When do essay prompts come out?

hyeonjlee
Sun, 06 Dec 2009 17:17:44 +0000

S1 did not START his essays until well into Oct for his U Chicago EA application (he is a freshman there). Finished required essays for his RD application 5 minutes before the deadline (yes, he deserved to be rejected by his top Ivy RD schools). He has friends who did not do any RD essays etc until they learned that they were not accepted by the Yale SCEA - they are all in top 10 schools any way. It almost feels like there was some kind of competitive “who can get in by doing everything absolutely at the last minute” contest.

Certainly, not to encourage others to follow this example - these are TERRIBLE examples. But to show that it can be done.

As for S2, we are going to encourage him to finish the first batch of essays by June - he will be applying to the ROTC scholarship, which should be done by June to maximize his odds. I assume that the main essay he will have to write for the ROTC application will be highly recyclable for his college applications - it will be all about his desire to “serve”, and I believe this will be a highly unusual essay - the kind the adcoms don’t see often. Since common app and most colleges allow “topic of your choice”, this will be the main stay for him.