How To Write A Winning College Application Essay

How To Write A Winning College Application Essay An admissions essay is not an opening statement in a debate tournament, nor is it a litany of personal accomplishments. CollegeandSeminary.com is dedicated to helping you find the right school, get accepted and create a life and career you love. If you include Step Three in your essay, you will reveal how you are able to take a life lesson beyond how it affected you, as well as your ability to think critically and reflectively. Founded in 1887, The Writer instructs, informs, and inspires writers, providing practical coverage of the craft of writing and of the publishing industry. Google the phrase “college admissions essay,” and more than 6 million results come back. At the top you’ll find countless samples of “essays that worked” and all sorts of tips on what to do in order to get that acceptance letter in the mail. You can write conversationally, but the grammar and spelling still need to be correct. And don’t solely rely on your computer’s spell-checker. Leverage your native culture, traditions, and experiences. If you’re an international applicant, Native American, or otherwise non-traditional student, don’t try to “Americanize” or “mainstream” your application. Where can there be space in the conversation not only for your own curiosity, but also for the curiosity of the other speaker? Framing your essay around this setup will help you make a strong first impression, and one that is organic, personal, and authentic. The goal is to stand out and not appear to be like all the other applicants. Always think about what information you want colleges to know and use when evaluating your application. Don’t share anything that doesn’t make you sound good, unless you absolutely have to and you can turn it around to show the positive. Demonstrate how you are compassionateâ€"don’t just tell readers you are. If you had a difficulty, don’t give the admissions committee a list of complaints. The best way to approach the admissions essay is to see it as a first conversation. To make a great impression, what would you talk about? What about yourself would you be willing to share honestly? What kind of language are you most comfortable using? And most importantly, what do you want to know about your interlocutor? A storyteller sizes up an audience and bends her/his story to the attentions of those present. A storyteller never tells the same story the same way. Or better yet, a storyteller never tells the same story. Don’t just write about what you’re comfortable with, but don’t take a risk that might swallow the essay whole. This may be acceptable for athletes and movie stars who pay for assistance with their memoirs, but should not be commonplace when competing for collegiate acceptance. After Ye Luo rewrote his essay with a narrower, deeper focus, he was accepted by a number of colleges, including Wesleyan University, where he is now a freshman. He hasn’t yet declared a major, but he’s studying Chinese in Wesleyan’s College of East Asian Studies. Ye Luo says that their words gave him a sense of pride and determination to succeed. You can read diverse opinions from our Board of Contributors and other writers on the Opinion front page, on Twitter @USATOpinion and in our daily Opinion newsletter. To submit a letter, comment or column, check oursubmission guidelines. Some college traditions are no longer applicable in today’s society. Let’s come up with a new solution that allows all children fair access to academic institutions. And let’s keep the personal in the essay by not allowing third parties to ghostwrite our children’s future. Students are essentially paying a third party to ghost-write their story in an essay which is supposed to be a culmination of their skill set, not a professional’s. Anyone can tell a story, but only a true storyteller can pull a captivating narrative out of the most mundane parts of life. A storyteller is equal parts collector and sharer, observer and raconteur. A storyteller absorbs the sensations and the happenings of life, and then shapes them into narrative objects of various sizesâ€"here a tall-tale, there a parable, here a quip and there an epic.