Overheard in Committee Part 1
Admit It! If you could be a fly on the wall of a Committee conference room you would be. Everyone is simply interested in admission; what we consider, what the tip factors are, how we arrive at the decisions we do. Well, to explain all of that wouldn’t be a blog; it would be a book. However, these blogs are intended to help prospective students and families understand better what we do, how we do it, and why we do it.
Overheard in Committee today: “Can we read the essay?” Before an applicant gets to Committee, his/her essay has been read twice by two different readers. However, when an essay stands out — be it for its content, it’s style, or both — that often is emphasized in the readers’ review of the applicant. On the application in question, both readers had noted the personality, voice and quirky sense of self that come across in a young woman’s essay. Committee members who had not read the applicant’s file asked if the essay could be shared. So we displayed the essay in our conference room, using a document camera, so that all of the Committee members could read the essay. Some chuckled, others laughed out loud, another noted how well written the essay was and one Committee member said, “that moves me to admit”.
The moral of the story is not to cause more stress about application essays. They are good at causing stress all by themselves. The moral is that a) we do read your essays, b) they can be a great way to show off who you are using your own voice and c) they can be a tip factor. For more tips on essay writing, see our application process website. On the right-hand side of the page, you’ll see a widget box called Essays Made Easy. That provides a link to several blogs about application essays from various members of our dean staff.
Stay tuned as this blog will continue to evolve as Committee continues.
Wendy Livingston ’03, M.Ed. ’09
Senior Assistant Dean of Admission
Comments are closed on posts older than one year, but we still want to hear from you. If you have a comment or question for us, please email admission@wm.edu.
Hehe, I bet all the girls reading this are hoping you are referring to *their* essay. I certainly am!
Thank you for all of the updates, it definitely gives the process a more personal touch and allows us to feel connected during those few months when other admission boards seem to disappear into oblivion. Keep it up, it’s great.
Lina,
Glad you’re enjoying the posts. The identity of the applicant is of course confidential but know that this particular moment in Committee happens more than once.
Stay tuned. Another installment of overheard in Committee will be posted this week.
Haha I can definately relate to hoping that too! Everyone hopes they have the perfect essay.
K.S., very true. However, the perfect essay is a rare find and most applicants who are admitted, gain admission with an essay that is fine but not over-the-top excellent. While good essay writing can certainly help an applicant, rest assured that most applicants write essays that are fine but not exceptional and still gain admission.
I, too, would like to think that this essay was mine. Then again, I submitted my application in December, so if it is just now being read…haha
Megan, we read applications in no particular order so someone who applied so when you applied has no baring on when your application is read. Additionally, the application to which I was referring in the blog had already been reviewed twice. The readers just so enjoyed the essay that their comments led the Committee to read it together. Sorry if that wasn’t clear.