College Application Essay Help Course
Video Course: The College Admissions Essay
I’ve always been passionate about written expression. I earned my first $100 at age of ten when I won a state-wide essay contest. Oddly, I don’t remember what my story was about, perhaps because words always flowed so naturally to me. I do remember clutching the certificate tightly to my chest and whispering, “First prize, first prize, first prize.” That was the moment that the world knew I was a writer; it was no longer my secret pastime.
Introduction: The Definitive College Essay Course
I’ve always been passionate about written expression. I earned my first $100 at age of ten when I won a state-wide essay contest. Oddly, I don’t remember what my story was about, perhaps because words always flowed so naturally to me. I do remember clutching the certificate tightly to my chest and whispering, “First prize, first prize, first prize.” That was the moment that the world knew I was a writer; it was no longer my secret pastime.
Before You Write: Understanding the Personal Statement
Close your eyes for a moment and imagine your college application as a jigsaw puzzle. Your academic transcript, activities, personal statement, supplemental essays, test scores, and teacher recommendation letters are all important pieces of the puzzle; each unique piece illustrates an aspect of who you are as an individual.
Picking the Perfect Topic for Your Personal Statement
When it’s time to start writing your college essay, picking a topic can be half the battle! Summing up your entire personhood in 650 words can feel like a daunting task, especially when the stakes are high. So, where do you begin?
The Admissions Essay: It’s Not as Hard as AP English
When you are writing an admissions essay, simply adhering to the rules of grammar you learned in middle school and using vocabulary words you picked up during SAT prep will not cut it. In fact, if you feel you need a thesaurus, then the writing is probably already bad. What you need is to keep in mind common pitfalls and these tips on structuring your essay.
Fatal Flaws: Mistakes to Avoid in Your College Essay
Since writing a college essay can feel a bit nerve-wracking for many students, here’s some good news for you: there isn’t one “right” way to write a college essay, no pun intended. Successful college essays come in a wide array of topics, representing a myriad of student voices. Wait, does that basically mean that anything goes? Nope! While there are many right ways to craft an essay, there are also quite a few wrong ways. If you’re wondering exactly what not to do, you came to the right place. Here, we’ll dive into some common mistakes that can inadvertently send your essay right to the bottom of the stack.
The Personal Statement: Writing a Winning Introduction
The opening paragraph of your college essay is a critical example of why first impressions matter. Writing a vivid, compelling introduction “hooks” your reader and draws them in, making them want to read to know the rest of your story. So, how do you create a winning introduction?
The Personal Statement: Writing the Perfect Conclusion
So, you’ve written a mesmerizing personal statement, capturing your unique story while allowing your personality and voice to shine through. Yet, one question looms in your mind: “How do I end this thing?
The Personal Statement: An Editing Checklist
Waves of relief wash over you as you write the final words to your college essay. You’re finished! Go ahead and breathe a big sigh of relief.
As tempting as it may be to hit “submit” on your applications without taking another glance behind you, editing your essay is a very important part of the writing process. Here’s a foolproof editing checklist to make sure that your finished draft is flawless.
Writing the “Why Us” Supplemental Essay
So, you’ve finished a stellar Common Application essay. What’s next? It’s likely that some of the colleges you’re applying to require one or more supplemental essays. A supplemental essay is a school-specific writing prompt and can range drastically in word count and content, depending on the institution and the prompt. A very common supplemental essays is the “Why Us” essay. In this type of prompt, a university attempts to zero in on exactly why a student has chosen to apply.
Writing the “Why This Major” Supplemental Essay
Many selective colleges use supplemental essay prompts as an opportunity to learn more about your specific areas of academic interest. Here are a few examples:
Writing on the Topic of Identity, Diversity, Belonging, & Community
In recent years, supplemental essays on the topics of personal identity and diversity have grown in popularity among many universities. In some cases, this prompt is optional (which we know isn’t really optional, right? By not responding, you’re relinquishing a valuable opportunity to share yourself with the admissions committee.) In other cases, this type of prompt is a required part of the application process.
Writing the “Quotation” Supplement
Using famous (or not-so-famous) quotations in your college essay is a bit risky because it's easy to unintentionally cross over into cliché territory. Additionally, when you’re limited by a maximum word count, you want those words to highlight you, not some former politician, author, advocate, or celebrity.
Unleashing Creativity: Writing Supplements with a Twist
Every once in a while, you may run into an exceptional quirky essay prompt, leaving you wondering, “What should I write about?” or perhaps more importantly, “Why would an admissions team want me to write about this topic anyway?
Admissions officers are busy people, and they do a lot of reading. Imagine stacks and stacks of essays. So, you can rest assured that you’ll never be asked to write an essay that isn’t significant to the college’s admissions decision making. If a supplemental essay is included in the application, it is important to their evaluation process, no matter how silly, unusual, or creative the prompt.
Finishing Strong
It is great to ensure that grammatically, all your punctuation is correct, you do not misuse "their/there/they're," "your/you're," or any other common mistakes, and you do not have any misused prepositions. However, before we get to that point, you will still want to check your content one more time.
The Final Step: Get Help
No matter how much work you put into the essay, you are going to have blind spots. The more work you put into it, the harder it will be to recognize these blind spots since you will be so invested in it, even if you edit your draft multiple times. To ensure the highest quality product, it makes the most sense to get help. There are two ways to do it.
Conclusion: The Definitive College Essay Course
The college essay process is a unique opportunity to reveal important aspects of yourself that aren’t evident in other aspects of your college application. As a result of the Definitive College Essay Course, it is my hope that you have learned something new that you feel more confident about the writing process.
Learn by Example: Passion Essays
You should infuse your essay with passion. But it’s not enough to write a laundry list of the things you’ve done that demonstrate your commitment to your passion. An essay about passion should follow the tried and true writing adage: Show, don’t tell.
Learn by Example: Intellectual Curiosity
When you are applying to college, a baseline assumption is that you are continuing your education in order to learn from the professors and academic resources available at the schools you are applying to. Therefore, one way to impress admissions officers is to show them how you can contribute to the academic community in college.
Learn by Example: Identity
Who are you? That’s the question the essays in this section attempt to answer. Of course, we are all complex individuals with many interests and experiences, but the applicants in this chapter refuse to get bogged down in trying to exhaustively represent themselves.