When should you start writing college essays?

AA former Stanford admissions officer, who read files in the office before she began advising students, holds that most students start their college essays too late. The usual start is the August before senior year, when the deadline is close enough to feel and the early rounds are only weeks away.

August leaves almost no room for the part of essay writing that matters most, and the damage rarely looks like lateness on the page; it looks like an essay about nothing in particular, polished hard. Her timeline begins months earlier, and its first stage looks nothing like writing an essay.