<h2>For schools that accept the Common Application, should I send different Common App essays and recommendations (not supplements) to different schools as method of risk-minimization*? While writing additional essays may seem like a waste of time, it pales in comparison to the 25+ supplemental essays I am planning to write. Has anyone done this before, or do most people submit the same essay and recommendations to every school that uses the Common App?</h2>
<p>*If I write three different Common App essays and acquire six different Common App recommendations, one bad essay or recommendation will not negatively affect my chances at all schools. Of course, I don't expect any of my essays or recommendations to be bad, but I suppose there is always a chance.</p>
<p>No, that’s not a good technique at all. You should write one common app essay, using the prompt that speaks to you. It won’t minimize your risk.</p>
And, I’m in agreement with @bodangles. Spend the time to craft a really great personal statement and send that essay to all your colleges, as many colleges will also have supplements that will require essays on specific topics. Some students that apply to 10-15 schools need to write 20 essays as it is, even when they submit one Common App Personal Statement. It’s a lot of work, especially as you must also keep up your senior year work and ace those classes.</p>
<p>@gibby: I was talking about asking multiple teachers and submitting recommendations from different teachers to different schools. For example, I might submit recommendations from Teachers A and B to Caltech but recommendations from Teachers B and C to Stanford.</p>
<p>@DiscipulusBonus: Common App member schools have agreed to allow only for TWO (2) teacher recommendations – and each of those goes to all of your schools. You cannot submit more than two, as the system won’t let you invite more than two teachers. And once your two teacher submit their letters, the recommendations tab is locked – the site won’t allow you to delete or change them. You should read the Common App directions.</p>
<p>The old version of the Common App used to supply pdf student directions, but the new version is not that user friendly. To view what can and cannot be done, you have to set up a Common App account, which you can do right now. The Common App will close down in July, so whatever you do, you’ll have to redo it in August when it reopens, but it’s worth the look. Some schools have provided their own pdf directions instead. Scroll down to page 21 to see what this one college has for teacher recommedations – they are only allowing for one recommendation: <a href=“http://www.paly.net/sites/default/files/Common%20App%20Instructions%202013-14.pdf”>http://www.paly.net/sites/default/files/Common%20App%20Instructions%202013-14.pdf</a></p>
<p>For recommendations, you can invite different teachers for different schools on CommonApp. For essays, you can only change it 3 times among submissions. In other words, you may have up to 3 versions that can be from the same or different prompt. Nevertheless, it is a bad idea to white different CA essays for different schools. It is a waste of time. Also, you will find after each submission that you need to correct some typo or grammar mistake. After each submission, the essay is locked. You can only unlock it twice totally (therefore 3 editions). </p>
<p>@gibby Your info on LOR is incorrect. CommonApp does not limit the number of recommendation. It is the school. Some school would accept more than 2 teacher’s LOR. My D have submitted 4 to UMich and 3 to Northwestern through CommonApp. And you can assign different teachers to different schools on CommonApp through invitation. But the letter from the same teacher would be sent to all schools he/she is assigned to.</p>
<p>You only have limited access to change your essay too. Maybe twice then it locks. I also think you should stick to one good essay, plus supplements. </p>
<p>According to the directions, this year’s common application would not let you write different essays. You could only make changes to the essay twice after your initial submission. This included simply fixing grammatical mistakes. In my opinion, the new common application is much more controlling, and less user friendly, than the earlier version.</p>
<p>Wait the comment about the teacher recs is not true. I had 4 teachers write recs and chose which to send based on the school. For MIT I sent a math and science teacher, while for my other schools I sent the strong recs from language and english.</p>
<p>@noel597 You mean @gibby’s comment is not true, right? I have already corrected him above.</p>
<p>@lacgrad CommonApp 2013 allows the change of prompt/essays between submission. I don’t think there are going to change this in 2014 as it was just updated to a new version of CommonApp in 2013. Also, you can change the essay as many times as you want until it is permanently locked, but you can only have up to 3 submitting versions. Every time you submit an application, the essay is locked. You can unlock it and edit it as many times as you want before the next submission. You can only unlock the essay twice. </p>
<p>@billcsho: Thank you for the correction. That was not a possibility in the ‘old’ Common App and I had not realized they had changed it so dramatically with the recent revision.</p>
<p>You are all very welcome. It was confusing for me last year too when the new CA was up. Hopefully it will be less confusing this year as there should be no change from last year.</p>
<p>@lbad96: From what I understand, you can send up to three different forms of your essay to as many schools as you wish. For example, you can send Essay A to three schools, Essay B to four schools, and Essay C to four more schools.</p>
<p>@guineagirl96: What exactly do you mean? According to @billcsho, you are allowed to submit up to three different Common App essays. I have also heard this outside of CC.</p>