writing a college admission essay

writing a college admission essay

Writing a Compelling College Admission Essay

1. Introduction

This book is designed to provide you with the best advice and tips for writing a compelling admission essay for your college application. Our aim is to help you make this opportunity the most successful and rewarding experience of self-analysis you have ever undertaken. Most importantly, your college application essay must be written to the specific prompt, be honest, and must be the writing that you own. Remember to carry your unique voice and point of view into your essay to help it stand out among the hundreds of essays that admissions officers will review. This book will guide you step by step through the essay writing process to help you produce a well-crafted personal statement that will enhance your college application. The essay section of your college application can seem quite intense, especially after filling in the easy stuff like your name, address, and test scores. Where do you begin? What should it sound like? Who can you ask for help? We will try to answer all your questions and concerns on this site and in the e-book. This may be the most difficult writing experience you have ever undertaken, but it will certainly be worthwhile!

2. Understanding the Prompt

In the definition option, the event or realization you utilize will confirm your perspective. Just as with an occasion from the past, admissions officers are in command of your reasoning and the outcome. They want to see that as you experienced cause and effect. The outcome with any option should be a shift from incorrect or missing, to understanding and growth.

Your editorial should be centered around you, however it’s not about you. Your function is to tell your viewers about something related and fascinating: a spot, an exercise, anything. If you choose the “occasion” or “realization” possibility, you’re primarily telling a narrative. You won’t be telling of previous failures or poor choices. Admissions officers will appreciate you more if you choose an “occasion” or “realization” that improved you as an individual. An individual who is prepared and educated is more likely to succeed than an individual who’s merely intelligent. Remember, this part of the essay is not about a detailed description of one thing from the past. So you’ll write about this later. Now you want to inform your viewer why and how this occasion affected you.

3. Crafting an Engaging Narrative

After this, you pull it is time to pull the reader into becoming more involved with your narrative. Ask the reader to put themselves in the place of the people involved. Is your brother wondering whether or not he should allow dad’s experience to affect the financial aid that he will accept from a university? Any decision made there amounts to borrowing the money in no small sum. Would your reader like the chance to secure your family’s future with some initiative, but it to not be recognized as you taking the easy route? This is a little bit past rhetorical questioning, but you are still not employing pathos. You need the reader to step into the role of doing a very specific action, that is pathos. At this point, you will describe a specific scenario vividly and say “now put yourself in his shoes”.

Recount an incident that vividly describes the problem and its causes. If you have a story to hang on this point that involves one or more of the people that you are expected to write about, then it’s to your advantage to relate that story. Ads are not only an effective form of rhetoric for its calling towards a particular action, but the ad employs pathos, logos, and ethos altogether. Remember to employ pathos here; it will serve you well. Step two: The Journey. This part of the narrative will tell the reader how one or more of the people involved responded to the problem.

Creating a narrative, what information to include or not to include is your first decision. Do not let any one part of the question go unanswered, but remember, it’s all too easy to overload your essay with extraneous information. Resisting the urge to save ten different essays for ten different questions is essential since it’s very likely that with more titles you will end up tunneling to the same. It is often helpful to ask someone else to have a look at your beginning, especially if the said person has not read the work that you are discussing, to tell whether or not it makes sense. If your reader cannot make heads or tails of your narrative, then your essay has achieved its goal.

4. Highlighting Achievements and Experiences

I tried to use a tone to portray myself as a positive and effective learner, and the strategies and effects on me in the long run were further used. I used an event in a basketball game to show that one learns from their mistakes. High points in each event led to specific achievements and how my character changed and developed. This is essential to show to a college because learning from mistakes and developing into a better person is a key ingredient for a student. A good student is what every university wants to recruit to graduate from their school. In my essay, I have shown how challenges have changed and made me a better person, preparing me as an ideal candidate for university.

After assessing rough drafts and getting feedback from different teachers, I began to write full essays. With each new essay, I wrote about a new challenge or event I faced, and it proved to be very effective. This is where I began to learn how challenges bring out the best in a person. To me, it was very important to show a college the type of person I am and the characteristics that I possess. I started with a quote or a definition of a life lesson. The best decisions stemmed from there and were informative and effective.

After reflecting on the life-changing event of moving to a new country, I decided to write about new challenges and how well I managed to overcome them. My essay would showcase that hard times make an individual grow and learn for the better, as well as a certain event or challenge that has changed their life. This was important to me to express to colleges, as I felt that my move was a very crucial time in my life with new lessons learned. I first wrote certain events and challenges before even attempting to write a full essay. This allowed me to trigger emotions and strong points for an effective essay.

5. Conclusion and Final Tips

Don’t: – Write a cliché or super typical essay. Admissions counselors read hundreds of the same essay. – Be a perfectionist. No one’s first draft is perfect. Embrace mistakes. – Waste time trying to impress the reader. Attempting to write an essay specifically to reel in an audience can and will lead to failure. – Feel that an overwhelming, traumatic or life-changing event is the only thing that makes a good writing topic. Students often get stuck on the idea that unless they write about an event like divorce, dysfunction, or death, then their essay will not be meaningful.

Do: – Completely draft a main idea before you even begin writing. – Make sure your writing reflects you and your intelligence. – Write a personal and truthful essay. – If possible, try to write about something you enjoy. – Be unique, be different. Try not to write something that seems the same as everyone else. – Double check grammar and spelling. – Get a second opinion—having someone else comment on your essay is a great way to know if you’ve effectively communicated the message you were attempting to portray.

It’s conclusion time. Conclusions are short, simple and effective. So, instead of taking this time to recap on everything that I have already mentioned, I am going to leave you with a list of Grace’s do’s and don’ts for college essay writing. Trust me, if you follow the “do” list and avoid the “don’t” list, your essay writing process will be MUCH easier.