Hello there! I am applying to Stanstead College in Canada as well as some more traditional New England prep schools, and one of the major ECs that I talk about is writing; as such, I’ve been working very hard on my essays so far that they’ve replaced my personal writing projects so that I can make them as good as possible. For the Stanstead essay prompt, I’m completely stumped. The prompt is: “Please upload a letter explaining why you are interested in attending Stanstead College. Include your interests, hobbies, and any additional information you feel would be helpful for Admissions to know.”
Anyone who is familiar with this school, type of prompt, or anything else, do you have any tips/ideas for how I can approach it? I’m genuinely completely stuck; should I just copy and edit over my favorite essay or something like that? Anything could help - I would appreciate all your help!
Perhaps my first reaction is that you should be genuine.
This leads to a question: Why are you applying to Stanstead College?
Another thing that comes to mind for me: Stanstead College is in a small bilingual town right near the US/Canadian border. I am pretty sure that there is a library nearby that is famous for having been intentionally built crossing the US/Canada border (it was originally built by a couple with dual nationality). I have read that the majority of the population speaks both English and French, and while according to Wikipedia there are a significant number of people who speak only one of these two languages, it is hard for me to believe that there are many residents who are high school age who can’t speak at least passably well in both languages. Thus attending Stanstead College would put you in a slightly foreign country (assuming that you are from the USA), and in a largely bilingual community. What does this mean to you?
By the way, I used to know someone reasonably well who came from a bilingual family. His mother was native French Canadian and his father was native English Canadian. He spoke both with equal ease. His first memory was that there are two words for everything. His second memory was that the words come in groupings, and some people only know one of the two groupings. You might very well meet some people in Stanstead who have similar memories. Would this be interesting, or would you not care?
This being a small town in Canada, you might expect there to be a hockey rink and a curling club, and apparently you would not be disappointed on either. Does this matter to you?
This sounds like an essay prompt that works a lot like a lot of prompts to colleges: the Why College? essay. Just do your best to show the admissions team that you have researched the particular school you are applying to and give a rough sketch of the kind of role you think you would fill there as a student. You sound like a thoughtful applicant, so you’re probably just fatigued with all the essays right now. That happens to a lot of students at this point in the calendar. Be yourself and don’t stress this. Good luck this application season!
This is a pretty standard question. It is less about why us and telling the school what makes them great, but rather why them, regarding you. What will you do there, be there, bring there? How will you contribute and take advantage of their offerings that will make both you and them better for having been there. Why will you be successful there vs any school that will take you.