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How to Write the Tufts University Essays 2023-2024

Tufts University is consistently ranked in among the top 30 universities and wants to admit students who demonstrate a genuine interest in Tufts. One of the best ways to demonstrate interest is through your supplemental essays.

All applicants will answer two prompts, but the prompts will depend on the school you’re applying to within Tufts.

The college applications process may seem overwhelming, but don’t worry⁠—CollegeVine is here to help you tackle Tufts’ supplemental essays! 

Read these Tufts essay examples to inspire your own writing.

Tufts University Supplemental Essay Prompts

Applicants to the school of arts and sciences, school of engineering, and 5-year tufts/nec combined degree:.

Prompt 1: Please complete the following statement: “I am applying to Tufts because…” (50-100 words)

Prompt 2: Now we’d like to know a little more about you. Please respond to one of the following three questions. (200-250 words)

• Option A: It’s cool to love learning. What excites your intellectual curiosity, and why?
• Option B: How have the environments or experiences of your upbringing – your family, home, neighborhood, or community – shaped the person you are today?
• Option C: Using a specific example or two, tell us about a way that you contributed to building a collaborative and/or inclusive community.

Applicants to the School of the Museum of Fine Arts (BFA or 5-Year BFA+BA/BS Combined Degree)

Prompt 1: Please complete the following statement: “I am applying to SMFA at Tufts because…” (50-100 words)

Prompt 2: Please answer the following question – we encourage you to think outside the box. Be serious if the moment calls for it but feel comfortable being playful if that suits you, too. Your response must be between 200-250 words. Art has the power to disrupt our preconceptions, shape public discourse, and imagine new ways of being in the world. What are the ideas you’d like to explore in your work? (200-250 words)

Applicants to the School of Arts and Sciences, School of Engineering, and 5-Year Tufts/NEC Combined Degree

Please complete the following statement: “i am applying to tufts because…” (50-100 words).

When first approaching this prompt, take a step back and think about why you added Tufts to your school list. Location, size, and prestige may contribute to your desire to apply to Tufts, however you must dig deeper into why and how you, as an individual, are a good fit for the Tufts community. 

As stated on their website , Tufts students are often described as:

• Interdisciplinary
• Multidimensional
• Intellectually playful
• Collaborative
• Civically engaged
• Globally minded

With only 100 words, you won’t have a ton of space to delve into every way you embody the characteristics of a Tufts student or list everything you love about Tufts. Instead of using generalities such as “great location near Boston” or “strong math major” or trying to squeeze all your ideas into 100 words, be sure to pick just 2-3 specific reasons you want to apply to Tufts. 

Remember that attending college is not only about academics, but also what you do outside the classroom. So, make sure to mention at least one extracurricular/social factor that drew you to Tufts, along with at least one academic aspect.

Reflect on your life, characteristics, and interests, then do your research and tie those aspects of yourself to Tufts’ values and traditions (refer to bullets above). 

• Maybe you’re a passionate, civically engaged environmentalist who is drawn to Tufts’ Food Systems and Nutrition minor, as you want to learn more about ways to increase sustainability in the food industry. 
• Or, maybe the 1+4 Bridge Year caught your eye, as you’re globally minded and want to live and intern abroad in Mexico before beginning your studies at Tufts, to better understand the border crisis and explore your interest in immigration law. 
• Or, perhaps the Traveling Treasure Trunk theatre group caught your eye, as you love being collaborative and putting on imaginative plays for children. 
• Or, maybe you’re multidimensional and have completely varied interests, such as ballet and neuroscience, and are drawn to Tufts’ interdisciplinary learning style. 

Regardless of your interests, whether academic or extracurricular, be sure to use them as an opportunity to form a connection between yourself and the Tufts community. 

Additionally, this prompt is a great place to include any notable experiences you had on any of Tufts’ campuses, or with Tufts students and faculty. You should avoid generally discussing an information session you attended or a campus tour you took, as those experiences are not unique to you and thus won’t help you stand out in the applicant pool.

However, you should definitely consider discussing a memorable conversation you had with a group of students, a particularly interesting class you sat in on, a meeting you had with a Tufts professor in the department of your intended major, or a Tufts club meeting you attended. While these experiences are not essential to your essay, they will certainly enhance your answer and further demonstrate your interest in Tufts.

Prompt 2, Option A

It’s cool to love learning. what excites your intellectual curiosity, and why (200-250 words).

To answer this prompt, you need to think about a topic that you enjoy studying and explain why you find it interesting. This prompt is great for applicants who have specific interests they want to showcase, like ancient Greek theater or quantum theory. Regardless of what you choose to write about, you need to be able to explain why this topic ignites your passion for learning and how you will continue to explore this topic at Tufts.

To start your essay off strong, begin by describing what sparked your interest in your topic. A great way to do this is by beginning your essay with an anecdote.

For example, you could explain that you became interested in civil engineering in sixth grade, when your science teacher challenged your class to break into groups and try to build the tallest structure possible using only marshmallows, tape, and uncooked spaghetti. As you worked to determine the perfect spaghetti-to-tape ratio, you realized that you had never before felt so focused on a school project. Keep in mind, your story does not have to be impressive or complicated; even the simplest stories will do as long as they reflect the origin of your interest. 

From here, your essay could go in a couple of directions. You might continue the narrative of your initial anecdote as you elaborate on your passion for your topic. For instance, you could write, “After winning the spaghetti structure challenge, I continued to enter engineering competitions throughout middle and high school, like the High School Bridge Building Contest. The thrill of competing deepened my enthusiasm and sent me to the library in search of books on seismic loads and renewable building materials.”

Alternatively, you could express your intellectual curiosity by explaining what specifically about your topic you find interesting. A fan of art history may identify a special interest in Ming dynasty ceramics; a computer science scholar could describe their fascination with machine learning.The details you share here provide evidence of your interest in your topic, so feel free to show off what you know!

Now that you’ve established your topic of interest, you need to explain to the reader why your topic excites you intellectually. If you are curious about biomedical engineering, you may refer to its many life-saving and life-changing applications, such as bionic eye technology. A Shakesperean may cite how his plays, despite being centuries old, can feel distinctly modern. In explaining why you enjoy learning about your topic, you reveal more about your character and personality to the admissions committee.

Finally, anchor your response in your interest in attending Tufts by explaining how you will continue your studies during your college years. Be specific, and think about how your topic aligns with courses and activities offered at Tufts. For example, if you were writing about your passion for Meso-American archaeology, you might state your intention to further explore the subject by enrolling in Tufts’ annual Archaeology Field School in Belize. Try to think outside the classroom as well—Tufts’ value of intellectual playfulness encourages learning in unexpected ways.

Prompt 2, Option B

How have the environments or experiences of your upbringing – your family, home, neighborhood, or community – shaped the person you are today (200-250 words).

This prompt is a great opportunity for applicants who want to discuss the influence of the culture of their upbringing on their personality, interests, and values. Additionally, this can serve as an opportunity to discuss a specific event that was particularly impactful for one reason or another. Whether you want to discuss culture or a particular event, you must specifically describe not only the culture or event, but its impact on different aspects of your identity. 

The first step in answering this prompt is to provide some background information. Describe what makes the culture, experience, environment, or event unique. For instance, if you’re going to discuss the caring environment of your community, you need to explain the specific scenarios that illustrate that, such as a weekly potluck. 

The next portion of your essay should be dedicated to how your culture, experience, environment, or event has impacted you. Go deeper than the surface level and show what aspects of your identity have been shaped by the experience you’re discussing. 

For example, if you’re writing about how you grew up in a low-income neighborhood, don’t just tell us “This experience taught me to be resourceful.” Instead, show us your resourcefulness through anecdotes and indirect details:

“Since money was tight, my siblings and I tried to ease the burden on our parents by dumpster diving for food, furniture, and toys. We scoured the streets of the city for overflowing trash bins. We figured out the delivery schedule of local grocery stores. I always looked forward to Wednesdays, when the corner shop would receive new produce shipments, and discard anything that hadn’t been sold. We’d scramble home with our arms full of perfectly-edible apples, carrots, and onions.”

Finally, you should connect the aspects of your identity that were shaped by the culture, experience, environment, or event you wrote about to the Tufts community. Discuss what values you have gained that would allow you to make a positive impact at Tufts. Whether it’s your desire to learn, care for others, collaborate, or advocate, explain how that characteristic will make you a good community member at Tufts. 

In the above example, the student may wish to join the Food Rescue Collaborative at Tufts, to use their resourcefulness to rescue food and help feed people in need.

Prompt 2, Option C

Using a specific example or two, tell us about a way that you contributed to building a collaborative and/or inclusive community. (200-250 words).

The final option Tufts gives you is to write about a community you are part of. Contrary to the belief that a community essay has to be about something large like an ethnic or religious community, you can actually choose just about anything. Community can span from a club you are in to an online forum of people who share a similar hobby. Don’t let the “seriousness” of your community prevent you from picking this prompt—anyone can write a compelling and personal essay about any community.

The key to success lies within the prompt: “using a specific example or two.” In other words, tell us a story! Anecdotes that are full of imagery will be your best friend for this essay. 

However, just setting the scene with an anecdote isn’t enough. Use your anecdote to explain the natural state of the community prior to your involvement—did the community exist, were members active in the community, did the community lack diversity, were people excluded from joining, etc.

Then, continue the anecdote to demonstrate your contribution. Really show the reader what you did, if you recruited members don’t just say that, explain your process for advertising and the conversations you had with prospective members. Finally, you need to highlight the positive impact you had on your community. This last part tells the admissions officers what you are capable of achieving, so don’t be afraid to brag.

Let’s look at some examples of what sample students could write:

• Online Book Club: A student who loves to read always turned to online reviews and forums to find her next great read, but she wished there was a way she could talk about the book she was reading in real time with others. This inspired her to start an online book club which she shared on social media to get the word out. Within two weeks she had 10 teenagers from across the country sign up and they read Where the Crawdads Sing for their first book. Not only did she find new friends and get to experience the nuances of the book through other peoples’ perspectives, she created a sense of belonging for the other members of the club.
• Jarabe Tapatio Dance Team: A student with Mexican heritage who’s part of a larger Mexican community of families felt awkward as she got older and became more distant from the other teenagers at community gatherings. Since she loved to dance, she decided to approach the other kids and suggested they learn a traditional Mexican dance, the jarabe tapatio. Every week, they would meet after school and learn the steps. She coordinated with adults planning the Hispanic Heritage month festival and arranged for the newly created dance team to perform.
• Caring Older Cousin: A student with a brother his age and a bunch of younger cousins might have always been exclusive at family events and refused to play childish games with his cousins. However, one Thanksgiving he was passing a football with his brother when his 10 year old cousin asked him to teach her. Through the process of explaining how to throw a spiral and what a pass looks like, he began enjoying the company of his cousin and invited the other kids to join. Soon he was running a football clinic in his backyard and playing a touch football game with all of his cousins. 

Each of these examples demonstrates how you can turn anything into an essay about community. Just keep in mind to show the before state, what you did to foster collaboration and inclusion, and the end result from your involvement.

Applicants to the School of the Museum of Fine Arts ( BFA or 5-Year BFA+BA/BS Combined Degree)

Please complete the following statement: “i am applying to smfa at tufts because…” (50-100 words).

The first question is very similar to the “Why Tufts?” essay. However, this one asks you to tie your experiences back into why you want to enroll in SMFA. 

Your goal here is to make admissions officers clearly see you maintaining a presence in their SMFA program. If you don’t like being bound to the restrictions of having to be shuffled into a major, write about how the SMFA program’s freedom of delving into a specific medium or exploring a variety of options caters to your goals.

Let’s say that you are interested in both the arts and doing research in a STEM field. Instead of having to choose between one or the other, at Tufts, you can take the shuttle to SMFA in the morning and research the impact of certain elements on human cells in the evening. 

Tufts is one of two schools in the nation that is affiliated with a museum. If you want to gain more insight into art history and see paintings for yourself, SMFA will allow you to do so. SMFA’s Morse Study Room even gives SMFA students access to papers that are not available to visitors. Therefore, those who wish to seek more than what is offered in the classroom and explore ranges of art will be well-suited to the program.

If there was a specific instance where you realized that you didn’t necessarily “fit in the box,” this prompt would be a good one to address that. But if you want to knock this question out of the park, ask yourself what you can contribute to the program. Tufts looks for students who want to add to the intellectual vigor of its campus. If you can convey the kind of person you will be on campus, Tufts will be able to visualize the impact you will make more clearly. 

Please answer the following question – we encourage you to think outside the box. Be serious if the moment calls for it but feel comfortable being playful if that suits you, too. Your response must be between 200-250 words. Art has the power to disrupt our preconceptions, shape public discourse, and imagine new ways of being in the world. What are the ideas you’d like to explore in your work?

As an artist, you have most likely developed some kind of theme or style that is recurring. Look back through your past works. Is there a pattern that seems to repeat itself? If so, write about that pattern and why it comes across your work so much. Did you grow up in New York City?

Maybe your art reflects the bustle and diversity of the countless people you see every day. Or perhaps your art could signify the tranquility you seek away from the honking cars and glistening lights. If your work does not have a common theme, or if you are gravitating towards a different theme in your work, explain why this is.

Tie your work back to Tufts and explain how a Tufts education will break the current limits you face as an artist. 

Where to Get Your Tufts University Essays Edited

Do you want feedback on your Tufts essays? After rereading your essays countless times, it can be difficult to evaluate your writing objectively. That’s why we created our free  Peer Essay Review tool , where you can get a free review of your essay from another student. You can also improve your own writing skills by reviewing other students’ essays. 

If you want a college admissions expert to review your essay, advisors on CollegeVine have helped students refine their writing and submit successful applications to top schools.  Find the right advisor for you  to improve your chances of getting into your dream school!

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College Essays

Tufts University has a selective acceptance rate— less than 10% in 2022 . You'll need a strong application to stand out from other applicants, including stellar essays. Luckily, this guide is here to help you out!

In this blog post, we'll cover everything you need to know about the writing portion of Tufts University's application, including what prompts are available and how to answer them.

Feature Image: Jellymuffin40 /Wikimedia Commons

If you want to study at Tufts' Ginn Library, you'll need strong essays. Nurcamp /Wikimedia Commons.

What Should You Know About the Tufts University Essays?

Tufts University uses either the Common or Coalition Application, so choose the one that works best for you . Each one has unique essays, so be sure you follow the correct prompt for whichever application you're using.

Both applications have their own writing sections that you'll need to respond to. These essays are more general than the Tufts essays, but it's still important to follow guidelines and aim to impress with them . They're part of your application, and deserve your best effort! The Common Application has one set of prompts to choose from and the Coalition Application has another , so do some reading ahead of time to plan for which one you'll answer if you need to fill out both applications for different schools.

What Prompts Does the Tufts University Application Have?

Tufts University requires you to apply to a specific school within the university during your application. This shouldn't be a problem if you already know what major you'll be applying to, and Tufts recommends not applying as undecided .

The application should give you the correct set of prompts for whichever school you apply to, but you can also check on Tuft's website .

If you're applying to the School of Arts and Sciences, School of Engineering, or 5-year Tufts/NEC combined degree, you'll have two essays. One is a classic "Why Tufts?" essay with a Tufts-specific twist, and the second prompt allows you to make your choice of two options.

For applicants to the BFA or 5-year BFA+BA/BS combined degree program, you'll also have two prompts. The first is, again, a classic "Why Tufts?" essay question, while the other asks you to to respond to one of three questions. 

What Are the Tufts University Prompts?

Because the prompts vary between different schools, there's a lot of information to cover for how to write the ideal Tufts essay. But Tufts does provide some helpful advice —"Think outside the box as you answer the following questions. Take a risk and go somewhere unexpected. Be serious if the moment calls for it, but feel comfortable being playful if that suits you, too."

In short, be yourself . Tufts doesn't just want to hear your academic qualifications, nor do they want to hear their qualifications as a good school recited to them—they already know!

For School of Arts and Sciences, School of Engineering, and Tufts/NEC Degree Applicants:

You have two essays to write for this section. Both are required, but the second prompt offers you three potential choices.

Prompt #1: The "Why Tufts?" Essay

The first prompt, which you have 100 to 150 words to answer, reads:

Which aspects of the Tufts undergraduate experience prompt your application? In short, "Why Tufts?"

This is a pretty straightforward question—it's a version of the popular "Why This College?" essay . You wouldn't be applying to Tufts if you didn't already know that you wanted to go there, right? But always be aware that every other student applying to Tufts also knows that it's a good school. You can't just list qualifications back them; you have to dive a little deeper than that.

Tufts wants to know here is not just what attracts you to the college, but also what you'll bring to it . Let your enthusiasm and fresh ideas shine!

Having said that, a great essay is going to show admissions counselors that you've done your research. Be sure you point to specific parts of the "Tufts undergraduate experience" in your writing! For example, maybe there's a specific professor you want to work with, or a unique program that only Tufts offers that's a great fit for you. The more specific you are, the more you'll show admissions counselors that you're serious about becoming a student at Tufts.

Prompt #2: The Free Choice Essay

The second prompt is a little more complex. It also has a word count of 200 to 250, but includes three options you must choose from:

Now we'd like to know a little more about you. Please respond to one of the following three questions.

A) It's cool to love learning. What excites your intellectual curiosity?

B) How have the environments or experiences of your upbringing – your family, home, neighborhood, or community – shaped the person you are today?

C) Where are you on your journey of engaging with or fighting for social justice?

These three prompts are a great way to tell the admissions office more about yourself, particularly if you have extracurricular interests that you haven't had the opportunity to discuss yet.

Any of these prompts is a great choice, but you can only choose one. Here's a breakdown of who each prompt is a good fit for:

• Prompt A: If you're an intellectually curious person, this is a great fit for you. People that fit this mold will engage in learning opportunities outside the classroom and constantly be on the hunt for knowledge. If you're the type that reads news before school or watches documentaries for fun, this is a good prompt for you!
• Prompt B: This is a good all-around prompt! Generally speaking, most people will have some experience that helps them answer this prompt well. Having said that, this prompt requires you to be thoughtful and introspective. You'll need to understand how your experiences and background have shaped the person you are today.
• Prompt C: Social justice is an important topic in 2021, and Tufts admissions officers are interested in students who fit with the university's mission of an "inclusive and collaborative" environment. If you have been part of the social justice movement, this would be a great prompt for you.

Keep in mind these are just suggestions. If one of these prompts jumps out to you as a perfect fit, run with it.

If you can't find this key on your keyboard, you'll have to invent it!

How to Answer Prompt A

In this prompt, Tufts wants to hear about your curiosity and interests. There are two ways you can approach this essay, each of which has its benefits and drawbacks.

First, you can choose an intellectual interest you have that relates to your future major. For example, say you're majoring in biology because you want to be in drug development. If that's the case, you can talk about a specific aspect of drug development that gets you excited. Maybe it's developing new vaccine production methods that use plants instead of animals, or maybe you want to develop new drugs to treat chronic illnesses like multiple sclerosis.

The trick here is being specific and letting your passion shine through, then tying all of that back to your future studies at Tufts. Don't be afraid to talk about a class you can't wait to take, or a project you hope to explore while you're in school. Just make sure that you're balancing talking about why you're curious with your academic plans. You don't want this to sound exactly like your "Why Tufts?" essay!

The second way you can approach this topic is by choosing something you're curious about that's a passion of yours, even if it isn't related to your major. This has the benefit of showing you're curious about more than just your major field, which is something admissions counselors are looking for.

For example, maybe you want to major in kinesiology, but you love social media and you're curious about how it impacts the ways we behave. You don't have to be majoring in psychology or computer science to write about this topic if you're passionate about it! The trick — and drawback — to going this route is making sure you're still connecting this passion back to your plans as a potential Tufts student. Maybe this curiosity has made you want to join the Tufts Psychology Society so you can learn more about how you can use human behavior and social media to help motivate people in your future career as a physical therapist.

How to Answer Prompt B

This prompt is asking you to write about how your background has shaped your character. Admissions counselors are looking for essays that showcase your thoughtfulness, especially in terms of how your experiences impact you as a person. This is a chance for you to highlight parts of your personality and identity that might not otherwise come across in your admissions materials.

If you choose this essay prompt, you'll want to spend some time figuring out which aspect of your background you want to focus on. Luckily, the prompt gives you a few ideas (family, home, neighborhood, and community) to start with, but you're not limited to those! Maybe you want to talk about an after school program you were a part of, or a sports team you played on for your entire childhood. As long as this experience or environment played a substantial part in your upbringing, it's fair game.

Whatever you choose, make sure you're choosing one thing . Don't talk about your family and your neighborhood and your community. This essay isn't long enough to cover all of that material! Instead, pick one thing and get specific. Explain why was this experience or environment important to you, and go into detail about how it impacted you as a person.

The best answers to this prompt are going to tell a story about your experience that helps readers connect with who you are. Perhaps one of the things that most shaped your character was growing up with five siblings. Tell a story about a specific moment that will help admissions counselors understand what that was like!

And finally, don't forget to connect this back to being a Tufts student by explaining how your character is a good fit for the university. For instance, let's go back to having lots of siblings. Maybe that's taught you to value everyone for their unique personalities because no matter how different you are, everyone brings something special to the table. Because of that, you're excited about making new friends and bringing people together as part of the Tufts community.

How to Answer Prompt C

This prompt is all about social justice. If you're not sure what social justice is, the National Association of Social Workers defines it as "the view that everyone deserves equal economic, political and social rights and opportunities." Put another way, social justice is the fight for equality for everyone regardless of their race, class, or economic status.

To answer this prompt, you'll need to explain how you're learning about, involved in, or fighting for social justice. What steps are you taking to help further this cause in your own life? Note that the prompt uses the term "journey," here. That means admissions counselors aren't expecting you to have this whole "social justice" thing figured out! So don't worry if you haven't arranged a march in your community or taken up donations to help with the Black Lives Matter movement. Admissions counselors are more interested in how you're learning about the social justice movement and making changes in your life to support that cause.

Here's the thing: if you're not part of the social justice movement or aren't comfortable with the idea, do not write this Tufts essay. You're given essay options for a reason! Admissions counselors are trained to sniff out falsehoods, so the worst thing you could do is fib about your social justice work. It's okay if this isn't a good topic for you!

If you do choose this prompt, make sure you start with a story. Did you participate in a march? Have you volunteered with a social justice oriented organization? Telling a specific story about your experience will help readers connect with you as a person. It's also okay if your experience with social justice was talking with a friend about it and realizing that you can do more to support the cause. Like the old saying goes: it's not about the destination — it's about what you're learning in the process.

Also, be honest about what your journey so far. It's okay to say you're still learning, or that the journey has been tough. Admissions counselors value authenticity, and the truth is that fighting for social justice can be hard. Just make sure you're keeping your discussion as positive as you can! Focus on what you've learned and how hard you're trying to make a difference.

And of course, be sure you tie this all back to Tufts. Explain how your understanding of social justice will affect how you participate in your classes and on-campus events. Make it clear that you're going to bring a spirit of equity with you to campus since that's what admissions counselors want to see in future Tufts students.

For BFA, 5-Year BFA+BA/BS at SMFA Applicants:

This section has two required essays. You don't have any choice over which prompts you'll be answering, which eliminates some of the struggle to choose the best option for you.

Prompt #1: The "Why SMFA at Tufts?" Essay

The first prompt, which must be answered in 100 to 150 words, reads:

Which aspects of the Tufts undergraduate experience prompt your application? Why SMFA at Tufts?

This prompt is similar to the "Why Tufts?" essay prompt, but with a slightly different focus. SMFA at Tufts is the School of the Museum of Fine arts program at Tufts , so it's definitely for those interested in the arts.

The admissions office wants to see you demonstrate what exactly draws you to this school over others, and what specifically drives you to seek an art degree . What will you get out of Tufts that you couldn't get elsewhere? How will an art degree enrich your life, and how will you use that degree in the future?

Colleges want to foster intellectual growth in their communities, which is why they ask for more than a standard "this is a good school" answer. They want to know why you want to attend, but they also want to know what you're bringing to the community .

Browsing Tufts and SMFA at Tufts galleries are a great way to get some inspiration. Can you see your artwork fitting in there? What will you offer that isn't already represented?

Think about art that you've created or art that you want to create . How will Tufts help you get there? What makes you want to pursue an art degree, rather than art as a supplement to another field? Clearly articulating your interest and commitment will demonstrate that you're a good fit for Tufts to the admissions office.

Prompt #2: The Art Prompt

The second prompt, also with a 200 to 250 word count, reads:

Art has the power to disrupt our preconceptions, shape public discourse, and imagine new ways of being in the world. What are the ideas you'd like to explore in your work?

This question dives a little bit deeper into your artistic mind. It's not enough to create art that is beautiful on a surface level—Tufts wants to know that you're thinking about your art meaningfully, too .

This prompt is essentially an artist's statement , though it's focused more on your artistic intent on a large scale rather than on an individual piece. Look through some of your favorite art you've created and think about common themes and recurring ideas, even if you didn't intend for them to be there . What concepts are you trying to explore, even subconsciously?

Consider not just what your art looks or sounds like, but also what it's made of and why you chose to make it that way. Think beyond availability or ease of use—always keep the question of "why" in your mind.

Themes are good, but try not to go too general or invent something that isn't there. Much of art is about capturing beauty, so try to think deeper than that. And if you're going to claim that your art critiques or represents something, you need to be able to demonstrate that— analyze what you've created to show how it connects to your themes, don't simply project something over the top and hope that admissions officers don't notice it wasn't really there .

What Do Tufts Essays That Worked Look Like?

Thankfully, Tufts University isn't shy about putting accepted essays online for applicants to browse. While some of these essays apply to older topics, they'll still help you get a sense of what admissions counselors are looking for in excellent students (and their essays).

"Why Tufts?" Essay That Worked

I vividly remember stepping onto the roof of Tisch Library and seeing a group of kids sitting in hammocks, overlooking the Boston skyline. I briefly tuned out my tour guide's presentation and began to eavesdrop. The students covered everything from physics to what they had for lunch that day. When they spoke about physics, they did not speak with pretension; instead they spoke with passion. Likewise, when they spoke about something as simple as lunch, they did so with witty intrigue. Tufts students are as interesting as they are interested. This description not only resonates with me, it defines me.

This essay does an excellent job of answering the questions at the core of the "Why Tufts?" essay. The writer channels an experience they had while at Tufts, detailing how listening in on other students solidified their desire to attend. They use words like "passion" to describe Tufts students, showing traits they also want to channel.

The ending really hits on something important: this student wanted to be part of the student body because the students they overheard were not only interesting people, but also interested . Remember the prompts mention of being "intellectually playful?" This is the perfect way to demonstrate curiosity, interest, and love of learning int he specific context of Tufts .

"What Have You Created?" Essay That Worked

This essay applies to an older prompt that asked students to talk about one of their creations. Here's what this student had to say:

When people talk about building something, creating it, they most often mean something physical. Engineers, architects, and laborers, these are the professions that I think of as making things. I've never been much of a builder, I lack that particular understanding of the world that is required to envision what you will build, and have never been coordinated enough to make much of anything with my hands, but I can create. What I have made is not something you can hold or touch, it spans no gaps and holds no weight, and I can't even claim to have laid a single finger on its construction. My creation is a poem, or rather, poems. Series of letters symbolic of sounds strung together to make words, which are in turn collected into lines and stanzas, pieces of a whole. My poems cannot be touched, but they can touch you; though they won't form a bridge, they can cross a divide; and while you'll never be able to weigh them on a scale, the weight of the ideas they hold can be felt the moment you read them. So I may not be an engineer or an architect or a laborer, but I am a creator. I craft words into meaning, forge lines into rhymes, and sculpt imaginations. So even if I can't hold what I make, I can watch it take shape and see its impact on the world.

This essay does an excellent job of answering the question not just by stating the answer, but by embodying it . It's clear that the student is a writer; their language is vivid, immediate, and playful, demonstrating how strong their grasp is on word meanings and sentence structure.

Importantly, this essay doesn't disparage other disciplines—it interprets poetry using language physical creators might use, such as "spans," "bridge," and "weight.

There's a great deal of creativity and intellectual play in this essay, which serve to set the writer apart from students who might have focused more on the existence of the thing they'd built (a souped-up car engine, for example) than the function of the thing they'd built (a souped-up car engine that reduces carbon emissions, for example).

When tackling this prompt, think about how you, too, can exemplify your creation in your essay .

Think like a dolphin: smart and playful!

Key Points for Your Tufts Essays

Best practices for Tufts essays are similar to other schools, but there are some special considerations to keep in mind.

Pay Attention to Tufts' Intellectual Bent

Tufts makes a point of using words like "playful" and "intellectual." These suggest a curiosity about the world that goes beyond wanting to attend a good school because it's a good school. Keep them in mind as you're writing— how can you demonstrate your own curiosity and interest in the world?

Remember That Tufts Is a Research University

You'll be interacting more with graduate students than you would in other settings . Not only will this give you a leg up in applying to grad school, but it will also grant you the opportunity to think more deeply than if you were only exposed to other undergrads.

Demonstrating an interest in learning from other students and participating in a learning community is a great way to show that you're interested in the unique experience of attending a research university.

Choose the Prompts That Are Right for You

Because Tufts has two different sets of prompts depending which school you'll be attending, be sure you select the right ones. Further, be sure you really maximize each prompt's potential— the rest of your application covers academics, so use your essay to showcase what really makes you stand out .

What's Next?

Before you get started on writing your essays, you'll want to know what kind of admission requirements Tufts has . Great essays are important, but you should also demonstrate academic success!

Plan to get the best scores possible on your standardized tests, too. Reading about ACT and GPA requirements ahead of time can help you plan your academic strategy, as can reading about SAT requirements . Use these guides to get a head start!

Melissa Brinks graduated from the University of Washington in 2014 with a Bachelor's in English with a creative writing emphasis. She has spent several years tutoring K-12 students in many subjects, including in SAT prep, to help them prepare for their college education.

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Tufts University Supplemental Essays 2022-2023

Tufts supplemental essays 2022-2023.

If you’ve already started researching how to get into Tufts , stats like the The Tufts acceptance rate may make the Tufts application seem daunting. Getting familiar with each part of the Tufts application, including the Tufts supplemental essays ahead of the deadline can help you feel confident as you prepare for the admissions process. 

In your Tufts essays, you’ll highlight what makes you unique and why Tufts is the right place for you. Additionally, the Tufts essay prompts will intentionally push you to explore what Tufts provides its students. So, the more you know about the school, the stronger your Tufts essays will be. Also, the stronger your Tufts supplemental essays, the better your admissions odds will be.

Given the low Tufts acceptance rate, Tufts admissions can be incredibly competitive. This means you should do your homework so that your personality, passions , and goals shine through in each of your Tufts supplemental essays.

Tufts Essay: Quick Facts

• 1 (~150 word) essay: Why Tufts essay
• 1 (~250 word) essay: Choose from 3 prompts essay
• 1 (150 word) essay: Why SMFA at Tufts essay
• 1 (~250 word) essay: What ideas would you like to explore essay
• Tufts University Application: Students can submit their Tufts University application through the Common Application or the Coalition Application .
• Early Decision: November 1
• Early Decision 2: January 4
• Regular Decision: January 4
• Tufts Supplemental Essay Tip: Both essays are required by Tufts admissions, so we recommend answering all Tufts supplemental essays comprehensively and thoughtfully.

How many supplemental essays does Tufts require?

Tufts University requires a personal statement that you’ll write for the Common App or Coalition App as well as two school-specific essays .

This makes the Tufts supplemental essays are one of few opportunities to make your application stand out. Like any supplemental essay, your Tufts supplemental essays should demonstrate why the university is a good fit for your goals while also sharing your personal experiences.

When it comes to the Why Tufts essay, you’ll want to be as specific as possible in sharing why Tufts is the school for you. A popular rule of thumb is that if you can replace the name of the university in the essay and it still makes sense, your essay may not be specific enough. 

What are the Tufts Supplemental Essay requirements?

Tufts has two school-specific essays in the Common App. As you consider the Tufts supplemental essays, you’ll notice that while the Tufts essay prompts are different, both essentially ask you to introduce yourself to the Tufts admissions team.

Why Tufts essay

In the Why Tufts essay, you should highlight the research you’ve done on Tufts and the reasons why you’d hope to attend. Your essays should also highlight how your experiences and goals tie into what Tufts offers.

Schools like Tufts that require a why school essay look for students who are specifically passionate about attending Tufts. That means you should include specific details about Tufts, like their academic curriculum, campus culture, student extracurriculars , or research opportunities. Rather than just listing them, you’ll want to articulate why these features excite you. You should also discuss how you imagine them helping you reach your goals.

More about you essay

In the second Tufts supplement, you’ll share more about your interests, passions, and community. While there are multiple ways to approach each of the Tufts supplemental essays, remember to cover new information in each of your responses. The exception to this rule, however, is if you are covering a new aspect of a previously mentioned experience/activity.

Unlike the why Tufts essay, you’ll have your choice of three different prompts to respond to. Each prompt covers a slightly different area of your life and interests , so you’ll have to select a prompt and narrow down your topic before you can begin writing the second of your two Tufts supplemental essays.

Tufts Supplemental Essays #1 – Why Tufts Essay?

Which aspects of the tufts undergraduate experience prompt your application in short, “why tufts” (150 words).

Before you start approaching this Tufts essay, you should make sure you understand the key features of the school. Chartered in 1852, Tufts University is a research university with a low student-to-faculty ratio of 9:1. They also offer nearly 150 majors and minors . Tufts is located in Medford, Massachusetts and has a unique mascot— Jumbo the elephant. Unique traditions abound that make life at Tufts all the more exciting.

Famous Tufts alumni include Nobel Prize winner Roderick MacKinnon, singer-songwriter Tracy Chapman, Olympic figure skater Michelle Kwan, and the former prime minister of Greece, Kostas Karamanlis. It could be beneficial for your Tufts supplemental essays, especially the Why Tufts essay, to reflect on the university’s rich history and expansive offerings.

Highlight what makes Tufts right for you

The Tufts essay prompts let you channel your personality and reflect on the research you have done. Hopefully, when you put your list of colleges together, you asked yourself, Why Tufts? If not, now is the time to take a moment to seriously consider this question. In fact, to answer this prompt well, take a moment to consider why you want to attend college. Do you know what you want to study ? Do you have clear personal and professional goals that tie into your college education? Are there activities that you hope to continue or try during your undergraduate career?

Once you’ve thought about your answers to these questions, think about how they specifically translate to a school like Tufts. What does Tufts offer that no other school does? Why do you see yourself attending Tufts? Are there specific opportunities you hope to take advantage of during your time at Tufts? Or are there certain faculty or alumni whose work has inspired you?

There are many ways you might choose to answer the question “why Tufts,” and we understand that writing a why school essay is no easy task. Here are some tips to use and questions to ask yourself as you tackle your why Tufts essay.

Leverage your word count

To help your Tufts supplemental essays shine, be sure to leverage your word limit to your advantage. 150 words doesn’t give you a ton of space to be wordy or expansive in your why Tufts essay. So, one of your challenges will be to concisely explain why Tufts is the place for you.

Rather than listing every single reason you’re interested in Tufts, focus on just one or two things in your why Tufts essay.  If you’re having trouble pinning your ideas down, it can be helpful to start your brainstorm with two lists. Title one, “Why college?” and the other “Why Tufts?” 

Under the “college” list, write general goals for your college experience. This might include what you want to study, the experiences you hope to have, and the professional goals that you’d like to achieve after college. Under the “Why Tufts” list, write the specific things that drew you to Tufts. Stay away from general attributes like prestige and reputation, as you can find these things at many other schools.

Find overlap

Once your “Why Tufts” list is complete, look at both lists for parallels you can touch on in your why Tufts essay. For example, if you’re excited to find new friends and community in college and one of your personal goals is to advocate for civil rights, you can talk about how excited you are to join the student organization ACTION (Advancing Civic Thought In Our Nation) and help in their after school programs. You might also consider some unique opportunities, classes, or faculty that connect with your educational goals. For example, a student planning to study engineering might discuss Tufts’ focus on socially-conscious engineering in their why Tufts essay.

Consider the future

The best why Tufts essay will also consider a student’s future beyond Tufts. The student interested in socially-conscious engineering, for instance, may want to discuss how they hope to channel what they will learn to solve a problem in the world or contribute to a new field of study.

While you have to stick to a singular prompt for your why Tufts essay, this Tufts supplement still  gives you some flexibility. Perhaps you have been a leader in one of your extracurricular activities . How do you see yourself applying these experiences to a specific organization or opportunity at Tufts?

As the shorter of the two Tufts supplemental essays, your why Tufts essay is relatively brief. Don’t waste words when establishing the “why” in your “Why Tufts” essay. This is not the time to share your love of Medford or Boston at large—unless you can tie in a specific connection with Tufts. Instead, channel your excitement for Tufts’ location into a description of how you’d like to get involved in the local community through Tufts’ own offerings.

Resources from Tufts Admissions

If you’re still not sure how to craft your why Tufts essay, take a look at admissions ’ Tufts essays that worked. These examples can be valuable resources. Each of the nine Tufts essays that worked showcase student’s with different goals, academic interests, and approaches to the why Tufts essay. As you read each example, try to consider what aspects of their why Tufts essay really helps you imagine each student as part of Tufts’ campus community.

You can also check out why school essay examples from other top colleges, include Y ale and Barnard , for more inspiration.

Tufts Essay Reflection Questions:

• Do you share experiences or interests that you hope to explore further in college?
• Does your why Tufts essay provide information that enriches the rest of your application?
• Do you provide college-specific examples that address why Tufts?
• Is it clear that Tufts fits your ideal college experience?

Tufts Supplemental Essays #2- Choose One

Now we’d like to know a little more about you. please respond to one of the following three questions. (250 words):, a. it’s cool to love learning. what excites your intellectual curiosity, b. how have the environments or experiences of your upbringing – your family, home, neighborhood, or community – shaped the person you are today, c. where are you on your journey of engaging with or fighting for social justice .

Here, you have multiple Tufts supplemental essay prompts to choose from. But which essay prompt is the best choice? While no individual topic is automatically better than another, consider what you have already shared apart from your why Tufts essay. Also, keep in mind that your Tufts supplemental essays show your audience your writing ability and overall readiness for college.

Highlight new details

Try not to repeat material you have already shared elsewhere in your Tufts supplemental essays. However, there is an exception to this rule—you can share something new with your readers within a topic that you’ve already discussed.

For example, in our why Tufts essay overview, we described a student hoping to study engineering through the lens of social consciousness at Tufts. If they felt really passionately about this topic, they could expand what they wrote about in their why Tufts essay in the second of their Tufts supplemental essays.

That student could talk about how their understanding of social justice (the third Tufts supplement) has led them to ask bigger questions about engineering—specifically, why do some individuals have access to resources and others don’t? They may talk about how in learning about social justice, they have learned the importance of representation and diversity in fields like engineering .

Now that we’ve given you an idea of how your Tufts supplemental essays might play off of one another, it’s time to focus on your second Tufts essay. Let’s dive into the three prompts for the Tufts supplemental essays!

Tufts Essay: Option A

Let’s look at Option A for the Tufts supplemental essays. While you could use this prompt to describe your potential major, you could also reflect on another intellectual interest. No matter the topic, ask yourself how have you explored this subject in the classroom and beyond? With over 150 majors and minors available at Tufts along with many student organizations, you have plenty of options to explore different interests. You might tie your intellectual curiosity to a class, or even an organization or activity that you hope to experience at Tufts.

Not sure what you want to major in? Check out our article . In it, we walk through how to choose a major and how your choice can affect your college applications.

Avoid writing about generic interests

You may find your most passionate intellectual curiosity may not be related to your major, and that’s okay! However, you should avoid stating generic interests like reading or the news. Instead, you want to be as specific as possible in your Tufts supplemental essays. 

For example, you may discuss how you stumbled upon an old Dutch-to-English translation of your favorite children’s book, which sparked your interest in the Dutch language. Just like you did in your why Tufts essay, use this space to share how your passions evolved and why they matter to you. When reading your Tufts supplemental essays, admissions officers want to see that you’re a self-motivated learner who will bring your diverse interests and passions to the Tufts community.

Tufts Essay: Option B

Considering Option B for your second Tufts essay? Remember that your Tufts supplemental essays are for you to share where you have been, where you are, and where you hope to be.

To start your brainstorm , we recommend getting your ideas flowing with another set of lists. Similar to the why Tufts essay, create four lists—family, home, neighborhood, and community—and write big events and people that have shaped you in each.

While “family” and “home” may seem identical, they’re not. For example, you may want to talk about how your family’s immigration story has shaped who you are today. This is completely different from someone who wants to talk about how living in many different types of homes (apartments, single-family houses, and townhomes) shaped how they live with and interact with others. In other words, you’ll want to think outside of the box and share something personal to you and your story.

In each list, try to zoom in on one or two examples and expand on them. Think about how they have made an impact on you, how you think, or how you approach new situations. While it may seem intuitive to share gratitude towards people or places that have been most impactful on you, remember that you are the protagonist of your Tufts supplemental essays. You wouldn’t want the admissions team to learn more about your hero or community than they do about you!

Tufts Essay: Option C

Option C is probably the toughest of the Tufts essay prompts. Done incorrectly, this Tufts essay can be preachy or veer into vague, philosophical musings on social justice. To answer this Tufts prompt well, you should be specific.

In general, Tufts supplemental essays give you plenty of leeway to be creative. However, you should still give concrete examples wherever possible. For this essay, think about ways that you engaged with social justice in your community. Perhaps you have participated in discussions or events near you. Or, maybe you have educated yourself and others through books, articles, or conversations.

Whatever experiences you choose to highlight, make sure that your essay stays away from performative social justice. In other words, avoid mentioning how many likes your social justice-themed posts garnered, name-dropping prominent activists that you’ve met, and/or co-opting the stories of others.

• Do you focus on your own experiences instead of those of others?
• Does your response share what distinguishes you from other applicants?
• Does your draft use active voice instead of passive language?
• Do you focus on one or two experiences instead of sharing a laundry list?

Tufts Supplemental Essays – BFA & 5 year BFA + BA Applicants

Applicants to the BFA or 5-year combination BFA/BA program will complete a different set of Tufts supplemental essays . These essay prompts are similar to the why Tufts essay and option A of the Tufts supplemental essay prompts.

SMFA essay #1: Which aspects of the Tufts undergraduate experience prompt your application? Why SMFA at Tufts? (100-150 words)

Smfa essay #2: art has the power to disrupt our preconceptions, shape public discourse, and imagine new ways of being in the world. what are the ideas you’d like to explore in your work (200-250 words).

As you can see, the prompts have similar word counts and topics they want applicants to cover in each essay. That means the tips and questions outlined above will still be helpful as you consider how to approach these prompts.

For the first BFA program Tufts essay, highlight why this program is the right fit for you. Like the first general Tufts supplemental essay, you’ll want to remain as specific as possible. Share details about why the Tufts BFA program is the right fit for you. 

In the second essay, highlight who you are as an artist and individual. Why do you want to make art? How do you see your art helping make the world a better place? What inspires and motivates you? Once again, the more specific you can be, the better. 

How to write Tufts Supplemental Essays: Five Easy Steps

Five steps for writing a tufts essay, #1- research.

Doing your own research will help you get familiar with Tufts and their application process (while hopefully getting you excited about the possibility of attending Tufts)! We recommend exploring the Discover Tufts page, where you’ll find information on Tufts academic schools, curriculum, and opportunities as well as campus life and student organizations. You’ll also find helpful links, like Tips for a Virtual Visit and tips for writing your essays . 

#2- Brainstorm

Even if you’re eager to jump into your first draft, remember brainstorming is one of the most helpful steps in the writing process. Use our suggested exercises to make lists, focus your ideas, and choose what to write about.

If you’re feeling stuck with writer’s block, that’s totally normal! Remember, your first draft doesn’t need to be a work of art. Focus on just getting your ideas down in sentences so you have material to draw from for your final draft.

While getting your first draft down is an accomplishment, the editing process is where your essay will really start to take shape. Especially since you are working within such tight word limits, you’ll probably need to edit out portions of your first draft. Every sentence (and every word) should string together to tell your story, so make sure you edit for conciseness and clarity.

#5- Proofread

No essay draft can be finalized without a comprehensive spelling and grammar check. Before you submit your essay, try to finish your draft at least a week before the deadline. Then, you can take some time away from your essay before your final proofread . Better yet, ask a mentor or peer to take a second look at your essay to check for clarity and any errors you might have missed.

How important is my Tufts essay?

Your Tufts supplemental essays are a crucial part of your overall application. With over 31,000 students applying to Tufts University this past year, you should be sure to put your best foot forward in your Tufts supplemental essays. Even if you have outstanding grades and test scores, many of the other students applying will, too. Your Tufts essays are your opportunity to stand out from the crowd and make an impression on the admissions team.

That being said, try to stand out while also remaining true to yourself. Don’t feel pressured into feeling like you need to embellish your experiences or make them seem more important than they are. If they are truly important and valuable to you, they’ll be just as important and valuable to admissions. This application advice can get you started on your Tufts essays and help you figure out Why Tufts is the place for you. 

Wondering how you can find opportunities that are unique to Tufts University? Fortunately, Tufts also offers online open houses to help you get a glimpse of the greater community. Additionally, check out resources such as the Tufts YouTube channel . These resources can give you insider insight to make your Tufts supplemental essays shine. 

Tufts Admissions Requirements

Now that we’ve discussed the Tufts supplemental essay prompts, let’s look at the rest of your Tufts application. In order for your essays to be considered, you need to make sure you’ve successfully completed all of Tufts’ admissions requirements.

All Tufts applicants must submit:

• A completed Common Application or Coalition Application
• Completed Tufts supplemental essays
• High school transcript(s)
• Senior grades

No matter which application platform you choose to apply through, you’ll need to submit your Personal Statement, two letters of recommendation, and your extracurricular activities. If you’re not sure how your extracurriculars will be considered as part of your application, check out Tufts’ application checklist for more context on how extracurriculars are evaluated.

Tufts Portfolio

Students who are applying to the School of Arts and Sciences of the School of Engineering may choose to submit a Tufts portfolio, but this is optional. However, students applying to either the BFA or 5-year combination BFA/BA program are required to submit a Tufts portfolio along with their Tufts supplemental essays.

Make sure you check the requirements for your Tufts portfolio to ensure you submit everything necessary. Students can also request a personal portfolio review prior to officially submitting, which is a great opportunity to discuss any questions you have about your Tufts portfolio and the overall application process.

As a reminder, Tufts is a test-optional school, meaning applicants have the choice of whether to include SAT or ACT scores as part of their application. Also, Tufts admissions reviews applications holistically, so your scores will be considered within the context of your entire application.

Tufts Supplemental Essays—Final Thoughts

Your Tufts supplemental essays are an essential piece of your plan for how to get into Tufts. Both of your required essays, especially the Why Tufts essay, can help you stand out in the admissions process. Overall, your Tufts essays can be the difference between a good application and a great one.

Remember, grades and test scores are only two pieces of the application equation. Your Tufts supplemental essays should help your reader learn about what really makes you tick.  If you’re ever feeling stuck in the writing process, remind yourself that the Tufts essay prompts are not trying to stump you. Instead, each Tufts supplement can shed light on the passion and potential that you would bring to the Tufts community.

Start early

To submit the best Tufts supplemental essays you can, you should start drafting your Tufts essays early—a few months before applications are due. The Tufts supplemental essays are not especially long, but you will need time to revise and get another pair of eyes (or two) on each Tufts supplement.

Make sure to pay special attention to the why Tufts essay. Clearly articulating why Tufts is the place for you will form the foundation of a strong application. Then, use the second set of Tufts essay prompts to share your passions and experiences with the admissions team. Use strong, dynamic language to draw your reader into your Tufts supplement.

Tufts alumni interview

In addition to the Tufts supplemental essays, be sure to request your alumni interview once you have submitted your application. Although they are optional, interviews can add value to your overall candidate profile.

Wondering where to start? Check out some of these Tufts YouTube videos on Tufts supplemental essays .

Also, the Tufts Associate Director of Admissions, Lauren Wilkes, helps give students some tips on how to succeed in your interview. A strong interview and well-crafted Tufts supplemental essays can help you submit the best possible application to this great research university. Good luck!

This Guide to the 2022-2023 Tufts Supplemental Essays was written by Stefanie Tedards. Looking for more admissions support? Click here to schedule a meeting with one of our Admissions Specialists. During your meeting, our team will discuss your profile and help you find targeted ways to increase your admissions odds at top schools. We’ll also answer any questions and discuss how CollegeAdvisor.com can support you in the college application process.

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Current tufts students, inside admissions, 5 essay writing tips to get you through december.

I vividly recall dedicating each day of Thanksgiving break during my senior year of high school to writing the supplemental essays for my college applications: one short answer per day. I’ve forgotten what most of those brief essays were about, but I certainly remember sitting cross-legged on my bedroom floor developing an intense writing schedule and agonizing over potential essay topics. Thirteen years later, I’ve lost track of the number of application essays I’ve read - as an admissions officer and as a college counselor - but thankfully I have learned a few essay-writing lessons along the way. Whether you’re just beginning the brainstorming phase for your personal statement or you’re polishing drafts of your last few supplemental essays, if you keep these five tips in mind, you’ll be as fabulous as Adele:

1. Start with the purpose: First, take a minute to consider the role of the application essays from an admissions officer’s perspective. Your writing serves to give a human element to your application file, creating a connection between you and the reader who likely hasn’t had the opportunity to meet you in person. Your essays help us understand your voice beyond the academic data and learn about your personality, values, interests, priorities, and background. Essays also help us see your fit for Tufts specifically: does the attitude you showcase in your writing match the “vibe” of our community? That’s our purpose in requiring you to submit all these essays. But you get to have a purpose, too. Each essay you write should have a clear intention behind what you’re communicating, an intention that you can actually identify and articulate. What do we need to know about you to have the fullest picture possible of (a) what you care about and (b) how you will engage academically and socially on our campus? Those ideas and qualities should deliberately align with the essays you send us.

2. Make the most of each essay: By asking you to write two short responses in addition to your longer personal statement/college essay, we provide you with multiple opportunities to share what matters to you. That means you get multiple chances to showcase the multiple interests and experiences that make you a multifaceted human being. By writing all your essays about a similar theme or overlapping topics, you’ve likely missed out on a chance to share other dimensions of your identity. When a college requires supplemental essays or short answer questions, it can be helpful to think of your writing as a package or a set, the way it will be read by an admissions officer. I’m trying to learn as much as I can about the many things that make you interesting, smart, likable, and engaging. Ideally, your personal statement and supplemental essays will come together to reflect a range of qualities that comprise your voice as a whole.

3. Focus on the details: Now, while your essays as a whole set help paint a broad picture of who you are, each individual essay should tell me something very specific. Rather than trying to squeeze your whole life story into a 650-word essay or writing broadly about your interest in science or your passion for public service, try to keep your topics narrow and go deep with them. Describing a single experience/interaction/memory/source of inspiration with vivid detail and deep reflection can often have the most powerful and original impact. A former colleague used to describe this idea as "letting the micro inform the macro.” Small details - in your storytelling and in the interpretations you offer in your writing - can be representative of the macro-level ideas you want to leave the reader pondering.

4. Maintain your voice: Let me assure you, from our perspective, your college application essays should not be approached with the same tone as a research paper or book report. While your writing should be grammatically correct and show evidence of care, the language, style, and spirit of your essays certainly can and should be authentic to how you speak in real life. If your friends, family, and teachers would describe you as goofy, outgoing, or relaxed, you probably shouldn’t submit a collection of essays in a formal, subdued tone. If your real-life personality is more subtle, perceptive, and insightful, that can certainly make for a great college essay, too! Whether your communication style is witty, sarcastic, lyrical, pensive, earnest, animated, or sensible, I encourage you to infuse that flavor into your written language to complement the character qualities found in the content of your writing.

5. Be thoughtful in seeking feedback: I’ve seen plenty of students go overboard in their pursuit of essay feedback and I feel pretty confident that sharing a Google Doc with your 20 closest friends and mentors is the surest way to become overwhelmed with conflicting advice and edit your own voice out of your college essays. There are lots of well-intentioned people whose college essay advice can be a bit misguided. Stick to sharing your drafts with just 2-3 people you trust; a former colleague suggests including one person who’s a particularly strong writer and one person who knows you REALLY well and can gauge the authenticity of your writing. Editing to catch typos and incorrect spellings is essential, but I encourage you not to let the editing phase sanitize the creative expression that should make your essays yours.

Tufts University 2023-24 Supplemental Essay Prompt Guide

Regular Decision Deadline: Mar 15

You Have: 

Tufts University 2023-24 Application Essay Question Explanations 

The Requirements:  1 essay of 100-150 words; 1 essay of 200-250 words.

Supplemental Essay Type: Why , Oddball

Think outside the box as you answer the following questions. Take a risk and go somewhere unexpected. Be serious if the moment calls for it, but feel comfortable being playful if that suits you, too. 

Applicants to the school of arts & sciences or the school of engineering:, please respond to one of the following three prompts in 200-250 words:, it’s cool to love learning. what excites your intellectual curiosity.

Tufts wants to accept intellectually curious applicants, so why not use this opportunity to rant and rave about your current obsession? Maybe you find marine life to be absolutely fascinating, and you’ve been reading up on the most dangerous creatures in the deep dark sea (and their preferred prey, of course). Or maybe you are super interested in Greek mythology and have been voraciously reading every book you can find on Poseidon and his many adventures. When was the last time you went down an internet rabbit hole trying to research something? When were you extremely motivated to solve a problem or create something new? What was the last fact or skill you learned outside of school that truly captured your imagination? The bottom line here is to discuss examples of what truly fascinates you, while also reflecting on what these examples say about your personality traits, interests, or learning style.

How have the environments or experiences of your upbringing – your family, home, neighborhood, or community – shaped the person you are today?

This is a classic community essay, through and through. Admissions wants to know what or who has made you into the person you are today. Where do you come from? What has shaped you as a person, and how has that made your perspective unique? What you focus on here can be reflective of larger cultural constructs or specific to you and only you. Tufts is looking to add diverse perspectives to the melting pot that is their student body. Is there anything you can teach your classmates about your hometown, traditions, culture, cuisine, orientation, identity, race, or ethnicity that they might not already know? Were you raised in a Muslim family in a small southern town? Do you identify as trans or queer? Were you adopted as a child? What has influenced your identity? What do you believe and how will your worldview bring something of value to the community at Tufts?

Using a specific example or two, tell us about a way that you contributed to building a collaborative and/or inclusive community.

First of all, let us remind you that your “community” can be just about anything, from your neighborhood to your family to your comedy troupe. Pick a community that means something to you and the diversity narrative will fall into place. Maybe your progressive church welcomes people of all sexualities and gender identities, and you developed a brand new youth group for queer and questioning teens. Perhaps your school is incredibly homogenous and isolated, and you helped your Spanish class organize Skype chats with a school in Guatemala to learn more about different parts of the world while developing your Spanish skills. No matter your starting point, be sure you tell a clear story with a beginning, middle, and end that demonstrates your commitment to creating inclusive environments. It might be tempting to pen a vivid description of your community and leave it at that, but the point of an essay like this is to tell a story about you and your contributions.

Applicants to the School of the Museum of Fine Arts (SMFA) at Tufts:

Please respond to the following prompt in 200-250 words:, art has the power to disrupt our preconceptions, shape public discourse, and imagine new ways of being in the world. what are the ideas you’d like to explore in your work   .

Tufts wants to know what kinds of ideas keep you up at night. Your response doesn’t need to have static answers that will stay with you, of course; your ideas will change over your evolving life as an artist, but now is the time to try to pin down a basic explanation of what your art means to you, what it addresses, and for bonus points: why you want to spend the rest of your life immersed in it. Ultimately, like with all written components of your application, it’s integral to be highly specific and use personal details to bring your essay to life. This isn’t the place to be modest or undersell yourself; present your work proudly and succinctly, and admissions is sure to be impressed. Inspiration can be infectious, so be passionate and take them on a journey into your mind.

In addition, we will ask all applicants to complete this sentence in 100 words or less:

“i am applying to tufts because…” .

Well, well, well… the admissions department wants to know why you hope to attend Tufts University next fall. What a surprise. Start by browsing the Tufts website and reminding yourself why this school is on your list to begin with! Does Tufts offer a specific major that’s hard to find at other institutions? Is there a professor you’d really like to learn from or a club you want to join? What do you have to offer Tufts’ community? Maybe your favorite classes are the ones in which you and your peers discuss literature and debate symbolism. Perhaps you are the punniest person you know and think this core part of your character will help you assimilate into Tufts’ playful culture smoothly. Whatever your reasoning may be, share it with admissions—and be concise! 

About Kat Stubing

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Tufts Supplemental Essays 2023-24 – Prompts and Advice

July 13, 2023

Tufts University has long been a highly-selective school. Yet, the Class of 2027 was the second time the acceptance rate dipped into the single-digits at 9.5%. As at any college that rejects more than 9 of every 10 applicants who apply (the overwhelming majority of whom are supremely qualified), aspiring Jumbos need every single component of their application to shine brightly. The Tufts supplemental essays are one such area of focus.

(Want to learn more about How to Get Into Tufts? Visit our blog entitled:  How to Get Into Tufts University: Admissions Data and Strategies  for all of the most recent admissions data as well as tips for gaining acceptance.)

Given this unprecedented level of selectivity, Tufts University’s supplemental section offers applicants a crucial opportunity to showcase their writing ability by generating powerful and detail-rich essays that will stand out to an admissions officer.

Tufts Supplemental Essay Question #1

Which aspects of the tufts undergraduate experience prompt your application in short, “why tufts” (100-150 words).

Tufts University is getting right down to business with this prompt. View this essay as akin to ending up in an elevator with a potential investor with 20 seconds to sell your million-dollar idea. In this “elevator pitch” essay, you only have 150 words to communicate why Tufts is a perfect match for you. As such, this one is going to require a fair amount of school-specific research. Further, plan on a good deal of editing in order to tighten up your essay enough to stay under the word limit.

How to write a winning “Why Tufts?” essay

• How will you take advantage of the university’s vast resources both inside and outside of the classroom?
• How will you become an active, contributing member of the student body?
• Show evidence of how your past/current endeavors will carry over onto the Tufts campus.
• Address a) why Tufts is the perfect fit for you and  b) why you are the perfect fit for Tufts.
• Cite specific academic programs, professors, research opportunities, internship/externship programs, study abroad programs, student-run organizations, etc. (as in the examples below).

Tufts Supplemental Essays (Continued)

Below are some examples of unique facts about Tufts University that you may find helpful as you brainstorm your response:

• There are 41 arts and performance groups on campus for the artistically-inclined.
• There are 300 total student organizations in which you can participate—pick one or two to elaborate on.
• Students are able to double major across colleges.
• With a 9:1 student-to-faculty ratio, two-thirds of undergraduate sections are kept under 20 students.
• There are numerous undergraduate research programs and scholarships at Tufts. Which one appeals to you and what would you research?
• 40% of juniors study abroad and Tufts boasts a number of notable programs in Beijing, Chile, Ghana, London, and more.
• There are more than 70 undergraduate majors to choose from.
• The Experimental College is a one-of-kind program.
• Tufts offers internship grants to a number of non-profit and government posts.
• An annual Undergraduate Research and Scholarship Symposium presents an exciting opportunity to present your original work to faculty.

Of course, these are just 10 out of the countless features that could be part of a successful essay. As you enter the prewriting stage, you’ll want to decide which elements will provide the most needle-moving value.

One last note on this essay—Tufts is nice enough to actually provide examples of their favorite “Why Tufts?” essays from the last admissions cycle.

Tufts University Supplemental Essay Question #2

Now we’d like to know a little more about you. please respond to one of the following three questions. (200-250 words):, a) it’s cool to love learning. what excites your intellectual curiosity.

In our experience, this is the prompt that applicants tend to select most often, primarily because the “Why Tufts?” essay is so short, students don’t feel they have enough space to talk about the academic discipline they hope to study at the university.

Whether it’s a general love for math/science or literature or a specific interest in aerospace engineering or 19th century French novels, use this opportunity to share what makes you tick, the ideas that keep you up at night, and what subject inspires you to dream big. What topic makes you read books and online content until your eyes bleed? Share the manner in which you relentlessly pursue knowledge. Whether it’s falling down a Wikipedia rabbit hole about the nature of time or consuming thousands of hours of podcasts on game theory, this is a chance to illustrate the ways in which you are an obsessive learner with an endless thirst for information.

The admissions reader should emerge with the sense that you are a sincerely curious person with a strong intellectual drive. If that curiosity can be tied into your intended area of study, all the better!

B) How have the environments or experiences of your upbringing – your family, home, neighborhood, or community – shaped the person you are today?

This essay encourages you to describe how your environment/community has shaped you into the present version of yourself. Community can be a “community” in any form: an ethnic, religious, family, or neighborhood community, or a group of individuals who gather for a club, sport, or service project. You are the captain of a team, the editor-in-chief of your school paper, the president of a club… but don’t just rest on those laurels—instead, bring your involvement to life. Use your writing ability to show the admissions officer the impact your community has had on your dreams rather than merely telling them. If your family/home (parent, grandparent, sibling) was a powerful force in your growth and development, that can be the sole focus of a successful composition here as well.

C) Where are you on your journey of engaging with or fighting for social justice?

Some students may have more direct experience with social justice than others, but—no matter your background—this is an opportunity to demonstrate that you care about justice and fairness in your local community as well as the global community. If applicable, you can speak about a time when you spoke up for a peer in a moment of need. Or, alternatively, share an instance when you got involved in a larger cause or movement (politics, activism, volunteer work, etc.). If you don’t have a deeply personal story to tell in this realm, you’ll want to select a different prompt. While there’s nothing wrong with simply articulating your basic beliefs in the values of inclusion, equity, tolerance, and diversity, it doesn’t necessarily make for the most compelling essay.

If you do choose this essay prompt, draw on past evidence of your commitment to being a positive force in your community and speculate how that is likely to manifest on Tufts’ campus. Research and cite Tufts’ student-run organizations, local nonprofit groups, or anything else you are drawn to. Drawing the link between your past efforts and future aims is critical here.

How important are the Tufts supplemental essays?

Tufts views six factors as being “very important” to their applicant evaluation process. These are: the rigor of one’s coursework, the GPA earned, class rank, recommendations, character/personal qualities, and—most relevant for our purposes here—the essays.

For all essays, we recommend heeding the advice of one Senior Assistant Director of Admissions at Tufts University who stated: “Be yourself. When writing your essays, you don’t have to sound like you already have your PhD (spoiler: we know you don’t—you’re applying for an undergraduate program). Instead, employ a voice in your writing that feels authentically you, exploring the topics you actually care about. That’s the voice that will help you stand out in our process.”

Tufts Supplemental Essays – Want Personalized Assistance?

If you are interested in working with one of College Transitions’ experienced and knowledgeable essay coaches as you craft your Tufts supplemental essays, we encourage you to get a quote  today.

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Emerson Wenzel, A20, works with a student in an English class in Nicaragua in 2016. Photo: Alonso Nichols

How Tufts Became an International Relations Powerhouse

Former provost Sol Gittleman reflects on the undergraduate program’s journey to its current position of strength

When the U.S. State Department announced its Fulbright scholars for 2021–2022, Tufts was well represented. With 11 current and former Jumbos earning awards to study in eight countries, the university was closing in on a total of 400 Fulbright scholarships to date, underscoring its place among the country’s strongest international relations programs.

Funny to think it happened by accident.

Coming Home to Go Abroad

The Fulbright program began at the very end of World War II. J. William Fulbright (D-Ark.), the junior U.S. senator of a segregationist state, had studied in England and knew his country needed changing. Seeing huge piles of surplus war materiel left in ravaged countries across the globe, he proposed that proceeds from the sale of these much-needed goods be used for “the promotion of international goodwill through the exchange of students.”

There was a hitch. To get a federally recognized Fulbright award, you needed an undergraduate degree. And if you were headed to a non-English-speaking country, having some acquaintance with the host country’s language would be a distinct advantage.

No better place to make that acquaintance than college.

Madeleine Weir, A20, and Daniela Sanchez, A20, enjoy a Madrid park during their Tufts 1+4 program in 2016. Photo: Alonso Nichols

Enter Tufts. Congenitally short of funds, the school was kept alive by a flood of returning WWII service members who made up more than half of the incoming class right after the war. Funded by the G.I. Bill, this wave of worldly students at Tufts and other campuses changed American higher education forever. They were older than typical matriculants. Many had seen combat overseas and married people from other countries. And a handful had been trained by the military as translators, interpreters, and counterintelligence specialists.

Some were destined to be the faculty of the future. One, Seymour Simches, earned a Ph.D. in romance languages from Harvard. He arrived as an assistant professor at Tufts in 1954, with a fresh passport and an urgent desire to return to Paris, this time with his students. Within 10 years, Professor Simches was chair of the Department of Romance Languages and seeking supporters to jumpstart an idea buzzing in his mind: a junior year abroad.

I landed at Tufts in 1964, having had a Fulbright to Germany at the University of Tübingen in 1956. When the faculty of arts and sciences approved two study abroad programs, in Paris and Tübingen, in 1965, Simches’ dream became a reality. Tufts wasn’t an international relations juggernaut yet, but the college was on the map.

A French Connection

The next decade was a turbulent one, with the Vietnam draft, the civil rights and women’s rights movements, Woodstock, Stonewall, the assassinations of the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr. and Robert Kennedy, and the killing of students at Kent State and Jackson State rocking the Tufts campus.

Donald MacJannet, a 1916 Tufts graduate, and his wife, Charlotte, pose at the former priory in Talloires, France, that they gave to Tufts.

Then came a surprise, in the form of a French-born leader.

Nothing in the previous 124 years of Tufts history could have prepared the university for Jean Mayer, who assumed the presidency on July 1, 1976. Passionate about world hunger and nutrition, Mayer in his first year talked the arts and sciences faculty into creating an interdisciplinary program of international relations, with John Gibson of political science as its director.

Mayer saw The Fletcher School, the graduate school in international relations launched in 1933, as a springboard to a university-wide internationalism. In 1979, Fletcher welcomed a new dean in Theodore Lyman Eliot Jr.—Ted Eliot for short—who signed on to Mayer’s vision. One of the partnership’s first acts was to hustle a federal appropriation for the expansion of Fletcher, including a new auditorium for undergraduate classes and office space for the undergraduate director of international relations.

Tufts international relations also had a home in Europe, thanks to Mayer’s seemingly inexplicable decision to accept the gift of a falling-down, 11th-century priory on Lake Annecy in the village of Talloires, France. Donald MacJannet, a 1916 Tufts graduate, had been running private camps for international students at the priory, but at age 90, he knew his time had come. Three earlier Tufts presidents had refused the deed to the property, but MacJannet had found his man in Mayer. The camp director and the new president sealed the deal for Tufts in Talloires soon after Mayer took office. Simches became its first director.

Global Expansion

From there, international relations as an academic enterprise took off like a rocket. Tufts added foreign language offerings in Chinese, Japanese, Hebrew, Arabic, Portuguese, Italian, and Ladino, a Judeo-Spanish language. Language enrollments multiplied, with nearly half of the junior class by the end of the 1980s electing to study abroad.

The decade culminated with a grant from the F.W. Olin Foundation for a new building on the quad of the Medford-Somerville campus dedicated to foreign language instruction, the first award of its kind in the foundation’s history. In the late ’80s, Rand McNally singled out entering Tufts undergraduates to each receive a copy of the company’s world atlas and World Facts in Brief . The company’s president, Andrew McNally, called it a good investment for the future, and the practice continued for 10 years.

Gabriella Goldstein, director of the Tufts European Center, in Talloires in 2021. Photo: Jandro Cisneros

Much of the success of the junior semester and year abroad in that period was due to remarkable program directors whose continuity was extremely rare in academia. Sheila Bayne in Medford, Jaki Leversen in London, Virginia Remmers in Paris, Angel and Joan Berenguer in Barcelona and later Madrid, Bob Asch in Tübingen, and Gabriella Goldstein in Talloires knew each other, shared their experiences, and left legions of Tufts students with unforgettable memories.

Their dedication was total, and the smaller cities, in particular, reciprocated. Asch became a Tübingen celebrity, described in the town newspaper as “der beste Amerikaner.” Goldstein and the villagers of Talloires shared annual Alpine fitness climbs led by Rocky Carzo, the longtime director of athletics and head football coach at Tufts.

Once discovered by the greater Tufts community, Talloires became a cherished destination. Site of choice for Fletcher programs in Europe, the former priory also hosted international conferences in health sciences and physics, as well as international conventions of university presidents. Tufts undergraduates arrived each summer for a semester at Talloires.

Still more was happening back home. In 1988, Tufts historian Martin Sherwin inaugurated a course on the nuclear age taught live via satellite from the health sciences campus in Boston, with faculty and students in attendance from Moscow State University. By 1992, 11 such courses had been taught simultaneously in both countries, a pedagogical accomplishment that stunned the academic world.

Citizens of the World

Things only heated up after the Cold War ended. In recent decades, Tufts has expanded its study abroad programs to include Beijing, Chile, Ghana, Hong Kong, Japan, London, and Oxford, England. The university just launched a summer program in data science in Italy, and there are studio art programs in London and, for School of the Museum of Fine Arts at Tufts students, at the lauded École nationale supérieure des Beaux-Arts in Paris.

Tufts in Hong Kong participants get acquainted with a distant relative of Jumbo in Thailand in 2016. Photo: Courtesy of Tufts Global Education

Back at home, Tufts is one of few universities in the U.S. to require two full years of foreign-language classes for undergraduates. For some students, the international exploration begins even earlier.

The 1+4 Bridge Year, launched in 2015 (and currently on pandemic hiatus), is Tufts’ take on a gap year and is supported by university financial aid for all who qualify. While living abroad for nine months and volunteering full-time for a local community-service organization—tutoring teens in Nicaragua, working with developmentally disabled youth in Madrid—high school graduates get a taste of the wider world before coming to Tufts for a four-year degree.

And that’s not all. The Tufts Civic Semester, which welcomed its inaugural cohort in 2019, provides an option for incoming students to spend their first semester working at a nonprofit in Peru or in the southwestern U.S. Participants take full-credit classes related to their community work, deepening their experiential learning.

A Tufts graduate student meets children in Jamaica in 2018. Photo: Timothy Kim, D18, DG20

On Tufts’ Medford-Somerville campus, the Education for Public Inquiry and International Citizenship program (better known as EPIIC) has for three decades brought together academics, policymakers, and student delegations from many countries to discuss current international issues in a year-long course and a student-organized symposium. The program, first created by Sherman Teichman as part of the Institute for Global Leadership, is now led by Abi Williams, F86, F87. 

The graduate schools also offer international experiences, such as the School of Medicine’s global health program and the School of Dental Medicine’s international service-learning program.

What started in Europe has now reached almost every corner of the globe, with Tufts students and alumni learning and working in most of the world’s nations. Through a series of fortuitous events—including the serendipitous arrival of faculty and staff with insatiable curiosity about the world and the appointment of a singular président de l’université —Tufts became and remains a place that prioritizes understanding the globe we live on. As a kid from New Jersey who learned a lot during my own Fulbright year in Germany, I hope that will never change.

Sol Gittleman, H10, is the Alice and Nathan Gantcher University Professor Emeritus and a former Tufts provost.

Tufts Students Land Fulbright Scholarships

Lessons Learned from a Civic Semester in the Southwest

Awakening in Nicaragua

External Programs Abroad

In addition to our ten Tufts Programs Abroad , you also have the option to take a leave of absence from Tufts to participate in a pre-approved external program. Below you will find our current list of approved program options sorted by general region. 

If you are considering an external program: 

• It is your responsibility to confirm that  the academic portion of the program is a minimum of 13 weeks per semester , and to obtain approval from the appropriate Tufts academic department for each course for which you wish to transfer credit. Learn More about Transfer Credit for External Programs  
• Applying to external programs requires that you submit two separate applications:  1) to the program provider and 2) to Tufts Global Education. Review the Application Process for External Programs  
• Students wishing to study abroad at a university partner of Tufts Programs Abroad (e.g., LSE, UCL, Sciences Po Paris, etc.) may only do so through Tufts Programs Abroad. You may not study at one of our partner institutions either directly or through an external provider (e.g., Arcadia or IFSA).   
• Approval of a leave of absence to study abroad applies to transfer of academic credit only; it does not imply an evaluation of current security conditions in the host country . For updated safety information, contact the program provider and consult the  U.S. State Department website . Study abroad in countries with a U.S. State Department Travel Advisory level 3 or 4 in effect is subject to review by Tufts'  International Travel Review Committee . You should notify the Foreign Study Advisor by March 1 for fall semester or October 1 for spring semester if you intend to study in such a country. U.S. State Department Travel Advisories can change at any time; therefore, the International Travel Review Committee reserves the right to review study abroad plans as needed. Learn More about Health and Safety Abroad  
• Our recommendation applies to the individual programs listed, not to all programs offered by the sponsoring program provider.  
• The semester- and year-long programs listed on this page are currently approved for transfer credit toward a Tufts degree as of August 2023.  (Refer to the program provider websites to confirm current program availability.) 

Petitioning a Non-Approved Program

If, after thoroughly researching the programs on the approved list, you find a program or university better suited to your academic needs, you must petition for approval. The petition process is as follows:

• You must contact the Assistant Director for External Programs no later than December 15 to discuss the program and the petition process. The Assistant Director will review the petition request and determine if it meets the threshold for consideration by the Education Abroad Committee. 
• If you are authorized to proceed, the Assistant Director will grant you access to the petition in the TGE application portal and you must submit your completed petition by February 1. A letter of support from a faculty member in your major department is required.
• Submit an application for an alternate program from the Approved Programs List (below) as a backup in case the committee does not approve your petition.

Petitions are reviewed once annually, for study abroad in the following academic year, by the faculty Education Abroad Committee. The Committee's decision is final and late petitions will not be considered.

Approved Programs

The approved programs list is divided by general region—Africa (Sub-Saharan), Asia, Europe, Latin America and the Caribbean, Middle East and North Africa, and Oceania. Within each region, the programs are sorted alphabetically by country and any special conditions are noted at the start of each country list. Each program is hyperlinked to the Tufts application; keep in mind that you will also need to apply directly to the program separately. 

Fall (F), Spring (S), or the Full Academic Year (Y) listed in parentheses after the program name indicates the term(s) in which the program is typically offered. 

Options for Engineering and SMFA students are indicated where available.

Africa (Sub-Saharan)

• CIEE Arts and Sciences Program in Gaborone, Botswana (F/S)
• CIEE Community Public Health Program in Gaborone, Botswana (F/S)
• Middlebury School in Cameroon: Yaoundé (F/S)
• American University in Cairo (F/S/Y) – Includes options for Mechanical Engineering (BSME)
• Tufts in Ghana (F/S)
• SIT Study Abroad Madagascar: Biodiversity and Natural Resource Management (F/S)
• SIT Study Abroad Rwanda: Post-Genocide Restoration and Peacebuilding (F/S)

South Africa

• CIEE Arts and Sciences Program in Cape Town, South Africa (F/S)
• Organization for Tropical Studies: African Ecology and Conservation (F/S)
• SIT Study Abroad South Africa: Social and Political Transformation (F/S)
• University of Cape Town (F/S)
• SIT Study Abroad Tanzania: Wildlife Conservation and Political Ecology (F/S)
• SIT Study Abroad Tanzania: Zanzibar Coastal Ecology and Natural Resource Management (F/S)
• The School for Field Studies (SFS) Tanzania - Wildlife Management Studies (Semester) (F/S)
• The School for Field Studies (SFS) Cambodia  (F/S)

Courses at Beijing Normal University in the fall may be taken through Tufts in Beijing only.

• CET Beijing (F/S/Y)
• CIEE Advanced Chinese Studies Program in Beijing, China (F/S/Y)
• CIEE Intensive Chinese Language Program in Beijing, China (F/S/Y)
• CIEE Sustainable Development in Beijing, China (F/S/Y)
• Middlebury School in China: Beijing (F/S/Y)
• Tufts in Beijing (F)
• CET Harbin (F/S/Y)
• CET Shanghai (F/S/Y)
• CIEE Accelerated Chinese Language Program in Shanghai, China (F/S/Y)
• CIEE Business, Language, and Culture Program in Shanghai, China (F/S/Y)
• CIEE China in a Global Context Program in Shanghai, China (F/S/Y)
• IES Abroad Shanghai - Economy, Business & Society (F/S/Y)
• Tufts in Hong Kong (S) – Options for Electrical and Computer Engineering (BSEE and BSCPE) and Mechanical Engineering (BSME)
• IFSA: Contemporary India (F/S)
• SIT Study Abroad India: Public Health, Gender, and Community Action (F/S)
• SIT Study Abroad Indonesia: Arts, Religion, and Social Change (F/S)

Courses at the Kyoto Consortium for Japanese Studies (KCJS) may be taken through Tufts in Japan only.

• IES Abroad Nagoya Direct Enrollment - Nanzan University (F/S/Y)
• IES Abroad Tokyo - Language & Culture (F/S/Y)
• International Christian University, Tokyo (Y)
• Tufts in Japan (F/S/Y)
• Waseda University, Tokyo (Y)
• American Councils: RLASP – Advanced Russian Language & Area Studies Program (F/S/Y)
• SIT Study Abroad Nepal: Tibetan and Himalayan Peoples (F/S)

South Korea

• Yonsei University, Seoul (F/S/Y) – Options for Chemical Engineering (BSCHE) and Electrical and Computer Engineering (BSEE and BSCPE)
• SIT Vietnam: Culture, Social Change, and Development (F/S) 

Europe (Continental)

• IES Abroad Vienna - Business, Economics & International Relations (F/S/Y)
• IES Abroad Vienna - European Society & Culture (F/S/Y)
• IES Abroad Vienna - Music (F/S/Y)
• IES Abroad Vienna - Psychology & Social Sciences (F/S/Y)
• American University: European Union in Action  (F/S/Y)

Czech Republic

• CET Prague (F/S/Y)
• CIEE Central European Studies Program in Prague, Czech Republic  (F/S/Y)
• CIEE Communication, New Media, and Journalism Program in Prague, Czech Republic (F/S/Y)
• CIEE Film Studies Program in Prague, Czech Republic (F/S/Y)
• CIEE Global Architecture + Design Program in Prague, Czech Republic (F/S/Y)
• NYU Prague (F/S/Y)
• DIS - Study Abroad in Copenhagen, Denmark (F/S/Y) – Options for Biomedical Engineering (BSBME), Civil and Environmental Engineering (BSCE and BSEVE), Electrical and Computer Engineering (BSEE and BSCPE) and SMFA students

Courses at Beaux Arts de Paris, Sorbonne Nouvelle (Paris III), Université Paris Cité (Paris VII), Sciences Po Paris, Paris College of Art, and Centrale Supélec may be taken through Tufts in Paris only. Students planning to participate in fall-semester programs in French universities should check semester ending dates carefully to be available for spring semester at Tufts.

• Columbia in Paris: French Immersion Program (F/S/Y)
• CUPA (F/S/Y)
• Dickinson College in France (F/S/Y)
• IAU: Aix-en-Provence, France (F/S/Y) – Options for SMFA students
• IES Abroad Nantes - French Language Immersion & Area Studies (F/S/Y)
• IES Abroad Nice – Business, Sustainability & Immigration (F/S/Y)
• IES Abroad Nice Direct Enrollment – SKEMA Business School (F/S/Y)
• IES Abroad Paris - Business & International Affairs (F/S/Y)
• IES Abroad Paris - French Studies (F/S/Y)
• Middlebury School in France: Bordeaux (S/Y)
• Middlebury School in France: Paris (S/Y)
• New York University in Paris (F/S/Y)
• Tufts in Paris (F/S/Y)
• Tufts in Paris - Beaux Arts (S) – For SMFA students only
• Tufts in Paris - Centrale Supélec (S) – For Engineering or Computer Sciences students only
• Tufts in Paris – Paris College of Art (F/Y) – For SMFA students only
• Tufts in Paris - Sciences Po (Y)
• Wellesley in Aix-en-Provence, France (F/S/Y)

Courses at the University of Tübingen can be taken through Tufts in Tübingen only.

• IES Abroad Berlin - Language & Area Studies (F/S/Y)
• IES Abroad Berlin - Metropolitan & Urban Studies (F/S/Y)
• IES Abroad Berlin - Security Studies & International Affairs (F/S/Y)
• IES Abroad European Union (F/S/Y)
• IES Abroad Freiburg - Environmental Studies & Sustainability (F/S/Y)
• IES Abroad Freiburg - Language & Area Studies (F/S/Y)
• Wayne State University - JYM at the University of Munich (S/Y) 
• Tufts in Tübingen (S/Y)
• College Year in Athens - Semester and Academic Year Program (F/S/Y)
• AIT Budapest (F/S/Y)
• Budapest Semesters in Mathematics (BSM) (F/S/Y)
• SIT Study Abroad Iceland: Climate Change and the Arctic (F/S)
• Arcadia University - Burren College of Art (F/S/Y) – Options for SMFA students
• Burren College of Art (F/S/Y)
• IFSA - Burren College of Art (F/S/Y) – Options for SMFA students
• Arcadia University - University College Cork (F/S/Y) – Options for Electrical and Computer Engineering (BSEE and BSCPE)
• IFSA - University College Cork (F/S/Y) – Options for Electrical and Computer Engineering (BSEE and BSCPE)
• University College Cork (F/S/Y) – Options for Electrical and Computer Engineering (BSEE and BSCPE)
• Arcadia University - Trinity College Dublin (F with early start/S/Y) – Options for Civil and Environmental Engineering (BSCE and BSEVE) and Electrical and Computer Engineering (BSEE and BSCPE)
• Arcadia University - University College Dublin (F/S/Y)
• Dublin City University (S/Y)
• IES Abroad Dublin Direct Enrollment - Dublin City University (S/Y)
• IES Abroad Dublin Direct Enrollment - Trinity College (F with early start/S/Y) – Options for Civil and Environmental Engineering (BSCE and BSEVE) and Electrical and Computer Engineering (BSEE and BSCPE)
• IES Abroad Dublin Direct Enrollment – University College Dublin (F/S/Y)
• IFSA - Trinity College Dublin (F/S/Y)
• IFSA - University College Dublin (F/S/Y)
• Trinity College Dublin (F with early start/S/Y) – Options for Civil and Environmental Engineering (BSCE and BSEVE) and Electrical and Computer Engineering (BSEE and BSCPE)
• University College Dublin (F/S/Y)
• Arcadia University - National University of Ireland Galway (F/S/Y)
• IFSA - National University of Ireland Galway (F/S/Y)
• National University of Ireland, Galway (F/S/Y)
• Arcadia University - University of Limerick (F/S/Y) – Options for Mechanical Engineering (BSME)
• IFSA - University of Limerick (F/S/Y) – Options for Mechanical Engineering (BSME)
• University of Limerick (F/S/Y) – Options for Mechanical Engineering (BSME)
• Brown in Italy (F/S/Y)
• ECCO in Bologna, Italy (F /Y)
• Middlebury School in Italy: Florence (F/S/Y)
• Smith in Florence (F/S/Y)
• SU Florence (F/S/Y)
• Tufts in Pavia: Data Science and Italian Program in Pavia, Italy (Summer)
• IES Abroad Milan - Business Studies (F/S/Y)
• IES Abroad Milan - Fashion Design & Merchandising (F/S/Y)
• IES Abroad Milan - Italy Today (F/S/Y)
• IES Abroad Milan – Music: Voice, Composition & Instrumental (F/S/Y)
• Arcadia University - Umbra Institute (F/S/Y)
• Temple University Rome (F/S/Y) – Options for SMFA students
• Trinity College Rome, Italy (F/S)
• CET Siena (F/S/Y)

The Netherlands

• CIEE Business and Culture Program in Amsterdam, Netherlands (F/S/Y)
• CIEE Social Sciences + Humanities Program in Amsterdam, Netherlands (F/S/Y)
• IES Abroad Amsterdam - Business & Economics (F/S/Y)
• IES Abroad Amsterdam - Law & Criminology (F/S/Y)
• IES Abroad Amsterdam - Psychology & Sciences (F/S/Y)
• IES Abroad Amsterdam - Social Sciences & Humanities (F/S/Y)
• IES Abroad Amsterdam Direct Enrollment - Conservatorium van Amsterdam (F/S/Y)
• Maastricht University, Netherlands (F/S/Y)
• SIT Study Abroad Netherlands: International Perspectives on Sexuality and Gender (F/S)
• SIT Portugal: Sustainability and Environmental Justice  (F/S)
• Middlebury School in Russia: Irkutsk (F/S/Y)
• Middlebury School in Russia: Moscow (F/S/Y)
• CIEE Russian Area Studies Program in St. Petersburg, Russia (F/S/Y)
• CIEE Russian Language Program in St. Petersburg, Russia (F/S/Y)
• Middlebury School in Russia: Yaroslavl (F/S/Y)

Courses at Universidad Complutense de Madrid (UCM) may be taken through Tufts in Madrid only.

• CIEE Advanced Liberal Arts Program in Barcelona, Spain (F/S/Y)
• CIEE Business and Culture Program in Barcelona, Spain (F/S/Y)
• CIEE Economics and Culture Program in Barcelona, Spain (F/S/Y)
• CIEE Global Architecture + Design Program in Barcelona, Spain (F/S/Y)
• CIEE Language and Culture Program in Barcelona, Spain (F/S/Y)
• CIEE Liberal Arts Program in Barcelona, Spain (F/S/Y)
• Middlebury School in Spain: Madrid (Carlos III) (F/S/Y)
• Arcadia in Granada (S/Y)
• IES Abroad Granada - Study in Granada (F/S/Y)
• CIEE Engineering and Society Program in Madrid, Spain (F/S/Y) – Options for Electrical and Computer Engineering (BSEE and BSCPE)
• CIEE Liberal Arts Program in Madrid, Spain (F/S/Y)
• IES Abroad Madrid – Business, Economics & Social Sciences (F/S/Y)
• IES Abroad Madrid – Engineering, Math & Science (F/S/Y) – Options for Electrical and Computer Engineering (BSEE and BSCPE) and Mechanical Engineering (BSME)
• Syracuse in Madrid, Spain (F/S/Y)
• Tufts in Madrid (F/S/Y)
• NYU Madrid (F/S/Y)
• IES Abroad Salamanca – Language & Area Studies (F/S/Y)
• IES Abroad Salamanca - Psychology (F/S/Y)
• CIEE Advanced Liberal Arts Program in Seville, Spain (F/S/Y)
• CIEE Business and Society Program in Seville, Spain (F/S/Y)
• CIEE Communication, New Media, and Journalism Program in Seville, Spain (F/S/Y)
• CIEE Communications, New Media + Journalism English in Seville, Spain (F/S/Y)
• CIEE International Business and Culture Program in Seville, Spain (F/S/Y)
• CIEE Liberal Arts Program in Seville, Spain (F/S/Y)
• DIS - Study Abroad in Stockholm, Sweden (F/S)
• The Swedish Program (F/S/Y)

Switzerland

• American College Program in Fribourg, Switzerland (F/S/Y)
• SIT Study Abroad Switzerland: International Studies and Multilateral Diplomacy (F/S)
• Smith in Geneva (F/S/Y)

Europe (United Kingdom)

You must enroll for 1) a full academic year, 2) a single semester that lasts a minimum of 13 weeks, or 3) both the second and third terms (spring) of a trimester schedule. Tufts does not transfer credit for a single trimester or for a short, fall semester only, whether through a program provider or through direct university enrollment (except where noted).

Courses at LSE, QMUL, RHUL, SOAS, UAL, UCL, and Pembroke College, Oxford may be taken through Tufts in London and Tufts in Oxford only. 

• IFSA - University of Sussex (S/Y)
• University of Sussex, England (S/Y)
• University of Bristol, England (S/Y)
• Tufts in London - Royal Holloway (S/Y)
• University of Lancaster, England (F with pre-sessions/S/Y) – Options for SMFA students
• Arcadia University - Goldsmiths, University of London (S/Y) – Options for SMFA students
• Arcadia University - King's College London (S/Y) – Options for Electrical and Computer Engineering (BSEE and BSCPE)
• Goldsmiths University, London (S/Y) – Options for SMFA students
• IFSA - King's College London (S/Y) – Options for Electrical and Computer Engineering (BSEE and BSCPE)
• IFSA - University of Westminster (S/Y) – Options for Electrical and Computer Engineering (BSEE and BSCPE) and SMFA students
• King's College London (S/Y) – Options for Electrical and Computer Engineering (BSEE and BSCPE)
• Tufts in London - LSE (Y) 
• Tufts in London - Queen Mary (F/S/Y) – Options for Chemical Engineering (BSCHE), Civil and Environmental Engineering (BSCE and BSEVE), Electrical and Computer Engineering (BSEE and BSCPE), and Mechanical Engineering (BSME)
• Tufts in London - Royal Holloway University of London (S/Y)- Options for Electrical and Computer Engineering (BSEE and BSCPE)
• Tufts in London - SOAS (F/S/Y) 
• Tufts in London - UCL (F/S/Y) – Options for Chemical Engineering (BSCHE), Civil and Environmental Engineering (BSCE and BSEVE), Electrical and Computer Engineering (BSEE and BSCPE), and Mechanical Engineering (BSME)
• Tufts in London - University of the Arts London (F/S/Y) – Options for SMFA students
• University of Westminster, England (S/Y) – Options for Electrical and Computer Engineering (BSEE and BSCPE) and SMFA students
• University of East Anglia, England (S/Y)
• Arcadia University - University of Oxford (S/Y) – Options for Electrical and Computer Engineering (BSEE and BSCPE)
• IFSA - University of Oxford (S/Y) – Options for Electrical and Computer Engineering (BSEE and BSCPE)
• Tufts in Oxford (Y) – Hosted at Pembroke College, Oxford
• University of Oxford (S/Y) – Options for Electrical and Computer Engineering (BSEE and BSCPE)
• IFSA - University of York (S/Y)
• University of York, England (S/Y)

Northern Ireland

• Arcadia University - Queens University Belfast (S/Y)
• IFSA - Queen's University Belfast (S/Y)
• Queen's University, Belfast (S/Y)
• Arcadia University - University of Aberdeen (F/S/Y) – Options for Chemical Engineering
• University of Aberdeen, Scotland (F/S/Y) – Options for Chemical Engineering
• Arcadia University - University of Edinburgh (F/S/Y) – Options for Mechanical Engineering (BSME) and Electrical and Computer Engineering (BSEE and BSCPE)
• IFSA - University of Edinburgh (F/S/Y) – Options for Mechanical Engineering (BSME) and Electrical and Computer Engineering (BSEE and BSCPE)
• University of Edinburgh, Scotland (F/S/Y) – Options for Mechanical Engineering (BSME) and Electrical and Computer Engineering (BSEE and BSCPE)
• Arcadia University - Glasgow School of Art (S/Y) – Options for SMFA students
• Glasgow School of Art, Scotland (S/Y) – Options for SMFA students
• Arcadia University - University of Glasgow (F/S/Y)
• IFSA - University of Glasgow (F/S/Y)
• University of Glasgow, Scotland (F/S/Y)
• Arcadia University - University of St Andrews (F/S/Y)
• IFSA - University of St. Andrews (F/S/Y)
• University of St. Andrews, Scotland (F/S/Y)
• Arcadia University - Bangor University (S/Y)
• University of Bangor, Wales (S/Y)

Latin America and the Caribbean

Argentina         

• CIEE Liberal Arts Program in Buenos Aires, Argentina (F/S/Y)
• IES Abroad Buenos Aires - Advanced Spanish Immersion (F/S/Y)
• IES Abroad Buenos Aires – Latin American Societies & Cultures (F/S/Y)   
• IFSA - IFSA Argentine Universities Program (F/S/Y)                                      
• SIT Study Abroad Argentina: Public Health in Urban Environments (F/S)                                      
• CET Brazil: Social Justice (F/S)       
• Middlebury School in Brazil: Florianópolis (F/S/Y)            
• Middlebury School in Brazil: Niterói (F/S/Y)        

Courses taken at the University of Chile and la Pontificia Universidad Católica can be taken through Tufts in Chile only.                                                  

• CIEE Liberal Arts in Santiago, Chile (F/S/Y)
• IFSA - Chilean Universities Program, Valparaiso (F/S/Y)                                      
• Middlebury School in Latin America: Chile: Valparaíso: Pontificia Universidad Católica de Valparaíso (F/S/Y)
• Middlebury School in Latin America: Chile: Valparaíso: Universidad de Playa Ancha (F/S/Y)
• Middlebury School in Latin America: Chile: Valparaíso: Universidad de Valparaíso (F/S/Y)                                      
• SIT Study Abroad Chile: Public Health, Traditional Medicine, and Community Empowerment (F/S/Y)                                      
• SIT Study Abroad Chile: Cultural Identity, Social Justice, and Community Development (F/S/Y)     
• Tufts in Chile (F/S/Y)
• CET Colombia  (F/S) 

Costa Rica       

• The School for Field Studies (SFS) Costa Rica - Sustainable Development Studies (Semester) (F/S)
• IFSA - Universidad de la Habana (F/S)

Ecuador            

• IES Abroad Quito - Area Studies & Language (F/S/Y)
• IES Abroad Quito Direct Enrollment - Universidad San Francisco de Quito (F/S/Y)
• SIT Study Abroad Ecuador: Comparative Ecology and Conservation (F/S)
• IFSA - IFSA Merida Universities Program (F/S/Y)
• SIT Study Abroad Mexico: Migration, Borders, and Transnational Communities (F/S)

Panama            

• SIT Study Abroad Panama: Tropical Ecology, Marine Ecosystems, and Biodiversity Conservation (F/S)
• SIT Study Abroad Peru: Indigenous Peoples and Globalization (F/S)
• IFSA - Pontificia Universidad Catolica del Peru (F/S/Y)

Turks and Caicos Islands          

• The School for Field Studies (SFS) Turks and Caicos Islands - Marine Resource Studies (Semester) (F/S)

Uruguay           

• Middlebury School in Uruguay: Montevideo: Universidad Católica (F/S/Y)
• Middlebury School in Uruguay: Montevideo: Universidad de la República (F/S/Y)
• Middlebury School in Uruguay: Montevideo: Universidad ORT (F/S/Y)

Middle East and North Africa

• American University in Cairo (F/S/Y)

Students studying in Israel for one semester are required to complete a pre-semester Ulpan (intensive Hebrew language) course.

• Ben Gurion University of Negev Beer Sheba, Israel (F/S/Y)
• Technion Israel Institute of Technology, Haifa University (S/Y)
• University of Haifa, Israel (F/S/Y)
• Hebrew University of Jerusalem (F/S/Y)
• Tel Aviv University, Israel (F/S/Y)
• CET Jordan: Intensive Language (F/S/Y)
• CIEE Advanced Arabic Language Program in Amman, Jordan (F/S/Y)
• CIEE Middle East Studies in Amman, Jordan (F/S/Y)
• Middlebury School in the Middle East: Jordan (Amman) (F/S/Y)
• SIT Study Abroad Jordan: Refugees, Health, and Humanitarian Action (F/S)
• AMIDEAST Area & Arabic Language Studies in Morocco (Semester/Academic Year) (F/S/Y)
• CIEE Language and Culture Program in Rabat, Morocco (F/S/Y)
• Middlebury School in Morocco (F/S/Y)
• SIT Study Abroad Morocco: Multiculturalism and Human Rights (F/S)
• SIT Morocco: Migration and Transnational Identity (F/S)
• SIT Study Abroad Morocco: Migration and Transnational Identity (F/S)
• Bogazici University, Istanbul (F/S/Y) – Options for Civil and Environmental Engineering (BSCE and BSEVE) 
• The School for Field Studies (SFS) Australia - Rainforest to Reef (Semester) (F/S)                 
• Arcadia University - University of Queensland (F/S/Y)     
• IFSA - University of Queensland (F/S/Y) 
• University of Queensland, Brisbane (F/S/Y)
• IFSA - James Cook University, Cairns (F/S/Y)          
• SIT Study Abroad Australia: Rainforest, Reef, and Cultural Ecology (F/S)                                    
• Australian National University, Canberra (F/S/Y)
• University of New South Wales, Australia (trimester – consult TGE advisor) – Options for Biomedical Engineering (BSBME), Electrical and Computer Engineering (BSEE and BSCPE), and SMFA Students
• Arcadia University - University of Melbourne (F/S/Y) – Options for Chemical Engineering (BSCHE), Electrical and Computer Engineering (BSEE and BSCPE), and SMFA Students
• IFSA - University of Melbourne (F/S/Y) – Options for Chemical Engineering (BSCHE), Electrical and Computer Engineering (BSEE and BSCPE), and SMFA Students
• University of Melbourne, Australia (F/S/Y) – Options for Chemical Engineering (BSCHE), Electrical and Computer Engineering (BSEE and BSCPE), and SMFA Students
• University of Western Australia, Perth (F/S/Y) – Options for Mechanical Engineering (BSME)
• Arcadia University - University of New South Wales (trimester – consult TGE advisor) – Options for Biomedical Engineering (BSBME), Electrical and Computer Engineering (BSEE and BSCPE), and SMFA Students
• Arcadia University - University of Sydney (F/S/Y) – Options for Chemical Engineering (BSCHE), Electrical and Computer Engineering (BSEE and BSCPE), and Mechanical Engineering (BSME)
• IES Abroad Sydney Direct Enrollment - University of New South Wales                                      trimester - consult TGE advisor                                               Options for Biomedical Engineering (BSBME), Electrical and Computer Engineering (BSEE and BSCPE), and SMFA Students
• IES Abroad Sydney Direct Enrollment - University of Sydney (F/S/Y) – Options for Chemical Engineering (BSCHE), Electrical and Computer Engineering (BSEE and BSCPE), and Mechanical Engineering (BSME)
• IFSA - University of New South Wales (trimester – consult TGE advisor) – Options for Biomedical Engineering (BSBME), Electrical and Computer Engineering (BSEE and BSCPE), and SMFA Students
• IFSA - University of Sydney (F/S/Y) – Options for Chemical Engineering (BSCHE), Electrical and Computer Engineering (BSEE and BSCPE), and Mechanical Engineering (BSME)
• University of Sydney, Australia (F/S/Y) – Options for Chemical Engineering (BSCHE), Electrical and Computer Engineering (BSEE and BSCPE), and Mechanical Engineering (BSME)
• Arcadia University - James Cook University (F/S/Y)
• James Cook University - Townsville, Australia (F/S/Y)

New Zealand

• Arcadia University - University of Auckland (F/S/Y) – Options for Civil and Environmental Engineering (BSCE and BSEVE), Chemical Engineering (BSCHE), Mechanical Engineering (BSME), Electrical and Computer Engineering (BSEE and BSCPE), and SMFA Students
• IES Abroad Auckland Direct Enrollment - University of Auckland (F/S/Y) – Options for Civil and Environmental Engineering (BSCE and BSEVE), Chemical Engineering (BSCHE), Mechanical Engineering (BSME), Electrical and Computer Engineering (BSEE and BSCPE), and SMFA Students
• IFSA - University of Auckland (F/S/Y) – Options for Civil and Environmental Engineering (BSCE and BSEVE), Chemical Engineering (BSCHE), Mechanical Engineering (BSME), Electrical and Computer Engineering (BSEE and BSCPE), and SMFA Students
• University of Auckland, New Zealand (F/S/Y) – Options for Civil and Environmental Engineering (BSCE and BSEVE), Chemical Engineering (BSCHE), Mechanical Engineering (BSME), Electrical and Computer Engineering (BSEE and BSCPE), and SMFA Students
• Arcadia University - University of Canterbury (F/S/Y) – Options for Chemical Engineering (BSCHE), Mechanical Engineering (BSME), and Electrical and Computer Engineering (BSEE and BSCPE)
• IES Abroad Christchurch Direct Enrollment - University of Canterbury (F/S/Y) – Options for Chemical Engineering (BSCHE), Mechanical Engineering (BSME), and Electrical and Computer Engineering (BSEE and BSCPE)
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Tufts encampment supporters say they’ll boycott commencement if officials turn to police

I f Tufts University calls on the police to break up a pro-Palestinian encampment on campus , students behind the movement say they’ll boycott commencement.

Roughly 320 undergraduate and graduate students set to receive their degrees later this month have sent a letter to university President Sunil Kumar urging Tufts to stay away from “police violence” and to “take action to end the War on Gaza.”

“If the University turns to police violence rather than engaging with its own students,” the letter states, “we pledge to boycott the commencement ceremony in solidarity with our peers currently protesting on the Academic Quad and the people of Gaza.”

The letter, first reported by Boston 25 Wednesday morning , comes after Kumar called for an end to the encampment Sunday before he and other officials co-signed a letter Tuesday in which they threatened to issue trespass violations and bar seniors from commencement if the tents don’t come down.

Encampment organizer Tufts Students for Justice in Palestine, in an Instagram post Wednesday morning, stated that the administration has agreed to reopen negotiations and that Kumar is set to meet with students. It did not disclose when that meeting will take place.

In the letter signed by Kumar, officials highlighted that students declined to discuss proposals with the deans of the School of Arts and Sciences and the School of Engineering on Tuesday, and that they’d rather meet in person with the president, the chief investment officer and members of the board of trustees.

“The university agreed to such a meeting in writing on the condition that the encampment end first and that the protesters agree not to disrupt Commencement,” the letter states. “This offer, which remains on the table, was rejected, and the meeting ended without an agreement.”

Leadership wrote it’s looking to “avoid the confrontations seen at other universities,” such as Emerson, Northeastern and MIT, locally, and Columbia and UCLA, nationally. Last week, Boston police arrested 108 pro-Palestinian protesters at the Emerson College encampment, and police broke up a protest at Northeastern University .

“We will be issuing a no trespass order to the protesters,” the letter states. “Tufts students who do not vacate the space will be subject to the Community Standards processes which may result in suspension or other sanctions. For seniors, this may include not participating in senior week activities or Commencement. It is our strong desire that it does not come to this, and the protesters choose to leave voluntarily.”

More than a hundred pro-Palestinian protesters took their demands that Tufts divest from Israel and call for a ceasefire in Gaza to campus last Friday, vandalizing school property with explicit messages including “F*** the trustees.”

Some of the protesters at the encampment include “demonstrators unaffiliated with Tufts to bolster their numbers and expand their encampment,” leadership stated in its letter Tuesday. “The presence of these outside protesters on campus has raised safety concerns among many in the community.”

Students described feeling “shocked and deeply concerned” by Kumar’s letter Sunday about how the encampment had started to disrupt preparations for the commencement, set for May 19.

“We wish to be resoundingly clear: any commencement ‘celebration’ built on violently sweeping, arresting, or otherwise harassing the Gaza solidarity encampment is not a celebration in which we would partake,” they wrote in their letter. “We have watched with shock and horror the past several weeks as university administrators throughout the country (including just across the river at Emerson College and Northeastern University) have unleashed violent police riots to quash undergraduate protests.”

“If the Tufts administration were to unleash this violence against our peers currently occupying the Academic Quad,” the letter continues, “it would mar our experience of commencement far more than chalked slogans and a keffiyeh on an elephant statue ever could.”

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Restoring the Academic Quad for Commencement

April 28, 2024

Dear members of the Tufts community, Tufts has a time-honored tradition of civil protest. Consistent with that tradition, and throughout this academic year, we have balanced our students’ right to protest with enforcing our conduct policies. Students have been sanctioned when protests affected public safety, were a clear violation of our conduct policies, or interfered with normal university operations. Over the past two weeks, we have respected our community members’ right to advocate for their beliefs through a small camp site on the academic quad on our Medford/Somerville campus. Our staff have tried to maintain open lines of communication with the goals of ensuring safety, enforcing our policies, and avoiding the escalation we have seen at other universities across the nation. We have even delayed some preparations for Commencement as much as possible to allow the protest to resolve peacefully. But now the encampment must end, ideally peacefully and voluntarily, so we can prepare the campus for Commencement. Student Life staff will be reaching out to the protesters tomorrow morning to plan for the end of the encampment in the next few days. The class of 2024 deserves to be celebrated. Many of this year’s graduates experienced the restrictions and losses of the pandemic and missed out on important life events including the opportunity to participate in their high school graduations. Commencement is the moment to celebrate their accomplishments with their family and friends and for us to honor their achievements as a community. Unfortunately, at this moment when we should be coming together as a community, we have seen behavior that clearly is trying to escalate the situation. Protesters, including some who are unaffiliated with Tufts, have created conditions that have caused multiple community members and guests to lodge formal complaints. While much of Friday’s demonstration was peaceful, there were many actions that violated university policies. Demonstrators entered a classroom, blocked paths, and defaced, stickered, and scrawled obscene language on buildings throughout the campus. Even beloved spaces such as Alex’s Place on the Tisch Library roof and the Jumbo statue were marred. Additional actions from the protestors throughout Friday and Saturday made multiple visitors at Friday’s Jumbo Days and Saturday’s admissions tours feel afraid and unwelcome, resulting in numerous complaints. These included harassment, intimidation, disruption of Jumbo Days sessions, and aggressive tactics. We will investigate every single complaint and hold those responsible fully accountable. Since the protests on campus began in October, Student Life staff have tried to keep open lines of communication with the protesters. These conversations have focused on requests intended to keep the campus operating and to keep the entire community safe and have been largely productive. But recent exchanges have been markedly different as the protesters have sought to escalate and disrupt normal university activity. Exchanges with Student Life staff are often now followed by false claims of threats and intimidation on the protesters’ social media accounts. Let us be perfectly clear: these claims are simply inaccurate and can only be seen as an attempt to further inflame the community by deliberately misrepresenting the situation. Following Friday’s demonstration, student organizers requested a meeting with university leadership. While we have always felt that dialogue is the best approach to resolving differences, it would not be appropriate to discuss a meeting with the student organizers until they clear the academic quad. Their request, which includes a threat to continue disruption, only comes after they have escalated their actions, caused intentional and malicious harm to our community and campus, broken multiple university policies and, most importantly, violated the values and norms of the institution. The protesters’ actions increasingly come at the expense of their fellow students' rights and a meeting cannot be a reward for such behavior. We have met with multiple students, student groups, faculty members, and others throughout the academic year to discuss ways in which the university may be able to help people in Gaza and those affected by the war in our community in the ways an educational institution can, including by supporting Scholars at Risk, helping rebuild the educational infrastructure in Gaza when the time comes, fostering dialogue and training programs on our campus, creating gathering spaces for affected Tufts community members, and funding social gatherings and meals. As we have said before, we are deeply troubled by the tremendous loss of Palestinian life, and we desire to work with all members of our community to support both the Palestinian and the Israeli people. It is time to celebrate the class of 2024. We are committed to maintaining an environment that will allow our students to finish the academic year strong and for the entire community to celebrate the class of 2024 at Commencement without disruptions. Our students and their families and friends deserve nothing less. We invite the entire community to join us in this endeavor peacefully and responsibly. Sincerely, Sunil Kumar President Caroline Attardo Genco Provost and Senior Vice President Michael W. Howard Executive Vice President James M. Glaser Dean, School of Arts and Sciences Kyongbum Lee Dean, School of Engineering

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David French

Colleges Have Gone off the Deep End. There Is a Way Out.

By David French

Opinion Columnist

I had my head in a law book when I heard the drums. That was the sound of the first campus protest I ever experienced. I’d come to Harvard Law School in the fall of 1991 as a graduate of a small, very conservative Christian college in Nashville. Many of my college classmates had passionate religious and political commitments, but street protest was utterly alien to the Christian culture of the school. We were rule followers, and public protest looked a bit too much like anarchy for our tastes.

But Harvard was different. The law school was every bit as progressive as my college was conservative, and protest was part of the fabric of student life, especially then. This is the era when a writer for GQ magazine, John Sedgwick, called the law school “ Beirut on the Charles ” because it was torn apart by disputes over race and sex. There were days when campus protests were festive, almost celebratory. There were other days when the campus was seething with rage and fury.

That first protest was in support of faculty diversity, and it was relatively benign. I walked outside and followed the sound of the drums. A group of roughly 100 protesters was marching in front of the law school library, and soon they were joined by an allied group of similar size from Harvard’s John F. Kennedy School of Government. I watched as they danced, sang and listened to speeches by student activists and sympathetic professors. That first protest had an angry edge, but it was also completely peaceful and endlessly fascinating to a kid from a small town in Kentucky who’d never seen a drum circle before.

But things soon got worse, much worse. Protests got more unruly, and student activists got more aggressive. The entire campus was in a state of conflict. In Sedgwick’s words, students were “waging holy war on one another.” Small groups of students occupied administrative offices, and angry activists shouted down their political opponents in class and often attempted to intimidate them outside class. I was shouted down repeatedly, and twice I received disturbing handwritten notes in my campus mailbox in response to my anti-abortion advocacy. My student peers told me to “go die.”

Watching the protests and experiencing the shout-downs changed the course of my career. I was both enthralled by the power of protest and repulsed by the efforts to silence dissenters. Given the immense cultural influence of American higher education, I agreed with the Supreme Court’s famous words in the 1957 case Sweezy v. New Hampshire : “Teachers and students must always remain free to inquire, to study and to evaluate, to gain new maturity and understanding; otherwise, our civilization will stagnate and die.” Those words, combined with my own negative encounters at Harvard, helped define my legal career. From that point forward, I would defend free speech.

It’s been more than 30 years since that first campus protest, and over that time I’ve seen countless protests, I’ve defended countless protesters — and I’ve even been protested against at several schools. In the course of those cases and confrontations, I’ve learned that the issue of campus protest is remarkably complex and that campus culture is at least as important as law and policy in setting the boundaries of debate.

There is profound confusion on campus right now around the distinctions among free speech, civil disobedience and lawlessness. At the same time, some schools also seem confused about their fundamental academic mission. Does the university believe it should be neutral toward campus activism — protecting it as an exercise of the students’ constitutional rights and academic freedoms but not cooperating with student activists to advance shared goals — or does it incorporate activism as part of the educational process itself, including by coordinating with the protesters and encouraging their activism?

The simplest way of outlining the ideal university policy toward protest is to say that it should protect free speech, respect civil disobedience and uphold the rule of law. That means universities should protect the rights of students and faculty members on a viewpoint-neutral basis, and they should endeavor to make sure that every member of the campus community has the same access to campus facilities and resources.

That also means showing no favoritism among competing ideological groups in access to classrooms, in the imposition of campus penalties and in access to educational opportunities. All groups should have equal rights to engage in the full range of protected speech, including by engaging in rhetoric that’s hateful to express and painful to hear. Public chants like “Globalize the intifada” may be repugnant to many ears, but they’re clearly protected by the First Amendment at public universities and by policies protecting free speech and academic freedom at most private universities.

Still, reasonable time, place and manner restrictions are indispensable in this context. Time, place and manner restrictions are content-neutral legal rules that enable a diverse community to share the same space and enjoy equal rights.

Noise limits can protect the ability of students to study and sleep. Restricting the amount of time any one group can demonstrate on the limited open spaces on campus permits other groups to use the same space. If one group is permitted to occupy a quad indefinitely, for example, then that action by necessity excludes other organizations from the same ground. In that sense, indefinitely occupying a university quad isn’t simply a form of expression; it also functions as a form of exclusion. Put most simply, student groups should be able to take turns using public spaces, for an equal amount of time and during a roughly similar portion of the day.

Civil disobedience is distinct from First Amendment-protected speech. It involves both breaking an unjust law and accepting the consequences. There is a long and honorable history of civil disobedience in the United States, but true civil disobedience ultimately honors and respects the rule of law. In a 1965 appearance on “Meet the Press,” the Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. described the principle perfectly: “When one breaks the law that conscience tells him is unjust, he must do it openly, he must do it cheerfully, he must do it lovingly, he must do it civilly — not uncivilly — and he must do it with a willingness to accept the penalty.”

But what we’re seeing on a number of campuses isn’t free expression, nor is it civil disobedience. It’s outright lawlessness. No matter the frustration of campus activists or their desire to be heard, true civil disobedience shouldn’t violate the rights of others. Indefinitely occupying a quad violates the rights of other speakers to use the same space. Relentless, loud protest violates the rights of students to sleep or study in peace. And when protests become truly threatening or intimidating, they can violate the civil rights of other students, especially if those students are targeted on the basis of their race, sex, color or national origin.

The result of lawlessness is chaos and injustice. Other students can’t speak. Other students can’t learn. Teachers and administrators can’t do their jobs.

In my experience as a litigator , campus chaos is frequently the result of a specific campus culture. Administrators and faculty members will often abandon any pretense of institutional neutrality and either cooperate with their most intense activist students or impose double standards that grant favored constituencies extraordinary privileges. For many administrators, the very idea of neutrality is repugnant. It represents a form of complicity in injustice that they simply can’t and won’t stomach. So they nurture and support one side. They scorn the opposition, adopting a de facto posture that says , “To my friends, everything; for my enemies, the law.”

I’ve experienced this firsthand. I vividly remember representing a campus Christian group in a dispute at Tufts University in 2000 . The group had been derecognized for requiring that student leaders of their group share that group’s traditional sexual ethic, which reserves sex for heterosexual marriage. You might disagree strongly with that view, but granting religious groups the flexibility to impose faith-based requirements on religious leaders fits squarely within the American tradition of free exercise of religion.

Tufts is a private university, so it has some flexibility in suppressing religious expression on campus, but it had no excuse for attempting to toss a Christian group from campus at the same time that it permitted acts of intimidation against those Christian students. For example, at the most contentious moment of the dispute, Tufts officials prevented my student clients and me from entering the hearing room where their appeal was being heard, while a crowd of protesters gathered in a darkened hallway, pressed up around us and herded us into a corner of the hall. There was no campus outrage at this act of intimidation. We saw no administrative response.

University complicity in chaos isn’t unusual. In a case I worked on when I was president of the Foundation for Individual Rights and Expression, we discovered that administrators at Washington State University’s Pullman campus had actually helped plan a disruptive protest against a play put on by a student director, an intentionally provocative show that mocked virtually every group on campus.

University or faculty participation in unlawful protest isn’t confined to the cases I worked on. At Oberlin College, administrative facilitation of ugly and defamatory student protests outside a local business ultimately cost the school $36 million in damages. At Columbia, hundreds of sympathetic faculty members staged their own protest in support of the student encampment on the quad, and there are reports that other faculty members have attempted to block members of the media from access to the student encampment.

None of this is new. All of it creates a culture of impunity for the most radical students. Disruptive protesters are rarely disciplined, or they get mere slaps on the wrist. They’re hailed as heroes by many of their professors. Administrators look the other way as protesters pitch their tents on the quad — despite clear violations of university policy. Then, days later, the same administrators look at the tent city on campus, wring their hands, and ask, “How did this spiral out of control?”

There is a better way . When universities can actually recognize and enforce the distinctions among free speech, civil disobedience and lawlessness, they can protect both the right of students to protest and the rights of students to study and learn in peace.

In March a small band of pro-Palestinian students at Vanderbilt University in Nashville pushed past a security guard so aggressively that they injured him , walked into a university facility that was closed to protest and briefly occupied the building. The university had provided ample space for protest, and both pro-Israel and pro-Palestinian students had been speaking and protesting peacefully on campus since Oct. 7.

But these students weren’t engaged in free speech. Nor were they engaged in true civil disobedience. Civil disobedience does not include assault, and within hours the university shut them down. Three students were arrested in the assault on the security guard, and one was arrested on charges of vandalism. More than 20 students were subjected to university discipline, three were expelled , and one was suspended.

The message was clear: Every student can protest, but protest has to be peaceful and lawful. In taking this action, Vanderbilt was empowered by its posture of institutional neutrality . It does not take sides in matters of public dispute. Its fundamental role is to maintain a forum for speech, not to set the terms of the debate and certainly not to permit one side to break reasonable rules that protect education and safety on campus.

Vanderbilt is not alone in its commitment to neutrality. The University of Chicago has long adhered to the Kalven principles , a statement of university neutrality articulated in 1967 by a committee led by one of the most respected legal scholars of the last century, Harry Kalven Jr. At their heart, the Kalven principles articulate the view that “the instrument of dissent and criticism is the individual faculty member or the individual student. The university is the home and sponsor of critics; it is not itself the critic. It is, to go back once again to the classic phrase, a community of scholars.”

Contrast Vanderbilt’s precise response with the opposing extremes. In response to the chaos at Columbia, the school is finishing the semester with hybrid classes, pushing thousands of students online. The University of Southern California canceled its main stage commencement ceremony , claiming that the need for additional safety measures made the ceremony impractical. At both schools the inability to guarantee safety and order has diminished the educational experience of their students.

While U.S.C. and Columbia capitulate, other schools have taken an excessively draconian approach. Gov. Greg Abbott of Texas posted on X, “Students joining in hate-filled, antisemitic protests at any public college or university in Texas should be expelled.” On April 25 the Foundation for Individual Rights and Expression sent a forceful letter to the president of the University of Texas at Austin condemning the display of force on campus. “U.T. Austin,” it wrote, “at the direction of Gov. Greg Abbott, appears to have pre-emptively banned peaceful pro-Palestinian protesters due solely to their views rather than for any actionable misconduct.”

At Emory University, footage emerged of police tackling a female professor who posed no obvious danger to the police or anyone else. Protests are almost always tense, and there is often no easy way to physically remove protesters from campus, but the video footage of the confrontation with the professor was shocking. It’s hard to conceive of a justification for the violent police response.

At this moment, one has the impression that university presidents at several universities are simply hanging on, hoping against hope that they can manage the crisis well enough to survive the school year and close the dorms and praying that passions cool over the summer.

That is a vain hope. There is no indication that the war in Gaza — or certainly the region — will be over by the fall. It’s quite possible that Israel will be engaged in full-scale war on its northern border against Hezbollah. And the United States will be in the midst of a presidential election that could be every bit as contentious as the 2020 contest.

But the summer does give space for a reboot. It allows universities to declare unequivocally that they will protect free speech, respect peaceful civil disobedience and uphold the rule of law by protecting the campus community from violence and chaos. Universities should not protect students from hurtful ideas, but they must protect their ability to peacefully live and learn in a community of scholars. There is no other viable alternative.

The Times is committed to publishing a diversity of letters to the editor. We’d like to hear what you think about this or any of our articles. Here are some tips . And here’s our email: [email protected] .

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David French is an Opinion columnist, writing about law, culture, religion and armed conflict. He is a veteran of Operation Iraqi Freedom and a former constitutional litigator. His most recent book is “Divided We Fall: America’s Secession Threat and How to Restore Our Nation .” You can follow him on Threads ( @davidfrenchjag ).

Russian Program

Russian Language and Cultural Studies at Tufts University offers a variety of majors, courses and activities designed for students who wish to learn the Russian language, study Russian literature and film, and immerse themselves in Russian culture.

The Program offers two majors: Russian Language and Cultural Studies, and Russian and East European Studies, as well as a minor in Russian Language.

Students are encouraged to  study Russian abroad  at one of several programs in Moscow, St. Petersburg or other locations, or to arrange an internship in the Boston area. The Program sponsors a  Russian-Slavic Culture House  on campus where eight students live. There is also an active Russian Circle which is supported by the TCU Senate.

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Van Wie receives lifetime award for pedagogy achievements

Bernie Van Wie, a professor in the Gene and Linda Voiland School of Chemical Engineering and Bioengineering, has received the 2024 Donald R. Woods Lectureship Award for Lifetime Achievement in Chemical Engineering Pedagogy.

As part of the award from the Chemical Engineering Division of the American Society for Engineering Education (ASEE), Van Wie will give a lecture on his work at the national ASEE meeting in June in Portland, Oregon.

The Donald Woods award is given for lifetime achievement “recognizing a sustained career of contributions to pedagogical practice, scholarship, and mentoring that not only caused innovative and substantial changes, but also inspired other educators to new behaviors that benefit students in Chemical Engineering,” according to the ASEE website .

During his career, Van Wie developed hands-on desktop modules for conducting engineering experiments that are used at more than 50 universities around the U.S. and the world. He began work on developing a low-cost, small footprint set of engineering experiments in the early 1990s when he was teaching fluid mechanics and heat transfer. He saw that students needed to see and do engineering to understand it well. He is quick to say without his colleagues, graduate students, and faculty willing to use these modules his efforts would not have succeeded.

Van Wie developed hands-on desktop modules for conducting engineering experiments that are used at more than 50 universities around the U.S. and the world.

The portable modules are made of clear plastic and allow students to observe flow patterns of water through fluid chambers and heat exchangers to understand difficult concepts. Working on problems in teams of three or four, students have the chance to learn collaboratively about the physical meanings behind the terms in their engineering equations. 

The modules have been used in chemical and mechanical engineering courses, including fluid mechanics, heat transfer, and kinetics. The hands-on devices can be used directly in the classroom, unlike other expensive devices on the market that need a functioning laboratory.

The learning modules have been shown to improve understanding of engineering concepts. Van Wie’s research teams have shown students who use the hands-on modules in classes improve significantly in conceptual understanding compared to control groups. Students also build collegiality through the activities, which transfers to success in other classes.

Van Wie’s work has been supported by the National Science Foundation, USDA, the Norcliffe Foundation, the World Bank, and Washington State University. He also received a Fulbright award to share his work in Nigeria. He has received several other awards, including an award for innovation in chemical engineering education from the American Institute of Chemical Engineering.

In addition to his research in pedagogy, Van Wie conducts research in bioprocessing and biosensing. He holds a bachelor’s, master’s, and doctoral degrees in chemical engineering from the University of Oklahoma.

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