By Helen C
The shorter “supplemental” essays required by most selective colleges can add some essential spice to the stew of your story.
Though small in word count, they are still significant! A slapdash supplemental response tells colleges that you don’t really care about them
and might land you in the “deny” pile.
Read on to learn how to supercharge your “supps.”
Supplemental prompts roughly fall into five categories:
- Why Here?
- Why YOU? How will you thrive within the school’s environment?
- Community
- A space to discuss your identity or background; this might be race, gender identity, sexual orientation, or religion, but “community” can mean many things!
- Intellectual Interest
- What are you OBSESSED with? Revive one of those topics that didn’t make it into your main essay.
- Disagreement
- Share that you have a point of view and that you can defend it peacefully. And, perhaps, find that it can change!
- Short Takes
- In a few words, add texture to your story and have fun in a serious way.
Now, SUPERCHARGE those Supplementals with these 3 must-do actions:
- Tell ONE Story
- Your application is the “story of you” and should be COMPLETE and COHERENT, without repetition or contradictions (though contrast is compelling!).
- Do your RESEARCH
- Colleges want to know you know them (and that you spent more than 5 minutes on their website).
- Link your specific interests to the school’s specific opportunities.
- Be EFFICIENT
- You might have 100 supplementals, but you don’t need to write 100 essays. Realistically, you should write about 5 then (carefully!) tailor those essays to the individual school. The schools’ specifics change, but YOU don’t.
- Let Bespoke’s expert essay coaches help! We have the experience, tools, and strategies to help students make the most of small word counts and share their COMPLETE stories, clearly and confidently.
This article is based on our 09/11 webinar, “Supercharge Your Supplemental Essays”.
You can watch here.
