best fits for you).
It is especially helpful if you discuss circumstances or activities that may have affected your
academic and professional development. Admissions committee members want to know if you
have what it takes to persist and succeed in graduate studies. This is your chance to
contextualize your application (e.g., GPA, standardized test scores, research experience) for the
committee members. The following list is not an exhaustive list of contextual factors but will
give you an idea of the kinds of activities that may be evaluated by the admissions committee:
• Demonstrated initiative to seize opportunities for advanced academic work or research
and/or clinical experiences;
• Demonstrated persistence and significant academic achievement by overcoming
barriers including but not limited to economic, health, social, or educational
disadvantages, including first-generation college student status;
• Potential to contribute diverse perspectives to enhance the higher education enterprise
(e.g., research, scholarly work, classroom dialogue) as evidenced by life experiences
and educational background. For example:
◦ Ability to articulate the barriers facing women and minorities in science,
technology, and engineering (STEM) fields;
◦ Participation in higher education pipeline programs such as BUILD, IMSD,
McNair Scholars, or summer research and internship programs;
◦ Military service
◦ Service in Peace Corps, Teach for America, Americorps, City Year, Summer in
the City
◦ Service in campus life organizations and groups
◦ Varsity Athletics
◦ Significant travel experiences including Study Abroad
◦ Research, scholarly, and artistic experiences, if not already mentioned
◦ Other community and volunteer experiences
Part 4: Discuss the relevance of your recent and current activities
If you graduated and worked prior to returning to grad school, indicate what you’ve been
doing: company or non-profit, your work/design team, responsibilities, what you learned. You
can also indicate how this helped you focus your interest in graduate studies.
Part 5: Elaborate on your academic interests
Here you indicate what you would like to study in graduate school in enough detail to convince
the faculty that you understand the scope of research in their discipline, are aware of resources
in the department, and are engaged with current research themes.
a) Indicate the area of your interests. Ideally, pose a question, define a problem, or indicate a
theme that you would like to address in your graduate studies. This should be an ample
paragraph!