Will These Magic Words Get You Into Harvard?
An analysis of Harvard applicant essays produced fascinating findings. Could using these words in an essay be the ticket into Harvard?
Fast Company writes:
Use These Two Words on Your College Essay to Get Into Harvard
Getting into an elite college has never been more cutthroat. Last year, Harvard’s admissions rate dipped to a record low, with only 5.3% of applicants getting an acceptance letter. Stanford’s rate was even lower, at 5.05%.
These days, it takes more than impressive grades, a full roster of extracurriculars, and a deep commitment to community service to get into a well-ranked school. Experts say that a stellar essay is the linchpin that will win the admissions department over. But what is less well known is that different colleges favor particular topics and even specific words used in essays.
This is a key finding from AdmitSee, a startup that invites verified college students to share their application materials with potential applicants. High school students can pay to access AdmitSee’s repository of successful college essays, while college students who share their materials receive a small payment every time someone accesses their data. “The biggest differentiator for our site is that college students who share their information are compensated for their time,” Stephanie Shyu, cofounder of AdmitSee, tells Fast Company. “This allows them to monetize materials that they have sitting around. They can upload their file and when they check back in a few months later, they might have made several hundred dollars.”
Shyu says that this model has allowed AdmitSee to collect a lot of data very rapidly. The company is only a year old and just landed $1.5 million in seed funding from investors such asFounder.org and The Social + Capital Partnership. But in this short time, AdmitSee has already gathered 15,000 college essays in their system. Many are from people who got into well-ranked colleges, since they targeted these students first. The vast majority of these essays come from current college students who were admitted within the last two or three years.
Use These Two Words on Your College Essay to Get Into Harvard (Fast Company)
Comments
I remember writing essays for admissions. I can’t believe what some of those highlighted wrote about. I would never have guessed.
Harvard isn’t for everyone. Harvard isn’t the best at every major. One should apply to the schools which have the best course offerings for a specific major. How many Harvard grads are polluting our lives because they entered politics and have no clue how the real world works? So students, do us all a favor and stay away from Harvard.