An example of MIT Sloan
Shriram Krishnamurthi’s response on Quora succinctly explains why the “List other institutions” question isn’t particularly meaningful:
I frankly find this a very silly question. It basically invites the candidate to guess why this is being asked and try to project an answer onto it that corresponds to that guess. Then the committee—if they read it at all—projects their guess on the candidate’s guess of their guess, and it becomes an extended game of epistemology.
Applying to graduate school often feels like an elaborate information game between the applicant and the institution. Discussions on platforms like Quora, Reddit, and Academia Stack Exchange reflect this uncertainty. Most contributors suggest leaving the answer blank, though some claim that answering truthfully hasn’t negatively affected them either.
Ultimately, this question—like many others in the application process—may not have a clear, universal dominant strategy. After all, not every game admits a clean equilibrium… Maybe we’ll understand its purpose better someday—but for now, the best strategy might just be to embrace the uncertainty.