you likely wonât get accepted to EAG if you donât look impressive enough
While I think this sort of true, reading the linked article might give you the impression the bar is much higher than it is?
I know many people whoâve recently been accepted to EA conferences with much less impressive or EA-relevant backgrounds. If it were just this I would say that itâs hard to make a perfect process and there will always be some false positives and false negatives.
But:
Thereâs something important missing from their description of their experience. They wrote, responding Amy, the head of the CEA Events team, âfrom our conversation, I came to understand that there is a distinct reason that could be pointed to for my rejection from EAGâ but then they donât disclose that reason and, citing privacy, neither will Amy.
Yeah, admissions is complicated. And writing âyou likely wonât get accepted to EAG if you donât look impressive enoughâ is a vast simplification. In reality I imagine that it is some nebulous combination of traditional impressiveness, EA-specific impressiveness, and potential future contribution (all from the perspective of the admissions team). But like many things in life, Iâm guessing that the decisions often come down to judgement calls, rather than strict and clear decision tree.
In a vague parallel to university admissions, there isnât a simply standard or algorithm (such as âa function of high school grades and standardized test scoresâ), and instead it is really a judgement call for each individual applicant. In another parallel to university admissions, sometimes the star trombone player is graduating and the school really needs a good trombone player. I imagine similarly, there are priorities for EA conferences that arenât transparent/âvisible to the public: maybe the person doing X will be resigning soon, so there is a big push to nurture more talent doing X to find a replacement.
While I think this sort of true, reading the linked article might give you the impression the bar is much higher than it is?
I know many people whoâve recently been accepted to EA conferences with much less impressive or EA-relevant backgrounds. If it were just this I would say that itâs hard to make a perfect process and there will always be some false positives and false negatives.
But:
Thereâs something important missing from their description of their experience. They wrote, responding Amy, the head of the CEA Events team, âfrom our conversation, I came to understand that there is a distinct reason that could be pointed to for my rejection from EAGâ but then they donât disclose that reason and, citing privacy, neither will Amy.
Yeah, admissions is complicated. And writing âyou likely wonât get accepted to EAG if you donât look impressive enoughâ is a vast simplification. In reality I imagine that it is some nebulous combination of traditional impressiveness, EA-specific impressiveness, and potential future contribution (all from the perspective of the admissions team). But like many things in life, Iâm guessing that the decisions often come down to judgement calls, rather than strict and clear decision tree.
In a vague parallel to university admissions, there isnât a simply standard or algorithm (such as âa function of high school grades and standardized test scoresâ), and instead it is really a judgement call for each individual applicant. In another parallel to university admissions, sometimes the star trombone player is graduating and the school really needs a good trombone player. I imagine similarly, there are priorities for EA conferences that arenât transparent/âvisible to the public: maybe the person doing X will be resigning soon, so there is a big push to nurture more talent doing X to find a replacement.