Why THIS college?

Why do you like a particular college?  What is it about the school that made it stand out to you and left you with the impression that this would be a good place for you to spend your collegiate years?

Hopefully, you have an idea about what you'd answer for both of those questions for each school that you are including on your list of schools where you are going to apply.  And, let me clear - you should like something about every college that you are considering and you should feel good about each of the schools if you are applying there!  If not, then you need to rethink your college list.

In addition to mattering for deciding where you are going to apply, your answers to these questions are essential when you are trying to answer college-specific essay questions.  Some colleges will ask applicants to answer supplemental essay questions and often one of these questions relates to what you like about their school.  They may phrase it in different ways, but the bottom line is that they are trying to determine why you believe their school is a good fit for you.

Remember, the admissions officers who work for the school already think their school is great and they know about the wonderful opportunities available so you need to take it beyond saying that they have a great location, outstanding professors, impressive reputation, and wonderful weather.  You need to take it to the next level by identifying specific aspects at the school where you can see yourself contributing to the school and offerings that you plan to take advantage of while you are in college.  Ultimately this still an essay about you and how you fit at the college with the opportunities that they provide, but you have to really think about both you and the college - think of it as an essay about why you're perfect for each other.

I have been reviewing these essays with lots of students lately and probably the biggest challenge has been in making sure that the student balances making sure that the essay still shares how they fit with the college with making it specific to THAT college.  This is important because if you could swap out the name of the college and it still applies then it isn't doing a good job of answering the question.  

In case you don't want to take it from me, here is a blog post from Tulane University that gives additional highlights for answering this essay question:

The "Why College X" essay

The College Essay Guy also has detailed information about answering this question

Good luck in searching for the right college fit for you and for conveying why it's a good fit in your essays.  As always, if you are struggling with what you want to say, please stop by to see me so that we can brainstorm it together.