CollegeVine College Essay Team August 22, 2025 12 Essay Guides 2025-26,Fordham University

How to Write the Fordham University Essays 2025-2026

Fordham is a Jesuit university in New York City. The school values and educates the whole person, preparing students for the world with wisdom, experience, critical thinking, and creative problem-solving.

Fordham University has just one optional supplement, of 300 words, that applicants can choose from four different prompts to write one essay. Although this prompt is technically optional, we strongly encourage you to take this opportunity to tell Fordham’s admissions committee a little bit more about yourself and why they should want you at their school. You already have limited space to share your personality with admissions officers, and by not responding to this supplement, you’re voluntarily limiting yourself even further. 

If you’re unsure about responding because you don’t know what to write about, don’t worry! That’s what we’re here for, as we’re going to break down each prompt option for you below.

Read this Fordham essay example written by a real student to inspire your writing! 

Fordham University Supplemental Essay Prompts

This is a take on the classic “Diversity” essay, which also incorporates some elements of the “Community Service” archetype. You’ll want to discuss your values, viewpoints, and personal growth through a specific story, preferably one that involves you actively working to make your community a better place. The important thing is to pick an anecdote that demonstrates your character and the good qualities that you will bring to Fordham. 

The prompt specifically asks for an event or experience, so though it may be tempting, you shouldn’t take this opportunity to list a variety of qualities or even a few quick examples of you demonstrating different qualities. While in theory you’re giving your reader more information with this approach than by focusing on a single story, in reality, trying to fit multiple anecdotes into just 300 words often leads to the essay feeling rushed or disjointed.

Instead, you should pick a single story, as one experience—if chosen well—will tell your readers just as much about you as a range of experiences can. So, dive deeply into the story you choose, and think about what it tells Fordham about you. If there is a culture, organization, or movement that you have deep involvement with, this is a good time to mention it, but you’ll still want to pick a specific event from that work, rather than summarizing across a period of months or years. If you don’t have a specific cause, can you think of a time when you showed particular strength of character? Either way, here are some questions to get you thinking:

• What qualities are you most proud of? What qualities do others admire in you? How did you develop them? Can you think of a story that showcases them especially well?
• Describe a time that you helped someone, or a group of people. What did you do? What led you to help? What did you learn?
• Reflect on some important beliefs that you hold. How did you come to those beliefs? Have they ever been tested? In what ways have you expressed or stood up for those beliefs?
• Name a time when your worldview changed or expanded. What prompted this change or expansion? How did you respond?
• Have you ever felt particularly inspired by a person or an event? What touched you about this experience? What did you do with the inspiration you felt?

Remember that the point of the essay is to set yourself apart from other applicants, so while you want to be honest and share an experience that was genuinely meaningful to you, you also want to be mindful of stories that might also be told in a lot of other students’ essays.

For example, talking about making a new friend from another culture and learning about their background is a nice story, but it’s an experience that many people have had. That doesn’t mean you need to pivot to something entirely different, however. Rather, you could instead write about an argument the two of you had about something seemingly unrelated to culture, and how it helped you recognize certain cultural values that you had taken for granted.

Let’s say your friend is Muslim, and couldn’t attend your birthday party during Ramadan one year because she was fasting and didn’t want to be around so much food and activity. You could write about how you initially struggled not to be frustrated with her, and fully accept this part of her identity. By taking an unusual approach to a common story, you’ll teach admissions officers much more about yourself than if you just rehashed a story they’ve seen thousands of times before.

Once you’ve decided on your story, it’s time to start writing. While 300 words is medium-length for a supplement, that doesn’t mean you have endless space, so you don’t want to waste words providing a bunch of background context on, for example, whether you drove or biked to the animal shelter. Just jump right in! You could start in the middle of the incident, or reflect from the present day, to make your essay dynamic and engaging from start to finish. 

However, you choose to structure your response, the majority should be focused on the event itself, which you should describe with vivid, sophisticated language. Then, incorporate a thoughtful reflection on this event and what it meant to you. Remember to talk specifically about what you took away from the experience and how you carry those changes with you now. Fordham wants to understand why you’re a good fit for their school, so the connection between this experience and your potential as a college student should be clear. 

This prompt is broader than the first, and allows you to explicitly connect yourself to Fordham. Rather than starting by looking backwards into the past, this option asks you to look to the future, imagining your growth over the next four years, and the contributions you would make to Fordham. 

In order to describe what you’ll look like as a college student, you’ll need to explain how you got to the place you are. Once again, the best way to showcase your unique personality, attributes, and viewpoints is through a story or anecdote. That will be much more memorable to the admissions committee than a bullet-pointy list of qualities you possess or a series of identities that are important to you.

When picking your example, you have more flexibility than with the first option. You might focus on a long-term commitment you have outside the classroom, like a local book club, or the ways you consistently go above and beyond to engage in classes, like when a book you read in class intrigued you so much that you attended a talk by the author, or you continued a science project after the deadline just to see how your research continued progressing. The words you want to focus on in this prompt are active engagement, leader, and close collaboration. Do any of these spark a story for you?

Some essays that could make for a strong response to this prompt include:

• A student who applied what she had learned in her science class to her after-school work at a daycare, where she led the older children in simple experiments.

• A student who learned that some of his high school bandmates couldn’t afford to travel to a major competition, and worked with the band to set up fundraising efforts so they could all compete.

• A student who wrote about a local performance for her journalism class and ended up being published in her town’s newspaper.

• A student who organized carpools for his swim team to increase team cohesion and keep younger teammates, or teammates without cars, from having to walk or ride the bus to and from the pool.

As you write, remember to outline the background of your story quickly, including all relevant details, and then describe the actual events in detail, focusing most on the aspects of the narrative that demonstrate the qualities you want to display. 

Finally, reflect on how you will bring what you learned from this experience to Fordham. There is an element of the classic “Why This College?” supplement here, so you want to make sure to connect your story to a niche you know exists at Fordham, to flex your knowledge of the school, and show you’ll be ready to contribute as soon as you step on campus. If you’re not sure how to make this kind of specific connection, the course catalog and clubs page are great places to start.

Let’s say that learning about Picasso in your art class inspired you to look more closely at the way African and African-inspired art has been received in the Western world. You might write about your research into the topic, and conclude by saying that you can’t wait to bring your passion and research skills to art classes in Fordham’s Africanist Group. 

Whatever you choose to write about, make it unique, focus on you and your best qualities, and then come full circle by connecting it to Fordham! It’s only 300 words, so keep it simple, focused, and make sure to put your best foot forward. 

There are some similarities between this prompt and the previous one, but here you’re being asked to picture yourself not just as part of the Fordham community, but as a resident of New York City. There are probably a million reasons why you’re excited about the prospect of living in New York, but, as we’ve noted in our breakdowns of the previous two prompts, remember that quality over quantity is the name of the game in college essays.

You also want to make sure you stand out–anyone can talk about the museums, the melting pot of cultures, or going to see Broadway shows. Although the prompt is asking you about New York, you should be talking about yourself. So, rather than approaching this prompt from a touristy lens, and listing all the sights you want to see, think of this question as an opportunity to share what path you’re hoping to take in college, and how New York will help you along it. Consider the following example:

This student did two things well here. First, they’ve picked a seemingly surface-level aspect of New York that most people wouldn’t think to write about. Second, they’ve connected that aspect to themselves in a unique, compelling way by taking a seemingly negative quality and reframing it as a positive opportunity for growth.

This student’s creativity with both evaluating New York City and reflecting on their own experiences will help them stand out to Fordham’s admissions committee. What unique attributes, narrative structures, or aspects of New York and yourself can you use to stand out to Fordham? 

This prompt is an open-ended opportunity to showcase an achievement, quality, or experience that you’re proud of, and that speaks to your potential contributions to Fordham. Fordham’s Admissions Committee is giving you a chance to share something that may not fit with the other prompts, but is still an important part of who you are.

If you’ve been saying to yourself, “Darn, I wish I could include this in my college application” then you’ve found the prompt for you! Just remember that this is still an essay, not a portfolio, so if you’re proud of artwork, a video, or a website, you won’t be able to include the physical piece itself, but you can still write about it.

Remember, the admissions officers will see your activities list and awards section of your application. While you might be extremely proud of winning your state championship in soccer or placing first at a DECA competition, the admissions officers will have seen these accomplishments elsewhere in your application. You want to take advantage of every aspect of your application to share as much as you can about yourself, so we generally don’t recommend choosing one of these as the topic of your essay. 

Instead, try and pick things you are proud of that reveal something about yourself that aren’t evident elsewhere. Here are some examples of what could be good options:

• You’re an avid baker but haven’t had the chance to talk about it in your application yet. You have perfected a brown butter chocolate chip oatmeal cookie recipe, and the day you finally figured it out the right ratios was your proudest moment.

• You struggle with anxiety and have been working to control it for years. One time you were in a situation that set off your anxiety, but you employed different coping mechanisms and were so proud of the way you controlled your anxiety and didn’t let it control you.

• Even though you get good grades in math, you’ve never enjoyed it and have had to work twice as hard in that subject as any other. You are so proud of your determination and perseverance.

• When a kid at your school was being bullied, you stood up for them and started sitting with them at lunch. You’re proud of how you stood up for what’s right even when it was uncomfortable.

• You love to upcycle your clothes and now you exclusively buy items from thrift stores and make them your own. You’re not only proud of your sewing abilities, but also your environmental stewardship.

• You’ve spent two years trying to solve a rubix cube in under 2 minutes, and were so proud all your hard work and studying of methods and pattern recognition paid off.

As you can see, there’s so many little moments that you could write about. Honing in on these smaller stories can often make for more powerful essays that allow you to engage in more self-reflection. 

Remember, you can’t just describe what you are proud of. You need to also share why that was meaningful to you. So whether it’s because you learned something, you developed new skills, it reflected your values, it was a moment of growth, etc., you need to share that information with the admissions committee reading your essay.

This isn’t meant to be an open invitation to brag; it’s meant to show Fordham something meaningful to you that ultimately can make you an asset to their campus community.

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