“The College on The Hill” aka Dartmouth College has just released its essay prompts for Fall 2017. This private liberal arts college in Hanover, New Hampshire is, as we’re sure you’re aware, one of the eight schools in the Ivy League system. But is Dartmouth right for you?
We assess this school’s offerings in our “College Spotlight” below. But first! The prompts and how to master them!
This year’s prompts pull from Dartmouth’s distinguished alumni, school traditions — even the Muppets! They should serve as excellent inspiration to get creative and dig deeper into Dartmouth’s culture as you research your responses.
*Required
*Essay 1 (100 words or less): Oh, The Places You’ll Go is one of the most popular books by “Dr. Seuss,” Dartmouth Class of 1925. Where do you hope to go? What aspects of Dartmouth’s curriculum or community might help you get there?
CEA’s ADVICE: This is a combination of what we at CEA call the “Why Essay,” and a future goals essay. When discussing “where you hope to go,” think about your academic and professional ambitions. Can you clarify for admissions what you see see for yourself in your studies and career moving forward? If you are undecided, can you talk in a more general sense about what you would like to accomplish or how you see yourself making a mark on the world or impacting others? Once you set up your goal, build a bridge to how Dartmouth, specifically, can help you achieve that goal. How do you do that? With details! Do your research. Look up academic programs, campus organizations and other activities and initiatives that will impart new skills and give you the necessary experience to accomplish your objectives. Make sure whatever you focus on is specific to Dartmouth — you want admissions to immediately recognize that you are invested in their school and see a good fit for yourself at Dartmouth in particular.
*Essay 2 (250-300 words): Please choose one of the following prompts and respond:
CEA’s ADVICE: Gotta love when a prompt gives Shonda some love. This essay asks you to recount a moment when you challenged yourself and said yes to the unexpected. When did you fight fear in favor of adventure? When have you surprised yourself? Did these risks yield rewards, and if so, how? These are good places to start when thinking about this essay.
CEA’s ADVICE: This essay should be both a celebration of your relationship with an educator (or even a friend or a relative in some cases) and your love of learning. What inspires you to want to know more about something and who in your life has stoked that curiosity? A good answer to this prompt will not only give admissions a feel for your appetite for learning, it will also give them insight into how you absorb new information, what inspires you and what your interactions in the classroom might be like.
CEA’S ADVICE: This is a prompt for both visionaries and activists. Is there a window for change you see in the world? If given infinite resources, how would you go about solving the problem you see? Or, if you have already been working for a cause that is important to you, this is the place to show it. What problems have you been trying to solve and how have you been working to enact change? Don’t forget to connect your ideas, be they totally practical or mildly fantastical, to the specific resources Dartmouth has to offer you in your pursuits.
CEA’s ADVICE: You can go pretty much anywhere with this one. Just remember that the point of these supplemental essays is to something new about yourself to admission — so what are you trying to say? Maybe you can discuss the hideousness of your forest green work uniform, leading to a larger discussion of what it’s like to work at Starbucks. Maybe being green can refer to the difficulty of being new at something. Whatever direction you take, commit to the idea and go all in!
CEA’s ADVICE: This one is a little tricky, as the line between describing sincere motivations and outright bragging can be a hard one to walk. Still, we would like to think all of you have some contenders for kindness stories, so think about these moments in which you extended yourself for others, with the purest of motivations. If you describe the action without characterizing it for the reader, the humanity should speak for itself.
CEA’s ADVICE: This is an incarnation of another one of our favorite common essay types, “the community essay.” How have you contributed to the environment around you, be it the school environment, your larger community or a smaller organization with which you are involved? What is your role in a group — are you a leader? A workhorse? Are you someone who fights for the rights of others? Someone people feel comfortable talking to? Whatever neighborly qualities you choose to represent, make sure you provide examples from your life thus far and point out how you plan to use these skills and qualities through participation in specific activities and organizations at Dartmouth.
Specific instructions and application information here.
Now that you have the prompts under your belt, what else do you need to know?
First you’ll want to consider Dartmouth’s “year-round academic calendar of four 10-week terms,” which offers students a ton of flexibility in terms of how they split up their on-campus study time, internships and study abroad programs (of which there are many). The school is known for it’s massive variety of majors and available methods for executing and combining them (Special Majors, Multiple Majors, Modified Majors) as well as its intimate class size. Dartmouth is also highly committed to research, offering opportunities for hands-on research experience and meaningful mentorships to undergrads.
And then, there is the vibe. As soon as freshman walk onto the Dartmouth campus, they participate in Dartmouth Outdoors first year program, an orientation program that allows students to bond in a unique way and get acquainted with the beautiful area surrounding the college. Another tradition that’s been around for over 100 years is the annual Winter Carnival, which was started as a way to showcase athletes. The modern-day event includes the “Polar Bear Swim”, inviting brave students to jump into the freezing cold Occom Pond. Not athletic? Maybe you will consider joining one of the many exciting organizations on campus. If this sounds like the type of environment you would enjoy, then you need to check out our profile, followed by the Dartmouth’s 2016-17 essay prompts (which you’re obviously going to get started on now, right?):
School Mission Statement
“Dartmouth College educates the most promising students and prepares them for a lifetime of learning and of responsible leadership, through a faculty dedicated to teaching and the creation of knowledge.”
Notable Alumni
Just a few of the many well-known Dartmouth alumni:
Most Popular Academic Programs
Political Science and Government
Social Media
Dartmouth is fairly active on social media. If you want to stay up to date with college events and student life, the school’s social pages is where you’ll want to be! Although the school doesn’t have admissions-specific social media accounts, information about the process is kept up-to-date on Dartmouth’s main social media pages. Have fun stalking away!
And that’s all, folks. You’re pretty much a Dartmouth expert now. So, start writing and maybe in a year from now, you’ll be writing and studying on the Green (while eating green eggs and ham?) at the College on the Hill.
