<p>Okay I had a weird feeling that admissions essays are supposed to be short, but I looked ALLLL over the Common Application and Harvard website for a word limit and there isn't one. I found out that the Com. App. has a character limit of 6,000....So I just started writing and I have about 5,500 characters and 970words.
I've been reading that people are writing essays less than 400 words...So yeah should I do a lot of revising??? lol
Oh and my essay is about a trip to Africa. It's pretty detailed, but my essay covers my entire summer there so to me I already feel like I'm leaving out a lot of stuff.</p>
<p>My common app essay was 947 words. I went into it thinking it had a 1000 word limit, but looking back I never saw that anywhere. I think the 400ish word essays are for supplements</p>
<p>Well, I believe where people (including myself) discerned “approximately 500 words” is that the supplement essays are often requested to be about 500 words long. Presumably, the two essays should complement each other. Granted, my essay is about 700 words, so it is longer than some, but it is also shorter than others. Start revising your essay as though you wanted to cut down to ~500 words and see where you end up. If you end up with less than 970 but sound pithy, that may be a good thing.</p>
<p>At 970, every word and the essay better be fabulous. Odds are that there are extraneous details that could be trimmed.</p>
<p>The two essays that my daughter sent in last year were 500 and 564. Believe me it does take work to trim an essay. D start by “just writing” and then worried about the word count later. I think that those two essays each started out in the 750 word range and i would say that the “trimming” process took about a week on each. But I will say that her final essays were of higher quality than her originals.</p>
<p>I am submitted four essays as part of my application - 3 as part of the application and a fourth as a creative writing supplement. All, excluding the latter, showed different facets of myself as an individual yet tied the subject matter into my academic and career interest of medicine.</p>
<p>CommonApp: 789 words
Supplement to the CommonApp:1,300 words
Havard Supplement: 800 words
Creative Writing Supplement: 1,144 words</p>
<p>The first three, I would assume, could be read within 4 minutes apiece and show considerable thought and reflection so I don’t necessarily believe that the adcom will be “annoyed” by having to read one additional essay or spending an extra minute or two on each. My essays are concise despite their lengths which will be somewhat of a problem when I attempt to reconstruct the third essay for Yale. But writing is a personal strength and pleasure of mine and something that I wanted to emphasize.</p>
<p>Thanks everyone! I deleted everything that wasn’t ABSOLUTELY vital. Um I’ve got it down to 911 words, 5,200 characters.
I guess I’ll send it…</p>
<p>Let it rest a bit then go cut some more. Be brutal!</p>
<p>There is a supplement essay to the common app?! Where?!</p>
<p>Can someone pretty please review my essay?
:)</p>
<p>1000 is almost always too long. I bet you could cut out at least 25% of it.</p>
<p>I agree with the previous post. Even at 911 words it is too long. The problem is not that a long essay is necessarily bad; the main issues are:
- A long rambling essay suggests the applicant is lacking in sense and judiciousness, unable to discern what is worthy to include and what is not.
- The longer the essay the greater the chance the admissions officer, who will likely have read many like it, will be turned off by it, and will consequently adjudge your entire package from a more negative perspective.</p>
<p>Make some cuts. Be harsh on yourself. In the end it must be your choice what to cut and what not to cut, so don’t rely on others to recommend cuts.</p>
<p>Ill look at it, its good to have an outside opinion. PM me the revised version. I agree it needs to be a bit shorter</p>
<p>what supplement to common app???
I thought only specific colleges have supplement essays?</p>
<p>^I attached an additional essay to the Additional Information section in the CommonApp. It is far from mandatory, of course.</p>