So given the subjective nature of the process, it isn’t entirely unreasonable to ask–over and over–what looks good on a college application?

So what looks good on a college application?

It’s not what you do, but how well you do it

Many parents believe there is some secret checklist that one follows to get into selective colleges:  

• community service,
• academic research, 
• leadership,
• sports,
• the arts,
• an internship.

But colleges care much less about the actual activity you pursue than the impact you make and the level of achievement you are able to reach. 

Athletics and college admissions

While it’s nice to play a sport–and American culture certainly emphasizes sports in our schools–the more selective colleges won’t care that much unless you are good enough to play for them and help them win the conference title.  Of course there are other benefits to sports other than the college application process, but if you want the sport to “look good” on the college application, you have to play well enough to get onto the college or university team.

Volunteering and college admissions

The situation is similar with community service.  Many people ask us how many hours of volunteer work look good on a college application. But it’s not about the number of hours. It’s about the impact.  For example, a student who spends 4 hours every Saturday for four years shelving books at the local library performs an important service to the community.  However, the impact is minimal:  if that student didn’t shelve the books, someone else would–eventually.  If, on the other hand, the student worked only a few hours a week over the summer to develop a new reading program for kindergartners and helped the library to write a successful grant proposal to fund it, the impact on the community would be much greater.  And imagine the two different recommendations the head librarian might write for these two students:  one was loyal and dependable and responsible, while the other was creative, innovative, and was able to envision a project and move it toward realization. It’s not the time you put in but the results you achieve.

Internships and college admissions

Similarly, internships are not about the time one spends or the prestige of the company.  It’s about what you do during your time on the job. It can be very useful for a young person to do a job shadow for a couple of weeks to learn about life as an engineer or a marketing director or sales manager. But that is a very passive sort of internship:  the student follows the principal around, attends meetings, and gets a feel for the world of work.  But what is that young person accomplishing? In some instances (though relatively rare), a high school intern is given a specific project to complete while on the job, and may also get some good supervision and access to various tools and systems that the young person can utilize to add value to the company. What colleges are looking for on the college application is your contribution, your agency, your impact on the organization. Most internships, to be frank, are of little value on the college application because most companies don’t have the wherewithal to conceptualize a meaningful experience for a high school intern–especially if the intern is going to be there only for a couple of weeks.  

Jobs on the college application

Having a job while in high school can look great on the college application. But here again, not every job is of equal impact. The student who slings ice cream a few evenings a week makes some good money and learns the value of punctuality, responsibility, loyalty, and adhering to the rules and regulations of the ice cream shop. However, the student who works very hard, goes above and beyond to build the confidence of the business owner may be promoted.

We once worked with a young woman who worked at In-N-Out Burger 20 hours a week all the way through high school. By the time she was a junior, she had been promoted to assistant manager and regularly opened or closed the store, handled all the money and receipts, and was trusted by the owner of the franchise to manage entire shifts on her own. Unsurprisingly, this young woman got a full tuition scholarship–in large part because of the outstanding letter of recommendation the franchise owner wrote on her behalf.  She clearly had a huge impact on this person’s business, and he was glad to tell the world what a responsible, considerate, diligent, and dependable human this young woman had become. So if you do get a job, and you want it to look good on a college application, look for ways to contribute above and beyond the expectations.

A case study of what looks good on a college application

Not too long ago we were working with a young man whose father insisted that he get a job. The father really loved the world of cycling, and he helped his son get an after school job at the local bicycle shop.  The young man was not very enthusiastic, but he was tasked with assembling bikes. By his own admission, he wasn’t very good at it, nor did he like it much.  But he showed up, day after day, and his coworkers liked him and engaged him in conversation. During these conversations in the shop, the owner learned that the young man was a computer whiz and enjoyed playing around with all sorts of programming software and had taken a computer science course in high school.  The owner then took him aside and showed him the inventory software they were using, and explained that nobody else in the shop could figure out how to work certain aspects of the software, and the inventory and sales data and reports weren’t matching up correctly. 

So the young man offered to help. And by the time he was done, he had completely reworked the software for the bike shop and created systems that the owner and other workers could use in a way that improved accuracy and efficiency–and profitability! And, incidentally, he never assembled another bicycle.  

Simply by showing up regularly, showing responsibility and a willingness to help, this young man made a tangible and useful contribution to the business he worked for.  When he put this job on the application, he could say much more about his work at the bike shop than reporting the number of hours worked and bicycles assembled. And his boss?  Just think of that glowing recommendation that was submitted along with the college application. 

Start ups can look good on a college application

The web is full of instances in which high school students started up new ventures, whether for profit or not-for-profit. These can definitely look good on a college application. Usually.

We worked with a young man who started up his own medical equipment donation organization–collecting supplies in the US and delivering them to clinics in Tanzania. Another young woman solicited donations to create back-to-school backpacks for elementary school students in low income neighborhoods. And another young man started up his own lawn care business that employed two other kids and made tens of thousands of dollars in a summer.  Yet another young man was written up in the New York Times because he refused to hear the word “no” when officials at this school said he could not create a film festival (he did it anyway). 

These are enterprises that the student conceived, planned, and executed themselves. Their motivations were sometimes different.  The young woman did her activity expressly to look good on her college application.  The young man with the lawn business need to pay for his car insurance, gas, and new tires.  What mattered, however, is that the students were firmly in charge of the programs they began, and had to resolve problems, react to setbacks, and interact with all manner of other people–almost exclusively adults–to achieve their aims. 

Less impressive start ups

Some start ups are less impressive, especially when it becomes apparent that parents are heavily involved in the success of the business, or provided the necessary seed capital to get it going (our lawn mowing student had to take out a loan from his dad to buy a mower), or otherwise provided too much support to make the venture go. Sometimes it’s hard to discern, from the outside, whether the venture is truly the brainchild of the child or the parent. But admissions officers have clues, most of which have to do with family income, social class, and privilege.  Kids whose ventures lie well outside the experience of the parents are most likely to be seen as creations of their own efforts–and not a result of parental guidance (or interference!). 

College admissions folks have become just a bit wary of the high number of start-up ventures that kids pursue.  It’s so easy in the US to set up a company or a non-profit company. The barriers to establishing a venture are pretty low. Here, as with any other activity, what’s important is not the establishment of the start up but the other metrics of success that the student is able to show: number of shipping containers delivered, number of kids who received backpacks, or the number of lawns mown and dollars earned.  Some ventures are able to show this sort of success, while others look good on paper, but don’t have the results to back up the claims.  

Intellectual curiosity is what looks good on a college application

These days, many kids are pursuing academic research as part of their college applications. They want to show that they have true intellectual interests and the skills and abilities to craft their own research. There are even programs out there for which families can pay to get the personalized guidance in developing and executing an academic research project. Other students make contact with academic researchers at local universities (or sometimes at far away universities) and develop research project with professors.  

Here again, however, not all academic research is treated equally in the college admissions process.  What’s important here–as in everything–is the impact, the substances, the quality of the research–and not the amount of time put in. It’s also not about the “prestige” of the university, the professor, or the department for which one works. In some cases, what is reported as “research” is nothing more than the student working in a lab cleaning test tubes or preparing samples.  It is not substantive work. 

In other cases, however, students are given quite a bit of responsibility within a structured laboratory environment, and they can actually contribute to the success of the research project. 

Sometimes the student is able to publish the results of the academic work they did, either as a co-author on a published research paper, or as a student author in publications like The Concord Review. 

Research is not just for science, either.  We’ve worked with students who have performed substantive historical research.  In one case it was with a professor, and in other cases it was with the guidance of a graduate student. One ended up being recognized in the publication the professor later published, while the other submitted his lengthy research paper for publication on his own. 

Reading will help your college application

Read. A lot. We can’t emphasize this enough. Reading not only will help your test scores improve, but it will both be a demonstration of your intellectual curiosity.  We are often dismayed when we ask high school students what they are reading.  Very seldom are they reading outside the school curriculum. We understand that many students are overprogrammed but reading for enjoyment is a great end-of-the-day stress reliever.

It is particularly disheartening when a student who swear she wants to do academic research is not reading in their professed field of interest. We have met kids who swear they are interested in neuroscience who have not ever read an article or book on the subject.  Or kids who want me to help them find a research project in biomedical engineering who cannot share anything they have read about it. 

Reading shows intellectual curiosity

But when a student tells us they are intellectually interested in something like military aircraft, and can point to the bookshelf full of books about WW2, the Red Baron, the history of commercial aircraft, air battles over Europe, and the use of rockets in warfare, we are impressed. And so are college admission officers.  After this young man was interviewed by the Vice President of Enrollment for a college to which he was applying, the Vice President called to say how impressed he was. The young man’s enthusiasm and knowledge for his little hobby was contagious.  Needless to say, that college accepted him with a huge scholarship. 

The fact is that colleges want to accept learners, and learners are not just people who get good grades in school.  They are not just people who sign up for summer programs or do “academic research” with the guidance of a professor or graduate student. 

Learners are people who read and teach themselves things. They are students who have curiosities about the world, and then set out to satisfy that curiosity–whatever it is. Yes, watching YouTube videos or listening to podcasts can be informative.

But exploring the world’s libraries is really where we can find the repository of human intellectual inquiry. If you can’t find your library card or haven’t used it since middle school, now is the time. 

Do summer programs  look good on a college application?

Sometimes. 

The thing about the vast majority of summer programs is that they are relatively passive.  Someone else sets the syllabus. Someone else defines the parameters of inquiry. Someone else scaffolds the learning in ways that are digestible for younger learners (who have the attention span of a YouTube video rather than a 300-page book). And if there is a performance or assessment at the end of the experience, someone else has decided what that shall be, too. 

Summer programs can be a great way to advance your knowledge of a subject or get a taste of life or introduce you to an entirely new domain of knowledge. 

But, to return to the points above–isn’t that what the library is for?

The other thing about summer programs is that they tend to be expensive. In this way, they are beyond the reach of many, many students and their families.  And in some cases, the summer programs are great moneymakers for the colleges that offer them.  The Summer at Brown program is full of interesting intellectual offerings.  But thing of the profits Brown is spinning every summer.  The overwhelming majority of participants in the Summer at Brown program will have absolutely no chance of getting into Brown, while the kid who spend his summer reading histories of Civil War battles from the confines of his back yard may have a better chance of acceptance. 

Intellectual curiosity on the college application

What’s my point?  Intellectual curiosity comes from within. You can purchase ready-made programs to learn, and it can be helpful to learn in this way (after all, this is what college is all about–enter a classroom, learn from an expert, and perform an assessment to show you have enhanced your knowledge).  But the most selective colleges in the land are seeking young people whose intellectual curiosity is self-driven, not externally driven.  The self-motivated intellect is more desired–because those students are most likely to take best advantage of the resources at a place like Brown–rather than the kid whose parents paid a pretty penny for them to spend two-weeks on the Brown campus safely inside a college classroom learning whatever some graduate student cooked up on the syllabus. 

All this said, there are some summer programs that are very valuable and difficult to get into.  Examples include the Iowa Young Writers Studio, the Telluride Association Summer Seminar (TASS), and MIT’s MITES program and Research Science Institute (RSI).  And these programs may not even cost anything at all–but are offered on a competitive basis to the best of the best. 

Need help with that college application (and what looks good on it)?

The team at Great College Advice can help guide you in making choices about how to spend your time and how to ignite those inner curiosities.  If you want chat with a counselor to learn more about how we help young people craft interesting lives–and good college applications–give us a call or contact us via our website.  We look forward to the conversation. 

Since 2007, the expert team of college admissions consultants at Great College Advice has provided comprehensive guidance to thousands of students from across the United States and over 45 countries across the world. Great College Advice has offices in Colorado, New Jersey, Chicago, North Carolina and Massachusetts.

In addition to our one-on-one counseling, Great College Advice extends its support through one of the most active and resource-rich Facebook Groups for college-bound students and their families: College Admissions Experts. With nearly 150,000 members—students, parents, and experienced counselors—this vibrant forum offers peer support and expert advice like no other.

The post What Looks Good on a College Application? first appeared on Great College Advice.

The writing approach matters. UC admissions experts recommend direct, conversational answers that quickly provide useful details. Elaborate storytelling, extended metaphors, and flowery prose can take space away from explaining your actions and what they reveal about you.

At Great College Advice, our recommendation is to begin with the information you want readers to understand about you. Then choose the prompts that allow you to communicate it clearly.

UC PIQs vs. the Common App Personal Statement and Supplemental Essays

Students sometimes approach every college writing assignment the same way. However, a thoughtful response starts with understanding the purpose of the question.

The Common App Personal Statement Allows More Room for Narrative

A Common App personal statement might follow a conversation, a recurring family routine, or an experience that changed your perspective. The structure can help the reader discover something about you as the essay unfolds.

For a UC response, we recommend making your subject and contribution clear much earlier. You still need reflection, but you have limited room (remember: 350 words maximum for each short answer) to establish the setting before explaining what matters.

Neither assignment benefits from inflated vocabulary or unnecessary decoration. Authenticity and clarity help in both.

Supplemental Essays Depend on the College’s Question

A supplemental essay might ask why you want to study a particular subject, how you contribute to a community, or why a college suits your goals. Others invite imaginative responses.

Some of that material may be useful for a PIQ. However, a campus-specific “Why this college?” response usually needs substantial rethinking before it becomes a useful UC answer.

Our advice: focus your PIQs on evidence from your life. Explaining how you pursued an academic question tells the reader more about you than praising a university’s reputation.

What Are the Eight UC PIQ Prompts?

The summaries below describe each prompt’s focus. Consult the official UC Personal Insight Questions page, including its admissions-team video, for the complete wording. Our suggestions explain how to develop each topic.

1. Leadership Experience

Focus: Your influence on others, conflict resolution, or sustained contribution to a group.

Our advice: Choose a situation that lets you explain decisions. Perhaps you changed how a team practiced, helped colleagues work through a disagreement, or made a family routine more manageable.

Common mistake: Spending the response describing your position and its responsibilities without showing how you exercised judgment or made an impact.

2. Your Creative Side

Focus: How you express creativity through art, original thinking, or problem-solving.

Our advice: Walk the reader through a choice you made. What did you try? Why did you revise it? What possibilities did you see that shaped the result?

Common mistake: Declaring that you are creative without giving the reader an example of your thinking.

3. Your Greatest Talent or Skill

Focus: A meaningful ability and how you have developed and demonstrated it.

Our advice: Explain your practice. A response about public speaking, repairing bicycles, or listening carefully can become compelling when you show how you improved.

Common mistake: Listing awards while leaving out the effort, feedback, and adjustments behind them.

4. An Educational Opportunity or Barrier

Focus: How you used a significant learning opportunity or addressed an obstacle to your education.

Our advice: For an opportunity, identify what you actively pursued. For a barrier, explain the steps you took and what remains challenging.

Common mistake: Devoting most of the response to describing a program rather than your participation in it.

5. A Significant Challenge

Focus: A major challenge, your response, and its effect on academic achievement.

Our advice: Make room for all three elements. Explain the connection to your schoolwork honestly, including how your approach to studying or seeking support changed.

Common mistake: Describing the difficult circumstances in detail but overlooking the steps you took to overcome the challenge.

6. An Academic Subject That Inspires You

Focus: An academic interest and how you have pursued it.

Our advice: Identify a question or idea that drew you further into the subject. Explain what you investigated and how that experience influenced what you wanted to learn next.

Common mistake: Saying you love a subject and listing courses without revealing your intellectual curiosity.

7. Improving Your School or Community

Focus: Your contribution to making a community better.

Our advice: Establish the need, explain your role, and describe the result with appropriate scope. A modest improvement can provide plenty to discuss.

Common mistake: Claiming a group’s accomplishments without distinguishing your contribution.

8. What Else Makes You a Strong Candidate?

Focus: Important information that has not been adequately conveyed elsewhere.

Our advice: Review your other responses before choosing this prompt. Look for a meaningful experience, responsibility, or perspective that would otherwise remain unexplained.

Common mistake: Writing a general sales pitch filled with adjectives such as “motivated” and “hardworking.”

The prompt summaries above draw on UC’s first-year PIQ worksheet.

How to Choose Your Four UC PIQs

Choose four prompts that let you provide specific evidence and reveal complementary aspects of your life. There is no required combination of topics.

We suggest making a list of experiences before drafting. Include schoolwork, employment, family responsibilities, independent interests, and activities. For each possibility, write down:

• What you did.
• A decision or difficulty you can explain.
• What happened.
• What the experience reveals about you.

Then compare your options.

For example, imagine a student considering four responses about a robotics team. Each might technically answer a different prompt, but the combination could leave the reader knowing little about the student’s other interests or responsibilities.

A more informative selection might include robotics problem-solving, a part-time job, an independent history project, and helping a younger sibling. This is a hypothetical example of topic planning, rather than a prescribed formula.

At Great College Advice, we recommend asking: What will the reader learn from this response that the other three do not explain?

What Are UC Admissions Readers Looking For?

UC describes PIQs as a way to understand students’ experiences, educational journeys, aspirations, and potential contributions. Its admissions experts emphasize that the responses should provide details and context rather than follow a traditional essay structure.

Our practical interpretation is that students should make their thinking visible. Help the reader understand the choices behind an activity or accomplishment.

Consider a student discussing a summer research experience. Naming the laboratory and listing procedures provides background. Explaining how the student responded to an unexpected result offers insight into their curiosity, persistence, and judgment.

Similarly, “I learned leadership” is a conclusion. Explaining how you changed your approach after teammates stopped participating gives that conclusion substance.

How to Write Direct UC PIQ Responses

Start with the experience or action you want to discuss, then provide the context needed to understand it.

Compare these hypothetical openings:

“Beneath the fluorescent glow of the laboratory, I discovered an infinite universe of possibility.”

“When our water samples produced inconsistent results, I reviewed our collection procedure and identified two steps we needed to standardize.”

The second opening immediately gives the reader something concrete to understand. The student can then explain the investigation, their contribution, and the outcome.

Direct writing can still convey personality. Your perspective emerges through what you notice, what you care about, and how you respond.

Use These Four Questions to Develop a Draft

As a planning tool, work through:

1. What happened? Establish the situation briefly.
2. What did I do? Explain your actions and decisions.
3. What resulted? Describe the outcome accurately.
4. Why does it matter? Explain what changed in your understanding or behavior.

This is a drafting aid, not a required structure. Give the most space to the parts that provide meaningful information about you.

During revision, look for sentences that could describe almost any applicant. Replace “This experience taught me perseverance” with an explanation of what you continued doing, how you adjusted, or when you sought help.

Can You Reuse Your Common App Essay for UC PIQs?

You can reuse an experience or idea, but rebuild the response around the UC question.

For example, a personal statement about chemistry might contain useful material for the academic-interest PIQ. Identify the parts that explain how you pursued the subject, then develop those details.

Great College Advice counselor Pam Gentry often has her students begin working on their UC PIQs before starting their Common App personal statement. The more pointed UC prompts help students get some initial ideas on paper that can be used for a potential personal statement topic. She will then have her students return to the PIQs in the fall after the personal essay has been written.

Frequently Asked Questions About UC PIQs

Are UC PIQs Essays?

UC admissions staff distinguish PIQs from traditional college essays. They encourage students to think of them as short, informative conversations with an admissions reader.

Which UC PIQ Prompts Should I Choose?

Choose the four questions that best fit your experiences. UC gives all eight equal consideration. Our recommendation is to prioritize specific examples and avoid unnecessary repetition across responses.

Do UC PIQs Need a Hook?

An elaborate hook is unnecessary. UC admissions experts recommend getting to the point quickly. A clear opening that identifies your experience can work well.

Should I Use All 350 Words?

The limit is 350 words per response. We recommend using the space needed to answer fully, then removing repetition. If a draft is very short, check whether you have adequately explained your actions and their significance.

Can I Discuss an Activity Already Listed in My Application?

Our recommendation is to revisit an activity when the PIQ adds meaningful depth. Explain a decision, difficulty, or learning experience that a brief activity description cannot adequately convey.

Get Personalized Help With Your UC PIQs

The college counselors at Great College Advice help students identify meaningful topics, organize their ideas, and revise their writing while preserving their individual voices. Our college admissions counseling services include application strategy, essay brainstorming, and revision guidance.

Schedule a complimentary consultation to learn how we can help your student develop four focused UC PIQ responses that explain their experiences with clarity and confidence.

The post UC PIQs: How to Answer Each Question first appeared on Great College Advice.

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On the one hand, don’t stress too much about your ACT score as it is only one element of the entire college application. Other elements, like GPA and academic rigor, are much more important. This is confirmed by the most recent annual survey from the National Association for College Admissions Counseling (NACAC). In it, only 5% of colleges and universities view ACT and SAT scores to be of “considerable importance”.

For more detail, please visit our post on why grades and rigor matter the most in college admissions.

Do my ACT or SAT scores matter? Less than you think, but more than you’d like.

Post-COVID, the vast majority of colleges and universities still remain test optional with the most recent data from Fairtest.org revealing that over 90% of colleges remain test optional. Here’s why your standardized test score could matter:

• more selective schools are going back to requiring test scores,
• reported ACT and SAT scores have become inflated at test optional colleges so it’s more difficult to report a score above the median,
• and a high SAT score can be the deciding factor in gaining admission especially if your GPA is below average.

Test Optional Led to More Applications Which is Now Why Some Universities are Once Again Requiring Test Scores

One effect from the test optional trend for many universities is that it increased the number of applications received. Some universities have seen a doubling of applications from pre-COVID levels. Previously, if a student’s SAT score was well below a test required school many students wouldn’t bother sending in an application. This was especially true at colleges that required supplemental essays. 

In the age of high school grade inflation, these highly selective universities needed another factor in determining whether a student could handle the rigor of their curriculum. The answer: the old reliable standardized test scores. There is high correlation between SAT scores and college GPA. As a result, many of these universities are now requiring test scores. 

Test Optional Has Increased the Reported Test Score Range at Many Colleges

Test optional policies also allowed schools to inflate reported ACT and SAT scores. Only applicants with above average top scores submitted their SAT scores, while others with average or below average scores did not. As a result, reported test scores improved at many colleges. Admissions offices with “test optional” policies are delighted when you send them high test scores, and most schools will be happy to accept you if you have SAT or ACT scores above the median of their reported test range.

Nevertheless, test “optional” does not mean the same as “test blind”. The University of California does not consider scores at all. These schools are completely test “blind:”  no one submits them ever.  

Good ACT or SAT scores will help if your GPA is below average

This is especially true if your grades are less than stellar. If you have poor grades, a high score can give an admissions officer some evidence that you are capable of doing college level work. This is especially true at the more selective schools. Thus, if you have opportunity, prepare for and take the SAT or ACT exams.

Do my test scores matter if I want to apply to the Ivy League?

In the years 2026 and 2027, yes, your SAT score matters again for selective universities. Every Ivy League university now either requires a standardized test submission or will require it in the near future. Why do the Ivy League universities now want to see everyone’s test scores? The explanations vary a bit, but in general, these highly selective universities have evidence that test scores are a good predictor of success at their respective schools. This is confirmed by examining the Common Data Set of the Ivy League universities. Both Brown and Dartmouth list standardized test scores as “very important” factors in the admission process. The reality is that competitive colleges and universities want students with high test scores. The largest exception is the University of California system.

Do my ACT or SAT scores matter if I need financial aid?

Whether you will require need-based financial aid or merit-based financial aid, high standardized test scores benefit both type of college applicant.

Need-Based Financial Aid and Standardized Test Scores

Let’s start from this premise:  colleges and universities are businesses. In order to operate, they need money. Thus customers who can pay the full price of admission are highly desired in the admissions process.  And while it is true that most of the universities with the largest endowments are generous with need-based financial aid, the majority of students in the Ivy League pay full price. So when it comes to giving out need-based financial aid, colleges tend to be more picky about whom they give that money to. Therefore, the more evidence an applicant provides that they are worthy of that money, the more likely that applicant is to receive it. And a test score is evidence.  Very solid evidence. 

Good ACT and SAT scores increase your odds of receiving merit aid

High ACT and SAT scores matter even more when it comes to the awarding of merit-based scholarships. For those colleges that offer merit aid (and there are many), your odds of earning a scholarship increase dramatically if you submit a standardized test score well above the school’s median score.  Of course, a high test score needs to be accompanied with a high GPA and academic rigor at a minimum. In fact, many colleges and universities key their merit-based scholarships directly to test scores. The higher the score, the more scholarships you may receive.

So from a monetary perspective, spending a bit of money on test prep to raise your SAT or ACT score a few points higher may mean thousands more dollars in scholarships. In some cases, even a single point on your ACT composite score can mean the difference between a scholarship of $5000 per year and $10,000 per year. If you do the math, this means that you could get $20,000 more free money for higher education over four years just by studying a bit harder for the tests. Investing in test prep can repay itself handsomely, depending on which colleges or universities you may be targeting.

Oh, and this is in addition to getting in:  if you want the money, you have to get in first. And a high test score–as explained–can help you do just that.

Bottom line: Your ACT or SAT scores matter

While standardized tests are not the only factor in college admissions, they do matter a lot. The more selective the university, the more they matter.

And if you’re looking for financial aid or merit-based scholarships, your scores on these tests may make the difference between a college on your list being affordable based on your budget.
So don’t neglect to prepare. A better ACT score means more and better options for you as you continue to navigate the entire college selection and admissions process.

How do I know whether my test scores matter for me?

While it’s great to read general principles here, you may still be wondering whether your tests scores really matter in your case.

• How do your test scores compare to other factors like your GPA in core courses?
• Will a particular score help you or hurt you when applying to a specific college?  
• How do you know whether to submit those scores or not?  
• Should you take the test again?  

The expert college admissions counselors at Great College Advice can help you navigate the uncertain waters of the entire college preparation, selection, and application process.  We can help you place your own test scores in the proper perspective and help you develop a strategy for admissions to the schools on your list.  

Reach out to the team at Great College Advice. We can put together a plan that makes sense for your student. Give us a call or contact us.

Since 2007, the expert team of college admissions consultants at Great College Advice has provided comprehensive guidance to thousands of students from across the United States and over 45 countries across the world. Great College Advice has offices in Colorado, New Jersey, Chicago, North Carolina and Massachusetts.

In addition to our one-on-one counseling, Great College Advice extends its support through one of the most active and resource-rich Facebook Groups for college-bound students and their families: College Admissions Experts. With nearly 150,000 members—students, parents, and experienced counselors—this vibrant forum offers peer support and expert advice like no other.

The post Do My ACT or SAT Scores Matter? first appeared on Great College Advice.

High School Grades and Rigor Matter the Most in College Admissions

The most recent National Association for College Admission Counseling (NACAC) State of College Admission Report updated its four-year college members’ survey of the Factors in the Admission Decision. Admissions officers mark each individual factor (grades, test scores, essays, extracurricular activities, letters of recommendation, etc.) as either of Considerable Importance, Moderate Importance, Limited Importance, or No Importance in regard to how they are used in determining whether to accept a student.  

Source: NACAC, State of College Admission Report. 

As shown above, the factors receiving the highest ‘considerable importance’ percentage were related to grades and course rigor with approximately ¾ of college admission officer respondents marking them as such.  

Why are grades the most important factor in college admissions?  

Well, the answer is pretty simple, really. Schools like to admit people who are good at school. Certainly, it’s nice to be a great center fielder, to have led your Model UN team to a regional title, or to be the lead in your high school musical. And colleges will be happy if you want to bring those talents with you to their school but not unless you can succeed in the classroom. The point is this: grades are the measure of your work in school. They are the assessments of your academic performance. And they are recorded and presented to college admissions officers on your transcript. 

Many large public universities do not have the resources to pour over every essay and teacher recommendation. They receive tens of thousands of applications every year and some as many as 100,000+. So, they create formulas based on GPA and rigor. If you meet that criteria, you are accepted. The Cal State system is an example of this approach. Essays and letters of recommendation aren’t required but, instead, these universities focus on GPA and academic rigor.

The Importance of Your High School Transcript in College Admissions 

As a result, the number one most important element of your college application is your transcript. The transcript is the record of your academic performance. It gives information about the rigor of your courses (e.g., Honors, Advanced Placement, IB, Dual Enrollment), as well as your performance (your grades in those classes). You have a GPA that is a mathematical representation of your performance through high school. Typically, if you’ve challenged yourself, your weighted GPA will be higher than your unweighted GPA as these Honors and AP courses receive a higher weight than standard coursework. And this GPA is used to compare your performance with other students at your school. 

College admissions officers read and re-read your transcript. They will focus on your primary academic subjects, including math, English, science, social studies, and world languages. Colleges want to know whether you can analyze literature, perform a chemistry experiment, identify the causes of the Vietnam War, or solve difficult geometry problems. So they will focus on your grades in the core academic subjects. They will pay much less attention to your grades in your “extracurricular pursuits done while in school,” including music, theater, business, art, debate, and athletics. 

What Other Factors Matter in College Admissions?

Even though your high school grades and course rigor are clearly the most important factor in college admissions, there are other factors that are also analyzed in the admissions process.  

Teacher Recommendations 

Other academic factors also enter the mix at most colleges. The first is your teacher recommendations. Not all colleges require them, but certainly, the more selective ones generally do. These recommendations do not focus on all your extracurricular achievements—but on your curricular ones. Your teacher knows very well how you do in the classroom, whether your assignments show sophistication and your tests indicate mastery of the material.  

As evidenced in the NACAC survey, with 11% indicating teacher recommendations are a considerably important factor and 40.5% moderate importance, teacher recs are an important element for college admission that build on your grades and course rigor. 

[For more about getting great letters of recommendation for college, see this post.] 

The College Essay(s) 

The Common App personal essay as well as supplemental essays remain an important part of a holistic college application review, with over 56% of colleges surveyed indicating it was given considerable or moderate importance. The roughly 20% of schools deeming essays of considerable importance has remained consistent over the last decade based on previous NACAC surveys. As we point out here, a well-crafted college essay can present admissions officers another side of you not seen in your high school transcript.   

Extracurricular Activities 

Extracurricular achievements can show dedication, perseverance, and distinctive talents, and often provide a platform for developing leadership abilities. So extracurricular accomplishments are definitely important. This is confirmed by the NACAC data, where even though only 6.5% of schools view extracurriculars with ‘considerable importance’, 44% weigh extracurriculars with ‘moderate importance’. Every admissions office wants to populate their campus with hard-driving, creative, and interesting people who are willing to make their college a better place.

But, as noted with extracurriculars being moderate and not considerable importance, admission officers won’t just skip over your poor academic performance and let you in based on how you have stayed busy outside the classroom. They may admire your creativity, but if you can’t demonstrate that you can hack the algebra and the five-paragraph essay, you won’t be admitted.  

What About Standardized Test Scores? 

The other academic factor is your test score on the ACT or SAT. Some elite universities that tend to dominate the college admission headlines have returned to requiring test scores in recent years, including all of the Ivy League universities as well as other selective universities such as MIT. In addition, some public colleges in certain states like Florida require test scores. There will likely be more in the years to come but test-optional at many colleges is here to stay.  The most recent data from FairTest indicates that over 90% of four-year colleges remain test-optional.

The NACAC survey points to just how much standardized tests have declined in importance over the years. Heading into the 2024 admissions cycle, only 5% of colleges surveyed placed ‘considerable importance’ on test scores compared to around 50% pre-COVID. 

But even if colleges remain test-optional, you should still attempt the test. A strong test score is another academic feather in your cap that demonstrates your prowess in the classroom. It is an imperfect measure of your intellectual gifts, but it certainly gives college admissions officers some solid information about your basic mathematical and English communication skills–not to mention your ability to do well on standardized tests! 

What’s more, a good test score might help you score some merit scholarship dollars at your preferred college (assuming that your preferred college awards merit-based scholarships…many of the most selective colleges do not). 

Study Hard and Challenge Yourself 

In the college admissions process, your grades and course rigor are far and away more important than the other factors looked at by admissions officers. Of course, also give yourself the opportunity to excel outside the classroom in activities that you enjoy. Find that balance where admissions officers can not only see that you will be able to do the work in college but also contribute and make a difference on campus.  

Does Your Student Need Academic Planning Help to Balance Grades and Rigor?

If you need assistance in the college admissions process, please contact us for a complimentary consultation. At Great College Advice, we provide personalized college consulting focused on helping make the process of preparing, selecting, and applying to college more successful, less stressful, and more fun.

Great College Advice is an independent college consulting firm specializing in personalized college admissions counseling for high school students and their families. Since 2007, Great College Advice has helped thousands of students across the United States and in more than 45 countries navigate the college admissions process. Headquartered in Denver, Colorado, Great College Advice also has counselors and offices in New Jersey, Chicago, North Carolina, and Massachusetts.

In addition to our one-on-one counseling, Great College Advice extends its support through one of the most active and resource-rich Facebook Groups for college-bound students and their families: College Admissions Experts. With over 140,000 members—students, parents, and experienced counselors—this vibrant forum offers peer support and expert advice like no other.

The post Why Grades and Rigor Matter the Most in College Admissions first appeared on Great College Advice.

Like almost all highly selective universities, Yale requires several supplemental essays and short answers in addition to the Common App Personal Statement. However, for its 2026-2027 application cycle, Yale has eliminated its “Why Yale?” supplemental essay. But that doesn’t mean Yale is no longer interested in why a student wants to attend. In fact, the change may reveal something important about how Yale wants applicants to approach their essays.

Last year, we wrote about Yale’s decision to introduce a new “Why Yale?” essay and the admissions philosophy behind the change. For the 2026–27 application cycle, Yale has reversed course: the direct “Why Yale?” question is gone.

So why did Yale eliminate an essay that had only recently been added?

According to Yale admissions officers, the answer has less to do with Yale’s interest in fit and more to do with what the essay was actually accomplishing.

Yale Didn’t See Enough About the Student in “Why Yale?”

The traditional “Why Yale?” essay seems straightforward. Tell the admissions committee why you want to attend Yale and what makes Yale a good fit for you.

The problem, according to Yale admissions officers, was that the responses weren’t consistently revealing enough about the student.

In a recent discussion about the 2026–27 application in its ‘Inside the Yale Admissions Office’ podcast, Yale admissions officers explained that they did not see enough improvement in the quality of the information they were learning about applicants from the “Why Yale?” responses. Too often, the essays focused on Yale itself rather than the individual writing them.

That distinction is important.

A student might write about Yale’s residential college system, a particular professor, a favorite course, a research opportunity, or a unique program. Those details can demonstrate that a student has researched the university. But they don’t necessarily tell an admissions officer much about who that student is, what motivates them, or how they see themselves fitting into the Yale community.

In other words, a well-researched “Why Yale?” essay isn’t necessarily a revealing essay.

And Yale wants its essays to reveal the person behind the application.

Yale Still Wants to Know: Why Yale?

The elimination of the formal “Why Yale?” prompt should not be interpreted as Yale no longer caring about fit.

Quite the opposite.

Students should still find opportunities in their Yale application to demonstrate why Yale makes sense for them. But the emphasis should be on the connection between the student and Yale, rather than simply listing things the student likes about Yale.

Think about it this way:

Old approach:
“Here are all the things I like about Yale.”

Better approach:
“Here is who I am, what I care about and how I think—and here is why Yale’s environment makes sense for the person I am and hope to become.”

That requires students to know themselves before they can effectively explain why Yale is a good fit.

For example, a student interested in interdisciplinary science might discuss an intellectual question that has fascinated them, how they have explored that interest in high school, and how Yale’s particular academic environment would allow them to pursue that curiosity in new directions.

The Yale-specific connection can still be there. It just needs to emerge from the student’s story rather than becoming the entire story.

Yale Tweaks Its Short-Answer Questions

While eliminating the “Why Yale?” essay, Yale has also made changes to its short-answer questions, deleting two short answer prompts and adding this new prompt:

“What is one aspect of yourself that you hope to grow or develop during college?”

The question is only a short response, but it provides Yale with a very different kind of information than the old “Why Yale?” prompt.

Rather than asking students to explain why they want Yale, the question asks them to demonstrate self-awareness.

What does the student recognize about themselves?

What are they curious about developing?

Where do they see room for growth?

And perhaps most importantly, are they entering college with an openness to change?

The new question provides students with an opportunity to show Yale something that may not be apparent elsewhere in their application. It encourages reflection rather than another opportunity to list accomplishments.

The Short Answers Are About More Than Accomplishments

Yale’s short-answer questions give students several opportunities to reveal different sides of themselves.

For 2026–27, students are asked short questions that touch on what they would teach, write or create; how they hope to grow or develop during college; and something about themselves that isn’t reflected elsewhere in the application.

Taken together, these questions encourage students to go beyond their résumé.

That’s important at a school like Yale with an acceptance rate hovering just above 4%, where virtually every applicant has impressive grades, rigorous coursework and meaningful extracurricular accomplishments.

Yale Admissions Overview for the Class of 2030 

• Total applicants: Yale received 54,919 applications, an increase of 9% versus the previous year. 

• Offers of admission: 2,328 applicants were admitted. 

• Acceptance rate: 4.2% vs. 4.6 the previous year. 

The challenge isn’t simply demonstrating that a student is accomplished.

It’s helping the admissions committee understand the person behind those accomplishments.

Students should therefore think carefully about how their short answers complement the rest of their application. If every response simply reinforces the same academic interest or extracurricular accomplishment, they are missing an opportunity to provide admissions officers with a fuller picture of who they are.

The short answers can be small windows into personality, curiosity, self-awareness and interests that might otherwise get lost in a highly accomplished application.

What Yale’s Changes Mean for Applicants

The elimination of the “Why Yale?” essay may initially seem like Yale is backing away from evaluating institutional fit. We don’t think that’s the right conclusion.

Instead, Yale appears to be refining how it learns about fit.

The admissions office wants to understand students as individuals—their intellectual interests, personalities, experiences, aspirations and capacity for growth. Students should therefore resist the temptation to turn their Yale essays into brochures for the university.

Know yourself first. Then explain why Yale makes sense for you.

That’s a more sophisticated approach to the “Why Yale?” question, even though the question itself is no longer on the application.

And it may be one of the most important lessons from Yale’s latest application changes: the best college essays aren’t necessarily the ones that demonstrate how much a student knows about a college. They’re the ones that demonstrate how well a student understands themselves and why a particular college is the right environment for them to thrive.

Need Help With Your Yale Application?

Yale’s application changes are a good reminder of how quickly selective college admissions can evolve. Great College Advice helps students develop an application strategy that goes beyond grades and test scores to identify their unique strengths, interests and story—and then communicate those qualities effectively to colleges.

Our experienced college counselors work one-on-one with students to develop compelling, authentic applications that demonstrate not only what they’ve accomplished, but who they are and where they want to go.

Learn more about our college admissions consulting services and how Great College Advice can help your family navigate the college admissions process.

The post How to Write the Yale Essays first appeared on Great College Advice.

Common App Essay Prompt 1 asks a deceptively simple question: 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.

It sounds like an invitation to write about whatever you love most. But according to Pam Gentry, a college counselor at Great College Advice, that’s exactly where students get into trouble.

The Trap of the “Obvious” Identity

Gentry sees it constantly with her student-athletes. A soccer player wants to write about being a soccer player. A pianist wants to write about being a pianist. On the surface, it makes sense — these activities take up hours of a student’s week and shape how they see themselves.

The problem is that thousands of other applicants are writing the exact same essay. Soccer, piano, dance, debate — these are common identities, and a common identity is hard to make distinctive on the page. If a student wants to use one of these as their “core identity,” Gentry pushes them to dig deeper: What did you actually learn from this identity? How does it show up in parts of your life that have nothing to do with the activity itself?

That’s the real test of Prompt 1. It isn’t about naming an interest — it’s about proving that the interest has shaped nearly everything else about who you are.

Why Prompt 1 Isn’t for Everyone

Gentry doesn’t recommend Prompt 1 to most of her students, and that’s a deliberate choice, not a lack of imagination. The prompt asks for something that has been genuinely pervasive — a thread running through a student’s entire life, not just their extracurricular résumé.

She points to a former student who was on track for the Olympics in archery. In 10th grade, that student made the deliberate choice to stay in a traditional high school rather than pursue a GED early, choosing a conventional high school experience and a path toward college and nursing instead of leaving school for elite training. That decision — not the archery itself — became her core identity: someone who chose a fuller, more typical life experience over an accelerated one, even when an extraordinary opportunity was in front of her.

That’s the level of depth Prompt 1 is looking for. As Gentry puts it, the identity a student writes about “really needs to be something that has led your life up until this point” in order for the essay to work.

A Simple Test for Whether Prompt 1 Is Right for You

Before committing to this prompt, it’s worth asking:

• Is this identity actually rare, or does it just feel personal to me? Plenty of students feel deeply connected to activities that, from an admissions officer’s chair, look identical to thousands of other applications.
• Does this identity show up outside the activity itself? If a passion for music only appears in the context of practicing and performing, it may not be broad enough to anchor a full personal statement.
• Can I point to a specific choice or moment that reveals this identity, rather than just describing it? The strongest Prompt 1 essays, like the archery example above, hinge on a concrete decision — not a general description of a passion.

If the answer to these questions is murky, that’s a signal worth taking seriously. Plenty of strong personal statements come from prompts other than Prompt 1 — the belief-or-idea essay, the personal growth essay, or the open-ended Prompt 7 all offer other ways to reveal who a student really is.

The Bigger Picture

Prompt 1 rewards specificity and depth, not passion alone. A student doesn’t need an unusual hobby to write a great Prompt 1 essay — they need an identity that has genuinely organized their choices, values, and priorities over time. For most students, that bar is high enough that it’s worth testing a few other prompts before settling on this one. Our comprehensive guide to all seven Common App prompts is a good place to start comparing options.

Not sure which Common App prompt is the right fit? Great College Advice’s counselors work one-on-one with students to find the story only they can tell — and the prompt that lets them tell it best. Contact us for a free consultation to get started.

The post What Makes You, You? How to Answer Common App Prompt 1 first appeared on Great College Advice.

In this video, we will explore what makes Brown different from all the rest.

So here I am today on the campus of Brown University one of the eight Ivy League schools. And sometimes it’s hard when I’m giving presentations to explain the difference among the Ivy League schools, and of course, the Ivy League is really nothing more than a football club. It was established so that athletes could play against one another, not because the schools have anything in common academically. Of course, a lot of really great students go to places like this, but they’re all very different and structured differently. Brown’s claim to fame is that it really has no structure.

Way back in the 1960s, 1968 and all of the—let’s call them reforms that happened in education around the ‘60s. The idea was that there was no need anymore to teach the old canon of academia. Prior to that a lot of students took Greek and Latin, took a very prescribed curriculum and the push in the 1960s was to eliminate all requirements.

Brown still embodies that decision to eliminate all requirements and allow students to study whatever it is they want. So you have a major at Brown but beyond that, you can take anything and everything you want.  So there are no curriculum requirements other than completing a major. You also have the option of taking classes without even ever getting a grade. Again, this idea of the 1960s of we can do anything we want, where ever we want, it’s for us to decide and not the man; that is still very much the tradition at Brown.

Other Ivy League schools have a different set of priorities and a different curricular structure. But Brown really is that freewheeling, do whatever you want; you don’t even need to get grades if you don’t want to kind of place. It’s a very wonderful place. Providence is a fun town, an interesting town. Thayer Street is kind of fun and funky and of course, the campus is beautiful and the academic facilities are remarkable.

But don’t think that all the Ivy League schools are the same. They’re very different not only in look and feel but in the academic priorities set by the institution itself.

Frequently Asked Questions

What is Brown’s Open Curriculum and how should my child address it in their application?

Brown’s Open Curriculum is a distinctive educational philosophy that eliminates general education requirements, positioning students as the architects of their own education. To address this effectively, an applicant must transcend superficial mentions of ‘freedom’ and instead present a sophisticated ‘Intellectual Trajectory.’

This requires demonstrating two key components:

1. A Coherent Intellectual Narrative: The applicant must connect their past pursuits—academic, extracurricular, and personal—to a future, interdisciplinary path of study that is uniquely possible at Brown. The goal is to show that their interests are not random but form a foundation for advanced, self-directed inquiry.
2. A ‘Provisional Blueprint’ for Exploration: A top-tier applicant will articulate a potential, yet flexible, course of study. This blueprint should reference specific departments, research centers, institutes, and even professors. For example, a student interested in the ethics of artificial intelligence might propose combining courses from Computer Science (e.g., ‘CSCI 1420: Machine Learning’), Cognitive, Linguistic, and Psychological Sciences (CLPS), and Philosophy, citing a desire to engage with the Data Science Initiative. This demonstrates proactive research and intellectual maturity.

Expert Strategy: The application should frame the student not as a consumer seeking freedom, but as a future scholar prepared to build something meaningful with it. The blueprint should convey excitement for exploration, not a rigid, predetermined path. It proves they possess the self-motivation and maturity to thrive with the autonomy Brown grants its students.

Learn more about Brown University and why Brown is so different from the other Ivy League universities.

Great College Advice Will Help You Get Accepted to Your Ivy League Dream School

Understanding how selective colleges like Brown actually evaluate GPA, course rigor, extracurriculars and your standardized test score is the foundation of a competitive application strategy. If you are ready to understand exactly where your academic profile stands and what steps will strengthen it, connect with our team to start building a strategy grounded in how admissions offices at elite universities actually make decisions.

The post What is Brown University Known For? first appeared on Great College Advice.

Watch the video to see more or read the transcription below.

Transcript describing Dartmouth’s D Plan

During a visit to Dartmouth College we spent more time learning about Dartmouth’s unique “D-plan.” At Dartmouth, the campus operates on a quarter system where students have the opportunity to decide which terms they are on campus and which terms they do an off campus program. During their off-terms students may participate in a study abroad program, internship or any number of valuable educational experiences.

However, one of the interesting parts of this structure is that all students are required to have an on campus term during their sophomore summer. So, even though some students across the country may think that summer school sounds like a drag, students at Dartmouth actually love the chance to be in Hanover, NH in the summer. There are such a wide variety of outdoor opportunities in the Upper Valley during the summer months.

Students go hiking, swimming in the Connecticut River, visit local farmer’s markets and much more. In addition, with all the sophomores together in summer it gives their class a wonderful chance to bond together. A wide variety of classes are offered to students in the summer, many specifically targeted toward sophomores. So Dartmouth students can make sure they are fulfilling specific prerequisite courses and getting to know their professors well in small classes and in a more relaxed atmosphere.

So, the next time you are thinking that summer classes may not sound like a lot of fun. Think again, and maybe even as you are considering what college to apply to it would be worth looking to see if the college offers classes in the summer.

Learn more how Dartmouth’s size, location, and culture makes it unique among the Ivies.

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This video was made in 2011 but the content remains relevant to this day.

The post Dartmouth College Distinctive D-Plan first appeared on Great College Advice.

The Common App’s seventh prompt reads simply: “Share an essay on any topic of your choice.” For many students, that freedom is paralyzing. Every other prompt gives you a frame; this one hands you a blank canvas and walks away. The result is that students either default to Prompt #7 out of laziness (“nothing else fits”) or avoid it entirely out of fear (“too open-ended”). Both instincts are wrong, and both produce weaker applications.

Used correctly, Prompt #7 is the most powerful option on the Common App. It exists because the Common App’s architects recognized that the most compelling stories don’t always fit a predefined category. A student who spent three years obsessively mapping urban heat islands in her neighborhood, or one who built a philosophical framework around competitive chess, or one whose defining experience is genuinely uncategorizable, deserves a prompt that gets out of the way. The question is whether your story actually belongs here, and if it does, how to structure it so it lands.

This guide gives you a decision-making framework for both questions: a filter to determine whether Prompt #7 is the right choice, and three structural templates to execute it well once you’ve decided it is.

Why Prompt #7 Exists (and Why Most Students Misuse It)

The Common App personal statement is not a resume summary. As Pam Gentry, a counselor at Great College Advice, puts it: “It should be something that only that student can write. It shouldn’t sound like anybody else.” The admissions reader reviewing your file already has your GPA, your test scores, your activity list. What they don’t have is a sense of who you are as a person.

Prompt #7 is not a catch-all for students who couldn’t make the other prompts work. It is a deliberate invitation for students whose most authentic story doesn’t map cleanly onto the other six options. The misuse happens when students treat it as the path of least resistance: “I’ll just write about whatever I want.” That approach produces essays that feel unfocused, because they are. The prompt’s openness is a feature for students with a specific, well-defined story to tell. It is a trap for students who haven’t done the work of identifying what that story is.

The admissions officer reading your essay is, as Pam Gentry describes, “probably closer to 28 than my age. They’re excited, they’re sculpting a class.” They are not looking for more data. They are looking for a person they want in that class. Prompt #7 gives you the most direct path to showing them that person, but only if you know who that person is before you start writing.

The “Why This Prompt?” Filter

Before committing to Prompt #7, run your story through this checklist. If you answer yes to more than two questions in the first group, your story likely belongs on a different prompt. If you answer yes to the questions in the second group, Prompt #7 is probably the right home.

Consider a different prompt if:

• Your story centers on a challenge you overcame (Prompt #2 is the better fit)

• Your story is primarily about your cultural background, family history, or identity (Prompt #1)

• Your story is about a sustained intellectual passion or academic interest that fits neatly into one domain (Prompt #6)

• Your story involves a belief or idea you hold, but it connects directly to a personal setback or failure (Prompt #5)

• You chose Prompt #7 because you couldn’t figure out how to start the others

Prompt #7 is the right choice if:

• Your story combines two or more domains in a way that doesn’t fit any single prompt’s framing

• Your most authentic narrative is belief-based or philosophical, and it doesn’t involve a specific challenge or failure

• You have a high-quality piece of writing from another context (a class essay, a different application) that captures your voice and can be adapted without feeling like a leftover

• Your topic is genuinely unusual, and forcing it into another prompt’s structure would distort the story

• The story you want to tell is the one that would make an admissions officer remember you specifically, not just your category of experience

The last point matters most. Gentry’s benchmark for a successful personal statement is whether the reader “wants to sit down and get to know you better and have a cup of coffee with you.” That test applies to every prompt, but Prompt #7 is where it becomes the primary criterion, because there is no structural scaffold to fall back on.

The “Recycle and Refine” Strategy

One of the most underused approaches to Prompt #7 is adapting existing writing. Students who have written a strong analytical essay for an AP English class, a research paper for a science competition, or a personal statement for a scholarship application often have high-quality material sitting unused. Prompt #7 is the only Common App option flexible enough to accommodate this kind of adaptation.

The key distinction is between recycling and repurposing. Recycling means submitting the original piece with minimal changes. Repurposing means identifying what made the original piece strong, extracting that core, and rebuilding it around the question the Common App is actually asking: who are you, and why does this topic reveal something essential about you?

A scholarship essay about food insecurity research, for example, might be analytically strong but written in a detached, third-person register. To repurpose it for Prompt #7, you shift the lens: instead of “here is the problem and here is my research,” the essay becomes “here is how this problem changed the way I think, and here is what that change reveals about who I am.” The research stays. The data stays. The argument stays. What changes is the frame: the essay now centers on you, not the topic. For students who have completed a major independent project, learning how to write a capstone project well can provide the raw material needed for this kind of deep, reflective essay.

Three questions determine whether a piece of existing writing is worth repurposing:

1. Does the original piece reveal something specific and authentic about how you think, not just what you did?

2. Can you reframe the opening so it begins with your perspective rather than the topic’s context?

3. After revision, will an admissions reader finish the essay knowing something about you that they couldn’t have inferred from your activity list?

If the answer to all three is yes, the piece is worth adapting. If the original is primarily descriptive or accomplishment-focused, it is better to start fresh.

Three Structural Templates for Prompt #7

Once you’ve confirmed that Prompt #7 is the right choice, the next decision is structure. The prompt’s openness means you have to impose your own architecture. The following three templates cover the most common story types that land in Prompt #7.

Template 1: The Deep Dive (Intellectual or Academic)

Best for: Students whose defining characteristic is a specific, sustained intellectual obsession that doesn’t fit neatly into a single academic discipline.

Structure:

• Open with a specific moment of discovery or confusion, not a general statement about the topic

• Spend the middle section tracing how your thinking evolved, not summarizing what you learned

• Close with what this intellectual pursuit reveals about how you approach problems, not where you plan to take it professionally

The Deep Dive works because it shows the admissions reader how you think, not just what you know. A student who became obsessed with the mathematics of musical tuning systems, for example, isn’t writing about math or music. They’re writing about the way their mind moves between domains, which is exactly the kind of thing an admissions officer cannot infer from a transcript.

The structural risk with this template is that it becomes a report rather than an essay. Every paragraph should answer the implicit question: “What does this reveal about you?” If a paragraph is purely informational, it needs to be cut or reframed.

Template 2: The Manifesto (Belief-Based)

Best for: Students who hold a specific, well-developed belief or philosophical position that has shaped their choices, and whose story doesn’t involve a single defining challenge or failure.

Structure:

• Open with the belief stated directly, then immediately complicate it with a specific experience that tested it

• Use the middle section to show the belief in action across two or three concrete examples

• Close with what holding this belief costs you, not just what it gives you

The Manifesto is the highest-risk, highest-reward template. Done well, it produces the most memorable essays because it gives the reader a clear, specific sense of how you move through the world. Done poorly, it reads as preachy or abstract.

The correction for both failure modes is specificity. “I believe in the power of community” is not a manifesto; it is a platitude. “I believe that the most important decisions are the ones you make when no one is watching, and here is the specific moment that belief was formed” is a manifesto. The belief has to be yours, earned through specific experience, not borrowed from a motivational poster.

Template 3: The Hybrid (Two Disparate Interests)

Best for: Students whose identity is genuinely defined by the intersection of two domains that don’t obviously belong together, and who can show that the intersection is productive rather than merely coincidental.

Structure:

• Open by placing the two domains in the same sentence in a way that creates productive tension

• Spend the middle section showing how each domain has changed your understanding of the other

• Close with what the intersection reveals about how you will approach college, not just who you have been in high school

The Hybrid template is the most common misuse of Prompt #7, because students often list two interests without demonstrating that the intersection is meaningful. “I love chemistry and I love poetry” is not a hybrid essay. “Here is the specific way that writing poetry changed how I read a titration curve, and here is what that shift taught me about precision” is a hybrid essay.

The test for whether a Hybrid essay is working: if you removed one of the two domains entirely, would the essay still make sense? If yes, the intersection isn’t doing real work. The two domains need to be genuinely load-bearing.

Common Mistakes Specific to Prompt #7

Choosing the prompt because the topic is unusual, not because the story is authentic. Unusual topics are not inherently compelling. A student who spent four years repairing a single car has a more powerful essay than a student who lists twelve exotic hobbies. As Pam Gentry notes, colleges can spot the difference between a student who “did it just to get into college” and one who was “genuinely interested.” The topic’s strangeness is not the point. The authenticity is.

Writing about the topic instead of writing about yourself. Prompt #7 is not an invitation to submit a research paper. The admissions reader wants to know what the topic reveals about you. Every paragraph should be traceable back to your perspective, your choices, your way of thinking.

Treating the prompt’s openness as permission to be unfocused. The absence of a frame means you have to supply one. Students who write Prompt #7 essays without a clear structural template produce essays that feel like they’re circling a point without landing on it. Choose one of the three templates above and commit to it. If you realize after submission that your essay lacked this focus, you may need to learn how to make changes to your college application to ensure your best work is on file.

What Makes Prompt #7 Work

The Common App personal statement, regardless of which prompt you choose, succeeds when it does one thing: it makes the admissions reader feel like they know you. Prompt #7 gives you the most direct path to that outcome, because it removes every constraint except the one that matters. The story has to be yours, told in your voice, revealing something specific about who you are.

The backwards approach that Great College Advice uses with every student applies here: start with the three to five things you want the admissions committee to know about you, then find the story that demonstrates those things most clearly. If that story doesn’t fit Prompts #1 through #6, Prompt #7 is waiting. If it does fit one of the other prompts, use that one instead. The goal is never to use Prompt #7. The goal is to tell the right story. Sometimes Prompt #7 is the only prompt that lets you do that.

If you’re working through the Common App and aren’t sure whether your story belongs in Prompt #7 or somewhere else, that uncertainty is worth resolving before you write a single word. Explore how that process works and what it looks like in practice at Great College Advice.

The post How to Answer the Common App ‘Topic of Your Choice’ Prompt first appeared on Great College Advice.