The Common Application is an on-line admission application created and accepted by a consortium of about 700 colleges. Almost every top-ranked college uses it, with the notable exception of the University of California system. It is referred to as the “Common App”, after the website students that log into to complete their applications: www.commonapp.org. Although many colleges customize the “Common App” by adding supplemental essays and short answer questions, almost every applicant must complete the “Common App essay”, a 650-word discussion of one of several specified questions.
Every two years, the Common App consortium revises those questions; this post discusses the revisions for 2017-18.
Why mention this now, when applications will not be due for at least six months? Because summer (and even Spring Break) is the best time to start outlining, and even writing, the essay; students will be busy enough in the months thereafter with tests, homework, and college selection.
You can review the 2017-18 questions here: http://www.commonapp.org/whats-appening/application-updates/common-application-announces-2017-2018-essay-prompts.
Although Questions #1-5 include only minor revisions to the same questions used in 2016, Question #7 has not been used in several years, and Question #6 is new:
- Describe a topic, idea, or concept you find so engaging that it makes you lose all track of time. Why does it captivate you? What or who do you turn to when you want to learn more?
- Share an essay on any topic of your choice. It can be one you’ve already written, one that responds to a different prompt, or one of your own design.
Question #7 is for students who are unable to “shoehorn” their essay into one of the other prompts. Colleges are again realizing that some experiences or ideas are not easily categorized. However, because most essay topics can be shoehorned into Questions #1-5, not just any essay will do – only an unusual and startlingly good effort will impress college admissions officers.
Question #6 is a welcome attempt to reach students who do not have many traditional extracurricular activities because they spend their time on one activity away from school. The essay is aimed at students who self-study a field in depth (“lose all track of time”). The interest is unspecified, so almost any pursuit will do (e.g. archeology, linguistics, philosophy, particle physics, linguistics, ornithology).
The essay asks students to expound on why they immerse themselves in that topic, idea, or concept, what problems or events in that field intrigue them, and how they explore them. The essay should demonstrate an ability, and passion for, self-guided learning. The results of that learning are not particularly germane to the essay, but if the student has won a Nobel Prize as a result of his or her endeavors, I would fit that in somewhere.
Do not neglect the second part of that prompt: “What or who do you turn to when you want to learn more?” Colleges want “self-starters”, students who can transcend the “show up at lecture and cram for tests” mode of learning and go out into the world and seek answers to interesting questions. They are looking for students who can find their own resources, and perhaps even more important, their own mentors.
This prompt is different from the other Common App essays, which are often used as showcases for student writing. Those essays give free rein to the student to include well-turned phrases, clever metaphors, and even concern about the plight of others.
This prompt is different; it calls for prose. It is ideal for “geeks”, “nerds”, and other students who travel off the beaten path in pursuit of a “passion.”
I call this prompt the Robert Frost question. See https://www.poetryfoundation.org/resources/learning/core-poems/detail/44272. It represents a huge opportunity for the right student. The gains to be made by carefully crafting a case that the student has an exceptional “thirst for learning” – and ability to quench it at the college level – will outweigh flashier essays written in response to the other prompts.
Students who are traveling that “path not taken” should begin planning their Robert Frost essay now.