Welcome to Common App Ready.
Students should navigate to commonapp.org, click on Apply Now to create a new account or to Sign In to an existing account.
This is the welcome screen that applicants will view upon signing into their accounts.
Applicants should navigate to the Common App tab.
The first section within the Common App, is the PROFILE section.
Sections can be completed in any order and you can access each section by clicking on that section name.
Applicants should navigate to the left side of the screen and click on Activities.
The activities section provides students with the opportunity to share information about their activities in and out of school. Students can add up to 10 activities.
First, you’ll indicate whether or not you want to report on your activities. By choosing “Yes” you will then be able to start providing details about the activities in which you participate.
Start by listing your principal activities in their order of importance to you. Once you’ve started, you can change their display order by using the up and down arrows on each activity.
The availability of 10 activity fields is not intended to imply that you should list 10 activities, and there is no expectation that you will do so. Rather, the fields are available in order to provide you the maximum flexibility in reporting and describing your involvements outside the classroom. You can also use the Additional Information area in the Writing section to share any other relevant information about yourself that is not captured in this portion of the application.
First familiarize yourself with the list of activity types provided, as it is an extensive list. However, if your activity type isn’t listed, select the “other club/activity” option from the drop-down menu, and you can specify further in the box for position/leadership detail or in the activity description field.
When entering your activities, you may need to abbreviate words to fit your text into the boxes provided since there is a limited amount of space, especially in the field for details, honors, and accomplishments. You are allowed 50 characters for position/leadership description and organization name and then 150 characters for details, honors won, and accomplishments.
For each activity you’ll be asked to indicate the school year and the time of year in which you participated. You’ll also provide the hours spent per week on the activity, and then the weeks spent per year. It is ok for applicants to estimate the number of hours per year based on the number of weeks in an athletic season or a school year and the number of hours per week on average spent doing the activity.
Lastly you’ll be asked to indicate if you plan to participate in a similar activity in college.
When you have completed as many activities as you feel are necessary, you can click preview in order to see how colleges will view your activity list.
As you’re working, if you need to update or change an activity, simply go to the Activities section and edit that specific activity’s information.
If you wish to delete the activity, move the activity to the bottom of the activity list. Once it is the last activity listed, you will see the icon to delete it.
Admissions officers who work at colleges and universities that accept the Common Application, become familiar with the layout and the order of activity information.
Some applicants are interested in uploading a resume to their application. Colleges that want to review a student’s resume will provide them an opportunity to upload it to the Member Questions page.
Information about the Applicant Solutions Center
Remember, we’re always ready to help you. If you experience a problem or have a question, let us know by going to the Applicant Help.
Center and searching the FAQs or clicking the Ask a Question tab. It’s probably a good idea to add ‘appsupport@commonap.org’ to your address book or contact list. We know you’ll have questions, and we are here to answer them. Help us make sure our responses don’t end up in your Spam or Junk folder by adding our support email address to your contact list.
