In a world where disconnection seems to often prevail, we are looking for students who embody the qualities of bridge builders—students who can connect people, groups, and ideas to span divides, foster understanding, and promote collaboration within a dynamic, interconnected, and vibrant global academic community. We are eager to understand how your experiences have prepared you to build the bridges of the future. Please consider one or more of the following questions in your essay (250 words or fewer):

1. What personal experiences or challenges have shaped you as a bridge builder?
2. How have you been a bridge builder in your school, community, or personal life?
3. What specific actions have you taken to build bridges between diverse groups, ideas, or cultures?
4. How do you envision being a bridge builder during your time at our university and beyond?

First of all, while NYU's supplemental essay is optional, we HIGHLY recommend writing a thoughtful reply to the prompt if you're serious about NYU. Any time you have the OPPORTUNITY to tell a school more about yourself... seize it!

NYU -- like the metropolis that houses it -- is dynamic, interconnected and global. The admissions committee wants to make sure that, if and when you're plunked in a dorm room off Washington Square Park surrounded by classmates from all walks of life, you can not only get by, but will thrive through building new connections and collaborations with the resources of NYU x NYC. Dartmouth it ain't—when your campus IS lower Manhattan, you don't have the same built-in nurturing cocoon as you might on a more rural campus. This is your opportunity to let them know (show, don't tell) that—not only are you ready for the NYU experience, but the NYU experience is PERFECT for you. You're someone who connects communities, resources, ideas... someone who can bridge ideological gaps through sincere dialog and doesn't shy away from the unknown.

First, write a list of ways you've built bridges. Don't get too narrow at this moment... the impact of your story is the most important... you can retrofit the bridge-building metaphor to any number of stories. It could be a collaboration in the classroom, the time you saw a need and created a new club at school, community outreach work, tough conversations across ideological divides, etc. Pick the impactful story that allows you to really highlight how YOU saw and opportunity and built a bridge where previously there was only a ravine.

You don't need to be a city-slicker to nail this one. If you've always lived in a small town in Idaho, own it and subvert their expectations... "people assume my worldview is narrow because I was raised in a small rural town, but actually this has FORCED me to actively build bridges to branch out and grapple with XYZ to go out and get for myself what city kids take for granted." or "BECAUSE I was raised in this small and somewhat dogmatic community, whose values are very different from my own, my entire youth has been filled with hard conversations with people who disagree with me."

250 words is short, so we recommend choosing question 1, 2 or 3 to anchor your essay. Question 4 (how you envision being a bridge builder at NYU and beyond) can be pulled through from your main story... as in, 'I built THESE bridges already because I saw the need, and NYU will provide me with the ideal opporunity to continue to practice building bridges in XYZ ways, to have THIS impact at school and THAT impact as a global citizen throughout my life. Don't ONLY answer question #4... answers that rely solely on your assertion that you'll be X kind of student at NYU -- without any historical examples to justify that assertion -- don't have the same credibility as answers that draw a connection (or build a bridge, if you will!) between what you've done in the past and what you'll do in the future. Of course, your past doesn't LIMIT what you can do, but it can indicate what you're capable of, and the values that shape and inform your interactions with others.