<p>I just finished reading Fat Envelope Frenzy, and I must say I was underwhelmed by the essay excerpts from the Ivy hopefuls profiled in the book.</p>
<p>I think the essay prompts are part of the problem. How many of us would be able to reveal the most appealing aspects of our personality by, for example, discussing some issue of personal, local, national, or international concern and its importance to you.</p>
<p>Thus, I’d like us to come up with some alternative essay prompts.</p>
<p>I’ll start: If you had to get a tatoo, what would you choose and why?</p>
<p>Wow - I won’t go that far out there, maybe explaining what type of songs are on your IPod (or general music collection if you don’t have an IPod)</p>
<p>It seems though that a majority of the schools that D will be applying to have honor codes, and some have essay prompts to write about that in their supplements. If a question on the subject of honor, ethics, trust, etc. was a Common App prompt, it would have definitely saved her some time instead of writing about it multiple times in different contexts…</p>
<p>There is always the option of picking your own topic.</p>
<p>How about " What is your pet peeve?" “What makes you laugh?” “What is your favorite time of day.”</p>
<p>These are all pretty bad.</p>
<p>I thought that Middlebury’s supplement was good “Describe your community.” My daughter did a lot of thinking about where she is from geographically as well as in terms of her ethnic background. It ended up being her favorite essay.</p>
<p>I do like the “Describe your community” prompt.</p>
<p>How you respond would really reveal quite a bit about you.</p>
<p>And I like the pet peeve one too. (Although my daughter told me that she would choose people who chew loudly, and I guess you couldn’t get too far with that.)</p>
<p>My daughter actually used that one. It works for some people, especially those whose most appealing aspect is their ability to write a coherent essay with some content in it, rather than something more personal.</p>