A gap explained
is not a gap

Interrupted schooling is common and understood — what trips applications is a hole with no context. Lay out your real history, see what a US reader would ask about, and answer it once, factually, everywhere.

Not everyone needs this. If your record is a straight line — one school per year, grades all there — skip this tool entirely. Leaving the Common App's Additional Information section blank is a completely normal, legitimate choice that many applicants make. This page exists for records the war bent out of shape: relocations, online terms, closed schools, missing papers. Those are context to provide, never something to apologize for.

Step 1 · Your history

Build your timeline

Add each period of your schooling, oldest first, the way you'd tell it out loud. Approximate years and unknown school names are fine — the tool never blocks you for a chaotic period.

Step 2 · Context, not excuses

Explain the flagged points

Each marker below is simply a place a reader might pause. Pick the category that matches your real situation, fill the blanks, and a short factual sentence is assembled from fixed, human-written wording — nothing is generated, dramatized, or invented.

You decide what to share. No category is ever assumed from your data — you choose, and "skip this point" is always an option. Especially for family circumstances: you are never required to disclose more than you're comfortable with. The fixed wording stays factual on purpose — admissions guidance is explicit that this section rewards brief facts, and that emotional reflection belongs in your essay, not here.
Step 3 · One story, everywhere

Your consistent summary

Admissions offices cross-reference. Use this exact wording in the Common App Additional Information section, give it to your counselor for their letter, and reuse it for any "explain a gap" prompt — the same story everywhere reads as credible, because it is.

“Advancing Excellence. Ensuring Success.”

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