Colleges May Know If You Opened Their Email — Demonstrated Interest, School by School
Every year, Elite Prep helps seniors through the college application process. We hope the information below is useful.
Every fall, a senior’s inbox fills up with admissions email: info session invitations, regional visit schedules, campus tour offers, “we’ll be in your area” notes. And every fall, families ask us the same thing.
“Can we just delete these? Does my kid really need to go to the info session?”
The short answer: it depends on the school. Some colleges actually use demonstrated interest — how much attention an applicant has shown that particular school — when they make admission decisions. Campus visits and info sessions count, and some schools are known to track whether a student opened an admissions email and clicked the links inside. Other schools, including Harvard, MIT, Stanford and UCLA, don’t consider it at all.
So there is no need to chase every college equally, and no reason to ignore every email either. Below, using official sources, we show how to check each school on your student’s list and what to do right now for the ones that care.
| Part | What it covers |
|---|---|
| 1 | What demonstrated interest is, and why colleges look at it |
| 2 | How many colleges use it — an analysis of 312 schools |
| 3 | Schools that count it, and schools that don’t |
| 4 | This year’s change — WashU starts counting it again |
| 5 | What colleges actually record |
| 6 | How to check your student’s schools yourself |
| 7 | What to do now for schools that count it |
| 8 | Cautions and common myths |
| 9 | Frequently asked questions |
1. What demonstrated interest is, and why colleges look at it
Every college has to predict how many admitted students will actually enroll. That percentage, called yield, drives everything from housing to budgets. So some colleges look at an applicant’s interest as a signal for one question: “If we admit this student, will they really come?”
How much weight a school gives it is something the school reports itself, in its Common Data Set (CDS) — a standardized statistical report most colleges publish every year. Inside it, section C7 has a row called “Level of applicant’s interest.” That row is demonstrated interest.
| C7 rating | What it means |
|---|---|
| Very Important | Weighed very heavily |
| Important | Weighed significantly |
| Considered | One factor among many |
| Not Considered | Not used at all |
⚠️ Keep in mind: the school fills in this rating itself. It is the closest thing to an official position you will find, but it can change from year to year.
2. How many colleges use it — an analysis of 312 schools
College Transitions pulled the Common Data Sets of 312 selective colleges. Here is what they found.
| C7 rating | Number of schools |
|---|---|
| Very Important | 11 |
| Important | 28 |
| Considered | 136 |
| Not Considered | 129 |
175 schools, about 56%, factor in demonstrated interest in some way. Most of them mark it only as “Considered” — one item on a long list. Just 39 schools give it real weight.
3. Schools that count it, and schools that don’t
Here are the schools families ask us about most, based on the 2025-26 Common Data Sets.
| Rating | Schools |
|---|---|
| Not Considered | Harvard · Yale · Princeton · Columbia · Penn · Brown · Cornell · MIT · Stanford · Caltech · UChicago · Johns Hopkins · Vanderbilt · Emory · Georgetown · Carnegie Mellon · UNC · UCLA · UC Berkeley · USC · Georgia Tech · Boston College · Williams · Amherst, and others |
| Considered | Dartmouth · Duke · Northwestern · Rice · WashU · University of Michigan · Tufts · Boston University · Wellesley · Bowdoin · Middlebury · Davidson · Barnard · Hamilton, and others |
| Important | Tulane · Lehigh · Bates · Kenyon · Trinity · Pitzer, and others |
| Very Important | American University · Dickinson · Quinnipiac · Mercer · Olin, and others |
Notice the pattern: many of the hardest schools to get into don’t track interest at all. They have more qualified applicants than seats and little reason to worry about yield. It’s the strong private colleges whose admits often have other great options that tend to care the most.
📌 Bottom line: where each school on your list falls in this table changes what an info session or an opened email is worth.
4. This year’s change — WashU starts counting it again
Washington University in St. Louis (WashU) stopped considering demonstrated interest starting with the 2022 applicant pool. This year (for fall 2027 entry), its admissions office announced on its official site:
“WashU has begun considering demonstrated interest as a part of the application review process.”
Here is what WashU lists as ways to show interest.
| What WashU lists | Notes |
|---|---|
| Visiting campus | “On the top of our list” |
| Virtual information sessions | |
| Talking with current students (Bear Chats) | In person or online |
| Meeting an admissions officer at a high school visit, regional event or college fair | |
| Exploring the website and joining the email list | “A great place to start” |
WashU was just as clear about what it does not mean: “This isn’t about contacting the Admissions Office to tell us you’re interested.” The process of genuinely getting to know the school is the interest.
In the same cycle, WashU also added a new non-binding Early Action round with a November 2 deadline.
💡 The same school can change from one year to the next. Last year’s data or an old blog post will miss shifts like this one.
5. What colleges actually record
These are the items schools that weigh demonstrated interest are known to track.
| Item | Examples |
|---|---|
| Campus visits | Official tours · info sessions · meetings with admissions officers |
| Events | Regional info sessions · college fairs · school-specific webinars |
| Interviews | Where the school offers them |
| Applicant portal activity | Logging in · completing optional items |
| Email engagement | Opening admissions email · clicking links (logged in a CRM system) |
| “Why Us” essay | Whether it gives specific reasons that fit only this school |
Email is the part that surprises parents most. Many colleges send their messages through a customer relationship management (CRM) system, and those systems can record whether a message was opened and which links were clicked. At a school that counts interest, simply opening its emails and following the links that matter is a small but real signal.
6. How to check your student’s schools yourself
Tables on blogs and forums are sometimes wrong. The most reliable source is the school’s own Common Data Set.
| Step | What to do |
|---|---|
| 1 | Search for “[school name] Common Data Set” |
| 2 | Open the most recent PDF on the school’s official site (usually the Institutional Research office) |
| 3 | Find the C7 table (in the First-Time, First-Year Admission section) |
| 4 | Look at the “Level of applicant’s interest” row and see which column is checked |
| 5 | Write Very Important / Important / Considered / Not Considered next to each school on your student’s list |
📌 Tip: the same C7 table also rates factors like “Interview” and “Character/personal qualities.” It’s a quick snapshot of what each school values, and worth reading while you plan the rest of the application.
7. What to do now for schools that count it
For any school rated “Considered” or higher in C7, make sure your student does the following before the deadline.
| Action | How |
|---|---|
| Open admissions email | Don’t delete it — open it and click the links that matter |
| Register for an info session, then attend | Virtual or regional — signing up without showing up may not register at all |
| Visit campus | If possible, register for the official tour and info session |
| Request an interview | If the school offers one, sign up |
| College fairs and high school visits | Talk with the admissions officer, even briefly, and leave your name |
| “Why Us” essay | Name specific courses, professors and programs found only at that school |
| Early Decision | The strongest signal of interest there is — but it is a binding commitment to attend if admitted |
8. Cautions and common myths
Demonstrated interest is a much smaller factor than grades and course rigor. In NACAC’s survey, about 16% of colleges rated demonstrated interest as “considerably important,” compared with about 75% for high school grades.
| Myth | Reality |
|---|---|
| “The more you contact them, the better” | It means nothing at schools that don’t count it, and schools that do don’t want repeated contact either (per WashU’s own guidance) |
| “Every college tracks it” | Many, including Harvard, MIT, Stanford and UCLA, do not |
| “The table on that blog must be right” | It varies by school and by year — check the original CDS |
| “Interest can make up for weaker grades” | Grades and course rigor come first. Interest is a small tiebreaker between similar applicants |
9. Frequently asked questions (FAQ)
Q1. Does attending an info session help at Harvard or MIT?
Neither school considers demonstrated interest in its CDS. Info sessions are still useful for learning about the school, so attend to find out whether it’s a good fit for your student.
Q2. We live too far away to visit. Is that a disadvantage?
Many schools also credit virtual sessions, regional events and college fairs. WashU itself lists virtual info sessions and online conversations with current students.
Q3. Do we have to open every single email?
Focusing on schools rated “Considered” or higher in C7 is enough. There is no need to worry about email from schools that aren’t on your student’s list.
Q4. My student already applied. Is it too late?
No. Checking the applicant portal, attending sessions and interviewing all still count after submission. If the result is a deferral, a letter of continued interest can also help.
Final thoughts
Not every college looks at demonstrated interest, and it never decides an admission on its own. But at the schools that do look, it shows. Sort your student’s list by C7 rating once, and make sure the emails and info sessions from the schools that count it don’t slip through the cracks.
For a closer look at your family’s plan, reach out to your nearest Elite Prep:
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