Harvard asks five required short answers of up to 150 words each: how your life experiences would let you contribute, a time you strongly disagreed with someone, the activities or responsibilities that shaped you, how you hope to use a Harvard education, and the top three things your roommates might like to know about you.
150 words is about six or seven sentences. That leaves room for one example per answer and one honest thought about it, and no room for a warm-up. Together, the five answers are a portrait: each should show a different side of you.
Harvard's questions at a glance
| Question | Limit | Who answers it | Type |
|---|---|---|---|
| Life experiences you will contribute | 150 words | Required | Background and identity |
| A time you strongly disagreed | 150 words | Required | Disagreement and dialogue |
| Activities that shaped you | 150 words | Required | Activity |
| How you will use your Harvard education | 150 words | Required | Why this college |
| Top 3 things your roommates might like to know | 150 words | Required | List |
How to plan the Harvard supplement
- 1Map the five answers before drafting any of them: one story or example per answer, no example used twice, and none that repeats your Common App essay.
- 2Draft the disagreement answer and the activity answer first; they need specific events. The future answer and the roommates list are easier once you know what the others already show.
- 3Read all five in a row at the end. If two sound like the same person on the same day, change one.
1. Life experiences you will contribute
Harvard's wording · 150 words · Required“Harvard has long recognized the importance of enrolling a student body with a diversity of perspectives and experiences. How will the life experiences that shaped who you are today enable you to contribute to Harvard?”
What it is really asking. Which life experiences shaped who you are, and how would they let you contribute to Harvard? The second half is the point: Harvard wants to see the contribution, not only the background.
How to approach it
- 1Choose one or two experiences, not your whole biography.
- 2Show each through a specific moment or habit it gave you.
- 3Spend at least a third of the words on contribution: what classmates, a seminar or a house would get from you because of it.
Mistakes to avoid
- A list of identities or hardships with no effect shown.
- Ending on the past instead of on Harvard.
Full guide: How to Write Harvard's "Life Experiences" Short Answer
2. A time you strongly disagreed
Harvard's wording · 150 words · Required“Describe a time when you strongly disagreed with someone about an idea or issue. How did you communicate or engage with this person? What did you learn from this experience?”
What it is really asking. A real disagreement about an idea or issue, how you communicated or engaged with the person, and what you learned. Harvard asks about the engagement, not the outcome.
How to approach it
- 1Pick an idea you actually care about and a person you had to keep talking to.
- 2State their view fairly, in a sentence.
- 3Give most of the 150 words to what you said, asked and did, and to what changed in how you engage.
Mistakes to avoid
- A story where you were simply right.
- A hot-button political topic told as a position statement.
Full guide: How to Write Harvard's "Strongly Disagreed" Short Answer
3. Activities that shaped you
Harvard's wording · 150 words · Required“Briefly describe any of your extracurricular activities, employment experience, travel, or family responsibilities that have shaped who you are.”
What it is really asking. Which of your activities, jobs, travel or family responsibilities shaped who you are, and how.
How to approach it
- 1Pick the one that changed you most, not the one with the biggest title.
- 2Give a detail the activities list cannot hold.
- 3Say what it changed in you.
Mistakes to avoid
- Restating your activities list.
- Covering three activities in 150 words.
More on this kind of question: How to write the activity essay
4. How you will use your Harvard education
Harvard's wording · 150 words · Required“How do you hope to use your Harvard education in the future?”
What it is really asking. How you hope to use a Harvard education. Harvard wants a picture of purpose, not a job title.
How to approach it
- 1Start from a problem or question you care about and how you got there.
- 2Say what you hope to do about it, and what a Harvard education specifically adds (ways of studying, people, breadth you cannot get elsewhere).
- 3Keep it honest: a direction is enough; you do not need a ten-year plan.
Mistakes to avoid
- "Change the world" with no world in it.
- Prestige as the reason.
Full guide: How to Write Harvard's "Use Your Harvard Education" Short Answer
5. Top 3 things your roommates might like to know
Harvard's wording · 150 words · Required“Top 3 things your roommates might like to know about you.”
What it is really asking. Three things your roommates might like to know about you: a chance to sound like yourself.
How to approach it
- 1Pick three things that are specific, a little surprising and true.
- 2Mix a habit, a quirk and something that shows how you treat people.
- 3Use the voice you would use with a roommate.
Mistakes to avoid
- Three résumé items.
- Three jokes with nothing underneath.
More on this kind of question: How to write short answer and list questions
What our grader checks in your Harvard answers
Every answer is judged against a checklist for its kind of question plus one check written for Harvard's own wording. Each area comes back Met, Partly or Missing, and those verdicts (with the word limit) set the answer's readiness: Ready, Nearly there or Needs work. There is no score out of 100.
| Question | Harvard's own check |
|---|---|
| Life experiences you will contribute | Names specific life experiences and says how they would contribute to Harvard, not only how they shaped the applicant. |
| A time you strongly disagreed | Answers all three parts: the disagreement, how they communicated or engaged with the person, and what they learned. |
| Activities that shaped you | It does every part of what Harvard's question asks, in the college's own terms. |
| How you will use your Harvard education | Gives a concrete picture of the future and how a Harvard education in particular gets the applicant there. |
| Top 3 things your roommates might like to know | Exactly three things, specific and in the applicant's own voice; light is fine, as roommates would see them. |
The type checklists are on the supplemental essay grader page.
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