Tons of Application Tips for Seniors!

Applying to College Admission Stories
1

I made a note on Facebook for all of my scared senior friends and figured I might as well share it on CC as well.

Summer
-It’s already August, but it’s not too late to look for volunteer opportunities or some sort of continuous activity to do for the rest of senior year. Look for something that reflects your interests. If music has been a key part of your high school career, make sure to exploit that!

-RESEARCH YOUR SCHOOLS. This is seriously the MOST important aspect when it comes to applying. Find out the little quirks that make the school unique - the stuff you won’t find on ranking sites like US News. Things that the students there would tell you about - cool traditions, student activities, the local atmosphere…
Some college websites are fantastic for this, like CP (particularly their “Best of” and “Inside scoop” sections. And of course the student reviews)

-Start outlining your rough draft for the common app essay. Make a list of points you want to emphasize. This doesn’t work for everyone, but for me I focused heavily on one specific aspect of my high school career (art), and breifly mentioned my less-meaningful activities. There’s a whole Activities section to elaborate on the others. Also don’t be afraid to admit failure, as long as you grew from it.

Fall
-Prioritize college apps. You will have the rest of senior year to go crazy with your friends. That’s not to say don’t hang out, just keep a healthy balance.

-Continue researching your schools. Really start to solidify what you’re looking for. A lot of people pick their college list based on national rankings. While that can be a factor, it should not be ALL you’re looking for. Look at the school’s strengths and weaknesses. If you’re a huge soccer player you may not be too happy at NYU.

-Draft essays! Don’t be afraid to completely scrap them if you get a better idea or if it’s just not working, even if you’ve spent hours/days on it.

-Get people to proofread! Teachers, family, and friends that are already in college are good choices.

-Take breaks from your essay (between a day to a week). Don’t rush it.

-Make a generalized resume with sections in sports, art, music, community service, whatever, it’ll help when you have to fill in the info over and over again.

Applications
-Don’t make your common app essay too long!! While there’s no length limit, admission officers really don’t want to read much more than 1000 words. They have finite time for thousands of applications. So an eight-page application generally won’t fly too well.

-Give your essay a voice. Don’t regurgitate a list of your accomplishments, and don’t thesaurus every other adjective.
For me personally, anecdote-style essays were very effective (where I used an event/story from personal experience as the basis of my essay)

-Cater specifically to the school you are applying for.
Many schools have short responses that are not their main essay - those are prime opportunities to show that you’ve done your research and are legitamately interested in that school.

-Don’t be afraid to recycle supplement essays, as long as they fit the prompt.

-If offered, don’t take the “Make your own prompt” option unless you have something REALLY unique in mind.

-Don’t worry too much about interviews. But do keep in mind that they can hurt you if you have a terrible one… but you should all be fine as long as you don’t recite a monologue about yourself the whole time. There should be dialogue. Interviewers are voluntary and genuinely enjoy talking to and learning about applicants. Also, do not turn down an interview!

On Supplementary Materials:
Submit supplementary materials if you are good. Not okay, not mediocre, but good (or better). Get honest opinions on your work to make sure they are worthy of submission. Colleges do not like receiving average supplements - it gives them the impression that you think you’re awesome at something you’re not actually that great at. It sounds harsh and many people will tell you to submit as much as you can, but I’ve talked to admission officers and a bad resume can really hurt you. That being said, you still have plenty of time to put together a kickass supplement. So don’t worry :slight_smile:

GOOD LUCK EVERYONE! And graduated seniors, feel free to add your own insight :slight_smile:

2

Thanks for the tips!
I have one question. Do you suggest using the same essay for all the common apps? Or should I write two or more essays and send them into different schools? It might also help to know that I am planning on applying to some schools that do not have supplemental essays on their common app supplements.
By the way, the common app essay now has a 250-500 word limit. New change this year.

3

The purpose of the common app essay is to submit the same one to all of your schools. Common app specifically states not to submit different essays to different schools. Schools who want a tailored statement will ask for a supplement.

4

^The above poster is correct.

Furthermore, the 250-500 word “limit” is not an actual limit; it is simply a guideline. I’ve contacted Common App about this and they assured me that they do not have the software to limit the amount of words on thousands of uploaded documents.

That said, I wouldn’t advise going over 800; 500-750 at MOST seems like a good range, from what I’ve read, heard, and experienced.

5

It is a “mandatory instruction” as stated by an official CommonApp rep: <a href=“http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/common-application/1158222-common-app-class-2012-a-11.html#post13012491[/url]”>http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/common-application/1158222-common-app-class-2012-a-11.html#post13012491&lt;/a&gt;

6

Although you could technically go over 500 words making it a guideline, I don’t think it would be difficult for colleges to figure out exactly how many words are in your essay, and I don’t know what their consequences would be for going over the limit

7

I still haven’t figured out why everybody wants to find out if they can “sneak” over the limit. Everybody has the same 500-word limit/guideline and it’s certainly doable. If you have so much to say, there’s surely plenty of stuff you can cut out. I didn’t think I could get my essay shorter than 650 words, but every couple of days I’d go back and re-read it, cutting out unnecessary things and finding more concise ways of stating the same message. Ultimately, if you can’t get it short enough no matter what, write a new essay.

If you can’t manage to write a 500-word essay, you have to wonder… are you ready for college? Not just in writing ability, but in the ability to follow a simple guideline…

8

^You’re referencing “commonappguy?”
Here’s my response: <a href=“http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/college-essays/1156079-common-application-essay-length-500-words-not-strict-cut-off.html[/url]”>http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/college-essays/1156079-common-application-essay-length-500-words-not-strict-cut-off.html&lt;/a&gt;
I don’t think such a pretentious response on your part was warranted.

9

Yes. Is that a problem? He has an official title under his username in case you didn’t notice: “Common App Tech Support”

You’d think the technical support guy would know what he’s talking about? Forgive me for trusting an official resource.

10

[Common</a> Application sets 500-word limit on main essay - The Answer Sheet - The Washington Post](<a href=“http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/answer-sheet/post/common-application-sets-500-word-limit-on-main-essay/2011/06/02/AGZg7WHH_blog.html]Common”>http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/answer-sheet/post/common-application-sets-500-word-limit-on-main-essay/2011/06/02/AGZg7WHH_blog.html)

11

Regardless, it’s not an actual limit in the sense that your response will be cut off after 500 words…admissions officers just don’t want to have to navigate through five pages of text.
If you’re fifty of seventy-five words over, I say don’t fret. Sure, look for things that you could cut out, but don’t do so unnecessarily.
Two pages, double-spaced, is a good guideline.

Furthermore, it seems like Scott Anderson has made contradictory statements regarding the wording:

-“After a four year experiment with no maximum essay size, we are simply returning to the practice of the prior 31 years in specifying a 500-word maximum…Since there is no magic number that would be acceptable to all, we returned to our historic 500 word limit, which allows an applicant approximately two double-spaced pages to express their thoughts and writing skills.”

-“When the new wording of the Common Application was published this spring, I wrote to Scott Anderson at the Common App, and he assured me that there is NO word limit on the main essay on the Common App, despite the wording of ‘250-500 words.’”

I honestly don’t know what to make of all of this, and will probably just end up contacting the schools I’m applying to in an attempt to decipher this.

12

The second quote you have seems to be from a secondary source whereas the first one seems to be from Scott Anderson himself. That’s the difference.

And this is exactly what my so-called pretentious post was referring to. Because the obvious option to just keep your essay at no more than 500 words is apparently a crime.

13

While I agree that it is a secondary source, it seems to be a valid secondary source at that.

And I don’t think it’s a crime, I just think it’s rather ridiculous. Why should you have to cut something down that isn’t an absurd length already (550-600 words) just to meet a limit imposed to stop rambling essays that lull on for pages and pages? I just think it goes against self-expression. Common App has imposed their limit on the extracurricular short answer; if they really, REALLY wanted a limit on the main essay, they would do the same.

I also doubt that highly regarded, creative, intellectually-based universities would cringe at the sight of an applicant marginally skimming over the limit by less than 100 words.

But again, it’s my opinion, no more. I don’t want you to think I have some personal vendetta against you for disagreeing with me, and I also don’t want you to think that I’m in fear of my own essay (it’s under 500 words). I’m just expressing my thoughts on the subject. People can feel free to take what I’ve said and run with it or ignore it completely.

14

I see your point, but then you could apply that argument to just about anything in the college admissions process. It’s also absurd that I have to take a ~3-hour test (SAT or ACT) to prove my competence and college-readiness (despite these being hardly accurate measures).

The key here being “AN applicant” … let 30,000 applicants go over by 100-150 words and you’ve increased the reading time by how much?

People are always going to want to go over the limit anyways; increase it to 1000, pretty soon you’ll have people finding ways to get their 1,200 word essay read.

I don’t. And I completely agree and am on the same page as you. :cool:

15

I’m absolutely with you on the standardized testing pains!

And I understand what you’re saying when it comes to one or two applicants bending the rules versus a handful, but will all 30,000 applicants (I assume you’re talking about one school?) have the standardized test scores and GPA’s to even have their applications considered, let alone their essays read? Probably not.

The point is, as you’ve mentioned, that people are going to do what they’re going to do, regardless of what you or I conclude dependently or independently.

16

Are you implying that they only read the essays if you make a first “cut” based solely on GPA standardized test scores? I never thought of that, but I really don’t think that’s how it works, though I honestly don’t have the slightest clue.

17

I think that, unfortunately, at the more elite universities, that’s how it works. I could be wrong though, as I’m certainly not an admissions officer. My thinking is that they’d probably still skim the essay to see if there’s anything breathtaking in there, but with less than a 3.5 GPA and a 30 ACT/2000 SAT, the applicant can’t really write anything to make up for the lackluster academic performance.

18

Again, I’m referencing (though I hate to take rankings with more than a grain of salt) the top 25 colleges according to USNWR, more or less.

19

“If offered, don’t take the ‘Make your own prompt’ option unless you have something REALLY unique in mind.”

^Could you explain that suggestion? Because I’m kind of leaning toward that…d:

20

Thank you so much. Those are very helpful tips.