University of California-Berkeley supplemental essays

• Prompt 1Required350 words max

  Your leadership experience

  Describe an example of your leadership experience in which you have positively influenced others, helped resolve disputes or contributed to group efforts over time.

  How to approach it

  Goals prompts fail when they stay noble and vague. Pick one concrete problem you care about, connect it to something you have already touched in real life, and let the ambition be specific enough that a reader could disagree with it. Specific beats impressive.

• Prompt 2Required350 words max

  How you express creativity

  Every person has a creative side, and it can be expressed in many ways: problem solving, original and innovative thinking, and artistically, to name a few. Describe how you express your creative side.

• Prompt 3Required350 words max

  Your greatest talent

  What would you say is your greatest talent or skill? How have you developed and demonstrated that talent over time?

• Prompt 4Required350 words max

  Opportunity or barrier

  Describe how you have taken advantage of a significant educational opportunity or worked to overcome an educational barrier you have faced.

• Prompt 5Required350 words max

  Your biggest challenge

  Describe the most significant challenge you have faced and the steps you have taken to overcome this challenge. How has this challenge affected your academic achievement?

  How to approach it

  For a challenge prompt, the challenge is the setup, not the essay. Spend most of the words on what you did and how you changed. Readers are wary of trauma used as currency; growth is the currency.

• Prompt 6Required350 words max

  A subject that inspires

  Think about an academic subject that inspires you. Describe how you have furthered this interest inside and/or outside of the classroom.

• Prompt 7Required350 words max

  Making your community better

  What have you done to make your school or your community a better place?

  How to approach it

  Community and identity prompts reward specificity over significance. A small, true community described from the inside beats a broad label described from the outside. End on what you carry from it into a campus, not on a moral.

• Prompt 8Required350 words max

  Your additional strength

  Beyond what has already been shared in your application, what do you believe makes you a strong candidate for admissions to the University of California?

Program-specific prompts

These apply only if you are applying to the named program or school.

• M.E.T. (Management, Entrepreneurship & Technology)Required350 words max

  Background & Motivation

  Share with us the world you come from (for example, your family, school, community, city, or town). What unique experiences from your world motivated you to apply to this business and engineering dual degree program?

  How to approach it

  Community and identity prompts reward specificity over significance. A small, true community described from the inside beats a broad label described from the outside. End on what you carry from it into a campus, not on a moral.

• M.E.T. (Management, Entrepreneurship & Technology)Required350 words max

  Engineering & Business

  Describe an experience that required you to combine an engineering mindset with a business perspective. How did adapting to setbacks in this experience shape your leadership and resilience?

  How to approach it

  Community and identity prompts reward specificity over significance. A small, true community described from the inside beats a broad label described from the outside. End on what you carry from it into a campus, not on a moral.