Key Takeaways
- An update is worth sending only if it tells the admissions office something new that your file doesn’t already show.
- Colleges have a channel for updates, usually the applicant portal. Use it instead of resending your application.
- Your grades and recommendations usually reach colleges through your counselor and recommenders, not through you.
A student hits submit on December 28.
She feels finished for about four days.
Then January starts. Her robotics team wins a regional award. Her first-semester grades come in. She becomes treasurer of a club she joined in October. She rereads her personal statement and decides she likes a different draft better.
Do I send all of it? What if I send nothing and miss my chance?
She’s stuck between two bad instincts. One says the file is locked and nothing she does now matters. The other says more is always better, so she should send everything.
Both instincts are wrong. The first leaves useful information on the table. The second buries it.
Can you even send an update?
Usually, yes. But the way to do it matters.
Harvard’s application requirements page tells applicants not to resend their application to make updates. If you need to send updates, additional information, or corrections, it directs you to the Applicant Portal. Harvard’s guide to what happens after you apply lists what that portal can do, including uploading additional documents and materials and self-reporting test scores.
Yale works the same way. Its Update Admissions Application Form, on the Yale Admissions Status Portal, lets active applicants send application updates, add digital documents, share new test scores, update personal information, and change some application responses. Yale says updates can be added at any time before decisions are released.
Policies differ from school to school, so open the portal for every college on your list and see what it allows before you write anything.
What’s worth including
Think of an update as an answer to one question.
Would an admissions officer learn something new from this that isn’t already in my file?
If the answer is yes, and the new thing matters, it may belong. Here’s where that tends to be true.
A significant new achievement. A regional or national award, a published piece of writing, or a project that finally finished. Harvard says its standard application materials typically give it ample information to decide, but that it welcomes optional materials from applicants with truly exceptional talents or achievements, and that documents like research or creative writing can be uploaded through the portal. The word that matters there is exceptional.
New test scores, if you’re sending scores. Yale lets you share them through its update form, and Harvard lets applicants self-report scores in its portal. Whether a score is worth sending at all is a separate decision, which we covered in our post on test optional.
Grades, but through your counselor. This one surprises students. Harvard requires a midyear school report, which your counselor completes, because transcripts sent with the application often include few or no senior-year grades. Yale says official transcripts and letters of recommendation must be submitted by a school counselor or other administrator. So your job is not to email your grades. It’s to ask your counselor when the midyear report will go out, and to check your portal to confirm it arrived. Our post on the Regular Decision timeline covers when that happens.
A real correction. Harvard names corrections as something to send through the portal. If a grade is wrong or an important activity is missing, say so. If it’s a typo, let it go.
A change in your situation. Harvard’s portal lets you update contact information and change your financial aid application status, and Yale’s form lets you update personal information. These aren’t “impress them” updates, but they keep your file accurate.
An additional recommendation, only when it adds something. Harvard says applicants can submit additional letters after applying, through a link in the confirmation email. That doesn’t mean you should. Do it only if someone sees a side of you that your other recommenders don’t. Our post on recommendation letters covers how to think about that.
What usually isn’t worth including
Small things you could have listed. A new club title or another volunteer shift won’t change how anyone reads your file. If it wouldn’t have changed your application on December 28, it probably won’t change it now.
A rewrite of your essay. Harvard’s advice is not to resend your application to make updates. A newer draft you like better is not new information about you.
A reminder that you’re interested. An update should carry information, not enthusiasm. Yale says it doesn’t track event registrations or contact with its admissions staff when evaluating applications. If you’ve been deferred, that’s a different situation, and we cover it in our post on letters of continued interest.
A steady trickle. Three emails about three small things are harder to read than one clear message. This is our advice, not a rule any school has stated, but it’s the same logic: fewer, better updates get more attention.
A weak update and a better one
Here’s the difference in practice. These two examples are made-up examples, not real messages.
The version most students send:
Hi, I wanted to share that since applying I joined the finance club as treasurer, completed 12 more volunteer hours, and I’m still very excited about your school. Thank you so much for your time!
It’s polite and it contains almost nothing new. Every line is something the officer would have shrugged at.
The version that does the work:
Subject: Application update, [Your Name]
Since submitting my application, my robotics team placed first at the regional competition, where I led the programming for our autonomous routine. This connects directly to the computer engineering program I listed as my intended major. I’ve attached the results page. Thank you for considering it.
It’s short, it’s specific, and it tells the reader what happened and why it connects. It doesn’t ask for anything.
Notice what both versions leave out: a request, an apology, and a long explanation. If the news is good, it speaks for itself.
Timing and channel
Send an update when you have something worth sending, not on a schedule.
Yale allows updates until decisions are released, so there’s no reason to rush a weak one out in the first week. If you’re waiting on something, such as a result or your midyear grades, it can be better to wait for it and send one complete message than to send a partial one and follow up.
And send it where the school asks for it. At Harvard and Yale, that’s the applicant portal, and your other schools may work the same way. If you can’t find an update option, check the school’s admissions site before emailing a staff member, because a message in the wrong place may never reach your file.
A quick test before you hit send
Is it new? If it was true when you applied, it isn’t an update.
Is it significant? If you have to argue that it matters, it probably doesn’t.
Does it connect to what you told them? The best updates extend your story, like the robotics award tied to an intended major.
Is there a channel for it? If the portal has a place for it, use it.
When being able to can answer yes to all four, send it. And when you can’t, you can probably let it go.
The takeaway
An application doesn’t freeze the moment you submit it. But it isn’t a mailbox you can keep filling, either.
The students who use updates well send one thing, and they send it because it changes what the file says. Everyone else is just adding to the pile.
Before you send anything, ask: what would they know after reading this that they didn’t know before?
If the answer is “nothing,” let the application you submitted do its job.
