<p>Inspired by my sister who applied to just 3 schools, my parents are now insisting that I apply to no more than 5 (the guidance counselor said 5-7). Their argument is that even though many schools I’m interested in use the common app, they all require a supplement, which would mean having to write an additional essay for each school.</p>
<p>I noticed that a lot of people here applied to many more than 7 schools, so any insight on applying to a (relatively) large number of schools would be much appreciated. Thanks!</p>
<p>i think what a lot of people do is either write a generic essay, or change the name of the school in the essay when theyre applying to that many…5-7 seems like a good number though – as far as i know, not many schools require a supplement to the common app, so it should be manageable…</p>
<p>Each supplement has different requirements, and in our experience almost ALL schools have a supplement. Some (Tufts comes to mind) want a ridiculous number of additional essays and short answers. Ditto Bennington. Wesleyan asks for no additional material, but that’s the only school we encountered that didn’t. I don’t know about state schools. So you can sometimes write an additional “why our school” essay and change the details, but be aware that the “why our school” is not necessarily the essay the supplements call for.</p>
<p>In addition to the time needed for completing the application, you will also have additional costs ($40-50 app fee typically; small fees to send more than 4 test scores, e.g.), more recommendation letters, transcripts, etc.</p>
<p>But the additional time and cost involved are really minor factors. When I look at students who applied to a large number of schools (12 schools, 15 schools…), I wonder whether they have actually evaluated the schools and their own criteria, or are simply listing schools they think are prestigious. I think it’s fine to apply to 5-7 as your guidance counselor suggested, perhaps even as many as 10 if you simply can’t decide, but more than that makes me wonder what a student is really doing. And it is critical to make sure you have a good set of match and safety schools, just in case. Good luck!</p>
<p>It depends on the college. Some supplements take longer than others. I applied to eight schools, and the supplements for those schools were all pretty much the same–the only real addition to the supplement is an essay on why you want to attend the school, and for the most part, the reasons why I wanted to attend the University of Chicago, for example, were the same for why I wanted to go to Swarthmore, so the supplements for both weren’t very difficult. </p>
<p>I don’t think it’s a good idea to limit the number of colleges you go to because you’re worried you won’t do a good job on the supplements. It would be a good idea to go on Google and type in the name of the college you’re interested in and ‘supplement application’ and try to find a copy of what they want. For the colleges I applied to, they weren’t much work at all (paragraph on why you want to go, paragraph on what you’re interested in studying…). Definitely not something to be worried about, but again, it depends on the school.</p>
<p>As someone above said, you can change the essays slightly for the individual colleges. For example, the “Why this college” essays will probably have similar answers, and these essays don’t take much time to write, because you don’t have to be really personal or anything. They just want a straight-out honest answer.</p>
<p>Thanks for the responses! Good to hear that writing essays for supplements was not that much of an issue. </p>
<p>I was looking at the supplements for the colleges that I’m interested in, and I noticed that the ones online are all from last year. Does anyone know if they change at all from year to year?</p>
<p>Generally they won’t change from year to year. They’re pretty much going to ask the exact same things, like why you’re interested in the school. Some schools try to make creative questions (that they hope will elicit creative answers), and of course those questions will probably change from year to year.</p>