<p>Tom,
No, I don’t think you have to write a whole new essay for each college. The core reasons for transferring will likely be the same for all schools, but it would be good to add a few specific examples of “Why college X?” for each school.</p>
<p>kor,
Like I told tom, you’ll have a basic part of your essay that applies to all schools and then perhaps a paragraph to address why you want to transfer to a specific school. You replace this part each time and insert the paragraph for another school. For instance, if you’re looking for a school with more of a community feel than the school you’re currently attending you might tell Rice that their residential colleges are particularly appealing to you, while at another school you would mention another factor.</p>
<p>At a presentation about essays last year by an adcom, they thought about 500-700 words was a good length for the regular (fr) CA essay. I’d say 1000 words at an absolute maximum, less if possible. My Ds a couple of years ago was about 500.</p>
<p>Hope that helps, let me know if you have any other questions.</p>
<p>Oh i see…thank you entomom. That helped alot. </p>
<p>So i have the basic reason why i want to transfer that can be applied to all the colleges I am applying to. But if i mention different schools in the essay…wouldnt that be weird to the other college? For example, if i mention why i would like to attend pepperdine in the essay, then LMU would look at that too. what i am asking is, is it safe to mention the names of the schools i am applying to in the essay for every college to see…?</p>
<p>But if we can make ‘alternate versions’ of the CA essays, then can’t we just make separate essays for each school? okay this is all really confusing me >.< sorry lol.</p>
<p>This is my situation, I am applying to three schools. And idk whether to mention all my colleges in the main transfer essay, or do that alternate thing. Not really sure how that works. I read the instructions though. Don’t know if i should risk it…</p>
<p>No, you absolutely don’t want to mention other schools in your essay. You can either modify a basic essay OR put in a whole new essay.</p>
<p>For example, you should be able to:</p>
<ol>
<li><p>Make a version for Pepp that includes your basic reason and your specifics for Pepp. Send this to Pepp.</p></li>
<li><p>Follow steps 2 & 3 on the CA support page that I gave where you will establish a replicate the information from your Pepp version; call this version LMU.</p></li>
<li><p>You can then edit your essay to take out the Pepp specific stuff and insert the part for LMU. Or, you can put in a completely separate essay if that’s what you want to do. And this might be the best way if you want to emphasize different reasons for transferring for different schools. For instance, one school might be better because it’s smaller than your current one, while another might be better because it has better academics in your field, I can see where your basic essay might be very different for these two schools. The point is that you can modify anything in the CA you like with the different versions that you create.</p></li>
</ol>
<p>I was unaware that i can edit the information because my senior year in hs when i was applying, i sent a Boston University specific essay thinking that i could edit my LMU and other colleges. Unfortunately, I didn’t know i could so i ended up sending LMU the BU essay which totally screwed me up. </p>
<p>But yeah, sorry so much questions lol…just trying to make sure about everything. So its OKAY to mention the name Pepperdine IF i send that one to Pepp right? And okay to mention the name LMU if that one is being sent to LMU and so on. Can I still make alternate versions if I am uploading a document on the CA? Or does it have to be only the ones that you do not upload? </p>
<p>You’re welcome! Ask away, it isn’t the most straightforward process, so it always helps to get feedback.</p>
<p>Yes, it’s fine to mention the name of the school, just make sure you double check and that you’re sending the one with Pepp mentioned to Pepp and not LMU ;)! It has happened, so be careful.</p>
<p>I think the alternate will be just like the original that you use, so it will have the uploaded document if the original did. I don’t know that for sure because I haven’t done it personally. Try it, and if the uploaded document isn’t in the alternate, you should be able to either upload or copy and paste it in.</p>
<p>entomom -
i have just realized this, but the main transfer essay’s question is “what are your reasons for transferring and what objectives do you hope to achieve?” </p>
<p>It doesn’t ask “why school X?”. So are you sure that it is okay for me to put reasons why i would like to transfer to pepperdine specifically?</p>
<p>Also, some colleges ask that i put down other colleges that i am also applying to. So for example, in the CA supplement for chapman, it says to provide the other schools that i am applying to other than chapman. Is this mandatory? What if i leave it blank…is there a way they can find out? Through fafsa?</p>
<p>If the school you are applying to does not have a supplemental essay that asks “Why do you want to attend?”, then you should put some specifics of why you want to attend that school in the main CA transfer essay. It shouldn’t be the majority of your essay, but you should show that you know something about the school. It really fits under the “what objectives to you hope to achieve?” part of the CA transfer essay, there should be something about the school you are applying to that will help you to reach your objectives.</p>
<p>Some schools ask this question, which is a pain, but I really don’t think it’s important. It’s less to judge you individually that for the school to gain data about what other colleges they compete for students with. I have heard that colleges are able to see who else you list on your FAFSA form. I’d just fill it in and not worry about it, these schools know that a student needs to apply to several schools in order to have a good chance at acceptance by at least one of them. There are a couple of schools that are sensitive to playing safety to the most selective schools, but they are few and I don’t think you have anything to worry about.</p>
<p>Its just that…my concern was, for example, what if i put things like this in the Chapman essay, “I want to work with big internships in Los Angeles…” and so on. But if they see that i also applied to University of San Francisco or BU, wouldn’t that be kind of contradicting?..</p>
<p>Also, this is off topic, but do you happen to know if the Public relations major at chapman is just as competitive as their film? Because they are in the same department…(dodge), and both require a department application additional to the CA app.</p>
<p>I don’t really think that they are contradictory, unless one believes that there is only one right school for each applicant. The fact is that within the 3k or so colleges in the country, there is some sub-set of colleges which will satisfy your needs, each with it’s strengths, which is what you’re pointing out in your essay. And with the schools you mentioned, all are consistently in larger cities which would provide the types of opportunities that you say you are seeking. For any one of those schools, you could go further to elaborate about a specific program the have that you’re interested in or discuss some other aspect that you like about the college (social, academic, EC, etc.). If I were the adcom at a small LAC in the middle of Maine where you were applying with the same reasons for transferring, that would stand out to me as anomalous.</p>
<p>It’s really not a crime to like and apply to several schools, colleges will not take offense that you are looking at other options, it’s just a fact of life to them.</p>
<p>I’m afraid I don’t know about PR vs. film. I suggest you start threads on the Chapman subforum, the Visual Arts & Film Majors subforum on the College Search & Selection forum to ask your question.</p>
<p>Ahh I totally understand. I was just afraid that they would be so close minded…but yes i see now. Thank you so much for the help entomom. your willingness to assist is much appreciated.</p>
<p>I’ve been reading though and I just have a quick question. In my freshman year I didn’t do as well as I wanted resulting in an ok GPA. I plan to apply for fall of next year to some schools and I was wondering if they will look harder at the fact that I am doing better in my sophomore year (upward trend) than they would at an overall GPA? Or will they just look at core classes for my major?</p>
<p>You said to put in specifics in the main CA transfer essay for the college im applying to IF they do not ask why i want to attend in their supplement. But can i still put in specifics of the school if in their supplement they DO ask why i want to attend, but it only allows me to write like 100 characters, seriously. how do they expect me to explain that in 2 sentences? </p>
<p>What about if in the supplement, they ask things like “what steps have you taken to learn more about us?”. its not really asking why i want to attend, so would it be okay for me to put in specifics in the main CA transfer essay, or i can ONLY put in specifics in the main essay if they do not ask any essay questions at all in their supplement…?</p>
<p>Unless they’re a strictly “by the numbers” school, they will probably assess your gpa in all of the ways you’ve described.</p>
<p>korhawaus,
The instructions I gave were a generality that fits what many schools ask transfer applicants. </p>
<p>Yes, you can definitely switch where you put college specifics depending on how the school asks their supplemental questions. You should absolutely address specific questions that the schools ask (like the “what steps”) in their supplement and then put your other comments in the main CA essay if necessary due to word limits. The key is to get both generalities on why you want to transfer as well as specifics about each school on to your application somewhere, it doesn’t matter where this information ends up.</p>
<p>I have a questions about choosing classes that may do good for us in transfering process. </p>
<p>I’m currently at Linfield, a Liberal Arts college. At my school, students are encouraged to take a wide variety of courses to discover ourselves. Would that be good for transfering? Should I do that or should I focus on courses of one or two majors I’m interested; so that I can show my transfering school that I have a real aim in my college study?</p>
<p>your thread is really great.</p>
<p>Thank you so much.</p>
<p>P/s: I’m sorry if this is a repeated question.</p>
<p>Hi link and welcome to CC! Yes, I know Linfield, it’s just up the highway from where I live.</p>
<p>I’m afraid there’s no set answer for your question. </p>
<p>If you’re not sure what you’re interested in right now, I think it’s a good idea to keep exploring as you will be fulfilling distributional requirements while doing so and hopefully will have a better idea of what you want to major in when you transfer since you won’t have much time to take a range of courses at that point. What you should be doing while you’re taking different classes is to be aware of class size (probably not much of a problem at Linfield) and the prof teaching the course, as you want to be able to get to know instructors well so that you’ll have great LORs when you apply to transfer. That said, I don’t think it’s wise to have 2 years full of just survey courses, but it would be shortsighted to restrict yourself too much now, and later end up getting a degree in something you’re not really thrilled about.</p>
<p>If you do have some idea what you’d like to study, then it always helps to take some rigorous classes and show that you are able to earn good grades in upper division courses. Of course the same applies about profs, try to get to know a couple well.</p>
<p>I kind of have an idea what I wanna do right now. I’m really into Interational Politics and Economics. If I stay at Linfield, I will probably double major in these two. I’m taking an Econ 210 Class this term and A politic class next term. </p>
<p>I’ve just gone through the admission process to college last year and it kind of really overwhelmed. At first, it seemed like there’s no source of information and then I ended up being in too much information. </p>
<p>How can I really avoid that? Especially now that I’m a college student already, which is an evidence of growth and maturity. (asking this question is not really mature though LoL). </p>
<p>You can’t believe how relived I am to find CC and this thread!</p>
</p>