HOW TO PUT A SMILE ON AN ADMISSIONS OFFICER'S FACE

OUR EXPERT: DARTMOUTH DEAN OF ADMISSIONS AND FINANCIAL AID

MAKE A MEMORABLE IMPRESSION One applicant sent a chair and painted it green with his name on it and said, "I have a chair at the table," or something like that. Another person sent a shoe and said, "I've got one foot in the door, how about admitting me so I can get the other one in?" I won't say if they got in or not in either of these cases. I don't want to encourage more of the same! Sometimes students will include novels or screenplays they've written or they ask us to visit their Web site, but with the time pressure we're under, we rarely have time to go deeply into other materials. This year we had a 17 percent increase in applications but we didn't have a 17 percent increase in time, so we don't often delve into all these things that aren't core pieces of an application.

FEED THE DEAN! Someone once baked a giant cookie. It was sort of sheet- cake size, about n-by-17 inches, and in frosting they wrote a poem in Dr. Seuss style about why they should get into Dartmouth. But it was shellacked, so we couldn't eat it. I guess to make sure it didn't break. Someone from South Carolina whose family had a peach orchard sent a box of peaches. I have to admit we ate those. They were just so fragrant. But that happened late in the process, so everything was already decided.

PLAY A GAME Now that most people apply using a common application, most of what we see is online. When essays were handwritten some people would write backwards so you'd have to hold it in front of a mirror to read it. That was a little frustrating. One person wrote in a spiral, so you'd have to turn it as you read it. We've received versions of Monopoly or Candy Land, where prospective students will take Dartmouth images and locations and events and create a board game showing themselves going through the whole experience. One woman a few years ago did this amazing pop-up book of different Dartmouth buildings. So you opened her book and up popped Baker tower.

BUT DON'T FORGET THE NUMBERS... We look at all materials with an open mind with the understanding that this is just one piece of information that helps us understand an applicant better. In all these cases, the students are just trying to set themselves apart. If it's not a strong applicant, we feel badly that someone has gone through all this trouble, but from a very strong applicant, we smile and think, "How clever." It is more competitive than ever. I know we turn away thousands of wonderful students who, given the opportunity, would really contribute to Dartmouth and take advantage of all we have to offer.

Laskaris has worked in Dart-mouth's admissions office since1987. She majored in psychology.