Adjectives are important: How schools describe themselves can help YOU

When you’re looking at schools one of your first stops has to be the school’s website.
You might get to tour, interview, and info session the school, but the website is the only place where you’ll get one of the most important tools for supplements in black and white- Adjectives.

Every school’s website is loaded with descriptions. Descriptions of the academics, the students, the campus life, the school itself.

And while they might be full of “fluff” and each school might seem to read the exact same as the last one, there are major differences hiding in those adjectives.

Does the school describe their students as “engaged” “independent” “involved” “active” “intellectual” “curious” “quirky” “achieving” “competitive” “cooperative” “fun loving” “committed” “strong” “diverse”
while it might seem like a mush of positive qualities, each school’s cocktail of traits can help you gauge your fit. These are the terms the school is using to describe itself, don’t take that lightly.

If a school breaks out the “engaged” it’s likely a political hotbed. “Active” brings to mind either a jock’s paradise or a hippie granola protesting campus. Intellectual and Curious seem like similar traits, but the former seems like a lot of papers and high ideas, and the later brings to mind research and trial and error. Quirky was a big positive for a lot of schools for me.

Adjectives are more than a useful search tool, they’re absolute gold when it comes to essays and interviews.

The schools want to know that you’ll fit in, so it doesn’t hurt to drop in a few of the adjectives that they use to describe themselves in your answers. If a school calls itself “competitive, active, and involved,” you might write in a supplement about “why ____” how:

You love the high levels of involvement of the students as you’ve always found you flourish in communities of high achievers, and the competition of being in a place full of the smartest most engaged minds of your generation doesn’t intimidate you but ignites you.

That’s a bit pretentious, but it also sucks up to the school, shows what the school can do for you, and why you fit in.

It’s also good to drop these adjectives in interviews when you can. Don’t be obvious, don’t be annoying, but use them to show that you are a great fit for the school.

So when you’re applying, make sure to look out for adjectives