We’re hard at work here at CEO keeping all the essay requirements current for each school in our extensive database. Each Friday, we send an email out to our current members to let them know which schools have been updated for the coming year, as well as to update them on key admissions data such as application deadlines, SAT and ACT ranges of accepted students, and class rank percentiles for the most recent class to enroll.

As an example, here’s the list of those added just this week, putting our list of updated schools at well over 430!

1. Colby College
2. Columbia College Chicago
3. Davidson College
4. Earlham College
5. Eugene Lang College
6. Fairfield University
7. Fairleigh Dickinson University
8. Long Island University/C.W. Post Campus
9. Marist College
10. Mercer University
11. Michigan State University
12. Montana State University-Bozeman
13. Mount St. Mary’s College
14. New Mexico State University
15. Northeastern University
16. Northwestern University
17. Occidental College
18. Oglethorpe University
19. Ohio State University-Columbus
20. Ohio University
21. Old Dominion University
22. Pennsylvania State University-University Park
23. Philadelphia University
24. Plymouth State University
25. Ramapo College of New Jersey
26. Ringling College of Art & Design
27. Rollins College
28. Rose-Hulman Institute of Technology
29. Rutgers-New Brunswick
30. Rutgers-Newark
31. Seattle Pacific University
32. Skidmore College
33. St. Bonaventure University
34. St. Catherine University
35. St. John’s College (MD)
36. St. John’s College (NM)
37. Stonehill College
38. Transylvania University
39. Tulane University
40. University of New Haven
41. University of Pennsylvania
42. Wheaton College (MA)
43. Xavier University (OH)

By using our Essay RoadMap preview page you can see all the schools we’ve updated so far for 2011. Any college without an asterisk has been updated – and while you’re at it, you can see first-hand the potential of what CEO can do for you.

The updating process continues in earnest this weekend, with another large push coming in the early parts of September. Stay tuned.

With so many different sources for this information, such as the Common App, College Board, and NCES, CEO is your trusted source, doing all the investigative work that would take one person days.

If you had a flag for every essay... That'd be thirty flags.

30? You read that right. The powers that be at New York University have so specifically divided the school that there are now 30 essays for undergrads to consider waiting in our database. 30!

To the school’s credit, no undergraduate applicant will have to write thirty individual essays when applying to NYU. The numerous essays mostly belong to specific departments, like the Tisch School of the Arts or the Silver School of Social work – all told, the Violet Bobcats of NYU have essays for programs in Film, Photography, Music Business, you name it. They even have a new satellite school in Abu Dhabi. While no applicant will have to address them all, each applicant will have to write several essays, regardless of which school within the university he or she chooses.

It just goes to show that the breadth and reach of schools like NYU should not be underestimated, and that with tools like CEO you can get a shortcut to those requirements, and in turn, see the opportunities that schools of such great diversity offer.

So keep in mind that the big schools often pose as many challenges in their applications as they do in their classes! It’s all benefits in the long run, but managing the task from the get-go can be daunting. Make sure you have the right tools to guide you on your journey.

And while you’re at it, make sure you’re not just avoiding questions like this guy.

Where does the road in that logo roam? To new technologies, my friend.

The Journal of College Admission, a publication that discusses the National Association for College Admission Counseling (or NACAC), recently put out an article called “Using Technology in Undergraduate Admission: A Student Perspective.”

It points out that nearly all students are using various forms of technology to guide them through the admissions process. In fact, the article mentions that, “One survey found that 88 percent of college-bound prospective students would be disappointed or possibly eliminate a school from consideration if the institution’s web site did not meet expectations.”

We encounter many college websites that are more complicated than they need to be, especially in their organization of honors, scholarship, and departmental essays, so we commiserate with applicants who are frustrated by this. Lucky for you, CEO’s goal is to design a simple technology that provides a solution while streamlining your efforts to simplify and organize the process. Glad to have you with us as we head into the new application season.

That's right. It says 35 years.

The Common App has updated for the class of 2015. This year’s application features twenty-nine new schools, including Columbia University, the University of Michigan-Ann Arbor, UConn, and three SUNY schools – Maritime College, Morrisville State College, and Potsdam.

As in past years, many schools require supplements to the Common App, which means additional writing, sorting, and organization. CEO is right on the edge of these releases and we make sure our application information is up to date. So as these supplements are made available, we’ll have them here, and your Essay QuickFinders and Essay RoadMaps will update automatically to reflect the latest information for the schools you’ve selected.

Make the most of these early releases and get your writing done ahead of time! Remember that CEO is a great resource for finding scholarship and honors programs, too. That’s cash money and respect! What else could you ask for?

One of the reasons schools make these requirements known so far ahead of time is to allow you to explore the departmental and honors requirements so many of them have without getting overwhelmed. Too often we hear about students who choose not to apply to programs or even entire universities just because of the application workload! That just won’t do. So use CEO’s tools as much as you can and keep your eye on the prize.

In the next few weeks we’re going to up the ante a little bit and open the floor to you in a more hands on, nuts-and-bolts way. If you have a question you’d like answered about the college essay process in general, about a specific prompt, or about CEO, let us know by dropping us an email.

As we roll into the fall and the admission season heats up, we’ll continue to maintain an open forum so you can get answers to your questions about your struggles, your curiosities, and your successes.

The Scottsdale Community College Fighting Artichokes are clear about what they want from applicants: a love of fighting and delicious cuisine. Other schools will require an essay.

The Independent Educational Consultants Association recently released a bit of press about what colleges are really looking for in applicants. And while a number of things we know to be vital remained vital – academic performance, difficulty of schedule, a willingness to challenge one’s self – this particular quote caught our eyes:

“The importance of the essay moved up since the last survey, perhaps reflecting the essay’s role as more colleges move to ‘test optional’ status. The essay was also seen as more important to private liberal arts colleges, as compared to large state universities.”

Schools continue to add essay requirements to find ways to distinguish their applicants and to find unique elements among them. Though on the surface this appears to make more work for applicants, much of that work is easily avoided with tools like CEO’s, and simultaneously delivers to applicants the opportunities they’ve long asked for to be considered as people rather than numbers. Not bad.

So recognize that our trusty friends at the IECA have spoken – get your essays right. They are truly your greatest opportunity to speak directly to the universities themselves. But even more than that, they are becoming opportunities to distinguish yourself clearly in an increasingly crowded marketplace.

Fun Fact: This picture was taken in February. Amherst's physics department can change the weather locally.

Amherst College is a Common App-exclusive school, but unlike many of its peers, it has gone ahead and released its 2011 essay requirements to the general public. They’re quite lengthy, so we won’t reprint them here, but Amherst’s decision to put them out ahead of the Common App’s August update points out a few great things about top schools like Amherst and what its actions mean for other schools that follow.

1. The more open a school is with you, the more open you can be in return. By putting out such a complex series of questions early in the admissions season, Amherst is showing you that it’s worth preparing to write your application essay. Amherst’s questions are challenging, and they require quite a bit of thought. Go ahead and put in the time it takes. Write multiple drafts. Get it right.

2. You have more work ahead of you than you think. Amherst recognizes that senior years are busier than they get credit for. So take advantage of the time the school has afforded you by putting this info out ahead of time. With opportunities like this and tools like CEO, your workload can be a lot more manageable than, say, those of your overworked and underprepared friends.

3. The college essay is the most underrated and under-appreciated part of the application. The admissions officers at Amherst know what it’s like to read half-baked and ill-conceived essays. Sure, they see writing from a lot of the top students in the country, but they also see it from people that have rushed themselves through a pile of applications, regardless of their grades and resumés. This is your opportunity to speak to the college – your chance to create something of a dialogue and show them who you are. Make the most of it.

If we were hard pressed to add a fourth element to this list, it would be that Amherst appreciates how many movies you have to watch this summer. That vampire flick ain’t gonna watch itself. Thank the school for its foresight and watch all the movies. There are so many. Then fire up CEO and get back to work.

You have a summer. Don't spend it like this guy.

One of the great advantages CEO provides to its users is the ability to get a head start on what can be a pretty humungous amount of work. Access to our database comes along with a weekly emailer, letting you know which schools’ requirements have been updated for the coming year, and giving you a chance to get out in front of that pile while you still have the time to do it.

The rude, nay, completely unacceptable reality of senior year is that your superiors insist on continuing to give you homework despite your being a full 75% complete with your high school education. What I’m saying is that seniors have work. Papers. Math. Things to do.

Piling the applications and essays has loads of upsides for you, but the amount of work and the creeping deadlines are not part of those upsides.

So here it is, July already, and after that, there’s, you know, August. Months when you may find yourself with a wee bit of free time. Working with CEO can help you turn September and October’s piles into very manageable slates of work. Get started ahead of time and knock those essays out beforehand, so your revisions in the fall feel more like tweaks and fine-tuning. The kind of work that turns high school writing into actual, honestly good writing.

Gotta diversify... And mix it up... Like a... British Jamaican DJ.

As we’ve written about before, the cost of diversifying your set of schools is minimal when compared to the potential reward you have in store for an acceptance at a school above your safe range.

Being accepted at a school on the high end of where you’re aiming is a big deal in terms of the academic experience you’ll have, the success your peers will have after graduation, and the professional expectations you’ll have, both in salary and breadth of opportunity.

So how do you expand that list of schools without wasting your time?

Focus on the core priorities you have for your university experience. Selectivity, reputation and ranking, class size, location, setting, etc. Once you’ve made those decisions, find ways to broaden your selections, and the odds of landing a position will increase.

If you’re going to be applying to, say, Cornell, Drexel, Boston College, and UConn, stretch out the list of top schools to three or four, and your chances of winding up at a school like Cornell, even if it’s not exactly Cornell – say, Brown, Carnegie Mellon, or Yale – are going to increase.

Remember, there are many reasons you can be denied admission to a school, many of which are outside of your control, such as your demographic, geographic location, or high school’s history with the university. Broaden your selection and you’ll improve the chances.

CEO is here to compliment the other tools at your disposal and make the many applications, and the legwork that goes along with it, that much easier.