve deeper! I think that that's the exact thing you need to do with the essay: to use this as a starting point, but you as the writer – you as the person – are gonna need to add embellishments to it to make it your your own.

I think, if you're doing that, you've truly written a good essay at that point.

Elton Lin: I think that makes sense. Just as an observation, on our end, I personally have read most certainly thousands of essays. And you've read tens of thousands of essays – without question. The reality is that the quality of writing is really a pretty wide range… and I sense that ChatCPT can actually help those people who really struggle with the writing process bring the floor up a little bit with regards to their quality: so they're able to communicate their story more effectively.

What I hear you saying is that you welcome that [using ChatGPT as a tool to help] and, at the same time, if you're just submitting a ChatGPT-generated thing… the reality is that it's going to sound a little not specific enough. It's not going to really stand out. It's not really gonna give your story much of a value-add, if you will. That's what I hear you saying; is that correct?

Giles Eady: Precisely.

Elton Lin: All right, fantastic. Certainly, if there are more ChatGPT questions, we can get into it in the Q&A. But let's spin off into another thing that's also very – I think – contemporary for 2023: I feel like there are more and more families who are really wondering about the value of a four-year education – maybe questioning whether it's worth it to spend X dollars in order to get a four-year degree.

Emory is a private institution. I would contend it's not inexpensive. The question of whether it's “worth it” is then leading to whether the school is providing enough opportunities for internships: opportunities to gain relevant skills that can be applied directly into the workplace.

Is Emory as an educational institution (from the perspective of the university) really addressing what it means to prepare people for the workforce of tomorrow? What might be some things that Emory is doing?

Giles Eady: I was just listening to a podcast today about, “Is college worth it?” In the 90s – especially – and in the 2000s, the value added was very clear to attending college. Now, after students go through a pandemic and just really see how the world can change – for the better, on a dime; for the worst, on a dime. Also with rising inflation – and certainly rising costs to attend college – sometimes the value added is questioned.

For Emory a couple things that we do to make sure students are getting good value added to the experience. First we started a project at Emory called the Emory Flourishing Project. We want to make sure that you, coming into Emory, are not just getting a good sound education – which you will – but also an education of self. You're going to take an inward journey while you're at Emory – so that you can leave Emory and be a well-adjusted, well-prepared person for the world.

The ways that we're doing that are:

• We're gonna, certainly, provide a professional, really strong academic experience.

• Combined with a community of well-being (a lot of emphasis on making sure that you are well during your time here at Emory) because, again, if you're not well, you're not going to do Emory well.

• We’re also going to provide professional pathways. In those professional pathways, we're going to help you find your path – and make sure you have something to do once you leave Emory.

We feel like once we've done those things, you certainly will be set up to know yourself… and flourish after that. That's one thing that we're really being intentional about: make sure your students are prepared.

But also, this podcast that I heard was saying that one of the things that may contribute to the value of college going down is the amount of student debt that students and families take on to go to college. It was saying that certain majors have become attractive because of the income that they can generate; others less so… but I have opinions about those, too.

Where the rubber meets the road, at Emory we meet 100% of demonstrated need for U.S citizens and permanent residents. So we're certainly going to help you cope with the costs – and help make Emory affordable for you. And along with that, we're loan-free at Emory – so if you do get a financial aid package from us, it won't have a student loan. Those things we certainly try to do to make college affordable – and add value to it for a student.

But I think, ultimately… I worry a little bit – for the state of our country and our world – we’re discounting the value of colleges. I think that colleges definitely offer a lot for society: not just in – I’ll say – tangible skills or trades… but they also, for the less – I say “lucrative” – careers coming out right away: [not] the technology majors, the students going to medical school, and things like that… for the humanities, they certainly help us, as a society, to continue to know our self.

I think that once you forget the self, you tend to repeat the past. We've seen that in certain ways in society uh where this happened. It's not to discount students who go to trade schools and such – because sometimes you just need a plumber, and when you need a plumber, you need a plumber.

Elton Lin: That's another webinar!

Giles Eady: I could tell you about that. Personally in my home, at 3am, I have needed a plumber.

Elton Lin: And you needed a plumber.

Giles Eady: I needed a plumber. No amount of degrees that I've earned was going to fix that either! So that plumber came at three in the morning – but at a very good premium – to do that. It has its place.

I think, as a whole, higher education is partly to blame – because it's been mostly attractive to people with liberal thoughts and liberal ideas. So folks with conservative views have often felt that they don't fit in in those colleges and universities. I think that that's because universities have oftentimes acted very insular. A job that we have to do is to get out more: to open ourselves up to communities, so the communities can see that we're places of all kinds of thought and all kinds of people.

That's my little soapbox.

Elton Lin: Let me step in your soapbox…

Giles Eady: Yeah, come right in.

Elton Lin: Personally, also working in the educational field, I one thousand percent agree with you with the value of humanities – and the value of really studying the humanities in order to make better decisions: to be more informed about the human journey as it relates to different industries. I'm also completely aware there are certainly families who are just wanting to know that their child has a job once they graduate. It's very basic. It's just: will they be able to support themselves?

This may or may not be what's happening in Emory, but here on the West Coast… The UCs, I think, are a very obvious example of this, but even I was at a counselor conference in Seattle and small liberal arts colleges (who are not maybe at the forefront; I don't want to name any specific names) were aware of a shift in the number of applications towards computer science, data science, neuroscience, statistics, and those fields – because of a direct higher ability [to earn money] in certain degrees. (USC has also made certain comments about the applicant pool inflating to a degree where the department cannot grow to the size of the applicant pool!)

I can understand families and students wanting to just make sure that – in a very changing economic landscape – when they graduate they have a job. That's a very understandable sentiment that I can relate with. But, on the other hand, there must be some ramifications in the admissions process if the applicant pool is changing to that degree. What are your thoughts? Is that happening at Emory (perhaps as it relates to computer science)? What do you think?

Giles Eady: I'll start with my thoughts on it, and then I'll tell you what's happening at Emory. I think that we should be very careful in purely selecting majors for the potential of employment. Because what you tend to find is people who are in the major just for employment – and not because they're passionate about it. The world doesn't need more people who are just going to work, clocking in every day… and maybe they're making a lucrative salary, but they are absolutely miserable.

I have plenty of friends who are highly-paid attorneys – who are miserable every single day, and are envious of my job: that I get to do what I do every day. The same goes for people in tech. I know engineers that have quit engineering because it just wasn't something they were passionate about.

The world needs passionate people – and passionate about what they do. I'm a firm believer that, when you're passionate about what you do, you're going to do it well. And once you do something so well, you're going to be sought after to do it. That tends to make people gainfully employed.

I can tell you – as a former business major. I started college as a business major… because I was told that business majors always have jobs. But, in starting my business degree, I had to take Accounting 1… and Accounting 1 was horrible for me – absolutely horrible. I just could not grasp it.

But I had a friend of mine who loved doing the accounting. And so, naturally, he's an accountant today.

The liberal arts experience, I think, is so rich. It helped me, and tends to help others. It forces you to be exposed to other areas. I took some political philosophy courses and loved them. I got excited when I could read Plato and Socrates and Kant. And so, naturally, it became my major. And the thing I always point out to people is that I've been gainfully employed ever since I graduated from college.

I like to think my major didn't hinder me from being gainfully employed… but certainly made me more passionate – for the world – to be someone employed.

But I do recognize – and this is going into where Emory is helping out – there are certain things that are gonna probably be more prevalent in society: namely, tech and comp sci. So there are now a lot of comp sci components that are being added to certain majors. It might not necessarily be that you're purely a comp sci major at Emory… but you could have another major, and it might have a comp sci component to it – so that you do get that exposure, but you're still able to explore your interests in certain areas as well.

Elton Lin: Got it. I think that this is a broader narrative (or conversation) for the last 20 minutes… but I feel like what you're implying is that really, Emory is – at its heart – a liberal arts institution: really trying to craft the scholar that can enter into society and be a leader – an internally and externally mature and insightful individual.

But you're also recognizing the prevalence of technology in every part of society, so trying to integrate either a data analysis (or computer science, or statistical) part of the curriculum that prepares students for an increasingly data-rich [world] – whether it's getting into business, arts, or accounting, prepositions in ancient literature… Either way, there's going to be some data aspect to every career or field from this point on.

Giles Eady: I think that that's something that we can foresee becoming more prevalent as time progresses – to where it won't necessarily be you're formally in a comp sci class. It just will be a part of general education requirements, I think, for a lot of Institutions – because it just will become that prevalent.

Elton Lin: I've got a lot of other questions… but I want to invite people in and give them an opportunity to ask you both some nuts and bolts questions about the admissions process – and hopefully it kind of stumps you! I don't know; I'm always hoping there'll be a question that kind of leaves you stumped!

But let's see what happens. Why don't I invite Anna to jump on with us – and, Anna, you can begin sharing some of the questions that have been posed; that'd be great.

Anna Lu: Yeah, that sounds great. We have a lot of questions covering a range of topics – one of which touches on something we didn't talk as much about, actually: testing policies. Some people were asking, basically, what (broadly) is Emory's approach to the testing process? Why did they come to this conclusion? If you could share a little bit about this incoming class, what amount of them were test-optional?

Giles Eady: Yeah. At Emory we are test-optional. We've been test-optional since 2020 – and that was in response to, certainly, the global pandemic: the availability of testing drastically decreased for students during the pandemic. So we became test-optional.

What we found is that we really enjoy it. And we were interested to see that students who did not submit testing (the ones that we admitted) were almost like the students who did submit testing. It was like, “Wow! This is really cool!” So this is something that we're going to continue. We've still built very strong academically, sound classes at Emory in a test-optional world… and so our approach right now is: if it's not broke, let's not fix it! We're going to continue on with it.

To illustrate the point: last year's class, it was a little over 45% of the class that was admitted did not have test scores. So it is truly a thing. If you want to submit test scores, you're welcome to; if you don't want to submit test scores, great!

An analogy I’ve come up with this year to really illustrate how testing is used in the process: think about if you have a bowl of ice cream. I like ice cream. I have to restrict myself on eating ice cream so much, because I love it a lot! But I oftentimes eat ice cream that's just ice cream. It does not have a cherry on top.

Think of the cherry as testing. I often eat a lot of ice cream without cherries – and it's still good. It still hits the spot: it satisfies me. But when I have an ice cream with a cherry on top, it's like: “Great! It's a cherry!” And I might eat the cherry – but I'm still gonna eat the ice cream. The ice cream is still more important to me than the cherry.

Think of the ice cream itself as students’ curriculum. I want to know what kind of curriculum you've been involved in: in your school, in your community… and how well have you done in that curriculum? The cherry is the testing – and that's one moment in time; that can be affected by a lot of things. Think of: we want the ice cream, not the cherry. If the cherry’s there, great. But the cherry is not going to make the ice cream.

Something else to note about testing: we report the mid-50% range of test scores that were submitted and were admitted – and they tend to be on the high end of things. What I have noticed is that people who tend to submit test scores are students who are on the very high end of testing, period. So it's not – to me – a good representation of the total pool.

Genuinely we are test-optional at Emory. If you want to submit those test scores, great. If you don't submit those test scores, that's totally fine. I can guarantee you this: because you did submit a test score, it did not tip your application one way or the other. It's just a thing of: “Okay, it's great: it's there, cool.” But it did not tip your application one way or the other.

Anna Lu: Thank you – definitely emphasizing a lot of holistic evaluations.

You mentioned previously that Emory meets all demonstrated need for those who qualify: U.S. citizens and permanent residents. Is Emory need-blind as well?

Giles Eady: Yeah, we're need-blind for U.S. citizens and U.S. permanent residents. And we are need-aware for international students.

Anna Lu: That makes sense.

Maybe this would be good as a former business major, as you mentioned! Do you have any programs that support students who have interests in entrepreneurship – or business themselves in that way?

Giles Eady: Absolutely. There's an entrepreneurship track that students can get in the business school at Emory. That's a track. And then we have rolled out, this year, a minor in business. That's another way students can get it. You can even get a certificate at Emory in entrepreneurship. So certainly, many ways you can do that.

Anna Lu: Do any students maybe pursue that in extracurriculars as well?

Giles Eady: Absolutely. They might be in an entrepreneurship club that we have. We have an innovation lab at Emory – so students work out their entrepreneurial pursuits there as well. Absolutely.

Anna Lu: A question about legacy admissions, and what your position is on it as a school.

Giles Eady: Currently…

Elton Lin: The next Supreme Court issue.

Giles Eady: Yeah, the next Supreme Court issue.

Currently it's a small part of the process. It's not a major part of the process. There are conversations being had about it right now; I would not be surprised if it goes away in the process. Again, it never was a thing that tipped your application one way or the other. It’s just like: “Okay.” It's context that you should have – as the kid of an alum coming to our institution. But it never – because you are an alum’s kid – doesn't say that you're admitted!

Anna Lu: Definitely a hot topic! I can see why some people would be interested.

We have one more question on the docket; if anyone else still has questions, feel free; we have the time to answer them!

A question of competition: which school at Emory is the most competitive, and least competitive?

Giles Eady: The most competitive schools at Emory are going to be Emory College and Oxford College. We don't admit anyone at Emory by major, so the competition is just to get into Emory or Oxford College. And that's it. Once you're there, you choose your major.

Anna Lu: How does that major selection work out, then – if you do it after being matriculated?

Giles Eady: Everyone has until the end of the second year to actually declare a major at Emory. Certainly you can tell me what you're interested in majoring in when you apply. We understand that that could change at some point during your time at Emory, so we don't hold you to it. You have until the end of second year to declare what your major is going to be – and still graduate in four years at that point.

Elton Lin: Let me follow up on that question – because we've heard it from so many admissions people. It's just perhaps the landscape of, again, this whole aspect of families and students looking for very employable majors… but have you seen a shift in the applicant pool towards particular majors, including technology majors?

But also, Georgetown – in the past – has also posted that there is some slight admit chance differential between different colleges: just so the general public know that this particular college at this particular school has more applicants; thereby (just by nature) there's going to be a slightly lower percentage admit. It doesn't mean that you're going to be applying into a particular college because it's higher admit rate – and if you don't fit that college, it's not going to work. But there's the sense.

Have you seen any shift in the applicant pool towards particular majors – and, thereby, is potentially somebody who's more interested in business (because you can't have 5,000 business majors)… is being interested in a particular major gonna be some of a disadvantage over, say being… there's been a published decline in English majors terribly. Is there any kind of differential in that?

Giles Eady: No, there is not any differentiation in our process. We feel like everyone who applies with a major to Emory is still undecided… because, again, no one touches their major at Emory until the third year, anyway. The first two years are going to be really doing the liberal arts curriculum: taking courses across a lot of disciplines.

I say, nine out of ten times, something changes about a student's major – and that's very intentional. We want something to change. If not the major itself changes, something gets added to it, or it gets tweaked in some way… and it tends to really make sure that things are leveled out across campus.

So no, it's not like you had an advantage or disadvantage for choosing a major. We just want you to apply to either Emory college or Oxford College – and if you get in one of those places (or both places) then choose your major from there.

Elton Lin: Sounds good. Apparently there are some more questions, so let's tackle something.

Anna Lu: There are. [Laughter.] But this is a very good discussion.

A question about early decision. They phrase it as: “Does Emory have an early decision advantage from regular decision?” I think a way to broaden this question is: essentially, how much does Emory place value on demonstrated interest?

Giles Eady: We don't track demonstrated interest at all. It is not a thing. “Demonstrated interest” is your application – because, literally, you've demonstrated interest when you apply to a place. It is not a thing.

I'm going to caution students, families… whoever's on here listening: take “advantage” out of the process. I feel like when students have “advantage” on their mind, they start doing things that are inauthentic (and we want authentic people on our campus) because they're strictly doing things for an “advantage” – versus because it's who they really are. So take “advantage” out of your thinking in looking at applying to colleges. Just be truly yourself.

Now we do have early decision at Emory. We don't have early action. The pool with early decision tends to be smaller – so that means that there are more opportunities for admission with early decision. Certainly in regular decisions the pool tends to get a little bit larger – with fewer seats available, at that point, for admission. But I always remind people that a good early decision student is also a good regular decision student.

And early decision should not be gamesmanship. It really should be a family decision – because with early decision it is binding. If admitted, you're telling me that you're coming. This needs to be a decision that you and your family need to be fully aware of – that you can do it. I have students all the time that are awesome students and just simply cannot do early decision – because so much of their college choice process is going to be based on financial aid. It wouldn't be advantageous for them to do early decision, or wouldn't be best for them… so they just don't. Make sure that it's a family decision that you choose with early decision.

Anna Lu: Authenticity is definitely important.

We have a question about what characteristics you would say describe Emory students. This seems like a hard question – just because there's such a diverse pool of students! But do you think there are some common characteristics you see – or some good trends that you see? (Maybe some fun facts that you have about your student body?)

Giles Eady: I think characteristics… and, again, I'm going to say this and caution you: please do not feel like that you have to craft yourself into what I'm saying to be a good Emory student! Be your true, authentic self. If you are your true, authentic self, you'll be a good Emory student.

What I'll say: there are certainly academically competitive students, but that's most colleges and universities; they're going to have students who are academically competitive. At Emory they're going to be very collaborative students; we foster a very collaborative environment. We want to see students who are going to be collaborative in nature.

And students who are passionate about something – and it shows; it eeks from them: they're so passionate about it.

Those, I think, are common things we see with Emory students. But it's not a thing that, if you're not passionate about something, you need to go find something to be passionate about! Just be your true, authentic self. We want people from all walks of life, all experiences, on our campus. That's what makes it rich – and everyone has something to bring.

Anna Lu: Absolutely.

A few very hyper-specific questions, so if either of you have ideas on how to broaden this, that would be helpful. A question about the after-effects of the affirmative action ruling: specifically whether or not geography would become more important for application context. We've mentioned that the diversity context with which you were evaluating applications has not been what the Supreme Court thought it was, but if you have any thoughts on this question…

Giles Eady: I think geography will be the same consideration as it was before. It won't be more emphasis put on geography – but, certainly, the same kind of emphasis. I will tell you that students from places that we don't tend to see students from are really exciting. It's another opportunity for us to diversify the institution.

That's something we will consider… but it's not like, just because you're from Idaho, that you're automatically admitted! We still want to make sure that you'll be able to fit in Emory as well.

Elton Lin: But South Dakota, Giles! What about South Dakota?

Giles Eady: South Dakota?

Elton Lin: Anyone here from South Dakota? That might be it.

Giles Eady: I don't know. We'll see.

Anna Lu: And then, jumping on – I guess this is also a geographically-oriented question: someone is asking: if they are a student who transferred from China to the U.S. in their senior year [of high school], would they be considered in the international pool or the national pool?

Giles Eady: Regardless of where you're from in the world, your citizenship… you're all in the same application pool. You're considered among everybody (from around the world) who is applying to Emory. The only thing that differs for students based on your citizenship is financial aid. On the end, also, if we're going to be need-aware with you.

But it's all the same pool. It's not like we separate international students and domestic students – and then consider them in different pools. No. It's all the same pool. We're still building the same class with both people in it.

Elton Lin: But maybe a follow-up with regards to the review process: is there a different staff that is perhaps in charge of an international internationally-originated student? I would assume – because there are going to be some context issues: context awareness that that brings into play

Giles Eady: Yes, so we do have first readers who are purely international first readers. I'm one of them as well. Certainly we bring that context. But it's the same kind of context we bring – me being the Bay Area rep, as opposed to someone who is the New York rep; we have a whole different understanding of context. And it's the same context I definitely bring to the admission committee. So that does happen.

Elton Lin: What I hear you saying is that there's no intentional aspect of the process where you're trying to look at international students differently. On a broader narrative, there's still an intentionality to want to diversify the student class – and geography is a part of that. But there are a lot of things that are a part of that… They're still wanting to diversify – that's important – but there's no intentionality to say, “We need this many international students, we need this many South Dakotans.” Nothing like that.

Giles Eady: No.

Elton Lin: Okay, all right. We’ve got one last one, which I think is a good ender.

Anna Lu: Yeah. “Does or will Emory use generative AI for application reading?”

Elton Lin: Let's make sure!

Giles Eady: Someone is trying to make me unemployed, right?

The emphatic answer that is no. The admissions process is still a (very much so) human process – and I think you want it to be that way. You don't want it to be a an AI process – even though AI is getting smarter and smarter by the day. You don't want to be that process… because inevitably – even with that process – there will be things missed. That's why it's a human process, and that's why there are humans actually reading.

Elton Lin: I want to throw in on that – not because I'm disbelieving; I believe you entirely, and I want you to have a job. I absolutely want you to have a job! With that being said, I've also definitely heard from different universities – including a couple of top 50 schools, where the challenge for the admissions office is oftentimes actually about staffing, and there is a decent amount of turnover (especially in light of the pandemic)…

You've been a human admissions office for quite a few years. You have a lot of experience; it'd be very difficult to replace somebody like you. There has been at least from what I hear: can AI help bridge the gap in trying to lend some consistency to the evaluation process?

I don't think anybody's implementing anything.

Giles Eady: No.

Elton Lin: So just to address the person who asked the question, I think that we're kind of far from that. But I've definitely heard the conversation emerging. It's not next week, I'm sure.

Giles Eady: No, certainly not next week! One: at our office we're fully staffed this year – we’re really excited about that. And two: even if it becomes a part of the process, it's not going to be a, “This is the end.” It'll be all part of the process – similar to ChatGPT. ChatGPT alone should not write your essay.

[With AI] in [the admissions] process, I don't think that it would get us our entire class – or we won't build the scope of the class that we want. There'll still need to be a human aspect – to even look over the AI decisions, if that's to happen. But I don't foresee that happening this year – and even next year; who knows, the next five years or so.

We plan to still have a very human process – and all the humans in my office are going to read all 30,000 or whatever number of applications we get. I don't know how many, but last year with 33,000 – and we all read them. If it's that many again this year, we're all going to read them.

Elton Lin: So – and this is for the people in the audience – the next two or three years. everything's gonna be humans. Five years down the road, I don't know!

[Laughter.]

Elton Lin: Yeah, and there could be other changes in the world that are perhaps going to be even more major. But hey, Giles, thank you so much for coming along with us and journeying with us on our exploration of not just Emory. but the admissions process – and giving everybody (including ourselves) a first-hand perspective… especially as it relates to ChatGPT and AI. Thank you so much Giles; I appreciate you.

Also thanks to Anna for jumping on monitoring with us. For all of you here, thanks for coming along with us. We'll see you on the next show – which is coming soon; keep a lookout on our email lists, and I will see you next time.

Appreciate everybody, take care!

Anna Lu: Thank you so much.