<p>A head's up. The application for Fall of 2008 that is set to go live August 15 is NOT the one that you can currently download a copy of. That is last years application, and the essays are NOT the same :(. </p>
<p>The good news is that they want only one essay this year, not two. The bad news is that the essay choices are three new essay topics that were not topics last year. You can locate the choices by finding the Timeline link on the admissions page, clicking on it, then clicking on Esssays.</p>
<p>The topics are as follows:
A. Tell us your favorite quote, who said it, and why it is meaningful to you
B. Name a global issue that concerns you and explain why
C. What is the best advice you have ever received, and why is it the best advice?</p>
<p>The essay to be completed is described as a personal statement, but I find these topics to be of a much less "personal" nature than last year's. I really think that FSU would get a much better feel for a student with last year's topics. Oh well....</p>
<p>ah crud.i called admissions about a month ago to ask them if they was going to be new essay topics.i wanted to get an early start.they told me they were going to be the same.so i just wasted my time writing essays for the old topics.</p>
<p>Thanks so much for the head's up. My D had already done one of the two on the old application so now she must start over. Here is the info from the website:</p>
<p>Essay
The essay is a very important part of your application. It assists the University in knowing you as an individual, independent of test scores and other objective data. We ask that you respond to one of the following topics. Your personal statement should be no longer than one page. The best personal statements are not necessarily the longest ones.</p>
<p>Tell us your favorite quote, who said it, and why it is meaningful to you.</p>
<p>Name a global issue that concerns you and explain why.</p>
<p>What is the best advice you have ever received, and why is it the best advice?</p>
<p>Essays should be mailed to the following address: </p>
<p>Office of Admissions
Florida State University
University Center Suite A2500
Tallahassee FL 32306-2400 </p>
<p>Does this mean that she sends it separately from her application even if she is doing the online application???</p>
<p>Although we do not require them, freshman are encouraged to write two essays. Be sure to include your name and date of birth on the essay so that we can match them to your application. For your convenience, you may email your essays to <a href="mailto:admsofficer@admin.fsu.edu">admsofficer@admin.fsu.edu</a><a href="please%20cut%20and%20paste%20the%20text%20into%20the%20body%20of%20your%20message%20rather%20than%20using%20an%20attachment">/email</a>.*</p>
<p>While it says they don't require an essay, I'd be sure to write as many as are suggested.</p>
<p>I like the new essay topics, they seem to be very easy to answer and give a child who may really have a passion for something to really showcase themselves and their talents.</p>
<p>Of course the answer to number three has to be my Parents :-) What else could possibly be a source for such wonderful advise on a bevy of topics such as Time and Financial management, numerous and extensive war stories from us captains of industry from decades of experience, and of course the in's and out's of making good sound judgements and decisions. And of course they got this all for free and usually without asking HaHa.</p>
[quote]
Although we do not require them, freshman are encouraged to write two essays.
[/quote]
BE CAREFUL, as this is a quote from last years application materials. This year they are saying ONE essay. I confirmed this information personally with the admissions office (after D had also already completed one essay based on last years topics.)</p>
<p>It seems they have added some pages with info to this years application, but they have not loaded this years application to complete, the one to print is still last years, AND there are still active links to last years info that they have not cleaned up. It remains comfusing, which is why I called. I also received an email with this info in writing.</p>
<p>"For your convenience, you may email your essays to <a href="mailto:admsofficer@admin.fsu.edu">admsofficer@admin.fsu.edu</a><a href="please%20cut%20and%20paste%20the%20text%20into%20the%20body%20of%20your%20message%20rather%20than%20using%20an%20attachment">/email</a>."</p>
<p>Thanks for finding this. Email is so much easier than snail mail for essays! Hopefully, when they update the website on Aug. 15, this will still be an option.</p>
<p>If sounds like it will be an interesting process for sure. If you remember the articles we talked about last year they talked about the glutt of applications being received and how the admissions process was basically an assembly line mentality just due to the volume of work to be done.</p>
<p>Given the budget situation I don't believe they are going to add additional staff to deal with this, the Wall Street Journal had an article this year that documented that applications are increasing every year at all schools I think by 3-6%. Then we have the enrollment freezes that most schools in Florida have put in place for 2008.</p>
<p>With additional elements required in the process it makes me wonder a couple of things. How do they manage the additional volume of work with basically the same staff? and what level of consideration are these kids actually going to get? I wonder if alot of them just get a quick check against some guideline and get bounced without really a serious consideration?</p>
<p>D has been having a hard time with new online essay portal. It keeps saying error and that the essay needs to "start with a letter". She tried adding the letter C and it didn't work then she got rid of the indentation (so her essay started with the word "The") and it didn't work...very frustrating.</p>
<p>hi . i had soooooooooooo much trouble creating my password but tomato king helped me solve that. i just wrote my essay and cut and pasted it into the box. a few times i did get an error message. but i refreshed -a few minutes--waited tried again and finally got it to accept it.</p>
<p>i found while helping my son that the application appears to time out after a certain amount of time. obviously make sure the essay is all edited and ready to go in microsoft word or whatever word processor you use. my son had done this then pasted it in to the essay field on the application and began to make additional edits on the app itself. then when he went to save it it had timed out.</p>
<p>ultimately, he made sure it was good to go in word, pasted it and then saved it. he had to logout and then log back in before it worked.</p>
<p>anyway. he finally got it submitted last wednesday evening. his status updated about 24 hours later. initially it said the app fee was not paid, then updated the next day and reflected that the fee had been paid on line.</p>
<p>No, the portal just won't take her essay. We retried it (refreshing about 10 time and then adding the letter C before her essay but it keeps telling her that there are errors on page and that :</p>
<p>Essay must start with a letter.
Guess I will just have to mail it in with the Florida residency statement.</p>
<p>She was instructed to include her full name and address in the body of the email and cut and paste her essay to the body of the email. Easy enough. She did that last night and I faxed in the Florida residency statement today. Now we wait for her application status page to update and let her know that she is "good to go".</p>
<p>As a suggestion we had D's 12th grade English teacher read the essay's before we sent it. She was happy to read it and made a couple of small builds on it. Basically though it went in as written. I had read this suggestion in the Princton review or one of the other college admission sites.</p>
<ol>
<li>Essay (for freshman applicants only)
The essay is an important part of your application. It assists the University in learning about you as an individual, independent of your academic
grade point average, test scores, and other objective data. We ask that you respond to one of the following topics. Your essay should be no longer
than one page (500 words).
a. Tell us your favorite quote, who said it, and why it is meaningful to you.
b. Name a global issue that concerns you and explain why.
c. What is the best advice you have ever received, and why is it the best advice?</li>
</ol>