<p>Well that sucks. I was planning on doing my apps this summer.....
How much does the Common App vary from year to year? Are the essay topics the same? It won't be a problem filling in all the mindless details in August/September, but I'd much rather have the essays finished this summer if at all possible.
Oh, and is there anything other than the essay on the Common App that takes a significant amount of time/effort/thought?</p>
<p>The common app changes very little fron one year to the next - the essay questions have been the same for at least the past few years. Keep in mind that the final essay question choice is to pick your own topic - so you really have a wide open framework.</p>
<p>Keep in mind that every college you apply to using the common app probably has a supplement as well - and these do change more from year to year. What I would do - print out a hard copy of the current common app. Fill it in by hand - this will save you time later - you’ll already have all of the info. Lots of kids don’t know where their parents work, or they need time to organize their ECs and honors, and there is a short answer question about an EC - you can do all of that in June/July. You can also start thinking about your main common app. essay as well.</p>
<p>Look at the supplements from this year for the colleges you think you’ll be applying to. Again, those are more likely to change - but it will give you an idea of how much work will be involved. Many supplements require another essay; some have multiple short answer questions, etc. So, there is a lot you can do now, before the new version of the common app is available.</p>
<p>Cool, thanks. Also, is it common for someone to use the same essay for multiple supplements? I’m planning on applying to Princeton, Duke, Emory, Yale, and possibly up to 5-10 more… Obviously if the supplements have polar opposite essay prompts then no… thoughts?</p>
<p>Obviously, people tend to use the same general ideas in all their supplement essays. But copying over supplement essays word for word isn’t a good idea; even if you remember to replace all the references to names and places of the colleges, it’s usually pretty obvious when you wrote the essay for a slightly different prompt than the one you’re answering.</p>
<p>The essay needs to fit the prompt. If 2 schools have the same question, well then fine, but how common is that? Here’s one example that worked - my son applied to 2 colleges that had an essay question about a book that influenced you - one was 250 words and one asked for 500. So, as amarkov said, he used the same ideas and concepts for each, but obviously had to structure them differently due to the difference in length.</p>
<p>Here’s an example that doesn’t work - I have a friend who is an admissions dean at a university in a major city. One of their essay prompts is why you chose X university - very common. She often receives essays that clearly were not written exclusively for her school, They will talk about the benefits of attending college in a major city and then at the end tack on so this is why I want to attend X University. It is so painfully obvious that this same essay went to various universities - not good.</p>