Spring Break
Admissions process turns entirely paperless
Issue date: 12/4/08
As part of a University-wide effort to conserve paper and utilize modern technology, the Office of Undergraduate Admissions has announced their "paperless" application process for the 2008-2009 application season.
Admissions directors spent much of the summer collaborating with Applications Online, a for-profit, Baltimore based business run by two Hopkins alumni, in order to begin offering a 100 percent online application and application reading process this fall.
According to John Latting, dean of Undergraduate Admissions, nearly 90 percent of students who applied to Hopkins last year applied online. Under the old system, each application had to be printed out and distributed to admissions readers.
"We had someone whose entire job was to print out hard copies so that people could read them … It was certainly not the most efficient way to proceed. To keep the information in the medium in which we receive it is really more efficient," Latting said.
Hopkins has offered the Common Application Online and the JHU Online Application for several years, but starting this year, Hopkins will also be offering the Universal College Application.
Unlike in previous years, admissions counselors will now be reading each application online, and the few paper applications that are submitted will be scanned into the University's computer system.
Latting said that the change means that he can employ admissions readers from other parts of the country, without risk of losing or misplacing an application.
"We have one reader whose fiancé lives in Boulder, Colo. Now, he is able to go to Boulder and read from there, without any concern about security … With paper applications, the risk of losing a suitcase, losing an application was way too high," he said.
The changes were also made in order to expedite what has traditionally been a long and tedious process of organizing applications, inputting data and manually calculating GPA updates - a process that meant that Regular Decision readings couldn't begin until mid-January.
Admissions directors spent much of the summer collaborating with Applications Online, a for-profit, Baltimore based business run by two Hopkins alumni, in order to begin offering a 100 percent online application and application reading process this fall.
According to John Latting, dean of Undergraduate Admissions, nearly 90 percent of students who applied to Hopkins last year applied online. Under the old system, each application had to be printed out and distributed to admissions readers.
"We had someone whose entire job was to print out hard copies so that people could read them … It was certainly not the most efficient way to proceed. To keep the information in the medium in which we receive it is really more efficient," Latting said.
Hopkins has offered the Common Application Online and the JHU Online Application for several years, but starting this year, Hopkins will also be offering the Universal College Application.
Unlike in previous years, admissions counselors will now be reading each application online, and the few paper applications that are submitted will be scanned into the University's computer system.
Latting said that the change means that he can employ admissions readers from other parts of the country, without risk of losing or misplacing an application.
"We have one reader whose fiancé lives in Boulder, Colo. Now, he is able to go to Boulder and read from there, without any concern about security … With paper applications, the risk of losing a suitcase, losing an application was way too high," he said.
The changes were also made in order to expedite what has traditionally been a long and tedious process of organizing applications, inputting data and manually calculating GPA updates - a process that meant that Regular Decision readings couldn't begin until mid-January.
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