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Tulane  /  Essays  /  Prompt 1

Tulane: The Tulane Community Essay

250 words maximum (optional but strongly recommended)

Describe why you are interested in joining the Tulane community. Consider your experiences, talents, and values to illustrate what you would contribute to the Tulane community if admitted.
What it’s really asking

This is a hybrid of the classic 'why us' essay and the community essay. Tulane wants two things at once: concrete evidence that you have researched Tulane and New Orleans and know why you fit, and a clear picture of what you, specifically, would bring to campus. Note there is only this one supplemental prompt for first-year applicants; some honors and scholarship programs (like the Honors Program or merit scholarship competitions) may invite separate writing later, but this is the universal one.

Why they ask it

Tulane is a demonstrated-interest school with a heavy Early Decision pull. This essay is how admissions gauges whether you are serious and whether you will say yes. It also tells them what flavor of student you are: the community here is small enough that contribution is not a cliche, it is a real consideration about who makes campus better.

Three ways in
Lead with a named academic resource

Pick one specific Tulane offering (a major, a course, a research center like the Taylor Center or ByWater Institute, a study-abroad track) and explain why it fits something you already do.

Tie yourself to New Orleans

Connect your interest to the city in a way only you could write: a cause, a culture, a problem, or a skill you would bring into New Orleans through Tulane's public service requirement.

Name the contribution out loud

Finish a sentence that starts 'What I would add to Tulane is...' with something concrete and true, then build the essay around it.

✕  Weak opening

“Ever since I visited, I knew Tulane was the perfect place for me, with its vibrant campus and the unbeatable energy of New Orleans.”

✓  Strong opening

“I have run a free Saturday chess table at our library for two years, and I want to bring it to Tulane's first-generation mentoring program before I ever take a seat in Gibson Hall.”

✦ Annotated example · The St. Roch reciprocity essay. Written by EssayLens to teach, not a real applicant’s essay. Tap a highlighted line →
My AP Environmental class skims wetland loss as a statistic. Louisiana loses a football field of land every hundred minutes. I only understood that number after I started building a flood-risk map for my town's low-income east side, color-coding storm drains that back up every spring. 1That work is exactly why Tulane's ByWater Institute pulls at me. I do not want to admire your coastal research from a lecture hall. I want to spend a semester in a Sustainable Construction lab and then bring what I learn to a community on the Gulf that needs it as badly as mine does. 2I also know New Orleans is not a backdrop for my resume. 3When I visited, I spent a Saturday with a porch-repair crew in St. Roch, not the French Quarter, and learned more about a neighborhood's memory in four hours than in any tour. 4I would bring that same instinct to Tulane: showing up where the work actually is, learning before fixing, and staying long after the project is graded. 5I want to belong to a place that measures itself by what it returns to the ground beneath it. That is the kind of student, and neighbor, I would be.
  1. 1Opens with a concrete project, not a feeling. Tulane wants demonstrated, specific interest. A student already doing flood-mapping work telegraphs fit with a school defined by water and coast.
  2. 2This is the reciprocity move Tulane rewards: not just 'I love your program' but 'I will give something back.' Naming the ByWater Institute and Sustainable Construction shows real homework, not a brochure skim.
  3. 3Directly names the trap most applicants fall into (using the city as scenery) and refuses it, which signals maturity about a real relationship with the place.
  4. 4A specific, unglamorous detail (St. Roch, porch repair, not the Quarter) proves a genuine relationship with the city rather than a tourist's admiration.
  5. 5Converts the anecdote into a clear claim about what the applicant contributes (persistence, humility, service), answering the prompt's 'what would you contribute' directly.
Stuck? Start here
  • What is one specific thing you do every week (a job, a club, a habit, a cause) that someone who knows you would instantly recognize as yours?
  • If you searched the Tulane site for an hour, which exact program, course, professor, or center made you think 'that is for me,' and why?
  • Finish this sentence honestly: 'Tulane would be a slightly better place because I would bring ____.'
Before you submit
  • Did you name at least one real, specific Tulane resource (not just 'great academics' or 'New Orleans')?
  • Did you clearly answer the contribution half, not just why you like Tulane?
  • Is it under 250 words with no padding, and would it be impossible to swap in another school's name?

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