A Timeline for College Essay Writing

The process of writing good college essays is like sculpting a statue. Think of Michelangelo sculpting David. The process begins NOT when the Great Sculptor strikes the marble for the first time. Rather, the process begins way before that: when the rock - the ten-thousand pound slab of raw white marble - is unearthed from the Carrara quarries of Tuscany. Then - instead of chipping at the rock right away - Michelangelo sat back and waited. He meditated on the rock… until the vision of David appeared before his eyes. In his own words: “I saw the angel in the marble and carved until I set him free.” And so he did. This is the kind of process and mindset that produces masterpieces. Likewise, this is the process and mindset we all should strive for in our college essays. 

Here’s the timeline of what typically happens with College Essays:

June-August:

Students finalize their shortlist of schools with their college counselors before going on summer vacation. After taking the first month off, students start brainstorming different ideas to answer UC’s Personal Insight questions and/or Common App’s Personal Statement. These are usually just bullet-points that they can later expand on. Summer ends without too much done in terms of college essays. Near the end of summer, students may or may not have a (very, very rough) first draft. 

August 1st:

Schools release their essay prompts. While they are almost guaranteed to be the same every year, there’s always the possibility that they may be different this year. This is why some students don’t even start writing their essays until then. Even if a change is made, it is usually just the same question rephrased, so it does not warrant the waiting at all!

Mid-Late August:

Senior year starts for most students. Now, not only do they have college essays to write, but they also have regular fall semester academics and all of their extracurriculars to juggle. This is particularly the case for the highest-achieving students. And for the students still planning to take another SAT, they could be setting themselves up for double jeopardy - not only in stress and anxiety, but also in the overall quality of their applications. 

Many students also realize around this time that college essay questions overlap significantly. They think they can easily repurpose their responses, killing two birds with one stone, so in their minds they think the main work is done. This is a TRAP! The truth is it is *never* as easy as it appears to fit a good essay that works with 650 words (from Common App’s Personal Statement) into 350 words or fewer (for one UC essay or supplement). The same is true from small to big. This gives them a false sense of security, so they let valuable time slip by. 

September-October:

School creeps into full swing - quizzes, midterms, season one sports, and the like. Many students also start reaching out to teachers and counselors for recommendations around this time even though most of the popular (because they’re great) teachers are already fully booked by students who had reached out much earlier. 

Most students also get several rounds of feedback from their counselors and peers. Yet, not all feedback is of equal value. Especially when the feedback is unhelpful, like “this is a bit cliché” or “you should come up with something a little bit more outside the box,” it could really derail the good progress so far. And if they are also planning to apply via Early Action or Early Decision (EA/ED) for schools like Stanford, MIT, NYU, etc… the pressure really starts to build. 

Mid-October:

Before students realize, they are already swamped juggling academic work and extracurricular commitments, making it even harder to squeeze in enough time to write their college essays, let alone invest the significant amount of time necessary to produce their best work. This is when the procrastinators really start to scramble. 

November 1st:

EA/ED applications are due. The Personal Statements that students submit at this time are usually not the same ones that they will ultimately submit for the remaining schools. This is because their essays are not in their best possible shape - there is still lots of room for improvement. While there is still time to fix their writings for the remaining schools, this is a circumstance to avoid because students typically apply EA/ED to the most competitive institutions on their school list. Students want to submit an application that presents them in their light, and that requires the best essays they can write.

November:

The scramble continues with the UC essays, which are due November 30th. Students also use this time to write the supplementary essays for all remaining schools. While most schools ask one to two “Why Us” questions, each still requires a good amount of dedication to be answered succinctly and effectively. If a student is applying to 15-20 schools, the amount of work that’s cut out for him or her will increase geometrically. This is also why we typically recommend students apply to no more than around 10 schools: quality over quantity.

December:

early admissions results are released around this time. For the lucky students, they are done. Congratulations! For those who are unhappy with the results, the struggle continues until Late December/Early January. 

Mid-December/Early January:

All remaining applications are submitted.

And just like that, it’s all over. As you can see, most students who fall into this pattern usually never get the chance to feel fully satisfied and confident with their essays. When students start writing their essays in August, it’s usually already too late. But this is when most students start!

I am not at all saying that this timeline is wrong; after all, this is the conventional wisdom. This is the timeline that most college counselors will recommend you to follow. It is, however, immensely flawed, so why take the risk at all? What’s so unfortunate is that most of us only realize this in retrospect - that the ‘recommended’ timeline never budgeted enough time to begin with - so many students and their applications suffer because of this. 

It is very easy to overestimate the amount of time you have and underestimate the amount of work you need to produce your best college essays. As a result, we underinvest our college essays with the amount of attention and energy they truly deserve. With your SAT, GPA, extracurriculars, and everything else largely set in stone by senior year, your college essays are by far the most important aspect that you have control over to influence your college admissions. 

Here’s how we approach College Essay Writing:

If you want to write high-quality essays, you need to start way ahead of time. As with anything good, you simply cannot rush the process.

April-June:

Begin brainstorming early. I suggest starting as early as April, or the last two months of school before summer break. The reason is this: while you are still in school, you are still in the headspace to do “work”. Unless you enroll for summer school or have an internship obligation, just think of how hard it will be to get yourself back to work after lazing around for a month. The biggest challenge is always generating momentum whereas it is much easier to keep the ball rolling once it’s already going - so start early. 

Pro tip 1: Don’t read the application prompts. Don’t try to answer the prompts with bullet-points or brainstorming because you could end up getting tunnel-vision and missing your best stories that are usually hidden in plain sight. Instead, the better approach is to find your stories via journaling. Just write and reflect. Introspect. You have time! Doing so will enable you to excavate your life experiences for the metaphorical diamonds in the rough. After all, as much time as it takes to sculpt your David, it takes even more time to find good materials for your essay. From our experience, the more time you spend here digging, the smoother the rest of your college essay writing process will be, and the greater your end result. You will thank yourself later.

July-Mid August:

Once you’ve found your piece, you can prepare to begin the polishing process. Look at the college prompts now, and look at the journal entries that you have written over the past months. Does a clear story emerge? Can you see how your true life experiences can piece together for a beginning, middle, and end? If the answer is no, let me reassure you: it is impossible to literally have nothing if you put in the work. Look harder and think harder, or ask for help from an outside perspective! The spectators always see the chess game better than the players themselves. 

Study “perfect” college essay examples. They are widely available online. What is it about them that works? What about them can be even better? Use these models as references for your own essays.  

Get feedback from your counselors and peers to check for any blind spots. Every good essay goes through several stages of revisions. Make sure that you can tell good feedback from bad feedback (a post on identifying bad advice is coming soon)! Be careful to ignore suggestions that are too vague or too general. 

Pro tip 2: Start with your Personal Statement. It is the longest essay you have to write at 650 words whereas the UC Personal Insights require four essays at 350 words each. This means that chances are you’ll be able to repurpose at least some parts of your Personal Statement for your UC essays! So yes, you may kill two birds with one stone - but only if you budget the time to do it right. 

Mid August-October:

Further refinements. By this point you should have more than a handful of drafts for your Personal Statement and UC essays. You’re committed to your responses, and you feel confident about the way your essays are taking shape, even if they’re not perfect yet. 

Start working on your supplementary essays around this time if you haven’t already.

Mid-October:

You should aim to have your Personal Statement + Supplementary Essays for your EA/ED schools 99.9% done by this point, around two weeks before the November 1st application deadline. During this two week buffer, not only will you have ample time to handle any midterms or extracurricular commitments, but will also be able to put the finishing touches on your essays and application. 

November:

You should not need to make any more major changes (better yet, any changes at all) to your Personal Statement at this point. EA/ED schools are usually the most important/hardest schools to get into, hence the early application to hopefully obtain a slight edge in admissions. What this means is that if you are still making changes to your Personal Statement for your regular admissions, it probably wasn’t your best essay. 

That said, with your Personal Statement done, this month should be mainly focused on completing your UC essays, which are due November 30th. If there is time, continue to tackle supplementary essays for the remaining schools.

December:

All the remaining essays are completed and applications submitted :)

The writing process does not have to be high-pressure or high-stress at all. It can even be fun! College essay writing is a fantastic opportunity for you to not only learn about yourself, but also learn how to articulate your life story. When you take the time to reflect on your personal journey, what you need to write will flow forth naturally. When Michelangelo was asked by the Pope about the secret to his genius, his answer was musing: “It’s simple. I just remove everything that is not David.” 

Again, but in short: start early. Dig deep. Masterpieces are never rushed. Write like Michelangelo sculpts.