What are the type of reasons they want to hear for you liking their school?
They want to hear SINCERE reasons.
Yeah I know that but I don’t really know how to make it sound sincere, I’m working on one for Duke and the word limit is 150. I don’t really know how to make it not sound generic in 150 words.
@college82016 I had the same issue as you for the Why Duke essay, I submitted ED a few days ago. Just be honest, why is Duke the school for you? Add something personal to it as well, it is really tough to fit in just 150 words believe me but it’s possible. Good luck!
But don’t say “in case I am denied at Harvard, Yale and Princeton.”
While at a Swarthmore info session we were told that the “Why Swarthmore” essay should not work equally well if you substitute “Williams” or “Amherst” or “Vassar”. That is, it should show that you know what the school offers that is different from what its peer institutions offer.
Reasons that are unique to the school, as opposed to those shared with other more selective schools. Basically, so that it does not look like you are applying there as a backup behind some other school, or shotgunning applications to a bunch of similarly selective schools.
One approach is to check out what the faculty in the department you are most interested in are working on - their areas of research, the books they have written, the courses they offer. You can then indicate in your essay who on the faculty you’d most like to take classes from, do research with, get to know better, based on your specific interests.
If there are special programs offered by the department(s) you are most interested in, then by all means mention those specifically as well.
The point of these essays is to demonstrate the you know something about what the school has to offer beyond the obvious and why it’s a good fit with your interests and aspirations.
Well, why DO you want to go to Duke? If your only answer is the “brand” prestige, then that will not serve you well in such a competitive environment. Have you bothered to learn anything about the school, its traditions, its particular culture, or its surrounding community? Why should they consider you if you haven’t taken the trouble to look as them as more than a status label? There is no single correct answer. It is perfectly valid to say that you are a longtime NCAA Basketball fan, and you want a school that is not too huge, has world-class academic offerings, and is an athletic powerhouse. That answer would hardly distinguish you from other applicants, but it would at least demonstrate that you didn’t simply pull their name from the USNWR rankings.
Something unique/specific to the school and to you that can fit in the space allotted. There is no “one answer fits all”.
When my son was applying to Tufts he figured every other kid who looked like him would talk about International Relations and active citizenship. The year he applied they only wanted 50 words, so he talked about how he like how often instead of putting up flyers, many Tufts events were advertised by chalking the sidewalks. He also wrote a couple of essays that started with all the reasons he didn’t think it was the right school - at first.(U of Chicago isn’t on a coast, Vassar was smaller than his high school, etc.)