Elite schools tend to be concerned about yield. If true, then one's college application essay may shed light on whether or not an RD applicant would likely attend.

To state that college application essays do not matter is incorrect with respect to the most selective schools as much can be garnered from an applicant's writing that may not be evident from the rest of the application.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I had no involvement in my kid's essays, though I did read the Common App one before it went in. I thought it was solid, and reflected both his voice and who he was, but it wasn't amazing.

His admissions results were not as good as I would have expected going into the process given his basic academic qualifications (3.98 GPA/4.53 wGPA, 35 ACT) and solid EC profile), though he's ended up in a good situation.

I don't know whether a better essay would have helped, but it might have.

Of course a better essay would have helped at the most selective schools for one with solid ECs, a 35 ACT score, and a near perfect GPA.

Essays are on college applications for several reasons--one of which is to gauge interest for non-ED applicants with outstanding qualifications.

No it wouldn’t have helped.

If it was bad then a good one would have helped. Competitive schools read them. They have 5 or 6 kids equally qualified for each slot. They matter. If your kids was fine but not outstanding -- not sure it would matter.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I had no involvement in my kid's essays, though I did read the Common App one before it went in. I thought it was solid, and reflected both his voice and who he was, but it wasn't amazing.

His admissions results were not as good as I would have expected going into the process given his basic academic qualifications (3.98 GPA/4.53 wGPA, 35 ACT) and solid EC profile), though he's ended up in a good situation.

I don't know whether a better essay would have helped, but it might have.

Are you willing to share admissions results from specific colleges & universities ?

In at Northeastern, Wake Forest, Virginia Tech, James Madison University.

Not in at Harvard, Yale, MIT, Williams, Amherst, or Virginia.

Was a full IB Diploma candidate, Eagle Scout, and two-time captain of both his high school and club hockey teams (hockey was a 25-30 hour a week commitment for all 4 years of high school).

Harvard, Yale, MIT, Williams, & Amherst are super reaches for unhooked applicants applying RD, therefore, no one can reasonably assert that your son under-performed with respect to college admissions based on these schools.

However, a denial from Virginia as a Virginia resident with such strong qualifications suggests that his application could have been better. Was it the essay ? Maybe, maybe not--but that is one area that was largely under the control of the applicant.

Anonymous wrote:How are so many of you speaking with such authority on whether the essay matters and how much it matters? The answer is, it might - no one knows.

There are many parts to a college application. When applying to most selective schools, the safest approach is to give substantial attention to each part of the application.

To those who think that college app essays do not make a difference, then just leave them blank.

College application essays often reveal multiple insights about an applicant.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I had no involvement in my kid's essays, though I did read the Common App one before it went in. I thought it was solid, and reflected both his voice and who he was, but it wasn't amazing.

His admissions results were not as good as I would have expected going into the process given his basic academic qualifications (3.98 GPA/4.53 wGPA, 35 ACT) and solid EC profile), though he's ended up in a good situation.

I don't know whether a better essay would have helped, but it might have.

Are you willing to share admissions results from specific colleges & universities ?

In at Northeastern, Wake Forest, Virginia Tech, James Madison University.

Not in at Harvard, Yale, MIT, Williams, Amherst, or Virginia.

Was a full IB Diploma candidate, Eagle Scout, and two-time captain of both his high school and club hockey teams (hockey was a 25-30 hour a week commitment for all 4 years of high school).

Yea I’d be disappointed too, honestly. Those aren’t great choices. No way it was just the essay.

Why didn’t he apply to LACs slightly below Amherst and Williams? It’s like you had all reaches and safeties and no matches. Or did you assume that UVA was a match?

How are so many of you speaking with such authority on whether the essay matters and how much it matters? The answer is, it might - no one knows.

Anonymous wrote:LOL DCUM be like
I’ll pay for private school, hire tutors, pay for test prep, pay a college consultant, stalk DCUM’s college thread, and college confidential, advocate to have child assessed, they may need more time, inspect class rigor each year in HS, calculate potential gpa, spring for spring break trips to do campus tours, stalk college websites….
….but the college essay?
God no, didn’t even peek at it. Cuz now that’s where I draw the line.

This was funny and accurate!

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I had no involvement in my kid's essays, though I did read the Common App one before it went in. I thought it was solid, and reflected both his voice and who he was, but it wasn't amazing.

His admissions results were not as good as I would have expected going into the process given his basic academic qualifications (3.98 GPA/4.53 wGPA, 35 ACT) and solid EC profile), though he's ended up in a good situation.

I don't know whether a better essay would have helped, but it might have.

Are you willing to share admissions results from specific colleges & universities ?

In at Northeastern, Wake Forest, Virginia Tech, James Madison University.

Not in at Harvard, Yale, MIT, Williams, Amherst, or Virginia.

Was a full IB Diploma candidate, Eagle Scout, and two-time captain of both his high school and club hockey teams (hockey was a 25-30 hour a week commitment for all 4 years of high school).

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I had no involvement in my kid's essays, though I did read the Common App one before it went in. I thought it was solid, and reflected both his voice and who he was, but it wasn't amazing.

His admissions results were not as good as I would have expected going into the process given his basic academic qualifications (3.98 GPA/4.53 wGPA, 35 ACT) and solid EC profile), though he's ended up in a good situation.

I don't know whether a better essay would have helped, but it might have.

Of course a better essay would have helped at the most selective schools for one with solid ECs, a 35 ACT score, and a near perfect GPA.

Essays are on college applications for several reasons--one of which is to gauge interest for non-ED applicants with outstanding qualifications.

No it wouldn’t have helped.

Anonymous wrote:I had no involvement in my kid's essays, though I did read the Common App one before it went in. I thought it was solid, and reflected both his voice and who he was, but it wasn't amazing.

His admissions results were not as good as I would have expected going into the process given his basic academic qualifications (3.98 GPA/4.53 wGPA, 35 ACT) and solid EC profile), though he's ended up in a good situation.

I don't know whether a better essay would have helped, but it might have.

Of course a better essay would have helped at the most selective schools for one with solid ECs, a 35 ACT score, and a near perfect GPA.

Essays are on college applications for several reasons--one of which is to gauge interest for non-ED applicants with outstanding qualifications.

Anonymous wrote:I had no involvement in my kid's essays, though I did read the Common App one before it went in. I thought it was solid, and reflected both his voice and who he was, but it wasn't amazing.

His admissions results were not as good as I would have expected going into the process given his basic academic qualifications (3.98 GPA/4.53 wGPA, 35 ACT) and solid EC profile), though he's ended up in a good situation.

I don't know whether a better essay would have helped, but it might have.

Are you willing to share admissions results from specific colleges & universities ?

I had no involvement in my kid's essays, though I did read the Common App one before it went in. I thought it was solid, and reflected both his voice and who he was, but it wasn't amazing.

His admissions results were not as good as I would have expected going into the process given his basic academic qualifications (3.98 GPA/4.53 wGPA, 35 ACT) and solid EC profile), though he's ended up in a good situation.

I don't know whether a better essay would have helped, but it might have.

Colleges don’t care about essays except on the margin and extraordinarily circumstances. Any poster here who thinks that they make such a difference that a parent who helps is hurting another kid’s admissions is kidding themselves.

I heavily edited a couple of my kids’ essays after they came up with their own ideas and wrote the first draft. Yes. And, now that I think back, they didn’t accept all of my edits even (I’d forgotten that actually) and I was ok with that.

So the F what.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:LOL DCUM be like
I’ll pay for private school, hire tutors, pay for test prep, pay a college consultant, stalk DCUM’s college thread, and college confidential, advocate to have child assessed, they may need more time, inspect class rigor each year in HS, calculate potential gpa, spring for spring break trips to do campus tours, stalk college websites….
….but the college essay?
God no, didn’t even peek at it. Cuz now that’s where I draw the line.

Yeah. Because having someone else write it or correct your mistakes is cheating.

First, some would say, that these cheat the system as well.
Second, what you call cheating, some would call The Writing Process.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:The essay is just marketing your kid. Whether you choose to out-source the marketing or handle it in-house is your choice.

Exactly. I write marketing copy for my day job, so I helped DS frame his story, polish the language, etc. He was a recruited athlete, so the essay was just window dressing.

Exactly. If colleges were really interested in making sure that essays were written entirely by the applicants without any outside influence, they would make them part of a timed exam. But they aren't interested in that - they could give a flying F what kind of writer a kid is or isn't.