Distinctive

By Victoria Tillson Evans, Ph.D.

Crafting college essays is frequently more an art than a science, and how you approach your writing process should represent your individuality in experience as well as thought. But it’s always nice when you can throw in a framework that takes away the anxiety of the blank page.

Fortunately, the “Why This School?” Essay, which has traditionally been the most common supplemental essay type, has a well-established framework that most people use to put it together. While I mentioned in “What Makes an Elite Essay” that you should strive to go beyond the formula, you can’t do that without knowing what the formula is. As Dr. Nora Lessersohn spells out in “How to Write the ‘Why This School’ Essay – Part 1,” the Mad Lib-like qualities of the “Why This School?” essay empower you to break its pieces down into an opening story, generally one or two body paragraphs of supporting details that you can plug and chug into the middle of the essay, and then an enthusiastic conclusion.

Yet, year after year, I’ve noticed that crafting the first “Why This School?” essay has proven incredibly difficult for nearly every student. It’s not because they can’t articulate why they like a particular college (though I do have to occasionally nudge some students away from commenting on the beauty of the campus, Greek life, or their excitement about parties). It’s because they can’t articulate how they intend to contribute to that school. Can you blame them? Most prompts don’t expressly ask that part of the question, plus it’s really hard to think about how you will be an asset to a place where you’ve never even lived. Yet, “Why This School?” essays are basically asking why you are a great fit, so you need to think about those aspects of your background that make you an appealing candidate. This is where the ABCs come into play.

The Original British ABC Method

I’m not sure who came up with the idea for the British UCAS personal statement, but the ABC formula is simply brilliant. It helps students pull together their ideas for their essay, which will ultimately explain why they wish to study a particular field in college (yes, in the United Kingdom, you have to pick a major, or “course” as it’s called there, before you apply). One big difference, however, is that one essay goes to five colleges, so there’s no opportunity to shape the essay with school-specific information. As a result, the essay focuses primarily on the students themselves: their past experiences, present plans, and future goals. If you were to implement the ABC Method for the UCAS system, it would look like:

A = Activity

B = Benefit

C = Course

Ultimately, students would identify Activities, be they academic or extracurricular, that have Benefited their intellectual and skill development for the Course they wish to study. It’s fairly straightforward, though it certainly requires reflection.

For example, if I were to say that I want to study Art History, I would first reflect on my various activities within that field and choose the most interesting ones. I would then approach my first idea as follows:

Activity – I worked for Scala Reale, a cultural association in Rome, creating a database about the city’s famous as well as off-the-beaten-path architectural gems.

Benefit – By doing this, I not only became familiar with the differences among ancient, medieval,

baroque, and modern styles and materials, but I also fine-tuned my research and organizational skills.  

Course – While I’m in college, I will apply my knowledge to my future survey classes on European art forms.

This is a great way to work through the body of a UCAS essay, and it’s a great starting point for an American “Why This School?” essay. Unfortunately, the American cousin to the UCAS essay needs to be a bit more school-specific and reflect on what you’re bringing to the table.

The New ABC Method for the American “Why This School?” Essay

Winston Churchill once quipped, “The United States and England are two countries separated by a common language.” While I wish there were a clear translation of the UCAS ABC Method to the American “Why This School?” essay, I’m afraid that I must make some fundamental changes, especially since the essay needs to be tailored to the specific opportunities available at colleges. We should thus reimagine the meaning of ABC. If I were to make some modifications, they would be the following:

A = Activity

B = Benefit

C = Contributions

Fortunately, both the British and my versions hinge on your Activities, which makes getting started easy. It’s the development beyond what you did that makes this kind of essay hard. The American “Why This School?” essay requires a delicate dance that simultaneously expresses how you will Benefit from, and Contribute those experiences to, specific opportunities available at the school. Most students have no problem identifying opportunities that they’d like to take advantage of. There are generally so many fun and amazing clubs, classes, and traditions to choose from! The trick is finding on-campus opportunities that match your past experiences, so that you can indicate how you will add to campus life in the future.

Let’s revisit the same example from the UCAS section, but apply it to the University of Michigan to see how things change for an American “Why This School?” essay:

Activity – I worked for Scala Reale, a cultural association in Rome, creating a database about the city’s famous as well as off-the-beaten-path architectural gems.

Benefit – While at the University of Michigan, I can’t wait to take Professor Terrnato’s class, “Great Buildings of Ancient Rome/Greece,” to gain a clearer sense of the Hellenistic influences on Roman architecture.

Contributions – Similarly, I’ll share my insights into how architectural styles and materials changed over the four centuries that Rome was the capital of the Roman Empire.

If you were to put these three sentences together, you’d be off to writing the key elements of a successful “Why This School?” essay.

If you look at these three sentences all together, however, the writing comes across as pretty clunky. Plus, with the relatively short word limits of American “Why This School?” essays require you to condense your thoughts as much as possible. You should, thus, endeavor to combine your ABCs into one or two sentences:

After creating a database about Rome’s famous as well as off-the-beaten-path architectural gems for the cultural association, Scala Reale, I can’t wait to take Professor Terrenato’s class, “Great Buildings of Ancient Rome/Greece.” There I’ll gain a clearer sense of the Hellenistic influences on Roman architecture, while sharing my insights into how architectural styles and materials changed over the four centuries that Rome was the capital of the Roman Empire.

While it takes practice and requires moving pieces of the sentences around, you’ll eventually get a handle on blending your ideas into more concise expressions. Carefully crafting a strong core of details that supports your reasons for applying to a particular school simply requires reflection on your experiences that match what’s available at a given college, a dose of patience, and a willingness to braid one layer at a time. If you do this with your first “Why This School?” essay, you’ll set yourself up to have a much easier process when you move on to similar essays for other schools on your list. You may even find that it as easy as A, B, C!