How important are the transfer essays?

Colleges and Universities A-Z University of Virginia
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<p>In the first-year admissions, they seem to make or break you. For transfers, however, everyone seems to be placing 90% of the weight on one's college GPA, and maybe HS GPA if they're applying for a second-year spot. So my question is, how much do the essays count? I would assume someone who has a good, yet not stellar GPA, could be significantly helped out if they can account for the slightly lower grades and show their true desire to want to attend UVa (with great reasons, not just "because it's UVa", but more because the curriculum fits them better, more opporunities, ect)</p>

<p>Ideas?</p>

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<p>I seriously doubt essays matter too much in the admissions department at all. My friend failed to submit 1 of them last year for 1st year admission and was still accepted. He wasn't even the top applicant from our school (3 more were accepted as well). Essays don't carry any statisical weight, so the most they can do is help decide between two very simular candidates, and even then, dumb luck probably matters more. GPA ansd SATs show up on national statisics and admission figures. Good Essays don't.</p>

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<p>Yeah think about it from an adcom's point of view - if this kid can keep a stellar GPA in high school and a stellar GPA in their first or second year of college, then most likely they will maintain that GPA for the rest of their years here. Everyone writes the same similar stuff for the essays, but they probably want to add some "weight" to their applications, so it's not so easy to apply (so they add the questions); I highly doubt they'd reject someone cause their essay answers weren't up to par or something.</p>

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<p>I don't know...I'm fairly confident that my essay was the reason I was accepted. I applied for Spring Transfer, OOS, with a 1240 old SAT and a 29 ACT (maybe 31 if they accepted my post-high school score). I'm coming from a state school that is probably 3rd tier. That said, I am in the honors program and have a 3.89 college GPA and 4.00 uw (4.3 w) high school GPA. Even with the good GPAs I don't think my stats alone would have been good enough to snag me one of the 60 spots of 500 applications that they let in for Spring, especially from OOS...but I got in. </p>

<p>I spent my time on the essays and wrote a REALLY unconventional answer to the long-answer question. C'mon, "Which 3 people, dead, living, or historical, would you invite to dinner?" That dry topic needed some spicing up!! </p>

<p>Thing about it: you can't change your high school GPA, UVa won't accept post-graduation standardized test scores apparently, you can't change your state of residency or the (lack of, in my case) prestige of your current university. Your essays and college GPA are pretty much the only things you have control over as a transfer. The essay is the only thing that distinguishes you as a PERSON rather than a robot or a set of statistical facts and numbers. My approach was to stand out, in a good way, and show UVa that they NEEDED me as a transfer. In my opinion, what they definitely don't need more of are people with perfect test scores and carbon-copy, watered down essays. Apparently the admissions people agreed!
Mal :)</p>

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<p>Mal, Would it be too prying to ask how you spiced up your essay?</p>

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<p>And what school were you at? Do help =)</p>

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<p>I applied from Ohio University, and speficially from the Honors Tutorial College there. The HTC is selective (200 kids of the 12,000 undergrad), but the university overall is going down the drain at a rapid rate.</p>

<p>For my essay I immediately thought of the usual subjects...Jesus, my late grandmother, Stephen Sondheim (theater major!!), etc, but I decided that they must get sick of reading those. Then I decided that it might be a very awkward dinner if the 3 people didn't know each other, and that it wouldn't be fun having to ignore Jesus while I talked to Sodheim. I tried to figure out some way to have 3 "related" individuals come to dinner. I also decided that literary figures might be interesting. </p>

<p>So, as a theater major, I came up with this idea to stage a scene from "A Doll's House," Henrik Ibsen's 19th century play. For some background info, I've read the play several times and it was really revolutionary in the 19th century. Plus, some people consider Ibsen the first playwright to introduce really strong female characters, and as a woman I've always respected that.</p>

<p>In my essay I chose to invite Ibsen himself and his two leading characters, Nora and her husband Torvald, to a dinner. I started out with a stage note taken directly from the text: "It was a winter evening. On the left a small stove located under a window. To the right, a small table" or something like that. I talked about how I'd be wearing some sort of period costume so I'd fit in. Then the scene would start, and Nora and Torvald would continue with whatever action should occur in Scene 5 or whatever the scene was. I talked about how I would make mischief and interrupt the scene, intercepting the fateful letter just to see an alternate ending...etc, encouraging Ibsen to rework certain parts.</p>

<p>The whole thing was an experiement about art imitating life, and being able to actually experience life in the moments that inspired the play- taking them out of Ibsen's mind and making them real events. I talked about how this dinner would make me the only person to break the "4th wall" that keeps the audience from being able to perforate the art. It would help me work on my craft, and I would be part of something revolutionary (the process of writing this play) in addition to having supreme knowledge about it since I know the ending but Nora and Torvald (and maybe even Ibsen!) wouldn't know it yet. I discussed how I would be able to break into a realm of theater unknown to all mankind by actually being in a scene with the two characters themselves, not actors, and how that would help with my own process of character development as an actor.</p>

<p>I guess I just realized how confusing this could be! Haha, I promise it made much more sense in my essay that how it's described here. </p>

<p>Anyway (I know this is getting to be a long post, sorry), I just wanted to let people know that there's life outside of CC. There are smart kids who don't have the best preparatory education, whose high schools don't offer 15 AP classes and who don't have the option of SAT/ACT tutoring. I feel like so many students here are completely (to use an anthropological term) reducing the variation between themselves in order to copy the stats of someone else who got in. If you do that, you give them no reason to pick you over the next applicant from CC with the same stellar stats. While you're going to need a great gpa, great recommendations, and decent test scores, take the chance of being a little offbeat!! It worked for me at least! </p>

<p>Okay, that's my little rant/advice of the day. Hope it helps!
Mal :)</p>

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<p>Wow. I've read "A Doll's House" and actually somewhat liked it. The entire book was put together very well manner, and everything, even the title, fit perfectly. It's clever how you put together your essay, I definently understand why you got in haha.
Anyways, a big question floating around the CC community is how do you set up the "why uva essay". I'm not necessarily asking specifics from your essay, but more how you actually set up that essay.
Thanks for all the help =)</p>

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<p>Thanks! As for the "why uva?" essay, I started with what I disliked about my current university. I know that there's a debate about that going on right now in one of my the main topics, but I felt like I had some justifiable reasons. Then I merged into what aspects I liked about UVa, and mentioned some really specific programs and activities that I wanted to be involved in- specific a capella groups, for example. Then to end I talked about what I hoped to gain from attending UVa, and a smidge about hoping that I could offer UVa just as much. I think it was pretty standard. I should also say that I actually turned down Virginia in favor of Vanderbilt, which was a tough choice, though I still look really foundly at UVa and wish I could've gone with both!!
Mal :)</p>

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<p>Why Vandy over UVA? Just wondering.</p>

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<p>I thought about it a lot and in the end, there were several reasons. I liked Vandy's smaller size, proximity to a major city, private school atmosphere, and the ability to travel there more easily (my nearest airport does not offer direct flights to Charlottesville). I also know no one at UVa, and at Vandy I know a handful of people. While both schools also have really good and reputable grad programs, the graduate student influence at UVa seemed a lot bigger than at Vandy. I actually made a huge pro/con list and the UVa list had like 8 cons to Vandy's 5...it was a majorly tough decision but I think (and hope!!) I made the right one for me.
Mal :)</p>

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<p>What were your cons against UVa? I only have a few, including: lesser engineering ranking (this reaalllyy doesn't bother me at all), slightly more expensive (IS tuition still though) and the strong conservative feel (again, i can get around this...). So, basically, I have no reasons to not attend if accepted =P So i'm curious what were yours if you can remember =P</p>

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<p>I think we can safely say that Essays won't really make up for another fault in your application, such as GPA, activities, or Test Scores. What they can do is make you more appealing compared to someone with simular stats. Don't worry too much about the essays. People tend to focus on making the application perfect, but in the end, its the things like GPA and Sat scores that really matter. An essay is mostly filler.</p>