January 1 (Early Decision II)
College-Specific Requirements: Not all Common App schools have the same writing, testing, essay, and letter of recommendation requirements. For example, if you’re applying early action to Stanford, you should know that October is the last acceptable SAT test date and September is the last acceptable ACT test date. Make sure you’ve done your research!
Financial Aid: The financial aid process is separate from submitting your Common App (and has different deadlines!). Learn everything you need to know about financial aid .
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Your chance of acceptance, your chancing factors, extracurriculars, common app essay vs supplement: which carries more weight.
Hey everyone, stressing a bit here. I've been working on my Common App essay and it’s coming along, but I just started looking at the supplements for the schools on my list. So, I gotta know, how important are those supplements compared to my main personal statement? Should I be putting just as much effort into those? Thanks!
The short answer is that both are crucial components of your application, as they play different roles in creating a comprehensive picture of who you are. For most schools, the Common App essay is a chance to see your personality and values at a high level. It's the only essay every college you apply to through the Common App will see, which is why it's so important. Since you're not catering your response to any one school or group of schools, what you say is entirely up to you, and that freedom means schools can learn a lot about you based on what you choose to include.
Supplements, on the other hand, are a way for colleges to gauge your interest in their specific institution and to determine how you might fit into their community. While there are certain values like intellectual curiosity, open-mindedness, and altruism that all colleges value, each school also has its own set of criteria that it looks for in applicants, which can vary slightly from one institution to another.
Ideally, you should put equal effort into crafting both your Common App essay and your supplemental essays. You also want to make sure you aren't repeating yourself in your responses—if you wrote your Common App essay about volunteering at your local animal shelter, and you have to write a supplement about an extracurricular activity, you should probably write about something else, so that admissions officers learn something completely new about you from your response.
If you want help with any school's particular supplemental essays, you can check out CollegeVine's essay breakdowns on our blog. Best of luck!
CollegeVine’s Q&A seeks to offer informed perspectives on commonly asked admissions questions. Every answer is refined and validated by our team of admissions experts to ensure it resonates with trusted knowledge in the field.
Published August 01, 2024
Billy Sichel
Assistant Vice President of Undergraduate Admissions
It’s August 1st and that means the application at NYU has officially opened. This year, we’ve made some pretty big changes to NYU’s Common Application to simplify the process for our applicants, and to help us learn a little more about you!
When you start NYU’s member questions on the Common App, you’ll see 6 sections that you’ll need to complete. We give you a little bit of a head start by checking off the “Writing” section. This section is optional – but also new and exciting! More on that later.
In the “General” section, you’ll be asked a few questions about how you want us to handle your application – Early Decision I, Early Decision II, or Regular Decision? – and which campus you want to apply to. As you (hopefully!) already know, NYU has three degree-granting campuses: in New York, Abu Dhabi, and Shanghai. Our Common App will let you apply to any combination of our campuses.
Once you make your campus selections, an additional set of questions will show up that are specific to your campus(es) of interest. Nothing too tricky here! You’ll be able to tell us about your academic area of interest for each campus, and a few other quick-and-easy questions about program eligibility, housing preferences, etc. so that we’re ready for you if you are ultimately admitted.
Once you have those sections squared away, you’ll move on to the Academics section. This section will walk you through the information we’ll need you to submit outside of the Common App itself. Nothing to do here, except confirm that you’re clear on the next steps and additional requirements.
Now, the moment you’ve been waiting for: The optional, pre-checked-off Writing section. Last year, we made the decision to update our supplemental question. However, what we heard from our applicants was that people really wanted to tell us more! But the thing is…we already know why NYU is a great place to spend your 4 years, so we thought: if you want to tell us more about your passion for NYU, let’s make the question about you .
The new writing question says:
“In a world where disconnection seems to often prevail, we are looking for students who embody the qualities of bridge builders—students who can connect people, groups, and ideas to span divides, foster understanding, and promote collaboration within a dynamic, interconnected, and vibrant global academic community. We are eager to understand how your experiences have prepared you to build the bridges of the future. Please consider one or more of the following questions in your essay :
What personal experiences or challenges have shaped you as a bridge builder?
How have you been a bridge builder in your school, community, or personal life?
What specific actions have you taken to build bridges between diverse groups, ideas, or cultures?
How do you envision being a bridge builder during your time at our university and beyond?”
So, if it feels right for you to tell us a little more about yourself in the application, we want to know where you will turn to for inspiration, and what experiences have shaped you and resonate with you. Four years at NYU will propel you into a future you might not even be able to imagine yet, but take a minute (if you want – it really is optional!) to tell us about the ideas that have gotten you to this point, and those that might shape you into the person you’re about to become.
These are just a few of the changes we have made this year, so make sure to carefully read each question carefully before you answer them. If you ever have any questions for us about our questions, we are always here to help . We wish you the best of luck this application season, and can’t wait to learn more about you!
More from Billy:
There’s no wrong way to approach the Common Application, but here’s two different strategies you might want to choose from when you apply to NYU.
Everything you need and everything you need to know about the transfer process.
There are many benefits to getting an early start on your Common Application to NYU.
Writing the college essay
How do you write a letter to a friend that shows you’re a good candidate for the University of Pennsylvania? What reading list will help the Columbia University admissions committee understand your interdisciplinary interests? How can you convey your desire to attend Yale by inventing a course description for a topic you’re interested in studying?
These are the challenges students must overcome when writing their supplemental essays . Supplemental essays are a critical component of college applications—like the personal statement, they provide students with the opportunity to showcase their authentic voice and perspective beyond the quantitative elements of their applications. However, unlike the personal essay, supplemental essays allow colleges to read students’ responses to targeted prompts and evaluate their candidacy for their specific institution. For this reason, supplemental essay prompts are often abstract, requiring students to get creative, read between the lines, and ditch the traditional essay-writing format when crafting their responses.
While many schools simply want to know “why do you want to attend our school?” others break the mold, inviting students to think outside of the box and answer prompts that are original, head-scratching, or downright weird. This year, the following five colleges pushed students to get creative—if you’re struggling to rise to the challenge, here are some tips for tackling their unique prompts:
University of Chicago
Prompt: We’re all familiar with green-eyed envy or feeling blue, but what about being “caught purple-handed”? Or “tickled orange”? Give an old color-infused expression a new hue and tell us what it represents. – Inspired by Ramsey Bottorff, Class of 2026
What Makes it Unique: No discussion of unique supplemental essay prompts would be complete without mentioning the University of Chicago, a school notorious for its puzzling and original prompts (perhaps the most well-known of these has been the recurring prompt “Find x”). This prompt challenges you to invent a new color-based expression, encouraging both linguistic creativity and a deep dive into the emotional or cultural connotations of color. It’s a prompt that allows you to play with language, think abstractly, and show off your ability to forge connections between concepts that aren’t typically linked—all qualities that likewise demonstrate your preparedness for UChicago’s unique academic environment.
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How to Answer it: While it may be easy to get distracted by the open-ended nature of the prompt, remember that both the substance and structure of your response should give some insight into your personality, perspective, and characteristics. With this in mind, begin by considering the emotions, experiences, or ideas that most resonate with you. Then, use your imagination to consider how a specific color could represent that feeling or concept. Remember that the prompt is ultimately an opportunity to showcase your creativity and original way of looking at the world, so your explanation does not need to be unnecessarily deep or complex—if you have a playful personality, convey your playfulness in your response; if you are known for your sarcasm, consider how you can weave in your biting wit; if you are an amateur poet, consider how you might take inspiration from poetry as you write, or offer a response in the form of a poem.
The goal is to take a familiar concept and turn it into something new and meaningful through a creative lens. Use this essay to showcase your ability to think inventively and to draw surprising connections between language and life.
Harvard University
Prompt: Top 3 things your roommates might like to know about you.
What Makes it Unique: This prompt is unique in both form and substance—first, you only have 150 words to write about all 3 things. Consider using a form other than a traditional essay or short answer response, such as a bullet list or short letter. Additionally, note that the things your roommate might like to learn about you do not necessarily overlap with the things you would traditionally share with an admissions committee. The aim of the prompt is to get to know your quirks and foibles—who are you as a person and a friend? What distinguishes you outside of academics and accolades?
How to Answer it: First and foremost, feel free to get creative with your response to this prompt. While you are producing a supplemental essay and thus a professional piece of writing, the prompt invites you to share more personal qualities, and you should aim to demonstrate your unique characteristics in your own voice. Consider things such as: How would your friends describe you? What funny stories do your parents and siblings share that encapsulate your personality? Or, consider what someone might want to know about living with you: do you snore? Do you have a collection of vintage posters? Are you particularly fastidious? While these may seem like trivial things to mention, the true creativity is in how you connect these qualities to deeper truths about yourself—perhaps your sleepwalking is consistent with your reputation for being the first to raise your hand in class or speak up about a cause you’re passionate about. Perhaps your living conditions are a metaphor for how your brain works—though it looks like a mess to everyone else, you have a place for everything and know exactly where to find it. Whatever qualities you choose, embrace the opportunity to think outside of the box and showcase something that admissions officers won’t learn about anywhere else on your application.
University of Pennsylvania
Prompt: Write a short thank-you note to someone you have not yet thanked and would like to acknowledge.
What Makes it Unique: Breaking from the traditional essay format, this supplement invites you to write directly to a third party in the form of a 150-200 word long letter. The challenge in answering this distinct prompt is to remember that your letter should say as much about you, your unique qualities and what you value as it does about the recipient—all while not seeming overly boastful or contrived.
How to Answer it: As you select a recipient, consider the relationships that have been most formative in your high school experience—writing to someone who has played a large part in your story will allow the admissions committee some insight into your development and the meaningful relationships that guided you on your journey. Once you’ve identified the person, craft a thank-you note that is specific and heartfelt—unlike other essays, this prompt invites you to be sentimental and emotional, as long as doing so would authentically convey your feelings of gratitude. Describe the impact they’ve had on you, what you’ve learned from them, and how their influence has shaped your path. For example, if you’re thanking a teacher, don’t just say they helped you become a better student—explain how their encouragement gave you the confidence to pursue your passions. Keep the tone sincere and personal, avoid clichés and focus on the unique role this person has played in your life.
University of Notre Dame
Prompt: What compliment are you most proud of receiving, and why does it mean so much to you?
What Makes it Unique: This prompt is unique in that it invites students to share something about themselves by reflecting on someone else’s words in 50-100 words.
How to Answer it: The key to answering this prompt is to avoid focusing too much on the complement itself and instead focus on your response to receiving it and why it was so important to you. Note that this prompt is not an opportunity to brag about your achievements, but instead to showcase what truly matters to you. Select a compliment that truly speaks to who you are and what you value. It could be related to your character, work ethic, kindness, creativity, or any other quality that you hold in high regard. The compliment doesn’t have to be grand or come from someone with authority—it could be something small but significant that left a lasting impression on you, or it could have particular meaning for you because it came from someone you didn’t expect it to come from. Be brief in setting the stage and explaining the context of the compliment—what is most important is your reflection on its significance and how it shaped your understanding of yourself.
Stanford University
Prompt: List five things that are important to you.
What Makes it Unique: This prompt’s simplicity is what makes it so challenging. Stanford asks for a list, not an essay, which means you have very limited space (50 words) to convey something meaningful about yourself. Additionally, the prompt does not specify what these “things” must be—they could be a physical item, an idea, a concept, or even a pastime. Whatever you choose, these five items should add depth to your identity, values, and priorities.
How to Answer it: Start by brainstorming what matters most to you—these could be values, activities, people, places, or even abstract concepts. The key is to choose items or concepts that, when considered together, provide a comprehensive snapshot of who you are. For example, you might select something tangible and specific such as “an antique telescope gifted by my grandfather” alongside something conceptual such as “the willingness to admit when you’re wrong.” The beauty of this prompt is that it doesn’t require complex sentences or elaborate explanations—just a clear and honest reflection of what you hold dear. Be thoughtful in your selections, and use this prompt to showcase your creativity and core values.
While the supplemental essays should convey something meaningful about you, your values, and your unique qualifications for the university to which you are applying, the best essays are those that are playful, original, and unexpected. By starting early and taking the time to draft and revise their ideas, students can showcase their authentic personalities and distinguish themselves from other applicants through their supplemental essays.
Calculate for all schools, your chance of acceptance.
Extracurriculars.
The Common App essay is one of the most important parts of your application, but it can be extremely daunting if you’re not familiar with creative writing or what admissions officers are looking for.
In this blog post, we’ll provide advice on how to break down these prompts, organize your thoughts, and craft a strong, meaningful response that admissions officers will notice. If you’d like more free personalized help, you can get your essays reviewed and explore school-by-school essay help on CollegeVine.
Admissions is a human process. While admissions committees look at grades, test scores, and extracurriculars, there are five students that have great qualifications in those areas for every spot in a university’s class. As an applicant, you need an admissions counselor to choose you over everyone else — to advocate specifically for you.
This is where essays come in; they are an opportunity for you to turn an admissions counselor into an advocate for your application! Of your essays, the Common App is the most important since it is seen by most of the colleges to which you apply. It is also your longest essay, which gives you more space to craft a narrative and share your personality, feelings, and perspective.
It’s not hyperbole to say that getting the Common App essay right is the single most important thing you can do to improve your chances of admission as a senior.
The Common App essay is the best way for admissions committees to get to know you. While SAT scores, your past course load, and your grades provide a quantitative picture of you as a student, the Common App essay offers adcoms a refreshing glimpse into your identity and personality. For this reason, try to treat the essay as an opportunity to tell colleges why you are unique and what matters to you.
Since your Common App essay will be seen by numerous colleges, you will want to paint a portrait of yourself that is accessible to a breadth of institutions and admissions officers (for example, if you are only applying to engineering programs at some schools, don’t focus your Common App on STEM at the expense of your other applications — save that for your supplemental essays).
In short, be open and willing to write about a topic you love, whether it is sports, music, politics, food, or watching movies. The Common App essay is more of a conversation than a job interview.
A great Common App essay is, first and foremost, deeply personal. You are relying on the admissions committee to choose you over someone else, which they are more likely to do if they feel a personal connection to you. In your essay, you should delve into your feelings, how you think about situations/problems, and how you make decisions.
Good essays also usually avoid cliche topics . A couple overdone themes include an immigrant’s journey (particularly if you’re Asian American), and a sports accomplishment or injury. It’s not that these topics are bad, but rather that many students write about these subjects, so they don’t stand out as much. Of course, some students are able to write a genuine and unique essay about one of these topics, but it’s hard to pull off. You’re better off writing about more nuanced aspects of your identity!
You should also, of course, pay close attention to your grammar and spelling, use varied sentence structure and word choice, and be consistent with your tone/writing style. Take full advantage of the available 650 words, as writing less tends to mean missed opportunities.
Finally, it’s a good practice to be aware of your audience – know who you are writing for! For example, admissions officers at BYU will probably be very religious, while those at Oberlin will be deeply committed to social justice.
See some examples of great Common App essays to get a better idea of what makes a strong essay.
The Common App is one part of a portfolio of essays that you send to colleges, along with supplemental essays at individual colleges. With all of your essays for a particular college, you want to create a narrative and tell different parts of your story. So, the topics you write about should be cohesive and complementary, but not repetitive or overlapping.
Before jumping in to write your Common App essay, you should think about the other schools that you’re writing essays for and make sure that you have a strategy for your entire portfolio of essays and cover different topics for each. If you have strong qualifications on paper for the colleges you are targeting, the best narratives tend to humanize you. If you have weaker qualifications on paper for your colleges, the best narratives tend to draw out your passion for the topics or fields of study that are of interest to you and magnify your accomplishments.
Because the Common App essay is 650 words long and has few formal directions, organizing a response might seem daunting. Fortunately, at CollegeVine, we’ve developed a straightforward approach to formulating strong, unique responses.
This section outlines how to: 1) Brainstorm , 2) Organize , and 3) Write a Common App essay.
Before reading the prompts, brainstorming is a critical exercise to develop high-level ideas. One way to construct a high-level idea would be to delve into a passion and focus on how you interact with the concept or activity. For example, using “creative writing” as a high-level idea, one could stress their love of world-building, conveying complex emotions, and depicting character interactions, emphasizing how writing stems from real-life experiences.
A different idea that doesn’t involve an activity would be to discuss how your personality has developed in relation to your family; maybe one sibling is hot-headed, the other quiet, and you’re in the middle as the voice of reason (or maybe you’re the hot-head). These are simply two examples of infinitely many ideas you could come up with.
To begin developing your own high-level ideas, you can address these Core Four questions that all good Common App essays should answer:
The first question focuses on your personality traits — who you are. The second question targets your progression throughout high school (an arc or journey). The third question is more difficult to grasp, but it involves showing why your personality traits, methods of thinking, areas of interest, and tangible skills form a unique combination. The fourth question is a concluding point that can be answered simply, normally in the conclusion paragraph, i.e., “Running matters to me” or “Ethical fashion matters to me.”
You can brainstorm freeform or start with a specific prompt in mind.
Sometimes, it can be helpful to start by jotting down the 3-5 aspects of your personality or experiences you’ve had on a piece of paper. Play around with narratives that are constructed out of different combinations of these essential attributes before settling on a prompt.
For example, you might note that you are fascinated by environmental justice, have had success in Model Congress, and are now working with a local politician to create a recycling program in your school district. You may also have tried previous initiatives that failed. These experiences could be constructed and applied to a number of Common App prompts. You could address a specific identity or interest you have associated with public advocacy, discuss what you learned from your failed initiatives, explore how you challenged the lack of recycling at your school, fantasize about solving waste management issues, etc.
Selecting a prompt that you identify with
For example, consider the following prompt: The lessons we take from obstacles we encounter can be fundamental to later success. Recount a time when you faced a challenge, setback, or failure. How did it affect you, and what did you learn from the experience?
Perhaps you had been a dedicated and active member of your school’s debate team until one of your parents lost their jobs, leaving you unable to afford the high membership and travel dues. You decided to help out by getting a job after school, and responded to your familial hardship with grace and understanding (as opposed to anger). A few months later, and after speaking with your former debate coach and your parents, you set up a system to save up for your own trips so that you could still participate in debate!
In general, the most common mistake CollegeVine sees with Common App essays is that they aren’t deeply personal. Your essay should be specific enough that it could be identified as yours even if your name wasn’t attached.
If you get stuck, don’t worry! This is very common as the Common App is often the first personal essay college applicants have ever written. One way of getting unstuck if you feel like you aren’t getting creative or personal enough is to keep asking yourself “why”
For example: I love basketball…
It can often help to work with someone and bounce ideas off them. Teachers are often a bad idea – they tend to think of essays in an academic sense, which is to say they often fail to apply the admissions context. Further, it is unlikely that they know you well enough to provide valuable insight. Friends in your own year can be a good idea because they know you, but you should be careful about competitive pressures applying within the same high school. Older friends, siblings, or neighbors who have successfully navigated the admissions process at your target universities (or good universities) strike that medium between no longer being competitive with you for admissions but still being able to help you brainstorm well because they know you.
Overall, there is no single “correct” topic. Your essay will be strong as long as you are comfortable and passionate about your idea and it answers the Core Four questions.
Common App essays are not traditional five-paragraph essays. You are free to be creative in structure, employ dialogue, and use vivid descriptions—and you should! Make sure that context and logic are inherent in your essay, however. From paragraph to paragraph, sentence to sentence, your ideas should be clear and flow naturally. Great ways to ensure this are using a story arc following a few major points, or focusing on cause and effect.
The traditional approach
This involves constructing a narrative out of your experiences and writing a classic personal essay. You are free to be creative in structure, employ dialogue, and use vivid descriptions—and you should! Make sure that context and logic are inherent in your essay, however. From paragraph to paragraph, sentence to sentence, your ideas should be clear and flow naturally. Great ways to ensure this are using a story arc following a few major points, or focusing on cause and effect.
The creative approach
Some students prefer to experiment with an entirely new approach to the personal essay. For example, a student who is passionate about programming could write their essay in alternating lines of Binary and English. A hopeful Literature major could reimagine a moment in their life as a chapter of War and Peace, adopting Tolstoy’s writing style. Or, you could write about a fight with your friend in the form of a third person sports recap to both highlight your interest in journalism and reveal a personal story. Creative essays are incredibly risky and difficult to pull off. However, a creative essay that is well executed may also have the potential for high reward.
Your Common App essay must display excellent writing in terms of grammar and sentence structure. The essay doesn’t need to be a Shakespearean masterpiece, but it should be well-written and clear.
A few tips to accomplish this are:
“Show, don’t tell” is vital to writing an engaging essay, and this is the point students struggle with most. Instead of saying, “I struggled to make friends when I transferred schools,” you can show your emotions by writing, “I scanned the bustling school cafeteria, feeling more and more forlorn with each unfamiliar face. I found an empty table and ate my lunch alone.”
In many cases, writing can include more specific word choice . For example, “As a kid, I always played basketball,” can be improved to be “Every day after school as a kid, I ran home, laced up my sneakers, and shot a basketball in my driveway until the sun went down and I could barely see.”
To use active voice over passive voice , be sure that your sentence’s subject performs the action indicated by the verb, rather than the action performing onto the subject. Instead of writing “this project was built by my own hands,” you would say “I built this project with my own hands.”
Finally, avoid clichés like adages, sayings, and quotes that do not bring value to your essay. Examples include phrases like “Be the change you wish to see in the world” (it’s also important to know that sayings like these are often seriously misquoted—Gandhi did not actually utter these words) and lavish claims like “it was the greatest experience of my life.”
A few tips for the writing (and re-writing!) process
This section provides insights and examples for each of the 7 Common App essay prompts for the 2024-2025 cycle. Each of these prompts lends itself to distinct topics and strategies, so selecting the prompt that best aligns with your idea is essential to writing an effective Common App essay.
Here are this year’s prompts (click the link to jump to the specific prompt):
The lessons we take from obstacles we encounter can be fundamental to later success. recount a time when you faced a challenge, setback, or failure. how did it affect you, and what did you learn from the experience, reflect on a time when you questioned or challenged a belief or idea. what prompted your thinking what was the outcome, reflect on something that someone has done for you that has made you happy or thankful in a surprising way. how has this gratitude affected or motivated you, discuss an accomplishment, event, or realization that sparked a period of personal growth and a new understanding of yourself or others., describe a topic, idea, or concept you find so engaging that it makes you lose all track of time. why does it captivate you what or who do you turn to when you want to learn more, share an essay on any topic of your choice. it can be one you’ve already written, one that responds to a different prompt, or one of your own design..
This prompt offers an opportunity to engage with your favorite extracurricular or academic subject, and it allows you to weave a narrative that displays personal growth in that area. An essay that displays your personality and a unique interest can be attention-grabbing, particularly if you have an unconventional passion, such as blogging about Chinese basketball or unicycling.
Don’t feel intimidated if you don’t have a passion that is immediately “unique,” however. Even an interest like “arctic scuba diving” will fail as an essay topic if it’s not written with insight and personality. Instead of attempting to impress the Admissions Officer by making up unusual or shocking things, think about how you spend your free time and ask yourself why you spend it that way. Also think about your upbringing, identity, and experiences and ask yourself, “What has impacted me in a meaningful way?”
Here Are A Few Response Examples:
Background – A person’s background includes experiences, training, education, and culture. You can discuss the experience of growing up, interacting with family, and how relationships have molded who you are. A background can include long-term interactions with arts, music, sciences, sports, writing, and many other learned skills. Background also includes your social environments and how they’ve influenced your perception. In addition, you can highlight intersections between multiple backgrounds and show how each is integral to you.
One student wrote about how growing up in a poor Vietnamese immigrant family inspired her to seize big opportunities, even if they were risky or challenging. She describes the emotional demand of opening and running a family grocery store. (Note: Names have been changed to protect the identity of the author and subjects in all the examples.)
The callouses on my mother’s hands formed during the years spent scaling fish at the market in Go Noi, Vietnam. My mother never finished her formal education because she labored on the streets to help six others survive. Her calloused hands not only scaled fish, they also slaved over the stove, mustering a meal from the few items in the pantry. This image resurfaces as I watch my mother’s calloused hands wipe her sweat-beaded forehead while she manages the family business, compiling resources to provide for the family.
Living in an impoverished region of Vietnam pushed my parents to emigrate. My two year-old memory fails me, but my mother vividly recounts my frightened eyes staring up at her on my first plane ride. With life packed into a single suitcase, my mother’s heart, though, trembled more than mine. Knowing only a few words of English, my mother embarked on a journey shrouded in a haze of uncertainty.
Our initial year in America bore an uncanny resemblance to Vietnam – from making one meal last the entire day to wearing the same four shirts over and over again. Through thin walls, I heard my parents debating their decision to come to the United States, a land where they knew no one. My grandparents’ support came in half-hearted whispers cracking through long-distance phone calls. My dad’s scanty income barely kept food on the table. We lived on soup and rice for what seemed an interminable time.
However, an opportunity knocked on my parents’ door: a grocery store in the town of Decatur, Mississippi, was up for rent. My parents took the chance, risking all of their savings. To help my parents, I spent most of my adolescent afternoons stocking shelves, mopping floors, and even translating. My parents’ voices wavered when speaking English; through every attempt to communicate with their customers, a language barrier forged a palpable presence in each transaction. My parents’ spirits faltered as customers grew impatient. A life of poverty awaited us in Vietnam if the business was not successful.
On the first day, the business brought in only twenty dollars. Twenty dollars. My mother and my father wept after they closed the shop. Seeing the business as a failure, my mom commenced her packing that night; returning to Vietnam seemed inevitable.
The next business day, however, sales increased ten-fold. More and more customers came each successive day. My mom’s tears turned into—well, more tears, but they were tears of joy. My mother unpacked a bag each night.
Fifteen years later, my parents now own Blue Bear Grocery. My parents work, work, work to keep the shelves stocked and the customers coming. The grocery store holds a special place in my heart: it is the catalyst for my success. My parents serve as my role-models, teaching me a new lesson with every can placed on the shelf. One lesson that resurfaces is the importance of pursuing a formal education, something that my parents never had the chance of.
When the opportunity to attend the Mississippi School for Mathematics and Science (MSMS) presented itself, I took it and ran, as did my parents by leaving Vietnam and by buying the store. Although I am not managing hundreds of products, I am managing hundreds of assignments at MSMS – from Mu Alpha Theta tutoring to lab reports to student government to British literature.
Had I not immigrated, my hands would be calloused from the tight grip of the knife scaling fish rather than from the tight grip on my pencil. My hands would be calloused from scrubbing my clothes covered in fish scales rather than from long hours spent typing a research paper.
Although the opportunities that my parents and I pursued are different, our journey is essentially the same: we walk a road paved with uncertainty and doubt with the prospect of success fortified by our hearts and our hands.
Identity – this can mean racial identity, sexual orientation, gender, or simply one’s place within a specific community (even communities as unique as, say, players of World of Warcraft). With the topic of racial identity, it’s important to remember the audience (college admissions counselors often lean progressive politically), so this might not be the best place to make sweeping claims about today’s state of race relations. However, reflecting on how your culture has shaped your experiences can make for a compelling essay. Alternatively, focusing on a dominant personality trait can also make for a compelling theme. For example, if you’re extremely outgoing, you could explain how your adventurousness has allowed you to learn from a diverse group of friends and the random situations you find yourself in. One important thing to note: the topic of identity can easily lack originality if you cover a common experience such as feeling divided between cultures, or coming out. If such experiences are integral to who you are, you should still write about them, but be sure to show us your unique introspection and reflection.
One student detailed how growing up as an American in Germany led to feelings of displacement. Moving to America in high school only exacerbated her feelings of rootlessness. Her transcultural experiences, however, allowed her to relate to other “New Americans,” particularly refugees. Helping a young refugee girl settle into the US eventually helped the writer find home in America as well:
Growing up, I always wanted to eat, play, visit, watch, and be it all: sloppy joes and spaetzle, Beanie Babies and Steiff, Cape Cod and the Baltic Sea, football and fussball, American and German.
My American parents relocated our young family to Berlin when I was three years old. My exposure to America was limited to holidays spent stateside and awfully dubbed Disney Channel broadcasts. As the few memories I had of living in the US faded, my affinity for Germany grew. I began to identify as “Germerican,” an ideal marriage of the two cultures. As a child, I viewed my biculturalism as a blessing. I possessed a native fluency in “Denglisch” and my family’s Halloween parties were legendary at a time when the holiday was just starting to gain popularity outside of the American Sector.
Insidiously, the magic I once felt in loving two homes was replaced by a deeprooted sense of rootlessness. I stopped feeling American when, while discussing World War II with my grandmother, I said “the US won.” She corrected me, insisting I use “we” when referring to the US’s actions. Before then, I hadn’t realized how directly people associated themselves with their countries. I stopped feeling German during the World Cup when my friends labeled me a “bandwagon fan” for rooting for Germany. Until that moment, my cheers had felt sincere. I wasn’t part of the “we” who won World Wars or World Cups. Caught in a twilight of foreign and familiar, I felt emotionally and psychologically disconnected from the two cultures most familiar to me.
After moving from Berlin to New York state at age fifteen, my feelings of cultural homelessness thrived in my new environment. Looking and sounding American furthered my feelings of dislocation. Border patrol agents, teachers, classmates, neighbors, and relatives all “welcomed me home” to a land they could not understand was foreign to me. Americans confused me as I relied on Urban Dictionary to understand my peers, the Pledge of Allegiance seemed nationalistic, and the only thing familiar about Fahrenheit was the German after whom it was named. Too German for America and too American for Germany, I felt alienated from both. I wanted desperately to be a member of one, if not both, cultures.
During my first weeks in Buffalo, I spent my free time googling “Berlin Family Seeks Teen” and “New Americans in Buffalo.” The latter search proved most fruitful: I discovered New Hope, a nonprofit that empowers resettled refugees, or “New Americans,” to thrive. I started volunteering with New Hope’s children’s programs, playing with and tutoring young refugees.
It was there that I met Leila, a twelve-year-old Iraqi girl who lived next to Hopeprint. In between games and snacks, Leila would ask me questions about American life, touching on everything from Halloween to President Obama. Gradually, my confidence in my American identity grew as I recognized my ability to answer most of her questions. American culture was no longer completely foreign to me. I found myself especially qualified to work with young refugees; my experience growing up in a country other than that of my parents’ was similar enough to that of the refugee children New Hope served that I could empathize with them and offer advice. Together, we worked through conflicting allegiances, homesickness, and stretched belonging.
Forging a special, personal bond with young refugees proved a cathartic outlet for my insecurities as it taught me to value my past. My transculturalism allowed me to help young refugees integrate into American life, and, in doing so, I was able to adjust myself. Now, I have an appreciation of myself that I never felt before. “Home” isn’t the digits in a passport or ZIP code but a sense of contentedness. By helping a young refugee find comfort, happiness, and home in America, I was finally able to find those same things for myself.
The above essay was written by Lydia Schooler, a graduate of Yale University and one of our CollegeVine advisors. If you enjoyed this essay and are looking for expert college essay and admissions advice, consider booking a session with Lydia .
Interests – Interest are basically synonymous to activities, but slightly broader (you could say that interests encompass activities); participation in an interest is often less organized than in an activity. For instance, you might consider cross country an activity, but cooking an interest. Writing about an interest is a way to highlight passions that may not come across in the rest of your application. If you’re a wrestler for example, writing about your interest in stand-up comedy would be a refreshing addition to your application. You should also feel free to use this topic to show what an important activity on your application really means to you. Keep in mind, however, that many schools will ask you to describe one of your activities in their supplemental essays (usually about 250 words), so choose strategically—you don’t want to write twice on the same thing.
Read a successful essay answering this prompt.
This prompt lends itself to consideration of what facets of your personality allow you to overcome adversity. While it’s okay to choose a relatively mundane “failure” such as not winning an award at a Model UN conference, another (perhaps more powerful) tactic is to write about a foundational failure and assess its impact on your development thereafter.
There are times in life when your foundation is uprooted. There are times when you experience failure and you want to give up since you don’t see a solution. This essay is about your response when you are destabilized and your actions when you don’t see an immediate answer.
For example, if you lost a friend due to an argument, you can analyze the positions from both sides, evaluate your decisions, and identify why you were wrong. The key is explaining your thought process and growth following the event to highlight how your thinking has changed. Did you ever admit your fault and seek to fix the problem? Have you treated others differently since then? How has the setback changed the way you view arguments and fights now? Framing the prompt in this way allows you to tackle heavier questions about ethics and demonstrate your self-awareness.
If you haven’t experienced a “big” failure, another angle to take would be to discuss smaller, repeated failures that are either linked or similar thematically. For example, if you used to stutter or get nervous in large social groups, you could discuss the steps you took to find a solution. Even if you don’t have a massive foundational challenge to write about, a recurring challenge can translate to a powerful essay topic, especially if the steps you took to overcome this repeated failure help expose your character.
One student described his ignorance of his brother’s challenges — the writer assumed that because his brother Sam was sociable, Sam was adjusting fine to their family’s move. After an angry outburst from Sam and a long late-night conversation, the writer realizes his need to develop greater sensitivity and empathy. He now strives to recognize and understand others’ struggles, even if they’re not immediately apparent.
“You ruined my life!” After months of quiet anger, my brother finally confronted me. To my shame, I had been appallingly ignorant of his pain.
Despite being twins, Max and I are profoundly different. Having intellectual interests from a young age that, well, interested very few of my peers, I often felt out of step in comparison with my highly-social brother. Everything appeared to come effortlessly for Max and, while we share an extremely tight bond, his frequent time away with friends left me feeling more and more alone as we grew older.
When my parents learned about The Green Academy, we hoped it would be an opportunity for me to find not only an academically challenging environment, but also – perhaps more importantly – a community. This meant transferring the family from Drumfield to Kingston. And while there was concern about Max, we all believed that given his sociable nature, moving would be far less impactful on him than staying put might be on me.
As it turned out, Green Academy was everything I’d hoped for. I was ecstatic to discover a group of students with whom I shared interests and could truly engage. Preoccupied with new friends and a rigorous course load, I failed to notice that the tables had turned. Max, lost in the fray and grappling with how to make connections in his enormous new high school, had become withdrawn and lonely. It took me until Christmas time – and a massive argument – to recognize how difficult the transition had been for my brother, let alone that he blamed me for it.
Through my own journey of searching for academic peers, in addition to coming out as gay when I was 12, I had developed deep empathy for those who had trouble fitting in. It was a pain I knew well and could easily relate to. Yet after Max’s outburst, my first response was to protest that our parents – not I – had chosen to move us here. In my heart, though, I knew that regardless of who had made the decision, we ended up in Kingston for my benefit. I was ashamed that, while I saw myself as genuinely compassionate, I had been oblivious to the heartache of the person closest to me. I could no longer ignore it – and I didn’t want to.
We stayed up half the night talking, and the conversation took an unexpected turn. Max opened up and shared that it wasn’t just about the move. He told me how challenging school had always been for him, due to his dyslexia, and that the ever-present comparison to me had only deepened his pain.
We had been in parallel battles the whole time and, yet, I only saw that Max was in distress once he experienced problems with which I directly identified. I’d long thought Max had it so easy – all because he had friends. The truth was, he didn’t need to experience my personal brand of sorrow in order for me to relate – he had felt plenty of his own.
My failure to recognize Max’s suffering brought home for me the profound universality and diversity of personal struggle; everyone has insecurities, everyone has woes, and everyone – most certainly – has pain. I am acutely grateful for the conversations he and I shared around all of this, because I believe our relationship has been fundamentally strengthened by a deeper understanding of one another. Further, this experience has reinforced the value of constantly striving for deeper sensitivity to the hidden struggles of those around me. I won’t make the mistake again of assuming that the surface of someone’s life reflects their underlying story.
This prompt is difficult to answer because most high schoolers haven’t participated in the types of iconoclastic protests against societal ills that lend themselves to an awe-inspiring response. A more tenable alternative here could be to discuss a time that you went against social norms, whether it was by becoming friends with someone who seemed like an outcast or by proudly showing off a geeky passion.
And if you ever participated in a situation in tandem with adults and found some success (i.e., by blogging, starting a tutoring organization, or participating in political campaigns), you could discuss your experiences as a young person without a college degree in professional circles. However, avoid sounding morally superior (as if you’re the only person who went against this convention, or that you’re better than your peers for doing so).
Another way to answer this prompt is to discuss a time when you noticed a need for change. For example, if you wondered why medical records are often handwritten, or why a doctor’s visit can be long and awkward, maybe you challenged the norm in healthcare by brainstorming an electronic-recording smartphone app or a telemedicine system. In a similar way, if you led a fundraiser and recognized that advertising on social media would be more effective than the traditional use of printed flyers, you could write about a topic along those lines as well. Focus on what action or experience caused you to recognize the need for change and follow with your actions and resulting outcome.
As a whole, this prompt lends itself to reflective writing, and more specifically, talking the reader through your thought processes. In many cases, the exploration of your thought processes and decision-making is more important than the actual outcome or concept in question. In short, this essay is very much about “thinking,” rumination, and inquisition. A good brainstorming exercise for this prompt would be to write your problem on a sheet of paper and then develop various solutions to the problem, including a brief reason for justification. The more thorough you are in justifying and explaining your solutions in the essay, the more compelling your response will be.
While this prompt may seem to be asking a simple question, your answer has the potential to provide deep insights about who you are to the admissions committee. Explaining what you are grateful for can show them your culture, your community, your philosophical outlook on the world, and what makes you tick.
The first step to writing this essay is to think about the “something” and “someone” of your story. It is imperative to talk about a unique moment in your life, as the prompt asks for gratitude that came about in a surprising way. You will want to write about a story that you are certain no one else would have. To brainstorm, ask yourself: “if I told a stranger that I was grateful for what happened to me without any context, would they be surprised?”
Note that the most common answers to this prompt involve a family member, teacher, or sports coach giving the narrator an arduous task ─ which, by the end of the story, the narrator becomes grateful for because of the lessons they learned through their hard work. Try to avoid writing an essay along these lines unless you feel that your take on it will be truly original.
Begin your essay by telling a creative story about the “something” that your “someone” did that made you thankful. Paint a picture with words here ─ establish who you were in the context of your story and make the character development of your “someone” thorough. Show the admissions committee that you have a clear understanding of yourself and the details of your world.
Keep in mind, however, that the essay is ultimately about you and your growth. While you should set the scene clearly, don’t spend too much time talking about the “something” and “someone.”
Your story should then transition into a part about your unexpected epiphany, e.g. “Six months after Leonard gave me that pogo stick, I started to be grateful for the silly thing…” Explain the why of your gratitude as thoroughly as you can before you begin to talk about how your gratitude affected or motivated you. Have a Socratic seminar with yourself in your head ─ ask yourself, “why am I grateful for the pogo stick?” and continue asking why until you arrive at a philosophical conclusion. Perhaps your reason could be that you eventually got used to the odd looks that people gave you as you were pogoing and gained more self-confidence.
Finally, think about how learning to be grateful for something you would not expect to bring you joy and thankfulness has had a positive impact on your life. Gaining more self-confidence, for example, could motivate you to do an infinite number of things that you were not able to attempt in the past. Try to make a conclusion by connecting this part to your story from the beginning of the essay. You want to ultimately show that had [reference to a snippet of your introduction, ideally an absurd part] never have happened, you would not be who you are today.
Remember to express these lessons implicitly through the experiences in your essay, and not explicitly. Show us your growth through the changes in your life rather than simply stating that you gained confidence. For instance, maybe the pogo stick gift led you to start a pogo dance team at your school, and the team went on to perform at large venues to raise money for charity. But before your pogo days, you had crippling stage fright and hated even giving speeches in your English class. These are the kinds of details that make your essay more engaging.
This prompt is expansive in that you can choose any accomplishment, event, or realization that sparked personal growth or new understanding.
One option is to discuss a formal accomplishment or event (whether it is a religious ritual or social rite of passage) that reflects personal growth. If you go this route, make sure to discuss why the ritual was meaningful and how specific aspects of said ritual contributed to your personal growth. An example of this could be the meaning of becoming an Eagle Scout to you, the accomplishment of being elected to Senior Leadership, or completing a Confirmation. In the case of religious topics, however, be sure to not get carried away with details, and focus on the nature of your personal growth and new understanding — know your audience.
Alternatively, a more relaxed way to address this prompt is using an informal event or realization, which would allow you to show more personality and creativity. An example of this could be learning how to bake with your mother, thus sparking a newfound connection with her, allowing you to learn about her past. Having a long discussion about life or philosophy with your father could also suffice, thus sparking more thoughts about your identity. You could write about a realization that caused you to join a new organization or quit an activity you did not think you would enjoy, as doing so would force you to grow out of your comfort zone to try new things.
The key to answering this prompt is clearly defining what it is that sparked your growth, and then describing in detail the nature of this growth and how it related to your perception of yourself and others. This part of the essay is crucial, as you must dedicate sufficient time to not undersell the description of how you grew instead of simply explaining the experience and then saying, “I grew.” This description of how you grew must be specific, in-depth, and it does not have to be simple. Your growth can also be left open-ended if you are still learning from your experiences today.
One student wrote about how her single mother’s health crisis prompted her to quickly assume greater responsibility as a fourteen-year-old. This essay describes the new tasks she undertook, as well as how the writer now more greatly cherishes her time with her mother.
Tears streamed down my face and my mind was paralyzed with fear. Sirens blared, but the silent panic in my own head was deafening. I was muted by shock. A few hours earlier, I had anticipated a vacation in Washington, D.C., but unexpectedly, I was rushing to the hospital behind an ambulance carrying my mother. As a fourteen-year-old from a single mother household, without a driver’s license, and seven hours from home, I was distraught over the prospect of losing the only parent I had. My fear turned into action as I made some of the bravest decisions of my life.
Three blood transfusions later, my mother’s condition was stable, but we were still states away from home, so I coordinated with my mother’s doctors in North Carolina to schedule the emergency operation that would save her life. Throughout her surgery, I anxiously awaited any word from her surgeon, but each time I asked, I was told that there had been another complication or delay. Relying on my faith and positive attitude, I remained optimistic that my mother would survive and that I could embrace new responsibilities.
My mother had been a source of strength for me, and now I would be strong for her through her long recovery ahead. As I started high school, everyone thought the crisis was over, but it had really just started to impact my life. My mother was often fatigued, so I assumed more responsibility, juggling family duties, school, athletics, and work. I made countless trips to the neighborhood pharmacy, cooked dinner, biked to the grocery store, supported my concerned sister, and provided the loving care my mother needed to recover. I didn’t know I was capable of such maturity and resourcefulness until it was called upon. Each day was a stage in my gradual transformation from dependence to relative independence.
Throughout my mother’s health crisis, I matured by learning to put others’ needs before my own. As I worried about my mother’s health, I took nothing for granted, cherished what I had, and used my daily activities as motivation to move forward. I now take ownership over small decisions such as scheduling daily appointments and managing my time but also over major decisions involving my future, including the college admissions process. Although I have become more independent, my mother and I are inseparably close, and the realization that I almost lost her affects me daily. Each morning, I wake up ten minutes early simply to eat breakfast with my mother and spend time with her before our busy days begin. I am aware of how quickly life can change. My mother remains a guiding force in my life, but the feeling of empowerment I discovered within myself is the ultimate form of my independence. Though I thought the summer before my freshman year would be a transition from middle school to high school, it was a transformation from childhood to adulthood.
This prompt allows you to expand and deepen a seemingly small or simple idea, topic, or concept. One example could be “stars,” in that you could describe stargazing as a child, counting them, recognizing constellations, and then transforming that initial captivation into a deeper appreciation of the cosmos as a whole, spurring a love of astronomy and physics.
Another example could be “language,” discussing how it has evolved and changed over the course of history, how it allows you to look deeper into different cultures, and how learning different languages stretches the mind. A tip for expanding on these topics and achieving specificity is to select particular details of the topic that you find intriguing and explain why.
For example, if you’re passionate about cooking or baking, you could use specific details by explaining, in depth, the intricate attention and artistry necessary to make a dish or dessert. You can delve into why certain spices or garnishes are superior in different situations, how flavors blend well together and can be mixed creatively, or even the chemistry differences between steaming, searing, and grilling.
Regardless of your topic, this prompt provides a great opportunity to display writing prowess through elegant, specific descriptions that leverage sensory details. Describing the beauty of the night sky, the rhythms and sounds of different languages, or the scent of a crème brûlée shows passion and captivation in a very direct, evocative way.
The key to writing this essay is answering the question of why something captivates you instead of simply ending with “I love surfing.” A tip would be to play off your senses (for applicable topics), think about what you see, feel, smell, hear, and taste.
In the case of surfing, the salty water, weightlessness of bobbing over the waves, and fresh air could cater to senses. Alternatively, for less physical topics, you can use a train of thought and descriptions to show how deeply and vividly your mind dwells on the topic.
Well-executed trains of thought or similar tactics are successful ways to convey passion for a certain topic. To answer what or who you turn to when you want to learn more, you can be authentic and honest—if it’s Wikipedia, a teacher, friend, YouTube Channel, etc., you simply have to show how you interact with the medium.
When brainstorming this particular essay, a tip would be to use a web diagram, placing the topic in the middle and thinking about branching characteristics, themes, or concepts related to the topic that are directly engaging and captivating to you. In doing so, you’ll be able to gauge the depth of the topic and whether it will suffice for this prompt.
In the following example, a student shares their journey as they learn to appreciate a piece of their culture’s cuisine.
As a wide-eyed, naive seven-year-old, I watched my grandmother’s rough, wrinkled hands pull and knead mercilessly at white dough until the countertop was dusted in flour. She steamed small buns in bamboo baskets, and a light sweetness lingered in the air. Although the mantou looked delicious, their papery, flat taste was always an unpleasant surprise. My grandmother scolded me for failing to finish even one, and when I complained about the lack of flavor she would simply say that I would find it as I grew older. How did my adult relatives seem to enjoy this Taiwanese culinary delight while I found it so plain?
During my journey to discover the essence of mantou, I began to see myself the same way I saw the steamed bun. I believed that my writing would never evolve beyond a hobby and that my quiet nature crippled my ambitions. Ultimately, I thought I had little to offer the world. In middle school, it was easy for me to hide behind the large personalities of my friends, blending into the background and keeping my thoughts company. Although writing had become my emotional outlet, no matter how well I wrote essays, poetry, or fiction, I could not stand out in a sea of talented students. When I finally gained the confidence to submit my poetry to literary journals but was promptly rejected, I stepped back from my work to begin reading from Whitman to Dickinson, Li-Young Lee to Ocean Vuong. It was then that I realized I had been holding back a crucial ingredient–my distinct voice.
Over time, my taste buds began to mature, as did I. Mantou can be flavored with pork and eggplant, sweetened in condensed milk, and moistened or dried by the steam’s temperature. After I ate the mantou with each of these factors in mind, I noticed its environment enhanced a delicately woven strand of sweetness beneath the taste of side dishes: the sugar I had often watched my grandmother sift into the flour. The taste was nearly untraceable, but once I grasped it I could truly begin to cherish mantou. In the same way the taste had been lost to me for years, my writer’s voice had struggled to shine through because of my self-doubt and fear of vulnerability.
As I acquired a taste for mantou, I also began to strengthen my voice through my surrounding environment. With the support of my parents, peer poets, and the guidance of Amy Tan and the Brontё sisters, I worked tirelessly to uncover my voice: a subtle strand of sweetness. Once I stopped trying to fit into a publishing material mold and infused my uninhibited passion for my Taiwanese heritage into my writing, my poem was published in a literary journal. I wrote about the blatant racism Asians endured during coronavirus, and the editor of Skipping Stones Magazine was touched by both my poem and my heartfelt letter. I opened up about being ridiculed for bringing Asian food to school at Youth Leadership Forum, providing support to younger Asian-American students who reached out with the relief of finding someone they could relate to. I embraced writing as a way to convey my struggle with cultural identity. I joined the school’s creative writing club and read my pieces in front of an audience, honing my voice into one that flourishes out loud as well.
Now, I write and speak unapologetically, falling in love with a voice that I never knew I had. It inspires passion within my communities and imparts tenacity to Asian-American youth, rooting itself deeply into everything I write. Today, my grandmother would say that I have finally unearthed the taste of mantou as I savor every bite with a newfound appreciation. I can imagine her hands shaping the dough that has become my voice, and I am eager to share it with the world.
We’ll let you know what your chances are at your dream schools!
This prompt allows you to express what you want to express if it doesn’t align directly with the other prompts. While this prompt is very open-ended, it doesn’t mean you can adapt any essay you’ve written and think it will suffice. Always refer back to the Strategy section of this article and make sure the topic and essay of your choice addresses the Core Four questions necessary for a good Common App essay.
This prompt, more than the others, poses a high risk but also a high-potential reward. Writing your own question allows you to demonstrate individuality and confidence. Here, you can craft an innovative essay that tackles a difficult topic (for example, whether to raise or lower taxes) or presents information with a unique format (such as a conversation with an historical figure).
We encourage you to try something unconventional for this prompt, like comparing your personality to a Picasso painting, using an extended philosophical metaphor to describe your four years of high school, or writing in a poetic style to display your love of poetry. If you are extremely passionate about a topic or an expert in a certain area, for example Renaissance technology or journalism during World War II, you can use this prompt to show your authority on a subject by discussing it at a high level.
Be careful to frame the essay in a way that is accessible to the average reader while still incorporating quality evidence and content that would qualify you as an expert. As always, exercise caution in writing about controversial social or political topics, and always make sure to consider your audience and what they’re looking for in a student.
Sometimes an unconventional essay can capture Admissions Officers’ attention and move them in a profound way; other times, the concept can fly completely over their heads. Be sure to execute the essay clearly and justify your decision by seeking high-quality feedback from reliable sources. As always, the essay should demonstrate something meaningful about you, whether it is your personality, thought process, or values.
This prompt, like the others, is really asking you to tell the story of who you are. Your essay should be personal and should talk about something significant that has shaped your identity.
Here are a few broad themes that can work well: academic interest; culture, values, and diversity; extracurricular interests; and your impact on the community. You should highlight one of these themes using creative, vividly descriptive narrative. Make sure to not fall into the common pitfall of talking about something else -- an extracurricular activity, for example -- more than yourself.
A student I advised had a great idea to respond to this prompt -- an essay about how they do their best thinking while sitting on a tree branch near their home. Not only was it unique and personal, but it allowed the student to show what they think about, dream about, and value. That's the main goal for any applicant responding to prompt 7.
All of the Common App prompts are broad in scope, but this one really takes the cake! I typically advise using the first six prompts as guardrails for your brainstorm, but in doing so, you may come up with a topic that doesn’t cleanly fit with any of the first six prompts. That’s where this prompt can come in handy.
Or, you might have an idea that’s really out there (like writing about your love of sonnets as a series of sonnets). Essentially, this prompt is a good fit for essays that are anywhere from slightly unconventional to extremely atypical.
If this all feels a bit confusing - don’t worry! How you write your story is much more important than what prompt you end up choosing. At the end of the day, these are just guides to help you cultivate a topic and are not meant to stress you out.
Students who want to complete the CommonApp’s seventh prompt need to have already gone through the other prompts and determined that their story cannot fit with those. Thus, generally speaking, I advise my students to not use the final prompt unless it is absolutely necessary.
If an admission officer believes that your essay could have been used with one of the other prompts, this may lead them to have a perception about you as a student that might not be accurate.
Nevertheless, as my colleagues have pointed out, what matters is the essay the most and not necessarily the prompt. That being said, the test of whether or not you as a student can follow directions is part of the prompt selection and how well you answer it. If you choose the final prompt and yet your answer could work with another available prompt, this will not put you in your best light.
In conclusion, only use this prompt when absolutely necessary, and remember that the purpose of the personal statement is to give the admissions officers a glimpse into who you are as a person, so you want to use this space to showcase beautiful you.
Where to get your common app essay edited.
At selective schools, your essays account for around 25% of your admissions decision. That’s more than grades (20%) and test scores (15%), and almost as much as extracurriculars (30%). Why is this? Most students applying to top schools will have stellar academics and extracurriculars. Your essays are your chance to stand out and humanize your application. That’s why it’s vital that your essays are engaging, and present you as someone who would enrich the campus community.
Before submitting your application, you should have someone else review your essays. That’s why we created our free Peer Essay Review tool , where you can get a free review of your essay from another student. You can also improve your own writing skills by reviewing other students’ essays.
If you want a college admissions expert to review your essay, advisors on CollegeVine have helped students refine their writing and submit successful applications to top schools. Find the right advisor for you to improve your chances of getting into your dream school!
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Many students want to attend Ivy League schools like Princeton, and for good reason. Princeton is known for its rigorous academics, prestigious faculty, and the great outcomes its students see after graduation. It is one of the most sought-after institutions of higher learning in the world. Securing your spot at Princeton is no small feat, and understanding the admissions requirements is crucial for prospective students aiming to join its ranks.
In this guide, I will provide a comprehensive overview of what it takes to get into Princeton, breaking down each component of the application process.
Princeton’s admissions process is holistic, meaning the university evaluates each applicant based on multiple factors, not just academic achievements . This approach ensures that the students admitted are academically capable and bring diverse perspectives, talents, and backgrounds to the campus community. As an institution, Princeton prizes a well-rounded student body, so while academics are an important part of your application, they aren’t the only part.
Princeton is the number 1 national institution in the US, and academic expectations are high. Princeton has an acceptance rate of 6% , so you want to do everything you can to make your application competitive.
A strong academic record is essential for Princeton applicants. While Princeton does not specify a minimum GPA for admission, the average GPA of admitted students is typically very high. Most successful applicants are at the top of their class, often in the top 10% or higher. It’s critical to take challenging courses throughout high school, including Advanced Placement (AP), International Baccalaureate (IB), and honors classes, to demonstrate your ability to excel in rigorous academic environments.
Additionally, Princeton expects that its students will have taken a rigorous course of study in high school. They want each student to have experienced:
Princeton has adopted a test-optional policy, meaning that submitting SAT or ACT scores is not required. This policy has been extended for first-year and transfer applicants until the fall 2025 application cycle. However, if you choose to submit your scores, they can strengthen your application.
The middle 50% of admitted Princeton students typically score between 1460 and 1570 on the SAT. Math scores are slightly higher, in the 780-800 range, while evidenced-based reading and writing scores are in the 760-780 range. ACT scores are also high, with the middle 50% of students scoring between 34 and 35 on the ACT. High standardized test scores can help offset a slightly lower GPA or other areas of your application.
Princeton looks for students who are not only academically gifted but also engaged in their communities and passionate about their interests. Extracurricular activities are a critical component of the application, demonstrating your leadership skills, commitment, and ability to balance multiple responsibilities.
Admissions officers are interested in the depth of your involvement in extracurricular activities rather than the sheer number. Holding leadership positions, initiating projects, or making significant contributions to clubs, sports teams, or community organizations can set you apart. It’s important to show how your participation has had a positive impact on your school or community.
The application essays are a vital part of your Princeton application. They offer you an opportunity to showcase your personality, experiences, and writing skills. Princeton requires several essays, including the Common Application essay and three supplemental essays.
The Common Application essay prompts change slightly each year, but they generally ask you to reflect on your experiences, values, or challenges. This essay should be personal, well-written, and give the admissions committee insight into who you are beyond your grades and test scores.
Princeton’s supplemental essays include prompts that ask about your academic interests, extracurricular activities, and personal background. These essays allow you to discuss your intellectual curiosity, how you plan to contribute to the Princeton community, and any unique aspects of your identity or experiences. It’s important to be genuine and specific in your responses, providing concrete examples to illustrate your points.
Princeton requires two academic teacher recommendations and one counselor recommendation. These letters should come from teachers who know you well and can speak to your academic abilities, character, and potential. Strong letters of recommendation provide a more comprehensive picture of you as a student and a person, highlighting qualities that may not be evident from your transcript alone.
Interviews are an optional part of the Princeton admissions process. If offered, they provide an additional opportunity to demonstrate your interest in Princeton and to further convey your personality and goals. Interviews are conducted by Princeton alumni and can be either in-person or virtual. While not required, a positive interview can enhance your application.
There are several parts involved in the Princeton application, and keeping track of them can be a challenge. Here is a checklist of what you need to complete your application to Princeton:
Princeton offers single-choice early action and regular decision admissions . For the current application cycle, if you are applying to Princeton for an early action decision, the due date is November 1 . The arts supplement is due by November 6. For regular application decisions, the due date is January 1 , with the arts supplement due on January 8 .
Applying to Princeton University can be an overwhelming process, but with the right support, you can enhance your chances of success. That’s why I created Prep Expert in the first place; test-taking is a skill that any student can learn to improve your admission chances. At Prep Expert, we offer a range of services designed to help you build a compelling application. Our SAT and ACT courses cater to every student’s needs, while our one-on-one tutoring sessions, led by experienced instructors, provide personalized guidance. Additionally, our dedicated college consulting services support both students and their families through every step of the admissions journey.
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Applying to colleges in the US can be a complex and time-consuming process, especially when you're targeting multiple institutions. Fortunately, the Common Application, or Common App, a nonprofit organization, simplifies this journey by serving as a centralized platform that allows you to apply to over 900 colleges and universities across the country with just one application.
Whether you're eyeing prestigious Ivy League schools or state universities, the Common App streamlines the application process, saving you time and effort. Here’s how you can get started and make the most of this invaluable tool for your college admissions.
Important steps to follow
By carefully navigating the steps of the Common App, you can efficiently manage your college applications, increase your chances of acceptance, and take a significant step toward achieving your educational goals.
Early Decision: Nov 1
Early Action: Dec 1
Regular Decision Deadline: Feb 1
The Requirements: 1 essay of 200 words
Supplemental Essay Type: Why
To nail this question, set aside an hour or so to get cozy with the Ithaca College website and read up on the school’s academic offerings. Doing as much research as you can before sitting down to write your essay will allow you to tell a cohesive story about yourself while also ensuring that your essay isn’t redundant. Pour all of your academic focus into your answer to this question. What do you love about your chosen major and/or minor? If you’re interested in the Cinema and Photography program, can you describe the unique opportunities you’ll find at Ithaca? What resources are available to undergrads and how will they help you further develop your skills? The more detail you include, the more admissions will get to learn about you.
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What do the 2024-25 supplemental essay prompts really mean, and how should you approach them? CEA's experts are here to break them all down.
The exercises and prompts we used to prepare for the Common App personal statement can serve as excellent material for addressing the many types of questions that come up in the supplemental essays.
Common App Supplements for 2024-25. Many colleges and universities announce their supplemental essay prompts in the weeks leading up to the official opening of the Common Application on Aug. 1. The Common App essay prompts are already available for this cycle, allowing students applying to college this fall to get a head start on their personal ...
The Common App essay prompts offer diverse topics, inviting students to share personal stories, challenges, growth, and meaningful experiences.
What is the min/max word count for the essays on the Questions page or Writing Supplement? 4627 Views • Jul 25, 2023 • Knowledge
THE WHY US ESSAY The WHY US Essay asks students a simple u want to go to THIS school and not THAT school? This is one of the most common supplemental essays, but to answer it eff EXAMPLE PROMPTS: Please tell us what you value most about Columbia and why. (300 words or less)
Common App Supplemental Essay Tips For each college that you apply to via the Common Application, you're going to need to create a supplemental essay that answers that school's specific questions while showcasing your talents and telling your story in a way that demonstrates your unique fit for that particular program.
Throughout this guide, "Common App Essay," "Common App personal statement," and "personal statement" are used interchangeably. Secondary or supplemental essays: These are the essays that schools can choose to have you write on top of the core Common App Essay.
The Common Application is used by over 1,000 colleges and universities in the United States and around the world, including all of the Ivy Leagues. In the 2023-2024 college application season, there are seven common app essay prompts to choose from. In addition, many schools require supplemental essays. On the Accepted blog, our college ...
How to Write the Most Common Supplemental College Essays: A Complete Guide Note: This post focuses on supplemental essays. If you want advice on the Common App prompts, check out our guide to the Common App essays.
What is the Common App essay? As you begin applying to college, you'll likely hear a lot about Common App essays (or personal statements). Of course, you'll complete other essays during the college application process—namely, school-specific supplemental essays. However, when someone talks about "college essays," or "personal statements," they are usually referring to the Common ...
Writing Supplement In addition to the personal essay which you submit through the Common Application, Barnard asks first-year applicants to respond to institution-specific Writing Supplement questions. We recommend spending time to thoughtfully consider these questions and your responses.
Writing requirements by college. This resource provides guidance to students on what writing questions they can expect within individual college questions!
Wondering where to find those sneaky supplemental essay questions? Are they in the writing section of the Common App or hidden away in some deep, dark corner of a school's supplemental application? You won't know until you go poking around -- or, until you watch this handy, dandy guide we made you! Where to Find Supplements on the 2017-18 ...
6 Ways To Prepare For The Common App's Supplemental Essays. Preparing before you sit down to write your college supplemental essays is a key step that many students skip. Gathering all your prompts, identifying deadlines, and doing research into your prompts will put you a step ahead in the essay writing process.
Fall 2025 Supplemental Application Essays. When you apply to Caltech through the Common App or QuestBridge Application, you will also submit the Caltech Specific Questions (for QuestBridge applicants, these questions come if you become a Match Finalist and you ranked Caltech). These questions change annually, are updated, and published in the ...
In the online Common Application Writing Supplement for those applying for Fall 2025 entry, please respond to both the Cornell University essay question and the essay prompt that corresponds to the undergraduate college or school to which you are applying.
The main difference between the Common App essay and supplemental essays is their purpose and audience. Your Common App essay is a personal statement that goes to all the schools you apply to through the Common App. It's your chance to showcase who you are beyond your grades and test scores.
Write only one essay (plus any supplements). You'll submit one essay through the Common Application for all your schools. Some colleges may ask you to also answer a few supplemental questions. Check out the Common App essay prompts now so you can start strategizing!
The short answer is that both are crucial components of your application, as they play different roles in creating a comprehensive picture of who you are. For most schools, the Common App essay is a chance to see your personality and values at a high level. It's the only essay every college you apply to through the Common App will see, which is ...
If you're starting to write your college essay, these Common App essay examples will help you understand what a strong, stand-out college essay looks like.
Planning to apply to NYU during the 2024-2025 academic year? Here's what you need to know about recent changes to NYU's Common Application.
The Common App is built to, hopefully, make the process easier. But it may feel intimidating at first. So in this guide, we're going to walk you through what you need to understand about how to use the Common App, including common questions and mistakes, to (hopefully) bring a little more ease to your application process. We think you'll find that the Common App can be pretty useful (oh ...
For this reason, supplemental essay prompts are often abstract, requiring students to get creative, read between the lines, and ditch the traditional essay-writing format when crafting their ...
Working on the 2024-25 Common App prompts? Our post will give you expert tips on how to write stand-out essays. Includes some real Common App essay examples!
Princeton requires several essays, including the Common Application essay and three supplemental essays. Common Application Essay . The Common Application essay prompts change slightly each year, but they generally ask you to reflect on your experiences, values, or challenges.
University of Massachusetts Amherst 2024-25 Application Essay Question Explanations. The Requirements: 3 essays of 100 words each Supplemental Essay Type(s): Why, Community UMass Amherst's supplement asks one question with two prompts: why here?
The Requirements: Two essays of 150-200 words each. Supplemental Essay Type(s): Why. We appreciate you taking the time to answer these Haverford specific questions and are excited for the opportunity to consider your application for admission.
Whether you're eyeing prestigious Ivy League schools or state universities, the Common App streamlines the application process, saving you time and.Common App application process. apply to U.S. colleges. how to use the Common App. college application tips. Common App account setup. U.S. college admissions. submit applications through Common App. college application platform.
Ithaca College 2024-25 Application Essay Question Explanation. The Requirements: 1 essay of 200 words Supplemental Essay Type: Why We're committed to supporting you in energizing your learning experiences so you can go further than you imagine.