I feel like I have made a huge blunder. While applying RD for Harvard, I wrote a 2000 word supplement reflecting on everything that the application alone wouldn’t show. I took the arduous task of explaining my life in brevity and decided hence to recall the most interesting incidents in my life and write them on it. The other half of the essay was more philosophical where I used some history and labeled it as the chronicles of humans. I actually showed the similarity between myself and some great men in history eg Napoleon. Some part of the supplement even focused on the possibility on why and how humans could have possibly created religion. In short, it was a philosophical masterpiece, which is unlike me since I only study engineering read math and physics.
However, my counselor said not to upload the supplement as in her view my application was very strong and it would falter and fall my own dignity regardless of what I wrote in the supplement. She believed that if I actually wrote a supplement it would look like I didn’t fancy my chances when in fact I was one of the best students applying there. I paid heed to her advice as she herself graduated from Columbia and Harvard. But now some people are telling me I made a huge mistake.
In case you’re wondering, I didn’t write that writing a supplement would be injurious to my dignity. I wrote that I didn’t need to write a supplement as I thought my application was complete without it. (which is what Harvard said in the topics as this was optional)
A 2000 word treatise would have been over the top. You did the right thing by not sending it. Harvard will receive about 37,000 apps this year and AO’s will have about 12 minutes to spend on each. Yours would have been dropped into the tl;dr pile. Good luck!
Your 4 page supplemental mistake would have been a big mistake. I concur with your counselor.
- your supplement sounds ridiculous, which is probably why she told you not to upload it.
- it's VERY VERY difficult to get admitted without a supplement. it's basically weighted as much as, if not more heavily than the interview. but considering your supplement (and general attitude about your application), I doubt it'll make much of an effect on your decision anyway.
I agree 100% that its presence or non-presence won’t affect your final outcome.
Ayyyy, you’re that guy from the MIT FaceBook page.
Thank the stars you did not submit the supplemental essay. In my opinion it would have killed your chances. In fact, comparing yourself to Napolean might have made it seem like you have a psychiatric illness.
Seriously? 2000 words of bio, chronicle and who knows what musings? Napoleon? They would have questioned your judgment, pronto. Do you not understand what these schools look for- or are you kidding?
Good GC.
Sending no supplement probably hurts you a bit. Sending a 2000 word supplement would likely have been fatal.
From Harvard’s Dean of Admissions, William Fitzsimmons:
However, keep in mind what Yale’s former Dean of Admissions, Jeffrey Brenzel, says: