Essay is a small part of admissions

Students may be sweating the new essay portion of the SAT, but college admissions officials say the essay is unlikely to make or break an applicant's chance of getting in.

''We have 3½ years of student work that we look at very critically, and that is given more weight than an essay or SAT score," said John Hamel, director of undergraduate admissions at Suffolk University.

The updated Scholastic Aptitude Tests, making their debut this weekend, give students 25 minutes to write a short essay with a point of view.

Many colleges are taking a wait-and-see approach. Georgetown University has postponed its use of the new writing section because of concerns about fairness, a spokeswoman said. At MIT, dean of admissions Marilee Jones said the institute may allow next year's applicants to submit scores from the older version of the test.

''We're not sure we trust the scoring system yet, because it will be done by thousands of people across the country, and we want to be sure it's not going to penalize certain kids," Jones said. She said MIT will also conduct its own studies of the new test ''to see if it's a reliable indicator."

Colleges already require essays from applicants. But as college admissions have grown more competitive and as families have increasingly sought the help of professional counselors, more essays are enhanced by coaching and editing, making them less helpful in assessing a student's ability.

Admissions directors said the SAT writing samples, which the College Board plans to make available online, may prove useful in a small number of cases in which students submit highly polished essays, but their transcripts show mediocre grades in English.

''For most applications, that would be unnecessary, but where the record is erratic, it's another piece of information, a raw sample, to help us make a good decision," said Sherri Geller, senior associate director of admissions at Brandeis University.

Writing samples have long been available: Many selective colleges already required applicants to take the optional SAT II subject test in writing, which has now been retired.

The SAT's major competitor, the ACT, recently added an optional writing test, and Brandeis will now require that section from applicants who take the ACT, including many in the South and the Midwest, Geller said.

At Brandeis, where 7,300 applications have been received for 700 spots, test scores are considered third, after a student's overall academic record and personal history, including leadership experience and family circumstances.

Other schools say they will use the essay results to assess the skills of incoming freshmen, to help decide, for example, what level English class they should attend.

The SAT revisions haven't changed minds at Mount Holyoke College, where administrators switched to an SAT-optional policy five years ago. Applicants, about 30 percent of whom choose not to send test scores, are required to submit a graded high school paper, which offers information about the quality of their high school instruction, as well as their writing skills, said Jane Brown, the college's vice president of enrollment.

Like the rest of the SAT, she said, the writing section is likely to be coachable, putting poorer students at a disadvantage.

''We're often asked if we're inclined to rethink our decision, and the answer is no, because our basic concern about the SAT has not changed," she said. ''We want to place the emphasis on the entire academic record, and we're finding the kind of writing we ask for is a better indicator of students' real writing skills."