Personal Statement vs. Supplemental Essay: What’s the Difference?

One question I get asked a lot is what’s the difference between a personal statement versus a college essay. And the fact is they’re generally the same thing most of the time. Kind of. Let me explain.

Your Common App essay should be a personal statement. A story about who are you, about something that’s important to you, or something you’ve done where a college can get to meet you and know who you are and whether or not they want to invite you to become a member of their student body so they’ll have a good idea that you’re a good fit for them.

Then, there are school-specific supplemental essays that many colleges assign over and above the Common App essay. And yes, even colleges on the Common App may have an extra essay or two or three or five or eight or even more depending on how competitive that school or that program is.

So, generally speaking, what I advise students to do is to spend June and July coming up with a few different good stories, good essay ideas. Write them, edit them until they’re good, but don’t worry about length because once August 1 comes, the Common App opens and many other school-specific applications follow suit. And then you’ll get to see what are those school-specific supplemental questions you’ll need to answer.

And you may find that the story you had pegged as your Common App essay may be better suited to answer some of those school-specific questions, and one of your backup stories may wind up ascending to become your Common App essay because you don’t want to send a college the same story twice – once for your personal statement and then again for one or more of their school-specific supplemental questions.

Now, that said, I will tell you that many of these school-specific essays may be shorter than the Common App that’s 650 words. I’ve seen some school specifics down at 400, 350, 120, even 50 words. But understand the shorter they are, the harder it is to pack something meaningful into that little package. So, don’t take them lightly. Put as much work into them as you would any other big story and always edit down to the length you need once you know what the length of the assignments are.

So get some ideas down, don’t worry about finalizing it until August 1st, and if you have more questions about personal statements versus college essays, don’t hesitate to reach out to us at 732-556-8220.