Questions about art supplements

I’ve read it can negatively impact your application, but how do I tell how good it is? I take pictures for fun so I’ve never really submitted them to a competition or anything, but I’ve looked at some winners from things like young arts and nat geo competitions and I think I’m as good or just below them, but of course it’s impossible for me to objectively look at my own work.

Is emailing a professor at the university a good way for me to get an objective opinion, or should I not do that? Also, is there any point to submitting the supplement when I’m mainly STEM focused and talk about photography only a little about my app (mentioned in certain ECs)?

If it’s good enough for an art school, submit. If not, don’t. Get an objective opinion from a local art teacher. Do not ask an MIT prof.

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Thanks for the answer. Would you recommend submitting if photography isn’t a large part of my application at all, and would it fall under that saying “the thicker the file, the thicker the kid?”

I don’t know you. Nor have I seen your application or portfolio. That said, if I had to guess, I would say the latter.

I would recommend uploading it. We can never know what could catch the eyes of the admission officers; some people I know that went to Stanford ran big non profit organizations, but what really interested the admission officers was his 7th or 8th activity in the application. So, you never know how impactful the photos could be.