I’m not sure how I skipped over the description of how long each response should be. Would it be worth it to contact the school and ask if I could upload new essays? Each of my responses were extremely short compared to the required 200, not just by a few words.
The word count is a maximum. You are probably fine. How many words in the essays you submitted?
An important thing isn’t the length but the content. These essays are often a proxy schools use to reveal interest in attending. Some schools look at demonstrated interest but that is unreliable since it is easily gamed by knowledgeable applicants and may favor the affluent.
By putting unique essay and short answer prompts that only they have asked a school can gauge how much you really care since you can’t recycle ones you used elsewhere. A student dreaming of the school will spend as much time and care on these as they did on the Common App essays. By contrast if they read choppy and poorly written as if the student rushed thru them that is a tell. And of course this is also why when the essays are labeled “optional” they aren’t really.
Look back again at the word requirement. Was it 200 max or was 200 the minimum? If it was the minimum then a much shorter essay may send a poor message about your interest in the school(s).
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