Honestly, these essay questions are much less daunting to me as an applicant, however I can understand why from a consultant’s perspective it would create lackluster essays. Definitely less room to get creative. Thanks for sharing your thoughts. I saw the new essay about a week ago and hoped you’d make a video ❤
Yeah, I could see that. But that's part of why they will be less valuable to candidates. The harder the climb, the greater the result. These are "easier" to start but also way harder to show depth and differentiation. But stay tuned next week for brainstorming tips!
Well clearly, you are not really convinced with these new essays :D But do you think applicants this year are at disadvantage because of these huge changes? As a whole - yes, but my question is that every applicant will have to say their stories now in those limited 300 words and it would affect everybody similarly. Also the admission consultants, this year won't be knowing what works and what doesn't work for Harvard :( Thanks for the amazing content always!!
Hahaha. Yeah I am not a fan of these new essays. It's true everyone will submit these same essays. But that will have a disproportionately negative effect on unique candidates vs. mainstream ones. That is sort of my point here. These essays will reduce the variance and the swings in quality of presentation. More people will sound similar to each other. So then the school will end up relying more on stats. So that will favor people with strong stats and make the door less open for people with less standard backgrounds to win the day with their story. Not that the chance is zero. It is just lower and harder. It's a bummer to be honest. Thanks for the kind words!
