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<li><p>I hear some people say that great college app essays are written by smart students who would have gotten into their schools even without the essays. so this basically tells me that if we don't have great stats and great EC's the essay won't even matter so much as to helping our chances of admission.</p></li>
<li><p>on the other hand, some people say that students can literally "write their way into college." to me, this means that someone with maybe average to slightly above average stats and EC's can write an amazing essay and get into good schools.</p></li>
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<p>i don't know which side to trust. I have average gpa (low for some schools I'm applying to), pretty high SAT, good but not spectacular subject tests/ec/volunteer, etc.</p>
<p>I’m going to vote for “neither”. These 2 views represent a black-and-white view of the world, typical of some HS students, in which a great essay either matters not at all, or overides a bunch of mediocre factors.</p>
<p>At the most selective schools, every factor contributes. You might as well debate which leg of a chair holds you up. A great essay can compensate for a slight deficiency in an area, but don’t gloss over the world “slight”. An average person with stellar essays still gets the thin envelope. A strong person who has scores or a GPA a bit under those of the admitted students may be able to make it up on the essays. </p>
<p>And to look on the other side, a student otherwise equal to those getting in but who sends in lousy essays they didn’t spend a lot of time working on (or perhaps aren’t capable of writing better) just wrote themselves out of an admission decision. Top schools get enough apps from strong in all the app areas students that they don’t have to acept someone who bombs on the essays.</p>
<p>Unless your schools say how much weight they give to essays, the only thing you know is that you will have the best chance if you do everything as well as you can.</p>
<p>Essays are incredibly important at colleges with a sub 25% acceptance rate. These schools get lots of qualified candidates and differentiate them through essays and a few other things.</p>
<p>At the majority of colleges they are not important at all as long as they are reasonably well written.</p>
<p>It seems like it would be much easier to reject a set of scores and a laundry list of activities than a person with a clear, interesting voice well-presented throughout the application.</p>