How I Know You Wrote Your Kids College Essay

How I Know You Wrote Your Kid’s College Essay Students use their grades and test scores to select where they apply. That means every college has a pool of applicants with similar grades and test scores. Risa C. Doherty is a copy editor and education and parenting writer whose work has appeared in The New York Times, Working Mother and Boston Parents Paper, among others. DON’T be pretentious or overly formal â€"this is not the time to play the role of Albert Einstein or Mother Teresa if that’s not who you are. Resist the temptation to portray yourself as a saint with a 4.0â€"you’re better off presenting the real you. DO be yourself â€" your essay should sound as if it could have been written by no one else. In that case, you might share a story about why you’re interested in studying a certain program that you can only find there â€" grounding it in an anecdote from your past â€" or a professor you want to study with. You don’t have to solely focus on academics, although you should make them a main point of your essay. Your familial connections may also factor in, but they shouldn’t be your sole reason for applying. Finally, if you can find pretty much all the reasons you give through a cursory look at the website or brochure, that’s a sign that it’s time to dive a little deeper. The “Why this college” or “Why us” prompts are fairly common. We’ll make sure you get the right guidance at the right time. She has a BA in English from Skidmore College and an MFA from the Warren Wilson Program for Writers, where she studied poetry. Before earning her graduate degree, she attended the New York Summer Writers Institute, The Breadloaf Writers Conference, and the Five Powers of Poetry Conference for Teachers. Even if you didn’t visit, you can still establish a strong connection to the school. In a 2007 Boston magazine article, Harry Lewis, former dean of Harvard College, drew a parallel between professional essay editing and hiring an imposter to sit for the SAT. “All this scribbling has almost nothing to do with whether the student gets in,” he wrote. DO write about other people as well as about yourself. We are defined as individuals largely through relationships and experiences with others. DO write about something about which you feel strongly. Did you know that Babson has a Writing Center on campus? Staffed by professors and peer consultants, it offers a supportive environment to practice and refine your writing. Describe a time when you made a meaningful contribution to others in which the greater good was your focus. Discuss the challenges and rewards of making your contribution. is a published poet and a high school English teacher. If you write on a topic in which you have little interest or knowledge, your lack of sincerity and enthusiasm will show. Essay writing tips adapted from Kelly Tanabe’s “Four Steps to Writing a Winning Admissions Essay, Part I”. See how eliminating extra words actually makes your point stronger? Eliminatingprepositionsis a great, easy way to tighten your writing. Start with a creative lead.Capture the readers’ interestin the first two sentences. DON’T use the personal statement essay to repeat your resume. Whether it’s one lesson or seven, you decide what to spend. DON’T let your tutor or your teacher or your parents take over your essay. The resulting essay will not reflect you and thus will not accomplish its goal, no matter how “good” it seems to be. You can also include traditions, extracurricular activities, and the campus itself. Prestige and rankings are another topic to avoid. Yes, Yale is very prestigious and consistently ranks among the top three universities in U.S.