<p>I plan on applying to JHU RD for the School of Engineering, Applied Mathematics and Statistics using the common app. Should my essay be about something analytic, or can it be a strong personal story? The rest of my application I hope shows my strength in math and statistics, so will this seem out of place, or will it supplement the application?</p>
<p>Also, I feel horribly uninformed asking this, but I haven't had an opportunity to visit the school yet. When do you declare your major? Are you stuck in the school that you apply for, or can you choose a major from either arts and sciences or engineering? Also, there wouldn't be a problem taking a minor/concentration (e.g. a language) in arts in sciences while pursuing a major in engineering, correct?</p>
<p>(1) Your essay does not have to relate to your academic interests. In fact, it should not. Your essay should be personal -- and should reveal who you are -- and it should represent something that can not easily be deduced by something else in your application. The essay is your one chance to share your own personal voice.</p>
<p>*Let me suggest that if you are using the Common App., you should strongly consider writing the 2 essays that are included in the JHU supplement. We really encourage that!!! And the second of the two essays does allow you to discuss your academic interests and experiences.</p>
<p>Engineering students declare their major by the end of the first year / Arts & Sciences students declare by the end of the second year. </p>
<p>Aside from the Biomedical Engineering program, you are not admitted to a specific school or program at Hopkins, so you can always change your mind. Double majoring or majoring/minoring across schools is quite easy.</p>
<p>Just to add to what Daniel said, minoring or double majoring in something completely unrelated to your major is relatively common, especially since at Hopkins, we have no core requirements, but rather "distribution requirements" and classes in one major will tend to fill the requirements for the second major. (For example, I'm an engineering major and I'm required to take 18 credits of humanities or social sciences - I'm doing an economics minor and all the economics (social science) credits will count towards my distribution requirement for engineering)</p>
<p>I have a question on the essay as well, but the optional one (not to steal the thread or anything). For the money in your pocket essay, I wrote about going to my grandfather's and listening to his stories about the holocaust, but most of my essay contains his story, although i did explain why I chose this at the end. Do you feel this is not meeting the essay requirements, as right now I feel like it might be (since a lot of the essay includes the story), and that I will have to start over.</p>
<p>I like to interpret the JHU topic like this: as long as it shows something personal about you while staying in the realm of the topic (as in not completely going off on a tangent).</p>
<p>reignfire22:
You can interpret the essay prompt in any way you want. There are no rules to these essays. We allow applicants to approach the questions in any number of ways.</p>
<p>Question - I have written one essay that shows how the things I do in my personal time interest me in particular majors. (open ended essay for common app) Also, does it matter if I went over 500 words? (600?)
Should I write both supplementary essays, or choose one that shows a more phsycological side of me?</p>
<p>abena301 - what do you mean by supplemental essay? If doing the online JHU app. you have two essays to submit. There are no supplemental essays.</p>
<p>darkrulerII - read what I have said previous on this thread. You may interpret the "money in your pocket" essay any way you want.</p>
<p>It is not necessary. You can submit a third supplement essay (and yes you would use the additional info section then) but there is a chance it will not be reviewed if you have already submitted the two JHU essays.</p>
<p>It is not a bad idea though ... just not necessary.</p>