Sara Ramirez Takes Us to School!
Advice from the Director of Admission at Emerson College

Near the busy Boston Common lies the Emerson College campus. From her office, Director of Admission Sara Ramirez overlooks a city with one of the highest student populations in the country and more than 32 colleges and universities. Teen Voices met Ms. Ramirez and got the inside scoop on everything from the ideal applicant to the value of education.

TV: What is your job as an admissions director?
Sara : Basically I’m responsible for the freshman and transfer student enrollment every year. I come up with a strategic plan for the office to do various activities to encourage students to apply for admission. That’s during the summer and fall, and then during January through March we spend a lot of time reviewing all of the applications that we have received. Then after that, once we accept students, we spend time recruiting those students, trying to encourage them to enroll at Emerson.

Teen Editors Ludmila Cesar and Shamara Rhodes talking with Sara Ramirez in her Emerson College office.

TV: As part of your job, what is it like to turn people away?
Sara : It’s hard! Because there are times when we meet students that we really like and really connect with, and then for one reason or another we’re not able to admit them. If there’s a particular weakness, like their grades aren’t what they should be, we might encourage them to take some classes somewhere else, like at a community college, and then reapply as a transfer student.

TV: Can it be hard making those decisions either accepting or rejecting students?
Sara : Definitely. It can be like splitting hairs! Last year we received a little over 5,000 applications, and we admitted about 45 percent. Which means that we’re not admitting 55 percent, so over half of the students are not admitted. Not all of the students will be denied admission, because we also have a wait list. And if there’s room then we’ll take students off of the wait list.

TV: When you’re reviewing an application is there any particular thing that you put a lot of emphasis on?
Sara : I think academic preparedness, how you have done in high school, the grades you’ve received, and the student’s writing ability are all important because in college classes there’s a lot of writing involved. We also look at what we call personal match, meaning if students have been involved in activities that particularly relate to their major.

TV: What type of advice would you give to teens thinking about applying to colleges or looking at colleges?
Sara : I think the process of looking at colleges is about knowing yourself. Before you start the process think about what you want in a college. The more self-aware you are, the easier it is going to be to find schools that fit your need. Another thing is to keep an open mind during this process. There’s no one best school. The best school for you might not be the best for someone else. When you’re looking at colleges just know that even though the school might have a big name or you may have heard about it because your friends have gone there, it might not be the best school for you.

TV: Let’s say a teen decides not to go to college straight out of high school. What do admissions officers look for in a student who decides to go back to school later on in life, after working or after having a child?
Sara : I think that we’re still going to look at what your academic preparation was in high school and if it wasn’t stellar then we would encourage that you take a couple of classes elsewhere. But usually it’s better during the transition to take classes for a year or so and then go full time. If you’re working full time it will be very difficult to work and go to school. You probably are going to have to do one or the other part-time.

TV: Once a student is in college, what is the biggest thing she should be prepared for?
Sara : I think that a lot of times students may have received As and Bs in high school and they come to college and think it’s going to be a piece of cake and that they’re going to receive the same grades without doing much work. It’s not true. I think that classes are more challenging in college.

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