In my last post on Admissions Essay Writing, I explained that winning essays require not only perfect grammar but also honesty, individuality, and imagination. I discussed individuality last time. Here I will discuss imagination.
Whatever the topic, your admissions essay is a story. As such, it must possess many of the same characteristics as fiction.
1. Your essay should have a beginning, a middle, and an end.
Put your protagonist (yourself) up a tree (beginning). Throw rocks at him or her (middle). Get him or her down (end).
For each of the Common Application essay topics, the different parts of your story will serve the same basic function.
Beginning: Define what you want or need
Background Story: To connect to the past (e.g., that of your family or your homeland)
Time You Challenged a Belief: To connect to the present (e.g., religion, subculture, or society at large)
Failure: To achieve something specific
Place You’re Content: To find somewhere you belong
Transition to Adulthood: To mature
Middle: You struggle to meet your want or need.
Background Story: You delve into some part of your history.
Time You Challenged a Belief: You experience discomfort with an idea forming part of the religion, subculture, or society to which you want to connect.
Failure: You work hard but fail.
Place You’re Content: You spend time somewhere, having experiences that mold you.
Transition to Adulthood: You face a situation where you must take responsibility.
End: You integrate your new experiences into your identity or understanding.
Background Story: You pursue an interest or embody qualities you share with your forebears.
Time You Challenged a Belief: You realize that the world is not black and white and that you are your own person.
Failure: You apply lessons learned to succeed at something else.
Place You’re Content: You draw on your special place for strength so you can continue to grow.
Transition to Adulthood: You incorporate your new-found sense of responsibility into other aspects of life.
The common thread in all of these is that
a. Something changes for you.
b. You struggle.
c. You learn from that struggle and become a better, brighter person.
2. Your essay should feature a compelling character (i.e., you).
Every story requires a hero readers root for. You need to make the character come alive. How? Make yourself vulnerable. Share a few details about yourself that you’re not sure you want others to know. Are you addicted to Korean dramas? Do you stuff yourself with Cheetos when you’re bummed out? Did you used to want to be a firefighter? Were you afraid of the dark (or clowns) as a child? One or two details like this will make you REAL to the essay reader (a person, not a list of activities or a GPA). Then, the reader will want you to succeed.
3. Your essay shou
ld include lots of specific detail.
Your essay must be as specific as you can make it. The more detail you provide, the more interesting and individualized your essay will seem.
Failure
Good: You tried to achieve high grades.
Better: You tried to make the mathletes team or understand an Emily Dickinson poem well enough to write a meaningful essay.
Place You’re Content
Good: Your house
Better: An attic stuffed with boxes of your parents’ junk that you reach by climbing a ladder
Good: Your backyard
Better: A stream (that appears every year but only in the spring) surrounded by black cherry trees, one of which came down in a recent ice storm and has been lying on the ground ever since
4. Your essay should contain specific, vibrant language.
Avoid adjectives and verbs that don’t offer specific descriptive detail.
Good: Go up the stairs
Better: Climb the stairs
Good: Smart classmate
Better: A human calculator
Use as many of the five senses as possible.
Sight: A white three-story Victorian house with a tower room
Hearing: Creaky floorboards, the hum of track lighting, the low thud of a foot hitting a kicking bag, the hollow echo of a knock on the door
Smell: the moldy smell of old books, the earthy, herbal scent of burning sage, the smell of sweat and dirty socks at an indoor sports competition
Taste: the salt in sea air, the metallic taste of blood, the bitterness of coffee
Touch: cool, smooth metal, the graininess of sand underfoot, the crunch of an apple