Who gets accepted to UChicago?

schlegelkopf
Tue, 20 Feb 2018 16:47:24 +0000

As a newbie to this board (take what I write with a grain of salt), based on all I’ve read these past few months, my child’s experience this year, friends‘ experiences this and previous years, and my 20+ year experience doing alumni interviews for an HYPSM, I think for applicants without hooks, in addition to high stats and good ECs, UChicago places significant importance on the uncommon essay. UChicago receives thousands of incredibly qualified applications, but as with all these competitive universities, they need to differentiate among these academic superstars, and one obvious way is the uncommon essay.

My child was accepted EA. She has no favorite university, just a few which are excellent for her intended major and where she believes she would be happy. She did not need to pledge her allegiance to UChicago to get accepted. Her Why UChicago essay was, in my opinion, mediocre, and her common app essay was, in my opinion, boring. She has never visited the university and didn’t even have an interview. But she had diligently read all the marketing material she received and fell in love with the school. She was excited about the uncommon essay and in a flash of inspiration, wrote a truly brilliant essay, the kind which reflects the thoughtful, intelligent, creative and witty thinking of which she is capable. Without really knowing of course, I believe this is certainly one thing that set her application apart from all the other apps with high stats and good ECs. Having read many of the UChicago uncommon essays published all over the internet, there is a certain intelligence, wit and creativity that they seem to have in common.

A friend‘s child who has high stats but was rejected in a previous year, wrote a nice uncommon essay but nothing that demonstrated any kind of witty or intelligent or creative thinking. Yes, this is only anecdotal, but thought I would still throw it out there. Maybe others have similar or completely different experiences.

Tl;dr - I think the uncommon essay plays a significant role in distinguishing which high stat applicants have the level of intellectual curiosity and creativity that UChicago is looking for.