For the college-bound seniors at HHS, August is a month that elicits anticipation for the new beginnings and surroundings that college promises—a transition sure to bring excitement and anxiety in equally abundant proportions. For the Class of 2026, however, there may be more anxiety than excitement associated with the upcoming months.

On August 1, the Common Application (known almost exclusively as the Common App) will open, and the Class of 2026 will be thrust into the world of supplemental essays, deadlines, and virtual campus tour binging sprees. With all the moving parts and uncertainties of college applications, rising seniors may as well be signing on to a juggling act that runs from the months of August to December. This circus, however, is one well known to the Class of 2025, and this year’s seniors are more than happy to make way for the next act. From building your list of schools to writing the classic “Why us?’”essay, the senior class has a slew of tips and tricks for the Class of 2026.

Building your list of schools

Before we can dive into applications, it’s important to talk about where students are applying. With hundreds of thousands of websites providing their insight into the “Top 10 East Coast schools” and the “Public Ivies to Look Out For,” researching schools can get a little overwhelming.

For Emma Savidge, senior and soon-to-be environmental science major at Skidmore College, Scoir was crucial to filtering through all the different online opinions and finding a list of schools that fit her. “Scoir is a really good tool when trying to find colleges to apply to. There are a lot of different filters you can apply based on preferences for location, size, available majors, etc. and even quizzes you can take that will match you with different schools based on your answers,” Savidge said.

The Common App essay

Next comes the step that most people immediately think of when it comes to college applications: the Common App essay. Consisting of a maximum of six-hundred-fifty words (which are endowed with at least six-hundred-fifty different expectations and anxieties), the Common App essay challenges students to encapsulate the essence of their being in roughly two pages of writing. 

Senior Adrit Saha will be attending Brown University in the fall for neuroscience pre-med. For him, the key to navigating the Common App essay was time. “Always start early,” Saha said. “It doesn’t mean that you will have your entire essay done within the first month of writing, but for me, I went through more than five different essay ideas and making the best essay took almost three months, so start before August 1.” 

Writing supplemental essays

Of course, the writing doesn’t end with the Common App essay. Most schools come with a slew of other supplemental essays, which allow them to get to know you through their own questions. Each essay will ask something different of you, but that doesn’t mean writing supplementals can’t be boiled down to a system.

Isabella DiStasio, senior and rising freshman and business administration major at the University of Michigan, believes that a strong supplemental essay is a balanced one. “Think about what you want to convey to the admissions committee. If you were meeting someone for the first time, what is the first thing that you would want them to know about you? And how do you say it in the most humble and eloquent way possible?” DiStasio said.

Making a decision

Nothing is ever easy with college applications. Just when you’ve submitted your final application, you’re hit with the realization that you will soon have to pick just one school to attend. For some, the choice is obvious; many people have dream schools and, hopefully, many will get in. For those who don’t have a dream school or who are forced to explore other options, however, the choice can be daunting. 

Senior Sanjana Bhatta will be attending UNC Chapel Hill Honors College to study global studies and philosophy, politics, and economics on a pre-law track. In Bhatta’s opinion, “the most important factor is the physical campus. Make sure to tour the school and see if it fits your vibe. Also, don’t base your decision off of others. Tune out the other voices and do what feels best for you.”