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Tips on Writing Essays

The college essay is often the most difficult part of an application for admission to college. To help you get off to a good start, we have put together the following tips and hints. These are comments from our admission staff that actually read your essays and evaluate them in the admission process. We can’t guarantee results, but this advice might help you get started.

  • The essay is one of the few things that you have control complete control over in the application, especially by the time that you are in your senior year. You’ve already earned most of your grades; you have already made most of your impressions on your teachers; and the chances are, you’ve already found a set of activities you are interested in continuing. So when you write the essay, view it as something more than just a page to fill up with writing. View it as an opportunity to tell the admissions committee about who you are as a person (italics added).

  • Be yourself. If you are funny, write a funny essay, it you are serious, write a serious essay. Don’t start reinventing yourself with the essay.

  • If you are recounting an amusing and light-hearted anecdote from your childhood, it doesn’t have to read like a Congressional Act. Make it fun.

  • Tell us something different from what we will read on your list of extracurricular activities or transcript.

  • Take time to go beyond the obvious. Think about what most students might write in response to the question and then try something a bit different.

  • Don’t try to take on too much. Focus on one “most influential person,” one event, or one activity. Tackling too much tends to make your essay too watered down or disjointed.

  • Concentrate on topics of true significance to you. Don’t be afraid to reveal yourself in your writing. We want to know who you are and how you think.

  • Write thoughtfully and from the heart. It’ll be clear who believes in what they are saying versus those who are simply saying what they think we want to hear.

  • Essays should have a thesis that is clear to you and the reader. Your thesis should indicate where you are going and what you are trying to communicate from the outset.

  • Don’t do a history report. Some background knowledge is okay, but do not re-hash what other authors have already said or written.

  • Answer each schools essay individually. Recycled “utility essays” come across as impersonal and sanitized. The one exception is an essay written for and submitted to the Common Application schools.

  • Proofread, proofread, and proofread. Nothing says "last-minute essay” like “are” instead of “our” or “their,” instead of “they’re”.

  • Keep it short and to the point.

  • Limit the number of people from whom you request feedback on your essay. Too much input creates an essay that sounds as though it has been written by a committee or results in writing that is absent your own voice.

  • Appearance cannot replace substance, but it can certainly enhance the value of an already well-written essay.

 

There are some great websites that will help you when you are writing your college admissions essays. Below is a list of some useful sites:

www.quintcareers.com/college_application_essay.html

http://www.hamilton.edu/admission/counselors/loras-tips-for-a-good-college-essay

http://www.nacacnet.org/studentinfo/articles/pages/top-ten-tips-for-writing-a-college-essay-.aspx


Tips on the Common Application  - http://collegeapps.about.com/od/essays/a/common-application-essay-prompts.htm?nl=1

About.com has useful articles, too (some of these are for the old Common Application prompts, but they are still helpful when writing essays):

5 Tips for a Winning Essay
10 Bad Essay Topics
The Six Essay Options for the Common Application

 

Sample Admissions Essays

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