<p>I'm having trouble writing a great "why-i-want-to-go-to-x-school" essay. Should I be really straightforward and literally say "I want to go to this school because...reason 1, 2, 3," or should I be nuanced and stylistic and write a crafty essay? Thanks for the advice!</p>
<p>in 2 of my essays I said the school im at just sucked</p>
<p>I always hated these kinds of questions. In my case, I discussed why I want to go to college, rather than why I wanted their specific university. This was necessarily in order to avoid false sincereity and true negativity. I suppose this might have been a bad idea... I don't know, maybe they want to know if you have some kind of strong affilition or deep desire for this particular school -- but I doubt that's what they really want. </p>
<p>It occured to me they want to see how well you handle dumb-assed questions. They might want to see how discreet/prudent you are. This is an easy question to answer poorly. </p>
<p>I can't think of a worse approach than saying your current school sucks. That's the kind of essay that gets a 4.0 GPA turned down.</p>
<p>This question is designed to detect those who have a genuine, specific need for transferring and to filter out those who participate in this process frivolously. </p>
<p>Also, this question aims to find those who need a particular school. Yale admits only 30 transfers and every adcom there insists that the essay is the single most important document. They need to know why you need--not want--to attend Yale, how you will benefit from it, how they will benefit from you being there, and how its important that you're there and not, say, Harvard, Brown, Dartmouth or another school which offers similar experiences.</p>
<p>How important is this particular essay in comparison to the rest of your application? Will it hurt your chances of being accepted if your "why-do-you-want-to-go-here" essay is mediocre, or your reason isn't all that convincing?</p>
<p>In addition, how long should your explanation be? a paragraph, two...etc? Does anyone know?....up40love?</p>
<p>Also, I'm applying to transfer into a particular program. Would I be pigeonholing myself and lowering my chances of getting in if the department website states...</p>
<p>"Any modification in the requirements (e.g. course substitutions) must be requested by the student no later than the first semester of their junior year. Course substitutions are not encouraged and must be brought to the attention of the Associate Director. If such a petition is granted, it is the student's responsibility to ensure the exception is entered on their Penn InTouch worksheet."</p>
<p>Any help would be great! Thanks!</p>
<p>Usually the length varies, check the application, it should specify.</p>