Hi guys, new to this. Anyway, I am done with most of my supplemental essays and I was wandering what to write for the common app. I really have no memory of anything relating to my background BUT I want to write about math ( you can call me Anna the Mathlete… LOL).Will writing about math sound too nerdy/geeky/dorky or will it be just okay with the right words.
BTW My name is Anna.
you can get really creative with the math topic! try relating numbers/math into your everyday life, your circumstances, etc.
I love you, some of my friend she think it will be nerdy since I already do well in math and think my scores already says MATH MATH MATH. Thank you and will it impress at least Harvard and Stanford.
Anyone else please?
For starters, let me say that I’ve been teaching math since 1980.
But how will an essay on math make them want to accept you to their school? How does it give them a reason to say yes to your application?
The essay needs to be about YOU. If you want to talk about how your interest in math has made you grow as a person or something along those lines, fine. But make sure you show, don’t tell, them about you.
Thanks bjkmom. For my essay, I want to say how math has become a creative outlet for me, just like art and from my art classes I have learnt to be observant with every curve in a graph, and all that stuff. Is that way of showing and not telling?
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Try to come up with very concrete examples. How, exactly, has math been a creative outlet? Tell me about a project or assignment or something where your creativity was used in solving a math problem.
Guys, will it impress Harvard and other top schools.
Good, I hope so.
Hi Anna! As others have mentioned, the topic can go either way. What is going to impress top tier schools is the writing and how you approach your essay. Stanford has a bajillion supplemental essays that will give them a chance to really get to know YOU, the real person, behind the application.
Without knowing how you are approaching the essay, it is hard to truly give some feedback on whether it sounds like it will appeal to college admissions officers. However, we can give you some general advice:
- Start with a “hook” to get your reader interested. Say you are going to focus on numbers, maybe you could start your essay with a big number, like 2,102,400. “Two million, one hundred two thousand, four hundred. It seems like such a big number. But it’s really so small when I consider it’s the finite number of minutes I will have in four years of college to pursue my passions and launch myself into the world. I have been alive for eight million, nine hundred thirty five thousand, two hundred minutes and in that time, I’ve learned a few things. You may have guessed that one truth I have learned is that I love math and numbers and seeing how they connect and reflect the world around me.”
That’s just one example and you would need to take it somewhere interesting, but a reader could be hooked by starting with a number written out like that.
Sometimes dialog can be a great intro as well. Or something that sounds odd when you don’t know the context. There is a great sample essay that we share with students at our school that begins with someone describing dragging bodies around and arranging them in weird positions. Turns out as you read further, the person is dressing and arranging mannequins for a store window. But you can bet you are intrigued as a reader and it shows creativity and some dark humor as well.
One essay I read last year was about a student that had a very diverse background and he started the essay with a powerful image of standing next to his mother, listening to the Vietnamese national anthem at a local festival, and seeing tears streaming down her face. She told him that she hadn’t heard it since she fled the country as a small child with her family. The rest of the essay was about him and what got him to that moment with his mom and how it affected him.
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Make sure the essay is about YOU. It can be about math and your love of numbers, but it needs to tell the admissions officer something intriguing about you while it shares a passion/interest.
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Please, please have someone that has a solid grip on English grammar and structure take a look at your essay. I do essay review with our seniors at our high school and it amazes me the number of students that come in with spelling errors or basic grammar errors in their “final draft” of their essays. Just doing a simple spellcheck will not catch a lot of errors - especially if all the words are spelled correctly, but they are not the right words (for example, see your original post - you said you are “wandering” what to write for the common app. That should be “wondering”, but a spellcheck will not bring it to your attention because both words are real words spelled correctly; however only one makes sense in the sentence.). I don’t want that to be taken as offense. I am hoping to be helpful and just give an example of where that error can be seen. I know this is a casual forum and we’re not holding people to strict grammar expectations here!
Thanks @RoonilWazlib99
Someone told me of a kid who used math to write his essay about the statistical probability he would get his first kiss before graduating from high school. Evidently it was a HUGE hit.