<p>Is there only one application essay- tell us something about yourself? I always thought there would be another one asking why I would like to attend Columbia... did they remove it this year?</p>
<p>There is an essay asking why you would like to attend Columbia, but it's meant to be much shorter and is part of the general application form.</p>
<p>Yeah, it's in there... It's kinda shortish, only about 7 lines.</p>
<p>Why DO you want to attend Columbia?</p>
<p>Although the "why Columbia" essay is somewhat short, it's probably almost as important, if not as important, as the main essay. They're looking for a bunch of things in the "why Columbia" essay, including people who want to come to Columbia for what they feel are the "wrong" reasons, such as "because Columbia's in NYC."</p>
<p>That's not entirely true. One of the major things Columbia looks for in the application is whether or not they think a person "can hack it" in the city, and whether he or she will be able to use the city's resources to further his or her education. So I would obviously mention the city, but not in the sense that one would like to be there in order to go shopping in Soho, but to visit the museums and concert halls as part of the Music and Art Hum curricula, or to visit ethnic neighborhoods as part of an anthropology project, or jazz clubs if one is studying jazz (there is a class that actually requires students to go to something like 12 jazz clubs).</p>
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including people who want to come to Columbia for what they feel are the "wrong" reasons, such as "because Columbia's in NYC."
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<p>I wrote two sentences about Columbia being in NY in my "who columbia" essay..(i'm not going to reproduce them here for fear of blatant copying)</p>
<p>Also, if you've noticed, columbia really prides itself on being in NYC and thats why they have it in the name and will point that out to you if they get the chance....so "because its in new york" is actually a good reason</p>
<p>That's true that Columbia prides itself on being in New York, exemplefied by the whole "Columbia University in the City of New York" title. However, when I went to their tour/information session, one of the adcoms talked about how they would rather applicants stayed away from the NYC reason, and mentioned something about how people could apply to NYU and a few other colleges in the city if their main reason for applying to Columbia was they wanted to go to school in NYC. So although it may be okay to include the city in the "why Columbia," from what I've heard it definitely shouldn't be a main reason.</p>
<p>yeah, the NYC answer is probably the most generic response</p>
<p>i agree with columbia 2010. they don't want it to be the main reason, but they probably want to know that you're prepared for it. it might be better if you are more specific than just nyc- talk about internships, diversity, etc. in balance with other reasons. go on the columbia website and find something really, really specific about the college, so that they think that you're reading all their stuff- mention a research project that a certain professor is conducting, or a certain class, or something like that so that they know that you know what you're talking about. wow that was a long sentence.</p>
<p>If you aren't actually applying to Columbia for reasons specific to the school and only look up attributes of the college in order to impress the adcom, you're applying to the wrong place. Students whose sole goal is to get a good education in Manhattan should stick with NYU; such people are generally unhappy with or dismissive of Morningside Heights anyway. "Ivy in New York" is an insufficient reason to attend- both for Columbia admissions and yourself.</p>
<p>i just meant that it is better to be very specific about a particular research project as an attraction than to say "research opportunities." i didn't mean that the reason should be fake, just not generic.</p>