<p>So now that I've been on break I've been working on drafts of my "Why transfer?" essay for the Common App, but when I started thinking about some of the school-specific reasons certain apps asked for I started to noticed redundancies between the two essays. I'm not sure how to approach this since repeating the same things won't be showing the adcom very much (and I'd look pretty lazy), but I've geared the schools I'm considering to match the reasons for transferring so this was bound to happen. Do I reference my "Why transfer?" essay in the "Why (school)?" essay and get far more detailed into the specifics or should both essays talk about the school? Hopefully this question doesn't sound too silly. I'm just not quite sure what readers expect to see in the Why transfer essay versus the one for their specific school (without having one be broad and the other very focused, which I think may be the most sensible option?).</p>
<p>i'm wondering the same thing. some insight would be awesome</p>
<p>I just filled this out on my app. basically i looked at it this way:</p>
<p>Why transfer- I wrote reasons why my CURRENT school wasn't fulfilling all of my needs (academics, specific majors/programs, etc.)</p>
<p>Why (this school)- I wrote reasons why the school i am applying to FULFILLS my needs (has my major, certain programs i want to take advantage of, etc.)</p>
<p>Thats pretty much what i got from it and wrote off of...</p>
<p>How were you able to mention your current school's academics without sounding negative?</p>
<p>from the Official Transferring to UVa Blog:</p>
<p>While I'll admit that these [two questions] are sort of similar, [the short answer] one asks more about why you want to transfer and what you see yourself doing here. The other asks what you see yourself doing with the degree. Take your time with these and they'll make more sense.</p>
<p>This cleared it up for me...hope this helps!</p>
<p>On a similar note, what would standard protocol be (if one exists) for the schools that don't have a "Why (this school?)" essay in their supplement/any supplement at all? The Why Transfer? essay can't change so you can't get specific about one school without the other schools seeing it. Thankfully the schools I'm applying to match up with my reasons for transferring so the reader might get a broad sense as to why I'm interested in attending, but I feel like it might be nice to have some acute reasons for going to the specific school.</p>
<p>re post #6... you can be very specific about school A. Then send off/submit the Common App to School A. THEN you can re-do the essay, very specifically for School B. Send off to School B. Repeat.</p>