Current Student
Joined: 09 Mar 2007
Posts: 187
Schools:Erb Institute: Ross | SNRE
Re: Optional Essay
[#permalink]
09 Apr 2009, 13:24
Montouk's book has good examples of optional essays.
The general advice is, when the adcom is reviewing your entire package (essays, transcript, resume, recommendations) and there's anything questionable that's not explained or has no obvious explanation, the adcom will make their own assumptions and create their own story for you. That = very bad.
If you think there's a gap in anything - whether it's explaining poor grades or providing context about yourself that you weren't able to do anywhere else - then go ahead and use the optional essay to do that. Be careful though because the optional essay should only be used if you weren't able to address that topic anywhere else. Adcom doesn't want to read anything redundant.
In my case, I wrote an optional essay for Michigan about community service because it's very important to me and I didn't think the other essays allowed me to express that part about myself. The end result...I got in and received a partial scholarship!