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What Is the Purpose of a College Personal Statement

College applications that require essays want to know more about a student than just the basic data of course grades, activities, and scores that appear in other parts of the application. The transcript might show they dropped German in favor of American Sign Language. An essay could reveal the friendship with a young neighbor and a desire to better communicate with her. The activities list might seem like a patchwork of unconnected clubs. An essay might discuss multiple cross-country moves as a military kid and how that experience taught them to make friends quickly.

When considering essay ideas, remember the topic of each essay is you, not what happened. The essay should paint a broader and deeper picture of you to the admissions reader. It might even draw direct connections to what you hope to do in college. The Common App personal statement can respond to any of the Common App essay prompts. Some college applications will have their own essay prompts, like the University of California Personal Interest Questions, or additional essay prompts like Why Us? supplemental essays.

Not sure what a Why Us? essay is? I explain what they are and how to approach them here: How to Write a “Why Us” College Essay.

How to Write Your Common App Essay

When you are ready to get started, read through some of the prompts. What experiences or stories come to mind? Jot down not only what happened but sensory details (how it smelled, sounded, felt, maybe even tasted). Then add some lines about why that experience mattered. How did you change as a result? How did you affect those around you? In other words, you want to get past describing only what happened to explain how this reveals more about who you are as a person.

Some people think their college admissions essays need to be unique. This can pressure them to try to think of topics that no one else has ever written about. But what matters isn’t writing about something unusual or unique. What’s important is making the essay individual to the student. How does the essay reveal who you are, what’s important to you, and how these traits will affect what you bring to campus?

It’s OK to feel uncomfortable during the essay writing process. You are trying to remember events in detail, convey them to someone who wasn’t there, and write in a way that is both grammatically correct and emotionally evocative. That’s a tall order and not something you will achieve at the first attempt. One of my writing profs used the phrase “zero draft” to describe the phase of pouring initial thoughts and words onto paper. This early phase wasn’t even at “first draft” stage, because we were still figuring out what to write about and where the connection points were. Give yourself time and space to work through these steps.

Close up of vintage typewriter. "rewrite...edit...rewrite...edit...rewrite" typed on paper. — College essay first drafts usually need work. Don’t be too critical of your early writing, but do leave plenty of time to reread and rewrite your essay. Remember to read it out loud and check for spelling and punctuation errors.
Photo by Suzy Hazelwood on Pexels.com

Full List of 2023-24 Common Application Essay Prompts

The essay demonstrates your ability to write clearly and concisely on a selected topic and helps you distinguish yourself in your own voice. What do you want the readers of your application to know about you apart from courses, grades, and test scores? Choose the option that best helps you answer that question and write an essay of no more than 650 words, using the prompt to inspire and structure your response. Remember: 650 words is your limit, not your goal. Use the full range if you need it, but don’t feel obligated to do so. (The application won’t accept a response shorter than 250 words.)

Some students have a background, identity, interest, or talent that is so meaningful they believe their application would be incomplete without it. If this sounds like you, then please share your story.

The lessons we take from obstacles we encounter can be fundamental to later success. Recount a time when you faced a challenge, setback, or failure. How did it affect you, and what did you learn from the experience?

Reflect on a time when you questioned or challenged a belief or idea. What prompted your thinking? What was the outcome?

Reflect on something that someone has done for you that has made you happy or thankful in a surprising way. How has this gratitude affected or motivated you?

Discuss an accomplishment, event, or realization that sparked a period of personal growth and a new understanding of yourself or others.

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.

Don’t Panic Over College Essay Prompts

Don’t obsess over these prompts. The Common App essay prompts are simply questions designed to encourage deeper thinking and writing in a way that lets you share what’s important to you. Your goal is to give admissions readers a better understanding of who you are as a person than they would get from just looking at grades and test scores. Your essays are your opportunity to control both content and delivery. It is one of the few parts of the application you exert this much control over.

If the first six Common App essay prompts don’t generate ideas, remember that Prompt Seven gives you the freedom to choose your own adventure. This is one reason I start my clients with pre-writing exercises that help them identify what they are trying to communicate – what their story is and what examples help convey it.

Essay coaching is included in each of my comprehensive packages. Essay coaching is also available through hourly services. If this is something you are interested in, let’s connect.

Once you’re done writing your personal statement, use the advice in How to Write a “Why Us?” College Essay to work on any supplemental college essays.

It might feel like vacation just ended. Maybe the notes from finals and AP study guides are still on your desk. But summer is the right time to for seniors to work on college applications. Most colleges open their new application cycle on August 1. Senior year starts just a few weeks later, with many class assignments, events, and activities competing for scarce time. Early deadlines might feel like they are far in the future, but they will loom up faster than you anticipate. These college application tips will help you get started on your applications and take some of the pressure off of senior year.

Make an Activities Master List

Most applications ask students about how they spent their time outside the classroom. Activities don’t have to be an official school club or team. They could include jobs, family responsibilities, volunteer efforts, participation in faith-based groups, and important hobbies. This isn’t just to pad your resume. Colleges are giving increasing attention to the fact that some students spend many hours a week working or caring for siblings or that a student may not be in a school club but devote their free time to beach cleanups or creating film productions.

Create a list of that includes what you did, what your responsibilities and impact were, how much time you spent each week, and what years you were involved. Go into details about projects, what you did and how you felt about completing them. If there is a teacher, coach, or adult mentor who might write a letter of recommendation, make a note of their name and contact info. Your list should lead with the activities that are most important to you, rather than strict chronological order.

Be expansive when writing this master list. The purpose isn’t to create something that is ready to attach to an application, but to create a detailed document that you can draw from when working on your applications. It’s ok to include bullet points, paragraphs describing an event or a responsibility, or a list of awards or performance pieces. When you are done with this activities master list, it will be easier to pull out the most significant activities and what you did in them to fill out the activities sections of applications, make a brag sheet for recommenders, or create a resume.

Pro Tip: It can be a good idea to ask your parents or a close friend if they remember any activities you’ve forgotten. Short term activities like a cyber camp or film conference might slip your mind, but might be combined with other activities in your application to demonstrate a thread of a deep and enduring interest area. When my own kids applied to college, looking back at old calendars brought up several items that we had forgotten about.

Create a Common Application Account

The Common Application is a portal used by hundreds of different colleges, from Aberystwyth University (Wales) to York College of Pennsylvania to process student applications. Students enter their personal information, school info, and activities on one main page, that is then sent to any participating college. The advantage for students is that they don’t have to enter basic information on a multitude of different applications. The advantage for colleges is that students are more likely to apply, if it’s a relatively easy add on rather than a totally separate application portal.

The Common App does an annual rollover to the new application cycle. The good news is that much of a student’s data is preserved in the rollover, so a rising senior can input this data during the summer and be a step ahead when the new application cycle starts. Student accounts are frozen for about a week during the system refresh, usually around the last week of July.

Data entered in the Common App tab will rollover. This includes the subsections for Profile, Family, Education, Testing, and Activities. Sections that do not roll over include answers in the My Colleges tab (which includes college-specific questions) and invitations to recommenders (or recommendations that might have been uploaded). So you should wait to enter responses to these sections until after the rollover has occurred. This Application Guide for First Time Students can help you create your account and start filling out the application. This year there will also be a set of free Common App walk through videos called the AXS Companion. These videos are a joint project of IECA and Oregon State University and feature a bunch of fabulous Independent Educational Consultants showing step by step how to complete the application.

Pro Tip: If you are primarily applying to colleges in California or colleges that have their own application, you might not use the Common App portal for your applications. In that case, take the time to research the applications you will be using so you have a better understanding of what you will need to submit.

Start Working on Your Essays

A strong essay should be primarily about you. It’s your opportunity to tell the admissions readers the rest of the story that they don’t get from reading your transcript, activities list, and test scores. Don’t procrastinate work on pre-writing exercises that helps you define and share what values, experiences, and goals make up your story.

Many colleges use similar essay prompts from year to year. The Common Application has announced the Personal Statement prompts for 2021-22, which includes one new prompt to replace one that wasn’t used often. This means that you don’t have to wait until applications officially open in late summer to start thinking and writing about who you are and what strengths and attributes you will bring to the college community. If this is an area you want help on, maybe an Admissions Decrypted Essay Coaching Package is something to consider.

Pro Tip: You should always write essays and other supplemental writing responses in a document and paste them into applications. This allows you to use spell check and word count tools and protects you from losing hours of work if there is a system glitch in the application.

Start Working on Applications Now; Have More Calm Later

Each of these tasks takes time, usually more time than expected. Getting a head start on completing college applications can relieve pressure from looming fall deadlines and allow headspace for putting together a high-quality application. Don’t panic when you can’t access your Common App account during the system refresh. Use this time to work on other tasks (like essays) so you are ready to go when rollover is complete. I hope these college application tips are useful. If you’d like help with your college applications or college planning, get in touch.

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Common App Essay Prompts 2023-24