ROSE HOROWITZ TUTORING
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What to Know About Writing the College Essay
When students set out to write their essay for the Common Application, the first question they often ask me is: How do I start?
Some students say they have been working on the essay in an English class at school. They think the college essay is done except for the last paragraph. That’s rarely the case.
The funny thing is that despite years of writing at school, most students have no idea how to write a personal essay.
No matter which prompt a student chooses among those offered in the Common Application, know this: you want to write an essay in 650 words getting to the heart of who you are and what makes you unique.
You want admissions counselors to read your essay and say to their colleagues, “Hey, read this essay.”
Beyond that, you want them to see how your experience and passions will add value to their campus to make it a richer place for all students.
Except for poetry, which students usually stop writing after elementary or middle school, writing in school is usually not creative. It is often explanatory.
There’s also the ubiquitous persuasive essay in which you articulate a position, support it, and present a conclusion.
What is it about the personal essay for the Common Application that makes it so foreign? It’s both mundane and amazing; to write this essay well, students have to look inward, consider their own strengths and weaknesses, and be tough on themselves.
Students, even the ones who may be brilliant at English literature or physics, are not used to this deep dive.
For example, one student I worked with was writing about how learning about the history of psychology, being mindful of nature, and seeing a counselor helped her feel better during some difficult months. What she didn’t want to say in the essay was that she actually had reached a low point.
I told her for her story to be believable, she had to deal with the “meat,” the pain, of how and what had helped her change.
Using a short prompt, I encouraged the student to write without stopping for 10 minutes.
Those 10 minutes allowed her to dig deeper and get at the heart of what was hardest for her about this period. Once she did that, she weaved some of those ideas into her essay.
The good news? This student was accepted into her first-choice school.
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