The Myth of Demonstrating Growth in Common App Essays

To the astute readers of the post titled ‘Common App Essays That Work,‘ where I outlined the only two types of Common App essays that work, they might have been surprised that I didn’t emphasize demonstrating personal growth as an essential component of those essays. Most of the time, if one writes such essays, growth will naturally be demonstrated. But if not, it doesn’t mean that the essay is bad.

Many students are obsessed with demonstrating how they have grown as people over the years. Some are so obsessed that they begin their essays by recounting what they were like as young children and make the case that now, as 17/18-year-olds, they are different from who they were as children. I'm sure those who have written such essays feel a bit silly after reading this segment of the article.

While colleges do care about personal growth and even dedicate some supplemental essays to asking specifically how one has grown or changed over time in response to certain experiences, many people misunderstand why colleges ask these questions. They are not as concerned with how much you grew during your time in high school—they assume that’s a given. What high schooler remains the same, personality-wise, after four years? If such an individual existed, it would be evident in their essays, and they would quickly be dismissed from consideration.

Instead, colleges are interested in gauging your propensity to grow much more after being fully immersed in the curated top-down experience they offer, in which they have invested hundreds of millions of dollars into cultivating on their campuses. They ask about growth not to assess if you are emotionally or academically ready for college, but to gauge how much you will benefit from the substantial investments they put into fostering academic and social opportunities on their campus. They don't want their investment to go to waste on people who don't want to grow and challenge themselves in college.

Top colleges with abundant resources ultimately choose applicants who they believe will benefit the most from what they offer. This is why so many “perfect” applicants with long lists of awards, perfect GPA, and SAT scores get rejected. It does no good for a college to admit students who will spend all their time studying in dorms, earn perfect grades, graduate, and not contribute socially to the campus community. They seek applicants who will join clubs and engage in intellectually challenging conversations, open to having their worldviews challenged or refined. They want people open to change and growth through full engagement with the environment they are in.

Therefore, merely showing growth does not address this critical question. Obsessing over it results in uninformative essays at best.

To ensure your essays demonstrate this propensity for further growth, show how your thinking has changed when confronted with new information. Discuss meaningful conversations you've had and their impact on you. Allow the reader to understand these conversations from a first-person perspective and how they contributed to your change. Talk about your aspiration to be among people generally more knowledgeable than yourself and your effort to not always be the smartest person in the room. If you were wrong about something, admit it, and explain how you addressed the situation by listening to someone else. Above all, make it clear how your perspective has evolved over time and how you wish to continue refining it through study and learning from peers with varied life experiences.

When discussing growth in your college applications, whether specifically requested or as part of your Common App essay, you should highlight the development you experienced during your junior year. This is typically when you take on your most challenging course load, both quantitatively and qualitatively. It's also the year when you should be most deeply involved in your extracurricular activities. From colleges' perspective, they expect that your most significant high school growth occurred during junior year. If taking rigorous classes and participating in intensive extracurriculars doesn't lead to demonstrable growth, colleges may interpret this as a sign that you wouldn't fully benefit from their educational or social offerings.

If you want to ensure you're effectively showcasing your personal growth in your college admission essays, schedule a free consultation with us. We'd be happy to review your essays and provide feedback.