If you’re aiming to get into an Ivy League school, you will already know that it is a lot of work just to apply – especially if you’re applying to multiple schools. The good news is, if you’ve spent a decent amount of time prepping for your Common App essay a lot of the work has already been done. This is because you can essentially use the material from various Common App prompts and rework it for your Ivy supplementals. 

When it comes to school admissions, experts may ask for the same information in different ways, but it’s important to remember they are using a set number of lenses to get an understanding of who you are and why you’re a better candidate for their school. This is why the ideation that went into the Common App prompts that you haven’t submitted as your main essay remain relevant. 

Some schools try to be very creative or unique in their supplemental essay topics. This is because their applicant pools are pretty homogenous: students with high GPAs, good recommendations, and extracurriculars with recognitions. The essays help admissions representatives by giving them a filter that is tailored to their school. At first glance, supplementals may seem like a massive undertaking, with many schools having 4-7 supplementals each. But, as we’ll demonstrate in this series, about 90 percent of them overlap with a prompt from the Common Apps. Be smart. Use the time that you’ve spent on your Common App essays to build your supplementals, and you’ll have so much more time to tweak and fine-tune your essays to perfection. 

If you’ve brainstormed for some Common App prompts but not others, we have a full breakdown series for each prompt here. Use the sample outlines as a benchmark to tell your own story. Now with this, you’ll be able to start building out your supplementals. So which questions go with which prompt? We’ll start off with Harvard.

Harvard supplementals (2022-2023)

No word count limit (We suggest 300-800 words)