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Your Common App personal statement goes to every school. The supplements are written for one school each — and at selective colleges, they often matter more. Here's how to write the "why us," "why major," and community essays so they actually help.
"Why us?" — why this specific college
The most common supplement, and the most botched. Generic praise ("great campus, strong academics") reads as a template. Win it with specifics only true of that school: a named professor or lab, a class, a program, a tradition, how you'd use a particular resource. Show you did your homework.
"Why this major?"
Connect a real moment — a class, a project, a job, a problem you care about — to what you want to study and what you'd do with it. Avoid "I've always loved X." Tell the specific story that made it click, and gesture at where you want it to go.
Community / identity / diversity
A community can be your family, neighborhood, team, faith, language, or an online group — not just race or hardship. Show what you contribute and carry, concretely. Colleges want to picture what you'd add to their campus.
Activity / "elaborate on one experience"
Don't restate your activities list. Zoom into one role and show growth, leadership, or impact through a specific scene. What changed because you were there?
The "why us" research move
Spend 20 minutes on the school's website: pull two or three specific things you'd actually use — a named course, a research center, a club, a study-abroad program — and connect each to something true about you. Specificity is the whole game.
Answer the exact question asked
A beautiful essay that doesn't answer the prompt loses. Re-read the prompt before and after writing. If it asks "why our engineering program," every paragraph should earn its place under that question.
Be specific or be cut
Any sentence that could appear in another applicant's essay — to a different school — is wasted. Names, courses, details, and your real reasons are what make a supplement convincing.
Respect the word count as a feature
Supplements are short (often 100–250 words) on purpose. Tight, concrete writing beats padding. Cut throat-clearing intros; start where the substance starts.
Reuse smartly, never blindly
A "why major" answer can be adapted across schools — but a "why us" essay must be re-specified for each, and pasting the wrong school name in is an instant reject. Keep a base draft, then tailor every detail.
Leaving another school's name in a reused "why us" essay. Admissions officers see it constantly, and it signals you didn't care enough to look. Always do a final school-name-and-detail check before you submit each one.
Building your essays? Start with the personal statement guide, find scholarships your drafts already fit with the essay vault, and tighten your word count with the word counter.