Visitas Welcomes Class of 2030 Admitted Students to Harvard Campus

On Sunday, April 26, Harvard College welcomed over 1,300 admitted students and their family members to campus for two days of the annual Visitas admitted-students weekend. Programming gave prospective undergraduates insight into life at the College through the Visitas Academic Fair, club and departmental info sessions, overnight stays with current students, and attending classes for admitted students and their families.

Admitted students weekends are designed to introduce (and promote) the higher education institution to prospective first-years, particularly for those who may be uncertain about committing. “I don’t think I processed it until I started going to all the admitted students days,” Mia Huang ’30 said. “[It’s been] meeting other people who also got in, and taking the classes and sitting in all the classes, and just really being able to experience the campus again from a different perspective of ‘Oh, I actually might go here’ instead of just like, ‘Oh, here’s a school I can visit and [is] unachievable.’”

For admitted student Grace Nelson ’30, she felt lucky to be admitted to Harvard and grateful that the admissions committee saw her potential. “Seeing the acceptance is a way to tangibly know that the last four years and even 18 years, the whole time we’ve been alive, is worth it and is valued,” she explained. “Especially with a Harvard label, where you grow up hearing ‘Harvard.’ That’s a huge name, and to see that somebody there believes in you enough to let you come to their school and take a hold of these opportunities.”

Students arrived on campus Sunday morning for check-in at Memorial Hall. There, they received a name badge, a campus access card, and an itinerary with further event information. From 11 a.m. to 11:45 a.m., University President Alan Garber ’76 and the Dean of Admissions and Financial Aid William R. Fitzsimmons ’67 delivered opening remarks to prospective first-years and parents of Harvard, congratulating them, encouraging them to choose Harvard, and explaining to students that they were selected for their excellence.

After the address, students were separated into two groups: one that went to the Visitas Extracurricular Fair and the other that made its way to Annenberg for brunch. 

At Annenberg, students were served brunch, which featured waffle stations for students to make Harvard’s iconic “Veritaffles”—waffles branded with the Harvard crest. However, the dining was overcrowded with long wait times, Paige Hines ’30 explained. “They started telling people to come back in another 30 minutes. So at that point, me and my friends just left, and we went and got food somewhere else.”

The rest of the day, admitted students attended activities chosen from the itinerary and a website displaying Visitas events. Hines attended the extracurricular and academic fairs, as well as club meetings, including Harvard Financial Analysts Club and Harvard Undergraduate Consulting on Business and the Environment at Felipe’s rooftop. “Every single minute was packed,” she continued.

For families, the University hosted events including Financial Aid Office Hours, conversations and get-togethers with current and prospective Harvard parents, and opportunities to meet and hear from College faculty.

On Monday, prospective first-years and families were encouraged to explore campus, with no official programming. The College sees this as a critical opportunity: prospective students should join classes ranging from “SANSKRIT 101B: Elementary Sanskrit” to “COMPSCI 20: Discrete Mathematics for Computer Science,” as well as meet with professors and prospective students in various departments. 

“I feel like with Visitas, we were given free rein. There was some sort of agenda, and it’s like, these are options, but you really weren’t held to it,” Nelson noted. “You literally had a card, and you can go anywhere you want.”

Other universities advertise the amount of effort they put into making prospective students feel wanted, Nelson said. These colleges schedule admitted students days to pack prospective first-years’ schedules with specific activities, giving them little free time. “At those campuses, a lot of times, they’ll talk on about the fact that the entire school is kind of shutting down for these days,” she explained.

According to Nelson, the programming of admitted students day might reflect a university’s broader mindset when it comes to its students. “It’s been interesting to think about Harvard as [a] ‘You make your opportunity’ type thing,” she said.

Others appreciated the flexibility. “It gave us the time that we needed to kind of socialize with other people, and there was so much freedom in choosing what we wanted to do. We didn’t have to go to things that didn’t interest us,” Hines said.

After attending multiple admitted students days, Huang has narrowed her decision to Princeton and Harvard. “I think that they’re very different vibes, and that’s kind of what I’m going off of. It’s just where I think I’ll fit in the best and seeing [myself] not only academically, but socially,” she noted.

Location is also an important factor for many. “I took into account the campuses … Do I want to be more in the suburbs or more in the city?” Huang said. “I’ve been in the suburbs my whole life, and I love the city, but just trying to figure out if I want to be this much in the city for the next four years.”

Admitted student Olivia Kwon ’30 acknowledged that while she has enjoyed Visitas, it’s just a snapshot of the Harvard experience. “Number one thing that I’ve heard from a lot of older current students is take Visitas with a grain of salt,” she explained. “I think because there are so many people and everyone is so ambitious as well, it’s been quite overwhelming.”

“But at the same time, Visitas is only two days. And so I clearly haven’t found my people yet, and so I think I’m just taking this as an opportunity to feel the vibe and get to know everyone as much as possible,” Kwon continued.

Unlike previous years, over the course of Visitas, the Harvard Graduate Students Union United Auto Workers formed picket lines in front of Memorial Hall and in the Science Plaza, chanting strike slogans that encouraged admitted students to attend other universities and distributing pamphlets with information about the strike.

According to Nelson, the strike has impacted the way she thinks about Harvard and her choice between Harvard and Yale. “From a purely rhetorical standpoint, [I] really appreciate seeing the strike here. [A,] It has opened some questions that I don’t think I would have asked before,” she said. “But B, seeing a politically active campus or like a student body that feels comfortable enough to stand up for themselves and organize a union like that, I definitely, I really like that.”

By Friday, May 1, all prospective undergraduates of American universities will have to decide where they formally want to commit for the next four years of their academic, social, and professional lives.

Julia Bouchut ’29 (julia_bouchut@college.harvard.edu) is the Associate News Editor of the “Harvard Independent.”