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Can it work against an applicant if they adjust the margins so that they can squeeze a few more lines into the personal statement? Also, what about using a smaller font (11 or 11.5 instead of 12)?

Thanks.

Cut out unnecessary words and fluff instead. And yes, there is some stuff that can go. Rewrite your sentences to be shorter. Legal writing is consise, better to start practicing now.

My understanding is that 11 is fine, but I wouldn't adjust margins. Adcoms read a bunch of these--they can probably spot smaller margins pretty quickly.

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The only app I ran across that specifically asked for 12 pt font was UCLA. (I didn't apply to t6, so I can't speak to those) but on that particular app, I adjusted the margins to .9 and took out the extra line space below the header so everything would fit. A small change like that might not get noticed (I hope), but if you need a bigger adjustment, then it probably is best cut something out.

Would it be grounds for rejecting an applicant? Assuming that their numbers are at medians...

I think it would depend on whether or not you ignored something that was specified in the application. If it asks for 12 pt NTR and you use 11pt arial, then I think it would be frowned upon. Idk if that by itself would be ding-worthy; but if it came down to you and somebody who followed directions, then it might. I've read that the #1 mistake made on apps is not following directions.

I think if it's not made clear, then either 11 or 12 pt would be fine. If you need to adjust margins a bit to make a couple of sentences fit, then that's probably ok, too. If you need to make them .7 to squeeze in an extra third of a page or something, it's probably not a good idea. I would say just use common sense. They read hundreds of essays, if the formatting is close, they probably aren't going to take the time to check. If it's obviously different from the rest, they might investigate.

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