<p>well, my cornell supplement is 735 words. i honestly do not think i can cut much, if any, out. however, it takes up about 1 1/2 pages with 11 font double spaced garamond. it does not look that long, in my opinion. also, i believe it flows pretty nicely.</p>
<p>i know that the limit is supposedly 500. but if it is a little bit longer, they will finish reading correct? i have read that yale is VERY strict about the 500 word thing. i'm just curious as to how strict cornell is about this.</p>
<p>put it away for a couple of days and then re-read it. you are almost ALWAYS able to cut more out. don’t be too wordy. 700+ is not okay for a 500 word limit. 550 would be okay.</p>
<p>you need to cut it down. An extra 235 words is nearly half the length of another essay that follows the requirements, and trust me there will be thousands of these. Each admissions office has their own policy as to how strict to 500 it needs to be, but well over 700 isn’t a good idea.</p>
<p>i just cut my essay down to 625, and i feel like i haven’t lost any meaning =]</p>
<p>however, getting it down to 550 is going to be a struggle, seriously.</p>
<p>is 625still waaay too much?</p>
<p>cut the intro and conclusion…</p>
<p>well it’s 621 now lmao. ugh. at least it’s shorter than my common app essay now lmao: the common app one is 703 words. </p>
<p>is 703 ok for the common app one?</p>
<p>and do you really honestly feel that, without knowing the exact number of words in my paper (assuming this), they will freak out for spending an extra 30 seconds on my paper.</p>
<p>and @ the person above, i have already cut the conclusion a little bit. and i love my intro =/</p>
<p>I submitted a 585 word essay for a 500 word limit. Didn’t have any problems.</p>
<p>I had the same exact problem as you. Trust me it wasn’t easy, but eventually I was able to eliminate over 150 words to get it down to the proper size. The 500 word limit is really annoying, but I guess I understand it, considering they don’t wanna read a bunch of long boring essays. Working with someone else such as an English teacher can help make the process a little easier.</p>
<p>I think they are looking at two things.</p>
<ol>
<li>can you follow directions</li>
<li>can you write well enough to say what you want without adding too much fluff</li>
</ol>
<p>the tough part is that so many HS english teachers teach their kids to add so much fluff. My daughter spent almost 2 weeks getting her essay down to about 535 words. When i read it before she cut the words, I thought it was just fine. But when I read it after, it did actually seem to be much better without the stuff she cut out.</p>
<p>Just remember, there are thousands every year that submit their essays within the word count, or only slightly over. Do you really want to be the odd man out.</p>
<p>I guess the bigger question is. Do they even count the words? or does the application tell them how many words it is. That I have no idea.</p>
<p>thanks for the responses ! i appreciate it</p>
<p>when i said there was no way i could cut my essay down from 735, i didn’t realize how much “fluff” there was. like basically, i’ll make a point, but then use excessive adjectives and whatnot. like you said usafa =]</p>
<p>i have a tendency to do that =/</p>
<p>i managed to cut from 735 to 621 without losing any points. i just removed excessive adjectives and unnecessary and implied phrases lol.</p>
<p>i really didn’t even think i could even get it down to 621 =/</p>
<p>at cernan: good for you lol. i hope they won’t mind an essay over 600.</p>