<p>The Common Application website says that the Common App transfer essay ("Please provide a statement that addresses your reasons for transferring and the objectives you hope to achieve. (250-650 words)") that you can't customize the essay to particular schools. But when you're transferring, shouldn't your essay be about positive, specific details about the school you are applying to? Does anyone know the rules around this? Are they saying you shouldn't customize the essay or that you simply have to make another version if you want to customize it. Surely you should customize this essay to each school you are applying to? Does anyone know the policies on this essay?</p>
<p>I’ve said this many times before, but I will repeat it for applicants during this cycle.</p>
<p>Yes, the CA states that you shouldn’t change essays between different versions. Although the decision to change essays or not is up to each applicant, I advocate for customizing essays as necessary because:</p>
<ol>
<li><p>The purpose of the CA is to facilitate the process for the applicant and schools, not create their own set of restrictions.</p></li>
<li><p>Colleges could care less if you send a different essay to them than you did to another school, as a matter of fact, I think they’d prefer it to a generic essay. This is particularly true for the transfer essay which is much more school-centric than the fr prompts.</p></li>
<li><p>Transfer supplements vary greatly and not all schools have a Why College X? question. Telling a college what makes them a good choice for you is extremely important for transfers and this isn’t always possible if you don’t customize the main CA essay.</p></li>
</ol>
<p>So, my recommendation is to:</p>
<ol>
<li><p>Write a general main CA transfer essay for schools that have a Why College X? question in their supplement.</p></li>
<li><p>Write customized main CA transfer essays for schools that don’t have a Why College X? question in their supplement.</p></li>
</ol>
<p>Again, it is up to each applicant to decide. However, I can say that many fr and transfer applicants customize their essays in alternate versions of the CA, including my kids, and I have never heard of any problems with either the CA or the colleges.</p>
<p>You should never make multiple CA accounts. Once you submit an application to one school, you follow the directions to make alternate versions (I’d give a link, but I keep getting error messages from the CA).</p>
<p>Thank you for your responses! @entomom I appreciate you repeating your information on the Common App transfer essay- I realize that you probably get this question quite often. What you said was very helpful, and makes a lot of sense. Thanks again!</p>
<p>I would only augment Entomom’s advice to say that if a college doesn’t have a supplement (like Vanderbilt) and you don’t customize your CA essay, many admissions counselors are open to an additional “Why this college” personalized short essay. You would, of course, want to inquire to the college is this is acceptable to them.</p>