How necessary is it to prewrite secondiaries?

[radioactive15]

Supposedly having a secondary sent within 2 weeks of receiving it is ideal, but does this require prewriting? (This is clearly assuming not every single school you apply to will send you a secondary so you won't have a crazy stack to do all at once)

When pre writing , how reliable is using a school's previous year's secondary prompts? How often do they change?

Do you HIGHLY recommend applicants to write general essays that address common questions like diversity, weaknesses, adversity now before reciving anything or should we just "enjoy" the free time between submitting and receiving secondaries ?

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[wagonwheel23]

The deluge of secondaries I received in July and August was overwhelming. I was writing after work (50-60hr a week job...) and on the weekends. I was also overwhelming my friends who were editing all of my essays.

If you have a chance, at least pre-write a few, particularly the ones that can be used across schools.

 

[gyngyn]

If you are planning to apply to a dozen or more schools, you will be wise to begin drafting responses to previous prompts.

 

[WedgeDawg]

Supposedly having a secondary sent within 2 weeks of receiving it is ideal, but does this require prewriting? (This is clearly assuming not every single school you apply to will send you a secondary so you won't have a crazy stack to do all at once)

The two week or bust rule isn't true. Just submit them as soon as you can.

When pre writing , how reliable is using a school's previous year's secondary prompts? How often do they change?

They're fairly reliable, but if it's a really long essay, it might be worth only doing an outline or something until you can verify this year's prompt so that you don't run the risk of wasting a lot of time.

Do you HIGHLY recommend applicants to write general essays that address common questions like diversity, weaknesses, adversity now before reciving anything or should we just "enjoy" the free time between submitting and receiving secondaries ?

No, because if you write a general essay, you're still going to have to modify it to fit each school's specific prompt. Write your essays as you figure out the prompts and save them in a word doc or something and if you encounter a similar prompt with a different word count or slightly different wording, you can just copy/paste your old essay and then modify it.

 

[neekzg]

Supposedly having a secondary sent within 2 weeks of receiving it is ideal, but does this require prewriting? (This is clearly assuming not every single school you apply to will send you a secondary so you won't have a crazy stack to do all at once)

When pre writing , how reliable is using a school's previous year's secondary prompts? How often do they change?

Do you HIGHLY recommend applicants to write general essays that address common questions like diversity, weaknesses, adversity now before reciving anything or should we just "enjoy" the free time between submitting and receiving secondaries ?

How busy will you be come July? If you're working full time, it could be beneficial to draft some statements for the common questions.

During this time, I basically organized all the schools I was applying to in a OneNote notebook and copy/pasted the old prompts to see what types of prompts I was seeing most often. I brainstormed a little bit but did not do any formal pre-writing since I wanted to take a break after working so much on my primary app.

You're going to get a lot of varied answers on this topic, so it's up to you and how busy you anticipate being the next few months. Two week turnaround is not required, just pay attention to specific guidelines the schools might give you.

 

[Gingy]

It's highly advisable, though not required, to do some form of prewriting. This can include brainstorming and isn't limited to fully formed thoughts.

You might also find it useful to comb through previous year's threads for the schools to which you're applying. Look at trends; some schools change their questions from year to year, but many don't. For those that don't, you can reasonably predict their secondaries and dedicate most of your time to those.

 

[TheRhymenocerous]

I pre-wrote everything because I was working full-time and it was one of the best decisions I've ever made. But even if you don't want to specifically pre-write for each school, I'd come up with a solid draft of one about how you bring diversity to the class and one about overcoming a challenge. You'll get a lot of mileage out of those.

 

[radioactive15]

If you are planning to apply to a dozen or more schools, you will be wise to begin drafting responses to previous prompts.

I'm planning to apply to ~25 schools (5 reaches, 20 targets). Do you think I should expect to receive >10 secondaries ?

 

[Cotterpin]

Do you HIGHLY recommend applicants to write general essays that address common questions like diversity, weaknesses, adversity now before reciving anything or should we just "enjoy" the free time between submitting and receiving secondaries ?

You're gonna have way more free time to "enjoy" after you send in all the secondaries and then have to wait around for weeks/months to hear back from schools.

I'm applying to 25 schools myself and after looking at the essays from last year, I can see that it's going to be something like 70 or 80 short essays (some longer). So I'm doing as much as I can now. Working on it a little bit every day.

 

[TheRhymenocerous]

I'm planning to apply to ~25 schools (5 reaches, 20 targets). Do you think I should expect to receive >10 secondaries ?

You should expect to receive, like, 23 secondaries. Nearly all schools just send 'em to everyone.

 

[nwts]

I applied to 15 schools last summer, and I pre-wrote secondaries. I was very glad that I did. I had a ton of secondaries (like probably 2/3 of them) come in within a week of the day when my primary application was transmitted, so I all of a sudden had a bunch of secondaries to fill out. A few schools changed one, some, or all of their questions, but most did not. I found that the pre-writing was definitely worth my time and helped me not to get too stressed and overwhelmed with the huge influx of secondaries. Additionally, I was glad that I was able to turn secondaries around so quickly because I ended up getting my first II on July 10th and a total of 3 in the month of July.

 

[ed*26]

I'm planning to apply to ~25 schools (5 reaches, 20 targets). Do you think I should expect to receive >10 secondaries ?

Yeah, most schools don't do any sort of screening for secondaries. How else are they going to get $$ from you? I'd expect to receive most of the secondaries, and most within the same 10-day period after your primary is transmitted. Hence why people pre-write.

 

[CaliforniaDreamer]

I didn't prewrite anything, but I did consider the outlines for how I would answer typical questions (challenge, diversity, what I had been doing since graduating, etc). I did them in order of a combination between when I received them, which schools I preferred, and how easy/quick the secondary was to fill out. Some of my longest turnround time secondaries resulted in interviews so I don't think the 2 week rule is a rule at all.

 

[To be MD]

I didn't prewrite anything, but I did consider the outlines for how I would answer typical questions (challenge, diversity, what I had been doing since graduating, etc). I did them in order of a combination between when I received them, which schools I preferred, and how easy/quick the secondary was to fill out. Some of my longest turnround time secondaries resulted in interviews so I don't think the 2 week rule is a rule at all.

Not trying to hijack the thread, but I have a similar question for you:

If you partially addressed a 2ndary essay prompt directly in your PS, is it okay to repeat some of that information in your 2ndaries?

 

[gyngyn]

I'm planning to apply to ~25 schools (5 reaches, 20 targets). Do you think I should expect to receive >10 secondaries ?

Way more.
With no restrictions on the number of applications, the only thing that makes any sense is to send out secondaries as quickly as possible. It's the only way to process the huge number.