"My academic interests in engineering and my friend" - Lehigh Admissions

Prompt: Why is Lehigh a good match for you? What contributions will you make to the academic experience and to campus life? (As a guideline, your response should be between 150-250 words.)

A very close friend of my family graduated from Lehigh and strongly recommended I go visit. I respect him and trust his opinion, so I visited during an open house event. I didn't know what to expect but I was very excited.

My academic interests in engineering have grown into a passion for wanting to dig deeper in the area of civil engineering. I believe The P.C Rossin College of Engineering and Applied Science would offer me the opportunity to build on my math, science and leadership skills and open up new and exciting challenges for me. Another factor that excited me about Lehigh is the chance to customize my learning experience and study across disciplines.

To balance my learning experience at Lehigh, I would like to assist with the South Bethlehem Neighborhood Center. I currently enjoy tutoring the freshmen math class at my school and I believe in helping others and contributing to my community. I believe everyone is entitled to a good education and given the tools to do well, anyone can succeed.

I remember Dean Washington telling the group that if during our many college visits, you feel a "wow", then you should trust your feeling. after my tour at Lehigh, I felt that wow.

This is pretty good! My only things would be that you didn't really talk about what you would bring to Lehigh besides the community service. Also, when you talked about your family friend suggesting Lehigh to you it is kind of unnecessary. You have less than 250 words to use, and you could come up with a stronger intro if you wanted to! Lastly, your paragraph about engineering is a little too general. Try adding in a professor that teaches engineering or a research project that they are working on and talk about how you could contribute to that. I like your conclusion though. Good luck!

This is pretty good.

Just a few opinions:

"To balance my learning experience at Lehigh, I would like to assist with the South Bethlehem Neighborhood Center. I currently enjoy tutoring the freshmen math class at my school and I believe in helping others and contributing to my community. I believe everyone is entitled to a good education and given the tools to do well, anyone can succeed."

I think you should further explain what South Bethlehem Neighborhood Center is.

And somehow try to connect these sentences to make it flow better if possible.

YES.. You only have to do 1 of the 4 essays for Lehigh, common app is confusing

Take your last sentence and put it in the beginning. Then, explain why you felt that "wow".

Also, the reasons for choosing Lehigh are kind of generic--there are lots of colleges that allow you to study across "disciplines" (which seems like an unnatural and awkward way of putting it).

And of course the engineering program would give you opportunities to take math and science. Leadership is the aspect that stands out, so emphasis how Lehigh offers this (if it actually does).

Lastly, the tone of the response and the points you give are not very compelling and convincing that Lehigh is unique and a great fit for you. To match the "wow" factor that you claim, demonstrate how wowing Lehigh is.

jasennett