Does being a first gen college grad hold any weight?

[MDurgs]

Neither of my parents went to college. Do ADCOMs make note of this? Should I mention it in my PS or is there a different section in the application to address this?

I ask because I'm a middle class white male so this is probably the only thing diverse about me other than some of my extracurriculars.

Thanks!

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[pioneer22]

Neither of my parents went to college. Do ADCOMs make note of this? Should I mention it in my PS or is there a different section in the application to address this?

I ask because I'm a middle class white male so this is probably the only thing diverse about me other than some of my extracurriculars.

Thanks!

other members can join me on this, but I believe it is a factor in admissions...not going to be a dealbreaker (cant have much lower stats), but it can help to separate yourself I believe.

 

[whitesheep12]

I'm in the exact same boat, middle class female first gen. I didn't have it in my personal statement, but I did include it in some secondary responses, but only when it fit (ie. they asked something like "How will you bring diversity to our school?"). I mentioned it in one interview, but only because it fit the scenario. When I did talk about it I didn't dwell on it or anything because I feel like people have it so much worse than I do and it wasn't really a significant barrier for me.

Also, some schools secondary forms will have a little box to check if you're the first generation in your family to attend college, but it varies.

 

[MDurgs]

I'm in the exact same boat, middle class female first gen. I didn't have it in my personal statement, but I did include it in some secondary responses, but only when it fit (ie. they asked something like "How will you bring diversity to our school?"). I mentioned it in one interview, but only because it fit the scenario. When I did talk about it I didn't dwell on it or anything because I feel like people have it so much worse than I do and it wasn't really a significant barrier for me.

Also, some schools secondary forms will have a little box to check if you're the first generation in your family to attend college, but it varies.

Thank you! I agree that it wasn't much of a barrier, so I'll keep it on the DL

 

[premedvideos1]

Neither of my parents went to college. Do ADCOMs make note of this? Should I mention it in my PS or is there a different section in the application to address this?

I ask because I'm a middle class white male so this is probably the only thing diverse about me other than some of my extracurriculars.

Thanks!

I know some schools had a checkbox, when I applied. I do not think it would be disadvantageous to mention in a diversity essay.

 

[JohnWill30]

As mentioned above, I talked about it during secondary responses or if they asked in an interview "is there anything you want to make sure you tell us?"

 

[aalamruad]

A lot of my interviewers loved that I'm a first gen college grad. I only had half of one sentence about it in my PS and didn't write about it in my secondaries, but it just naturally came up in conversation a few times.

 

[aldol16]

On the primary application, it will ask your parents' education level and give you an automatic classification based on that. On many schools' secondaries, they will also ask you to explain if you feel you were educationally disadvantaged, etc. Whether you fill that out is up to you and specific to your circumstance. For instance, if your parents only had a high school education but make millions of bucks and sent you to a rich prep school, you might come off a bit pretentious in claiming educational disadvantages.

 

[Save a life]

Yeah, I put it in my application and mentioned it in interviews. It may have helped a little bit but it's not going to give you that much of an advantage.