Sam Teener, Jon Darga, and Quentin Long all got into the University of Michigan. Kim Bryant could have stopped them from doing just that. Kim Bryant is a U of M Admissions Officer.

Bryant has been working at the U of M admissions office for 15 years. Her job includes reading applications, meeting prospective students, and going out to high schools and college fairs to meet potential applicants. She said, “The thing about admissions is that no two days are alike. One day I might be meeting with parents [of possible students], and the next day I might be in the office answering general calls from prospective students.”

Bryant’s job however, is no different from any of the 130 other people in the admissions office. “Everyone does an equally important job. We get around 32,000 applications per year, so we need as many people as we can working to split the load,” said Bryant.

However, only about 13,000 of those 32,000 applicants will make it in, and only around 5,400 will commit. That is why Bryant is selective about whom she tries to get to apply to Michigan. She said, “This is an office of admissions, not rejections. We know that U of M is not a fit for everyone. That’s why at a college fair, I might tell someone who wants to be a veterinarian, ‘You want to be a vet? Great, but MSU [Michigan State University] has a better program. They’re right across the room over there. Go talk to them.’”

“We want people who are leaders,” Bryant said. “We want the students who are competitive to come to the U of M, who were leaders in their high schools, to come to U of M. If you aren’t that, then maybe U of M just isn’t going to be the best place for you. The students that we think can thrive in our curriculum are the ones that we are going to admit.”

Here is a story about admittance that Bryant tells fondly with a smile. Once, one of the applicants who was on the wait list was accepted. Bryant then drove down to Toledo where the applicant was working in a musical. One of his lines in the musical was “There’s something wonderful out there for me.” So Bryant had the applicant’s counselor have him rehearse the line again, while she was sitting in on one of the sets out on the stage with her back facing him when he sang the line again. She then jumped down from the stage with his acceptance letter, and when he saw who she was and the letter, he was shocked. He started crying because he was so happy.

But Bryant’s job is not just about admitting students to the University of Michigan. “There also are the programs during the summer that we have to handle,” she said. “For example, there’s the Meet Michigan program during the summer. That’s a big program. We have prospective high achieving juniors in High School come to the U of M. There’s a big cookout, and all of the staff goes.”

“It’s a year-round job,” said Bryant. “In the fall, we start going to high schools, and hosting college nights. Applications start coming in early September, and keep coming until November. We’re busy reading applications until around April, and around then, we start hosting programs and campus tours. Then in May, we start setting our new goals and receive new assignments. We work on the summer programs, and in August, we start travelling to high schools again.”

Finally, Bryant has advice for all of the high school students out there. “Just because you know the campus already doesn’t mean you shouldn’t go on a campus tour. I’ve met students before who have never been to the campus until orientation. I think that’s a very bad idea. Just because you won’t get lost on campus doesn’t mean you’ll know what student life is like. What if you go to the college and then realize you hate the student life?” she said. “You’re looking for the college that fits you academically, not geographically. I tell people who want go to the U of M but can’t, ‘I can help you, and I can help you transfer in, but promise me that wherever you’re going, you’ll go there with an open mind.’”