Explaining W's to schools who don't ask on secondaries?

[misosoop]

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Hi, some of the schools I'm applying to don't have a space to address academic inconsistencies/"other information". I withdrew from 3 courses in one semester due to a family death and I feel like so many withdrawals at once would definitely raise some eyebrows and warrants an explanation. Should I try to wiggle an explanation into the secondaries that don't explicitly ask about this?

Thanks for your insight.

 

[Mr.Smile12]

Prepare to answer when prompted. It should be obvious something happened with a semester withdrawal, but if they don't ask on their secondaries, you can ask the admissions team whether it's something they want to know. Believe it or not, some adcoms don't care once you get to interview stage.

 

[wysdoc]

Hi, some of the schools I'm applying to don't have a space to address academic inconsistencies/"other information". I withdrew from 3 courses in one semester due to a family death and I feel like so many withdrawals at once would definitely raise some eyebrows and warrants an explanation. Should I try to wiggle an explanation into the secondaries that don't explicitly ask about this?

Thanks for your insight.

If they don't ask it on the secondary, I wouldn't stick it in to some other essay.
Your grades didn't appear to suffer so it wouldn't fit the academic inconsistency prompts, but it might be a better fit for an essay asking for difficult situations you have gone through. Or they might ask in an interview if they have your whole file in front of them.

 

[misosoop]

but if they don't ask on their secondaries, you can ask the admissions team whether it's something they want to know.

By this, do you mean emailing admissions directly?

Believe it or not, some adcoms don't care once you get to interview stage.

This is reassuring, thanks. I worry that unexplained W's will make it more unlikely to make it to the interview stage.

 

[Mr.Smile12]

By this, do you mean emailing admissions directly?

This is reassuring, thanks. I worry that unexplained W's will make it more unlikely to make it to the interview stage.

Email the admissions office if they need this information for screening your file. That's the only way I can answer your question for programs that don't ask in advance.

 

[Goro]

Hi, some of the schools I'm applying to don't have a space to address academic inconsistencies/"other information". I withdrew from 3 courses in one semester due to a family death and I feel like so many withdrawals at once would definitely raise some eyebrows and warrants an explanation. Should I try to wiggle an explanation into the secondaries that don't explicitly ask about this?

Thanks for your insight.

If they don't ask for it, why should you mention it?

 

[GoSpursGo]

I agree, if there isn’t a place to naturally discuss in a secondary then I wouldn’t shoehorn it in. It might come up in an interview but honestly it shows maturity for you to recognize that you needed to take a break rather than trying to pull yourself up by your bootstraps