The 2012-13 Common Application went live last night. And today, Arun and I are releasing our guide, How to Make your 2012-13 Common Application a Lot Less Common. It’s 63 pages, sold as a downloadable PDF for $12.99. You can buy your own copy here, or view a free preview version here.
We released our first version last fall, and it became the most popular selling item in our online store. It's been revised and updated to reflect the changes in this year’s application, and we've implemetned some of our own ideas for improving the guide.
Our guide takes you line by line through the Common App and tells you exactly how to handle the sections that so many students struggle with, like:
- How to fill out the “Activity” section and highlight your best accomplishments
- How to use (and not to use) the “Additional Information” section
- How to handle the explanation for any, um, disciplinary incidents
- Specific advice for each of the prompts for the long essay (and advice about whether or not it’s a good idea to choose “Topic of your choice")
- How to write a punchy response to the “Please elaborate on one of your extracurricular activities…” essay (without spending 1000 characters explaining that football is hard)
- What to do if you need to update your Common Application after you submit it
Here’s the link again to buy it. We’re really happy with how it turned out and hope you enjoy it.