The Common Application Part 2

Welcome back to Part 2 of the Common Application! Now that you’ve learned a little about what the Common App is, it’s time to dig in and rock applications with these Common App tips.

(This post assumes you are familiar with the Common Application, or Common App, already. If you need a refresher, check out Part 1 here.)

I’ll start by sharing my top Common App tip: Give yourself plenty of time.

This is not an application you want to save for the day before it’s due. Or even the week before. I’d encourage you to open an account as soon as you can verify if you’ll need to use it or not. It’s best conquered through multiple work sessions and tackling the forms piece by piece. The strongest applications are also polished and complete—applicants have taken time to review everything before submitting.

Common App: Do You Need to Use It?

Before creating account for Common App, you have an important decision: do you need or want to use Common App? Not all colleges and universities accept the Common App. There are also some colleges that will only accept the Common App. How can to decide what to do? Here are 2 steps to determine if you will need to, or would benefit from, using Common App.

First, look at the list of schools you plan to apply to. Do any state that they only use the Common App? If you have at least 1 school that uses Common App exclusively, then you’ll need to use Common App. If none of your schools accept only the Common App, keep reading.

Second, do two or more of your schools accept the Common App? If no schools explicitly require the Common App, but you have two or more colleges that can accept Common App, it may save you time to use the Common App. Generally speaking if you can send Common App to at least 2-3 of your schools, it’ll be a good use of time to use Common App.

(Note: Colleges that use the Common App and another application–such as their own or another application platform—agree not to benefit one application type over the other. It’s a requirement for schools to join Common App. So choose what is best for you, without worrying about what colleges prefer.)

Common App Tips: Creating Your Account

If you’ve determined that you’re going to use Common App, then it’s time to create an account.

There are no paper options for Common App, so you’ll need to head straight to their website.

1. From the website, select “Create an Account”
2. Select “First Year Student” (Unless you have already graduated from high school and have already completed college-level coursework after graduating. In this case you would select the transfer option.)
3. Fill in each field in the box that opens next.
   • Use proper spelling, punctuation, capitalization, your full legal name, etc. Do this throughout your entire application, too!
   • Choose an email address that is one you check regularly and that looks professional.
   • Triple-check that you’ve typed your email address correctly.
   • Record your username/email and password somewhere you’ll be able to find it.
4. Select “Create Account.”

Common App also provides excellent instructions to help guide you through the specifics of creating an account.

(Note: Students can now create a Common App account prior to being in their final year of high school. If you are in a younger grade and want to see what it’s all about or use some of the search or financial aid resources in Common App, feel free to create an account to check it out! When you create your account, you’ll be able to enter the year you expect to start college.)

Common App Tips: Entering Information

Congrats, you’ve got your very own Common App! Take some time to look around, if you’d like.

Filling In Your Common App: The “Common App” tab at the top of the screen that comes up after logging in is the “common” part of your application. In other words, this is the part of the application that will go to each of the colleges that you send Common App to. There are 6-7 sections of this main part:

• Profile, Family, Education, and Testing: These sections are relatively straightforward and shouldn’t take you more than 30-60 minutes. I recommend entering what you know and taking notes on a paper notepad next to you for questions/areas you need to double-check or research more to add later.
• Activities: This section asks for up to 10 activities (school-related, community-related, work-related, anything!) that you’ve been involved in. You don’t need to have all 10. Take time to reflect on your involvement and thinking of how best to communicate your involvement to colleges. You get to choose the order you list your activities. I encourage students to look through the format for the Activities section and then complete the work in a separate document to adjust order, change descriptions, etc. You can enter your final activities list into Common App once you’ve determined exactly what to include.
• Writing: In this section, you’ll select which essay prompt you’re responding to and then enter your beautiful, polished essay. Always write your essay in a separate document then copy and paste it into the Common App.
• (Optional, only used by a few colleges): Courses & Grades: If you have colleges on your list of schools (see the next section for details), you will be able to see how  many of your colleges, if any, require this last optional section. Essentially, to complete this section you need to enter your entire high school transcript from 9^th grade on into the standardized Common App form. Hopefully none of your colleges require this section. It’s unpleasant! 

Adding Your Schools: If you know which colleges you plan to apply to, select the “College Search” tab and type in the name of each college on your list, one at a time. As the college appears in the search boxes, click the blue + sign to “add” the college to your list of “My Colleges.” Complete this until you’ve added all of the schools on your list.

(Note: you can add and delete (even re-add!) colleges to this list anytime. Feel free to add a school to see the requirements, and delete it if you choose not to apply. It’s nearly impossible to submit your application accidentally through the Common App.)

Completing Your School’s Supplements: Earlier we talked about the “common” parts of the Common App. This is about the parts that are different for each school, the schools’ supplements. You can access these supplements by clicking the “My Colleges” tab and selecting any of the colleges on that list. Once selected, you’ll see information about that colleges application requirements and deadlines. You’ll also see a drop down of Application and Writing Supplement parts.

• Questions: These are most often the college-specific additions to the basic information you’ve entered in the main “Common App” section. Which academic term are you applying for? What major(s) are you interested in? Are you applying to a specific school within the university? Which admissions plan (Early Action, Early Decision, Regular Decision) are you applying with?
• Recommenders and FERPA:
  • Recommenders: This is where you can invite your teachers, school counselor, and maybe an optional outside recommender to submit a recommendation on your behalf. (Be sure to ask them in person before just typing their email address and assigning them!) (Also, if your high school uses Naviance, you may encounter grayed-out boxes here because you’ll need to assign recommenders through your Naviance account. See your counselor for details.)
  • FERPA: Family Educational Rights and Privacy Act waiver. Essentially, you are asked if you’d like to waive your rights, or not, to view your letters of recommendation. These letters are technically apart of your educational records, so you have a legal right to access and view them. However, college admissions offices know that recommenders will write more openly if you have waived your right to see the final letters. Once you’ve typed your name and date to sign off on your FERPA on Common App, you can’t un-do it. So go slow and be thorough.

• Review and Submit: There’s a review and submit section for both the Common App and Supplement and the Writing Supplement. See the last section below for more details!
• Writing Supplements: Colleges may have additional essays, specific to their school. Those essay prompts are listed here in their writing supplements. These typically aren’t as long as your main Common App essay, but they are just as important. Give yourself time to dissect what the prompt is asking and write, revise, and re-write each answer. Your grammar, spelling, punctuation, and evidence of clear thinking is important here!

Common App Tips: Submitting Your App

The Common App is submitted directly and specifically to individual colleges. As such, you will be submitting the Common App through the college supplement screen to one school at a time.

When you see green check marks next to all of your Common App sections and each of the supplemental sections for a specific college, you’re ready to submit!

Finally, you’ll need to check off a few acknowledgement boxes on the final submit page back in Common App. The very last step is entering your full name and date in the form. Click submit and wait for confirmation that your application has been successfully submitted. Congrats- you’re done with that application!  Again, you’ll need to do this separately, for each college you are applying to using Common App.

Best of luck with your Common Application!

College planning and applications are a big undertaking. You don’t need to go it alone. I’m still accepting hourly students for Class of 2020 and comprehensive package students in the Class of 2021 and 2022. Let’s chat.