Some students have a very clear sense of their academic and career interests. They might know what classes they want to take and may even have everything planned out for the next 5-10 years. If this is where you’re at, honestly, we’re impressed.
Buuuut ... maybe you’re still testing the waters, trying to figure out what you’re interested in. That’s also totally fair. Not everyone has a 10-year plan.
Luckily, you can write the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign (UIUC) supplemental essays no matter where you fall on the spectrum. Want to get a better sense of what the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign is looking for? You’ll find an extensive, by-the-numbers look at its offerings, from enrollment and tuition statistics to student life and financial aid information, on its Common Data Set. For deep insights into how this university envisions student success (and how it wants to grow and evolve), read its strategic priorities. Reading through this will give you a strong idea of the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign’s values.
What are the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign supplemental essay prompts?
Prompts
You'll answer two to three short-answer prompts as part of your application. The questions you'll answer will depend on whether you're applying to a major or to our undeclared program, and if you've selected a second choice. Each short-answer response should be no more than 150 words.
If You're Applying to a Major:
- Explain, in detail, an experience you've had in the past 3 to 4 years related to your first-choice major. This can be an experience from an extracurricular activity, in a class you’ve taken, or through something else. (max 150)
- Describe your personal and/or career goals after graduating from UIUC and how your selected first-choice major will help you achieve them. (max 150)
If You're Applying to Our Undeclared Program:
- What are your academic interests and strengths? You may also include any majors you are considering. (max 150)
- What are your future academic or career goals? (max 150)
If You've Selected a Second-Choice Major (Including Undeclared):
- You have selected a second-choice major. Please explain your interest in that major or your overall academic or career goals. (max 150)
Optional: Academic Challenges
Explain any challenges (outside of COVID-related) you have faced throughout your academic career, including the dates or timeline below. (max 300 words)
Optional: If you have a low grade or a drop in grades that you have not already explained, do so below. (max 300 words)
How to Write Each Supplemental Essay Prompt for University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign
These prompts essentially ask you to expand on your academic interests. They’re pretty straightforward. If you’ve chosen a major, UIUC wants to know why that field of interest. If you’re undeclared, school officials still want to know more about your academic interests, so Option 2 is your chance to share. And anyone who’s shown an interest in a second major, here’s an extra 150 words to elaborate on that one. The big question here for each of the three is “why?” And, quite honestly, this is a great question to be asking—both for the essays and life.
However, “why” can often feel like an intimidatingly large question. Here are some smaller, more manageable questions you can ask yourself to get to the big one:
What academic subjects have I enjoyed in high school? What did I like about them?
Were there any projects, personal experiences, internships, or extracurricular activities that excited me in high school and made me want to know more about a subject?
What are resources, research opportunities, or classes at the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign that look interesting or exciting to me?
Which UIUC professors would I like to work with or get to know better? What department do they work in?
What’s a question I find myself contemplating often? How would I go about finding an answer to it?
What skill sets do I want to develop? What would I do with those skills once I’d learned them?
With some of these things in mind, let’s take a second look at those three options.
You'll answer two to three short-answer prompts as part of your application. The questions you'll answer will depend on whether you're applying to a major or to our undeclared program, and if you've selected a second choice. Each short-answer response should be no more than 150 words.
If You're Applying to a Major:
- Explain, in detail, an experience you've had in the past 3 to 4 years related to your first-choice major. This can be an experience from an extracurricular activity, in a class you’ve taken, or through something else. (max 150)
- Describe your personal and/or career goals after graduating from UIUC and how your selected first-choice major will help you achieve them. (max 150)
- What are your academic interests and strengths? You may also include any majors you are considering. (max 150)
- What are your future academic or career goals? (max 150)
- You have selected a second-choice major. Please explain your interest in that major or your overall academic or career goals. (max 150)
All three options above are what we call “Why Major” essays.
You’ll find a step-by-step guide to writing this type of essay at this link, which we recommend reading through, but here are some basic tips to get you started:
Tip #1: Make sure your answer complements your personal statement. What do we mean? If your personal statement is all about business and this one is all about dance, admission readers might be like, “Whaaaat?” So at least make sure the values you show in the personal statement are values that would serve you in the major/field/career(s) you mention here.
Tip #2: Just because you explicitly name a major in this essay doesn’t necessarily mean you can’t change it later. At most schools, you have flexibility to change your mind. (Quick note: This isn’t true at all programs at all schools, so be sure to a) Google it first, then b) check in with the school to make sure, if you’re unsure.) That being said, try to keep your answer as clear and straightforward as possible. Even if you’re not totally sure what you want your major or area of study to be, picking one or two you feel strongly about can help you figure out what to say in this essay.
Tip #3: Imagine a mini-movie of the moments that led you to your interest and create a simple, bullet-point outline. Here’s an example of what this might look like:
1) Elementary school: Getting my first dinosaur toy and reading dinosaur books
2) Middle school: Visiting museums, seeing water under a microscope
3) High school: Doing online research, getting internship where we analyzed brainwaves and dissected a stingray
Tip #4: Put your moments (aka the “scenes” of your mini-movie) in chronological order, as it’ll help you see how your interests developed. It also makes it easier to write transitions. Maybe try putting one “scene” per short paragraph to make it clear when you’re moving the story forward.
Tip #5: Expand on the impact of your intended major or areas of interest. Here are some ways to think about impact:
Numbers. Perhaps what you choose to talk about has a particularly shocking statistic. Maybe your interest in that topic inspired you to do something that had a significant numerical effect. Consider adding specific numbers to bolster your claims and give your readers a sense of magnitude.
Anecdotal evidence of impact, or quotations. Impact doesn’t have to be quantitative to convey urgency, importance, or power. The more of you that you put in your essay, the better.
Personal impact (on you, the author) in the form of lessons learned, skills gained. It’s especially interesting to note if these skills transferred to other areas of your life.
Tip #6: Write it long first, then cut it. In our experience, this tends to be easier than writing a very short version and then trying to figure out what to add. The tricky part here is that, unlike earlier versions of these UIUC prompts, you only get 150 words per option. So think about that as you work through the tips above.
Here’s a great example of a prior-year UIUC essay (when word count was longer), with tips and analysis below for how it could be tweaked to fit this prompt.
Example:
I’ve long wanted to know why I stuttered with a nine-year-old brain but not with a thirteen-year-old brain. One summer, I had the opportunity to use EEG machines to measure signals from the brain and correlate them to certain letters in the alphabet. The experience made me realize I have even more questions about the brain that I’d like to answer, and UIUC’s dynamic cognitive psychology and neuroscience program is the best place for me to get those answers. My high school classes, like computer science, music theory, philosophy, and statistics, introduced me to the ways in which these fields can be interconnected through cognitive science. Now I’m hungry to study how the brain itself works and how it helps store language, music, memory and perception. As a psychology major at UIUC, I’d love to take classes like Social Cognition and Perception and Sensory Processes to learn about how unconscious processes lead to our perceptions of the world. I’m also excited about the opportunity to apply as a research assistant to the Cognition and Brain Lab, learning firsthand about brain electrical activity and its relationship to language.
I’d also like to study under Professor Aber and learn what influences an individual’s understanding of race and how to design effective programs to promote community development. I hope to apply this learning to ChessOpenDoors, the nonprofit I founded to provide children access to a community that spans geographies, classes, religions, and even generations. I want to learn from Professor Aber’s research on contextual influences on individuals' understanding of race in public school settings, and use it to help make ChessOpensDoors an example of how collaborative community-based programs can promote community development through public schools.
My belief is that, in these troubled times, understanding the brain and diversity science can fundamentally improve the way we communicate and help mend race relations. As a fourth-generation Illini whose great-grandfather emigrated from China to Illinois in 1918, I would use my time at UIUC to focus on learning about the practical steps we can take to change perception in race relations and better listen to one another. (350 words)
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Tips + Analysis:
Get to the point. If this student were writing for the current prompt, he’d have only 150 words to do what he did here in 350. When every word counts, consider cutting “fluff” words or phrases that don’t add value to the story of you. E.g., “My belief is that” can be “I believe.” “The experience made me realize” becomes “I realized.” Pro tip: You don’t want to start every sentence of your essay with “I” statements, so consider how you can vary your sentences but still concisely make an impact.
Consider depth over breadth. This student chose to explore several psychology-related interests in his essay—cognitive science at the beginning and race relations/diversity science at the end. In a shorter essay, he might’ve chosen to focus on his ultimate goal of changing perceptions in race relations, using his mini-movie to show how he’s developed that interest. You can do the same by going deep on how you’ve explored one topic versus how you’ve pursued a number of interests that may be only tangentially related.
Tie it all together—or don’t. This student opens with a compelling lead: Why did he stutter at 9 but not at 13? But he ends by talking about race relations. In a longer essay, where he’s able to go wide (see tip No. 2 above), this works. In a shorter essay, the disparity might leave the reader unsatisfied, having not learned the answer. There are two ways to approach this. The first is to go with a simple, to-the-point opening, like “I want to study psychology to change perceptions in race relations,” and dive in headfirst from there. The other is to tie your hook in with your closing. So if you start with stuttering, maybe end with it, too? Or if you end with changing perceptions and improving communications, maybe develop a must-read lead that complements it?
Here’s another great UIUC-specific essay (again, for when UIUC’s prompts had a longer word count).
Example:
Perhaps the academic opportunity I’ve valued most at Phillips Academy has been Astronomy, especially spending evenings this past fall in the Science Center’s Observatory and using the Schmidt-Cassegrain reflector telescope. Observing the cosmos as the Observatory’s dome rotated 360 degrees made me realize how much bigger the universe actually is and that my point of view in everyday life on Earth is infinitesimal compared with what’s happening across the galaxy. I reveled in witnessing the Crab Nebula in its infancy stage emitting vivid colors, and I’ve been amazed that stars that are so far from Earth can nonetheless be so bright and clear. That I was able to observe something so rare made me thirst for more. I’d love to pursue a deeper understanding of space exploration and the cosmos, and Illinois’ dynamic Observational Astronomy and Computational Astrophysics program offers a perfect opportunity.
As an astronomy major at UIUC, I’d dive deep into understanding celestial mechanics with classes like Stellar Astrophysics. I’d especially like to learn why mass transfer only can happen at the inner Lagrange point (where the two Roche lobes meet). The Star Formation course would teach me how supernovae create the building blocks of life by dying. I can’t wait to take Observational Astronomy and study pulsars that emit electromagnetic waves other than visible light. I’d also like to learn more about ways we can try to harness the tremendous energy produced by solar flares in Theoretical Stellar Physics, and I hope to study how modelling of the sun can be used to predict solar cycles. Through classes such as Computing in Astronomy and its accompanying laboratory work, I could also develop strong data analysis and computer programming skills, which would have wide applicability beyond my lessons in astronomy.
I’m especially excited about the opportunity to pursue my budding curiosity about the cosmos in an independent research project under the guidance of an expert like Professor Fields. I think it’s fitting that Solar Cycle 25 is now underway and is expected to peak in 2025, coinciding with the time I hope to graduate as an Illini and make an impactful contribution to our understanding of the universe. (360 words)
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Tips + Analysis:
Consider your goals. Previously, UIUC only suggested students connect their desired major with their future career goals in their response. This student chose not to. So while he paints a clear picture of what he wants to learn as an astronomy major, he doesn’t quite connect that with a specific career goal. This year’s prompt is more direct, so we’d expect his revised response to elaborate on what he wants to do post-college and how an astronomy degree will help him do that.
Tell a story. Whether it was one pivotal moment or a succession of smaller events, there’s almost always a reason you’ve chosen the major you have. UIUC wants to hear that story. What’s the event that made you question everything (and why)? How has your curiosity led you to new experiences? New questions? New loves? This student’s astronomy class was his pivotal moment, but are there also other things he did to quench his “thirst for more”? UIUC wants to know.
Identify the impact your experiences have had on you. For this student, astronomy has been about more than identifying stars or watching their life cycle. It’s caused him to think philosophically (How do supernovae create life by dying?) and environmentally (Can the power emitted by solar flares be captured and used on Earth?). UIUC loves to hear how your interests result in critical, creative thinking that’ll help you answer new questions outside the classroom.
It’s normal to be unsure. It’s entirely possible that the student above isn’t 100% convinced he wants to be a modern-day Copernicus or Galileo—and that’s perfectly OK. College is a time for exploration (and we don’t just mean space exploration), and we hope you find new interests during those four years. So if you’re not confident in your major, you can just as effectively discuss an academic area you’re interested in learning more about. We’d bet you can’t tell whether the student above is a confident astronomy major or simply a student who’s curious about the world around (and above) him, and we don’t need to.
Here’s another great example for this prompt. It was originally written for another school with a 250-word limit, but it still shows what you can do with a prompt like this (and a shorter word count, though you’ll have 100 fewer to work with).
Bonus Example 1:
My interest in Gender and Sexuality Studies was sparked in my eighth grade Civics class when we studied topics pertaining to sexual equality. I went into the class knowing I believed women had a right to make choices for their own bodies and that view remained the same, but I discovered the complexity of abortion debates. I challenged myself by thinking about the disparity between actual and potential personhood and the moral rights of unconscious lives. If pregnancy had the same consequences for men as it does women, how might the debate be different? Would this debate even exist?
A year later, I shadowed an OB/GYN at a nearby hospital. On my first shift, I watched an incarcerated woman receive a postpartum exam after giving birth in her cell toilet with just Advil, and the issues discussed in Civics suddenly became urgent and real.
My school projects have often focused on reproductive rights. I’ve spent numerous hours delving into summaries of Supreme Court cases on abortion and contraception, and am even known as the “Tampon Fairy” at school because I frequently restock the school bathrooms with tampons and condoms.
I’m interested in exploring how Gender and Sexuality Studies connect to Public Health and Reproductive Biology, as well as Public Policy and Law. The interdisciplinary nature of this major will allow me to investigate many other areas of study and create a more nuanced understanding of how this particular field interacts with our world and society.
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Tips + Analysis:
You can include a thesis in the first paragraph. This isn’t true for all college essays, but for this essay, this approach totally works. And the great thing here is that you know exactly what this student is interested in from the first sentence of her first paragraph.
Connect the dots. If you look at the first sentence in each paragraph of this piece, you’ll notice that each focuses on a specific experience or moment in time. As we read through the essay, we see how the author has developed her interest in different settings and contexts. That narrative structure helps propel the piece forward and keeps readers engaged. If you do the “scene” outlining strategy mentioned in the general tips above, putting your essay into this structure should be relatively easy.
Consider using imagery. You don’t need to explain the nitty gritty details of every internship you’ve ever had or every class you’ve ever taken to explain why it meant something to you. Note how this author does an incredible job of showing how civics issues became “urgent and real” for her after watching an “incarcerated woman receive a postpartum exam after giving birth in her cell toilet with just Advil.” That image stops us in our tracks. The fact that this student so clearly remembers this moment and how it changed her thinking is powerful. Using anecdotes or descriptions of specific experiences is a wonderful way to emphasize meaningful growth.
Describe relevant personal experiences. This student uses the third paragraph in her essay to expand on how she’s acted on her interest in Civics and Gender and Sexuality Studies. She’s done hours of reading about abortion and contraception while becoming the widely known “Tampon Fairy” at her high school. You don’t have to include statistics or numbers to demonstrate impact (although you definitely can). Personal anecdotes and moments of reflections can be just as powerful.
End with what’s next. Although the first part of your essay might convey a clear thesis statement that answers the question in the prompt, your conclusion can explore nuance as you look ahead. For example, in this essay, the author uses the conclusion as a place to reflect on how her interest in Gender and Sexuality may intersect with other areas of study and how that might provide her with a more nuanced understanding of the knowledge she’s already gleaned. This conveys a sense of curiosity and an openness to new experiences that she’ll carry with her to college and beyond.
Here’s another great essay. It was also written for another school, but it’s still an excellent example of what you can do when answering this prompt.
Bonus Example 2:
At heart, I’m both regulatory bureaucrat and capitalistic entrepreneur.
Coming from a small business-owning family, I’ve grown up finding ways to one-up the competition, from boosting website search ranking with unconventional SEO to negotiating with book suppliers to cut costs. After all, our rent depends on our profits.
However, I also hold enormous respect for regulation. I vividly remember seeing my second grade classmate Nelson sprawled on the asphalt in front of the Chinese school we attended, accidentally run over by his teacher. I later discovered that afterschool was unlicensed: no safety training, no inspections, nothing. Years later, when my mother opened her own afterschool business, I filed the licensing documents and installed government-mandated guardrails. Though burdensome, regulation is crucial.
The afterschool industry taught me the inseparability of business and policy, but also sparked my curiosity concerning how political economics can leverage that relationship for maximal social benefit. In my Democratic Party internship, I examined how to incentivize below-market-rate housing construction without reducing overall supply. At FBLA Nationals, I delivered a presentation on management practices to reduce oil spills, increasing profits while meeting environmental standards.
CMU strikes me as surprisingly similar to the afterschool industry: an environment where learning occurs through doing and where business and policy can be explored in tandem. I’m excited by the new Economics and Politics degree, which would allow me to take Tepper’s and Dietrich’s classes concurrently. I’d love to attend the Washington Semester Program, applying my education to policy at a greater scale than I am currently. And I’m intrigued by electives like Coffee and Capitalism, using my favorite drink as a microcosm of commerce and geopolitics.
Whether I become a leader in the afterschool industry or an elected official regulating it, I know CMU will enable this Capitalist Bureaucrat to catalyze purposeful impact.
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Tips + Analysis:
Consider starting with a powerful one-liner. The first sentence of this essay is great. It’s sort of cryptic, smart, and a little funny, and it makes you want to keep reading. It also acts as a clever thesis. The Bonus Example 1 (see above) offers a more straightforward thesis; this one is a bit more subtle. Both ways can work. It also was really smart of this author to make the first line its own paragraph. The white space in between sets it apart and magnifies its impact.
Make it personal. Even though this prompt is asking you to expand on an academic interest, make an effort to weave non-academic details about your life into the piece. This author is mainly talking about his passion for business and policy, but he’s also able to incorporate information about his family and upbringing. The little details about his mom’s afterschool business or the moment he saw his Chinese classmate hurt make the essay more personal. They make us feel like we know the author at a deeper level, and that primes us to more readily engage with the rest of his piece.
Demonstrate how you took initiative. The author here has done some incredible things. He gave a public presentation at FBLA Nationals and did a Democratic Party internship. He’s also used his knowledge to help his mom deal with regulatory hassles in her own business. He’s showing how he took an interest and rolled with it. Use this answer as a space to talk about the incredible things you’ve done.
(Selectively!) use words and phrases that show you know your stuff. The author uses a lot of terms associated with economics and business in his essay (“regulatory bureaucrat” and “capitalistic entrepreneur” in just the first line). His use of these terms is a subtle way of signaling to readers that he has a firm grasp on what he’s talking about. You don’t want to use too much jargon, because that risks confusing (and alienating) your reader, but throwing in some subject-specific words here and there adds credibility and dimensionality to your essay.
OPTIONAL ESSAY PROMPTS
Academic Challenges
Explain any challenges (outside of COVID-related) you have faced throughout your academic career, including the dates or timeline below. (max 300 words)
Grades
If you have a low grade or a drop in grades that you have not already explained, do so below. (max 300 words)
It’s fine to treat these as truly optional—don’t try to force anything if it feels like you’re stretching things.
That said, if there are either any non-COVID challenges you’ve faced in your academic career, or a drop in grades not explained elsewhere, it can be useful to offer some context and detail.
If you do so, a few pointers:
Be direct. You can treat these prompts as largely informational. These are the school’s way to gain more information and understanding about your experiences and how you’ve dealt with and been affected by any challenges and obstacles. So while you can play with things like a fancy hook if you really want to, you’re totally fine being simple and straightforward with how you write these. To that end…
Simple structure is great here. You can use a basic narrative approach and roughly split these into thirds, focused on the challenge + effects, what you did about it, and what you learned. That’s especially useful for the second option—you aren’t offering excuses, but instead are providing straightforward context for what occurred. As such, the what you did and what you learned parts are generally more important.
Want advice on dozens of other supplemental essays?
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Special thanks to Julia for contributing to this post.
Julia published her first “book” on the elusive Pika in elementary school and has been writing fervently ever since. She’s thrilled to unite her quirky love of grammar and master’s in psychology to help students tell their most meaningful stories. Her favorite punctuation mark is the apostrophe because, in the words of Imagine Dragons, it’s “a symbol to remind you that there’s more to see.”
Top values: Collaboration | Family | Productivity
