<p>Moreover, most 18 year olds are understandably clueless on the basis of reading a couple of brochures and - if they’re lucky - an overnight visit, what it will be like to live in Durham, Cambridge or Palo Alto for 4 years, or how they’d like it.</p>
<p>so i read one of the post says that perstige is not something you should go to a school for?
I wrote prestige in my essay, in fact, it was the first sentence “I would like to go to penn b/c it’s prestigious”. that’s why i wanna go to penn. I also wrote i wanted to be surrounded by smart ppl. So what’s wrong with going to a school for its prestige?</p>
<p>I don’t think there is anything wrong with prestige being a factor, and honestly the schools know that people consider it. I do think, however, that you could pick a slightly more original topic for your essay… If that is what the essay is about, it doesn’t say much to distinguish you from the rest of the applicants.</p>
<p>nope, it really doesn’t lol</p>
<p>Did you honestly tell them that you wanted to go there for Penn’s prestige? If you did, doesn’t that strike you as a bit shallow?</p>
<p>Sucking up to a school’s adcom is tantamount to flat-out rejection. I’d be interested to know how many students actually include some statement(s) in their apps along the lines of “and that’s why I want to go to _____ University/College”…</p>
<p>i did say prestige, because i am a very straight forward guy. I am going there for the prestige and a good education,
and i also said “therefore, that’s why i would like to go to ____ University”
is it bad?</p>
<p>when the essay calls for a reference to the school, I don’t think that’s a problem. But just flat out saying “I want to go to your school for its rep” isn’t that distinguishing of yourself…</p>
<p>Well, what about the common application? I used it (of course) for Dartmouth, my first choice. I wrote everything out like I cared a lot about the process and sent the same application to my second to last choice school and all in between. Most schools I applied to didn’t even have a supplement. What would they think about my app?</p>
<p>I think that’s fine Greensleeves. If you spent a lot of effort on that application, then it’s a good idea that you reuse it instead of doing another application that you might do sloppily. I think what babybird and downindreams were saying is that using a formulaic sentence like “I want to go to [insert name of college] because blah.” or finishing it with “So that’s why I want to go to [insert name of college]” is boring, unoriginal, and incredibly bad writing. Sending out an application that you worked hard on to several schools, on the other hand, saves time and is, in my opinion, a good idea.</p>