'what have you been doing' secondaries?

[Dulcina]

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so there are a bunch of "what have you been doing since graduation" secondaries. are people writing these out in essay format, or list/bullet format. here's the one i have currently:

• If you have already graduated, briefly (4000 characters max) summarize your activities since graduation

thanks for the input!

 

[shemarty]

so there are a bunch of "what have you been doing since graduation" secondaries. are people writing these out in essay format, or list/bullet format. here's the one i have currently:

• If you have already graduated, briefly (4000 characters max) summarize your activities since graduation

thanks for the input!

4000 characters?!

I wrote mine in complete sentences, but it wasn't a developed essay with an intro and conclusion. It was just a list... in sentence format.

 

[JackInTheBox]

I'm not doing lists/bullets, but I'm not going full-out essays either. More like "After graduation, I did XX and YY. I've also been doing ZZ." I won't even get close to 4000 characters. I sort of feel like that limit is more for non-traditionals who have a decade of post-graduate experience they need to talk about.

 

[chad5871]

Yeah, 4000 characters is a bit extreme. GWU only gave us 3 lines (~300 characters) and I managed to cram it all in there.

 

[Dulcina]

yeah, that was harvard's (EDITED) from last year. dont know what's up with their extremely long char limit, im just gonna stick with the one i've written thats like 1100 characters.

 

[jelly476]

dont worry about it. they just want to see that you're being productive so dont write "from june - september I sat on my ass and played Grand Theft Auto 4. Then, in October I moved to Australia to take advantage of the coming Aussie summer by surfing during the day and boozing at night. O and I playe GTA4 summore lolz haxxorz."

I think that would get your app shredded.

 

[fireflygirl]

I agree that 4000 characters is a bit much to write about! I would stick with a brief version of what you've done and if you can, maintain a focus on things that show you've been productive and workings towards your goal.

 

[Podie]

Ha. So I just realized for the GWU secondary, I didn't fill out that part asking me what I was doing because I'm now doing my Master's so I considered that to be in school still in not graduated. Should I have included that in that answer instead of leaving blank? I wonder if they will discard my application for obvious stupidity:S p.s. I wrote in the primary that I was a thesis student as one of my activities...?

 

[dienekes88]

so there are a bunch of "what have you been doing since graduation" secondaries. are people writing these out in essay format, or list/bullet format. here's the one i have currently:

• If you have already graduated, briefly (4000 characters max) summarize your activities since graduation

thanks for the input!

I wrote these out in complete sentences, but it was pretty much just a list.

 

[useatoothbrush]

This is a silly question but if we're still undergrad students (will take classes next yr full time), is it ok just to leave it blank or should we put N/A or write out explicitly that I will be taking classes?

 

[Dulcina]

This is a silly question but if we're still undergrad students (will take classes next yr full time), is it ok just to leave it blank or should we put N/A or write out explicitly that I will be taking classes?

I'd say leave it blank. most of the prompts say "IF you have graduated... "