Writing Feedback / Computer games are time consuming and they do not provide educational value [3]

Hi Vu, listen, you did a good enough job on this essay to score a 3, in my opinion at least. There were a number of mistakes made in the development of the essay which led to the lower end score for your essay. The first problem, is that your opening paraphrase is not exactly accurate. While you did offer a proper discussion instruction at the end, you did not clearly depict the topic for discussion. That is the main reason your score had to be lowered. A more appropriate paraphrase for your essay is:

There is a discussion as to whether computer games as a form of entertainment are a trivial use of time for children. That is why youngsters should be prevented from participating in this activity. I agree with this opinion based on several reasons.

Your opening statement was not really a proper paraphrase of the original prompt because it does not follow the template of the original discussion. In the version that I wrote for you, the theme of the original prompt remained intact up to the presentation of the personal opinion at the end.

Now, the prompt indicates that you have to discuss only one opinion for this essay. There is no option for a comparative analysis. As such, your presentation became faulty to a great extent. Even though you over discussed the opinions, you did not really develop a convincing explanation for any of them because you tried to discuss too much in one paragraph. A standard ruling for the essay response development is, do it within 5 sentences and focus on only 1 topic so that you can clearly explain yourself. That is how you increase your scoring chances in any English test. You must stick to only one discussion per paragraph. Since you have 3 body of paragraphs for the essay, you should use the paragraphs to present 3 solid and convincing evidence of your opinion. There is no need to present an opposing argument as it is not required by the prompt.

The concluding statement is too short and limits your scoring considerations. Always write at least 3 sentences for a better scoring consideration. Just restate the prompt in a new manner, summarize the details of the discussion or topic sentences, then repeat you opinion at the end. Simple, but effective in increasing your score overall.

Scholarship / Strong network I get would be beneficial for my career and Indonesia coastal development [3]

Shofia, you need to stop repeating that you work for your father or family company. You have repeated that in every essay that you have developed even though the Chevening prompt instructions continuously warns you against repeating information in your essay. Please, I am begging you, for your own good, remove those references in all your essays except one. You are endangering your application by constantly reminding the reviewer that you come from a wealthy family. The impression is that you do not need this scholarship because your family is so well placed, but just do not want to pay for an education that you can obviously afford to pay for overseas. Now is not the time to keep bragging about your family's well to do position in your society. That is going to work detrimentally towards your application.

I also noticed that there is no solid reference to a UK maritime project sponsorship in your country. You really need to find such a project to refer to in this essay because without it, your application will be rejected. I have said this enough times. If the UK does not have an active project in your country that serves as a priority interest then your application will not be part of the priority considerations and will have to battle it out with some other non-essential applicants for the remaining limited slots for non priority projects. Which means, you stand a very slim chance of getting this scholarship.

This is one instance when your country's president's idea for more UK - Indonesia cooperation will not matter very much in the context of your application. It is the existing UK-Indonesia project in this field of interest to you that can win or lose you this scholarship in the final round.

Scholarship / You cannot hope to build a better world without improving the individuals; leadership question [4]

Heba, these essays normally function best when you go direct to the point in your discussion. While others do find it beneficial to give a personal definition of leadership, that should only be done if one has a very strong sense of leadership that has developed over the span of a professional career. I don't believe that is necessary to do in your essay. You may very well open with your third paragraph and then further develop your essay from there.

What I noticed in your essay is that you dropped the terms leadership and influencing in various forms in the essay almost like a social media hashtag. That isn't how this essay works. You cannot imply leadership and influencing. You must justify it with solid situations in your workplace. For example, when you say that you took the lead on conducting "influential" regional trainings, you must give a specific instance of leadership and influencing that occurred during that activity. Justified by a successful outcome for your organization. Indicate what sorts of actions you have taken as a leader that resulted in positive outcomes in terms of combating the crimes that were ongoing at the time. What was your success percentage and indicate how that information can be verified.

Influential discussions are easy to mention, explaining how it became influential is another thing. Develop the scenario for actual presentation. The essay functions on solid examples, not lip service. Actual action must be exemplified and supported with verifiable data such as the names of places, organizations, dates, and results. You only did this once throughout what should have been an information heavy leadership and influencing essay.

It would be best if you skip the university presentation and just work on using the full 500 words on developing your professional skills in leadership and influencing. That will be the most impressive presentation that you can do in this essay.

Writing Feedback / Population worldwide until 2100 and its distribution between developed and developing countries [2]

Khang, you are looking at a possible high score of 4 with the type of presentation that you have given. There are a number of problems with the presentation that you used because you did not accurately represent the contents of the summary overview and the rest of the chart in the paper.

You have to be conscious of the fact that each paragraph is only considered properly informative if you have 3-5 sentences (maximum) in each presentation paragraph. Each paragraph needs to contain a specific set of data in order to be completed. In a Task 1 essay, a total of 3 paragraphs will already garner you an acceptable score provided the other criteria for scoring are met.

For the summary overview that you presented at the beginning, the missing information include:
1. A proper paraphrasing of the given prompt.
2. A representation of the discussion instructions.
3. A trending statement that will kick off the essay discussion.
4. A transition sentence (optional)

In every body paragraph, the transition sentence is not optional because you will be scored on the smoothness of your presentation and your ability to interconnect the discussion from one paragraph to the next as part of the GRA considerations. So the body paragraphs need to contain:

1. A topic sentence, usually a summary of information from the chart.
2. Supporting data from the chart.
3. A comparison whenever possible.

The biggest problem in your essay is that you do not even provide an actual comparison of data within the chart unless you are mentioning the end of the measurement scale. A properly referenced summary indicates the numerical data, as indicated within the chart. Use a ruler when necessary to guide the numerical information presentation analysis on your end. Rough estimates may be used in placed of actual data when the graph does not indicate an actual numerical figure. You cannot present just the beginning and the end. The trending information within the chart must also be represented as part of the comparison analysis.

The same discussion format should have also been used for the second chart, which you barely began to discuss in your presentation as the final paragraph. All you had to do was properly represent the growth of the developing regions against the developed regions. The developed regions showed a steady number that never increased or decreased as the years progressed. That should have been properly indicated in order for this essay to have been properly informative to its reader.

As for the conclusion, that is optional in a Task 1 essay so it doesn't matter that you don't have a concluding statement represented in this essay.

Writing Feedback / Studying English will give many advantages to myself and to the future of Timor-Leste. [5]

Crissia, kindly provide the IELTS prompt that you are responding to so that I can better assess the work that you have done. It is difficult to analyze your work as I have no idea what you are trying to discuss and how you should be discussing it. The proper formatting for the IELTS essay is also not being followed. The problem, is that I cannot give you an example of the proper discussion format because I don't know what you are being asked to represent in the essay. Therefore, even though I see that you have a some what well developed essay here, I am stuck when it comes to correcting your mistakes and redirecting your format towards the proper discussion style. While you do have an acceptable grasp of the English language, this does not automatically mean that you know how to properly discuss a test prompt. Kindly provide that the next time you post an essay for review here. Right now, I can see the potential in you. I just don't know how to hone it yet.

Undergraduate / U-dub supplement: Being an Ambassador since age 2 [2]

Good work Joanna, I don't see any reason why this essay will not work as a response to the prompt. You may want to clarify which Chinese language you speak though as I have heard that each province of China has a different take on the Chinese language. So do you speak Fookien Chinese, Mandarin Chinese, or what? Being specific about it will also add to the unique perspective and point of view that you are presenting. While the Chinese traditions may be standard, the languages that the Chinese language has offshoots of helps you to become even more diversified than you think. You may want to add information, rather than remove information though. For instance, when you say that you are a natural pro at the language and cultural translation, you may want to add how this blended background has created a unique understanding of the world we live in for you. Maybe explain that as you tread two worlds, you also manage to widen your understanding of the things that make each culture unique and diversified, which has led to an interesting personality development on your part. You can still add that information if you wish to. You still have the available word allotment available to do so.

Scholarship / I need an MBA that has both traditional and practical approach to learning. I chose my universities. [6]

It's very good but lacking in the academic foundation reference that is required as part of the explanation of how your academic studies and professional achievements have helped to prepare you for a masters degree course. The academic foundation should be the paragraph before the course outline. The professional experience in relation to the programs chosen need to be depicted on an individualized level as well. So the format of the sentences should be:

1. Reason you chose the course.
2. Relevant academic foundation (class, internship, or other academically related experience)
3. Relevant professional experience that connects with the program.
4. Future work application.

Based on the format I gave you, this means that you have to present a general academic description first. Then you explain specialized courses that you took in relation to the masters degree you chose. The relevant work experience should be self explanatory, as well as the future job application.

You can actually remove the reference to your skills that you believe makes you a perfect MS student and instead, bring down the work experience explanation that you have opening the essay at the moment. It will be more balanced with an academic presentation first, professional experience, last presentation of paragraphs. You then have an appropriate opening and closing statement for your essay.

Overall, this is shaping up to become a pretty solid essay. A few more tweaks are required but you should be able to come up with a new, more usable version based on my instructions above.

Scholarship / I have practiced different levels of leadership during the last 8 years and in different channels. [3]

Ahmed, are you sure that your 9 part time work experiences, when combined with your 14 month permanent work experience will total 2 years worth of job exposure? Simply saying 8 years varied work experience does not mean you have the total work hours required completed. You must compute those work hours in order to make sure you pass the required minimum work hours. Remember, Chevening will accept part time job references, along with relevant volunteer work, only if it adds up to a total of 2 years or 2,800 hours total of work time. Therefore, you need to make a reference to the length of time that you performed in each work capacity for the computation of your 2 years work experience to be valid. So work schedules and years you participated in these activities need to be indicated in the essay.

Now, it is not only the work time that you need to be qualified for in this essay. It also needs to have clear depictions of your leadership and influencing roles in every instance. The references to these elements are questionable in this essay as the representations are not clear. You also need to discuss each of the 9 part time jobs that you have had that exemplify the leadership and influencing skills or, at least mention the most significant one that you can think of to justify those roles during those work periods. Clarify what the job was, what your position was, then the situation that required your leadership and influencing skills to come into play. I think there is a potential to prove these points in your essay. Unfortunately, the presentation of the requirements remained unclear to the end of your essay.

Scholarship / "Leadership is an art that can be developed"; the leadership and influential skills [6]

Estephanie, this is an essay that will disqualify you from the running as a scholarship applicant. The leadership skills that you need to reflect must be on a the professional level. It must also reflect a leadership and influencing ability that took place within the last 2 years, at the very least, within a professional setting. Your experience is practical in presentation because these are examples of how you developed your leadership skills over time. These are not applicable to the workplace where you could prove that you have the ability to lead people and also, influence their actions towards a positive outcome. Why can't you refer to a professional leadership role? Is it because you do not have one to depict? If you don't then you don't have a chance at this scholarship. If you are just shy about sharing it, then don't be. It is what the scholarship committee needs to learn about you. Pick your best professional leadership and influencing ability. That is the only way to do it. Remember, you need to show that you have the potential to make a change in your country upon your return from the Chevening sponsored masters studies. The information you shared, just doesn't prove that.

Graduate / Columbia MPH in Sociomedical Sciences Personal Statement [2]

Tracy, your essay will fall under the prompt requirements much better if you remove the first two paragraphs that you currently have in this version. Those 2 paragraphs do not have a direct response in relation to the questions you are being asked to answer. Therefore, these are irrelevant information that take sup too much of the essay portion that the reviewer uses to consider your application. Since your response does not fall within the required immediate responses, in all likelihood, the reviewer will stop reading your essay before he finishes the first paragraph. Since the third paragraph and its succeeding accompaniment fully responds to the required discussion elements, you should simply open with that and keep on track with the attached paragraphs. No need to revise or edit. You just need to delete the unnecessary elements and the essay will be highly prompt responsive already. If you do want to add some information, you could focus on the career element of the response. Since you only indicate an internship here, you would be doing yourself a disservice. Try to reflect a more professional career goal instead. That is, if you want to.

Scholarship / Suddenly something changed when I tried to do something new and said adieu to my comfort zone. [3]

Mukhtiar, you need to focus this essay on your leadership and influencing abilities on only 2 fronts. The first, is when you developed the android app and you had to convince a foreign investor to give you a start up capital, and then depict how you gathered the team of 5 people to work with you on the development of the project. You may not know it but, the foundation of your future leadership and influencing skills became evident during this time. More importantly, it focuses and shows a clear influencing style which is required by the essay. Second, discuss how you created Alpha Brains and what sort of leadership challenges you faced when you were starting the company. That will illustrate your leadership abilities. 2 different stories, but 2 strong stories that depict impressive leadership and influencing styles on 2 different occasions. That is exactly what Chevening is looking for.

Scholarship / I'm applying for Chevening scholarship and they are asking to write Networking skills essay [3]

Hussein, this is not an essay that qualifies as a networking discussion. You are not even trying to identify how your exterior network is developed, maintained, and used. A usable professional network needs to go beyond the workplace in order to increase its usability. I do not see any indication of you going outside of the workplace in order to create business or professional contacts. You are boxed into your place of employment. Those contacts are not networks because you did not have to cultivate them. These are in place automatically for you to use in the performance of your tasks. A true network is created for a purpose because one does not exist to address the necessities of your job. Therefore, you will need to revise the full content of your essay to reflect an out of work network that actually assisted you in the performance of your tasks. Make sure that you can justify the network as being useful to Chevening due to a specific purpose otherwise your essay will be incomplete.

Scholarship / 3 Choices of University Courses that Will Develop My Career. [3]

Obbie, your first course choice is the weakest presentation in this essay because it is the one that doesn't have any "meat" to its presentation. Since this is your first option for study and will be the course you will enroll in when your scholarship is approved, you need to expand the discussion in this paragraph. Remove the information about the data you got from the internet. Don't talk about the courses, Instead, discuss how the internship program will help you to improve your skills as a State Auditor in your country. That is the most important element of the course curriculum you have chosen and that is the discussion with the most applicability to the work you are doing, so focus on that instead. In order to bring down the word count of your essay, you need to shorten the introductory paragraph. Just say that graft and corruption is the main problem in your country and experts in the field of "graft and corruption elimination" are necessary in order to eradicate the problem, which is why you are interested in the 3 courses. You do not need to give such a detailed explanation in the opening paragraph. The main concern here are your university choices. Keep your closing statement. That helps to reinforce the discussions you have presented. You cannot have an essay that does not have a closing paragraph. That is not done in an academic setting.

Scholarship / The use of my networking skills on a specific example from my professional development [5]

Sasha, you asked @Meyamoo if you have to revise the essay and the response was you just have to edit it. I hope you will not be cross with me but, in my expert opinion, you have to revise the whole essay. The Chevening networking essay must focus solely on your post study network development. That means, you cannot use the story about how you got an internship because that was done during your academic time. This whole essay covers a period of time when you were not building a professional network so you will automatically get eliminated from consideration for the scholarship. You mentioned towards the end that you maintain active contacts with the design community. Depict that in the revised essay, without relying on the app to prove that this is a real network. The reviewer needs real life, not virtual contact, with these community members. If you cannot represent any organization that you are a member of, if you cannot depict how this network has helped you with your career path going forward, if you cannot prove that a network exists that can enhance the Chevening network, then I can tell you instantly, you will not be considered for the scholarship. One failure to properly represent required information in the written interview will get you taken out of the consideration list. Don't let that happen.

Scholarship / Chevenning Scholarship Networking Essay for Master's in Law [4]

Muhammad, the advice given to you previously is incorrect and does not apply to anything in your essay. You perfectly framed your response to the networking essay that shows how directly networked you are in terms of government agency relevance to your line of work. I speak o course of the Telecommunications Act and your participation in the realization of the law. You can safely remove your opening statement in this instance as it doesn't really reflect a usable network in the sense that your presentation of the Telecommunications Act does. Your bank stint is not developed enough to prove that this job was able to help you increase the scope of your network so you should either develop that some more or delete it. don't speak of future job opportunities. Chevening is only interested in your past experience and your here and now experience. Expand the 2 scenarios I indicated here so that the essay will become stronger in terms of networking asset presentation. Don't forget to insinuate how these networks can perform a vital function in terms of helping Chevening and its scholars expand its network. That is not represented in the closing paragraph at the moment. Since that is a requirement, you cannot skip that presentation.

Scholarship / It challenge and process to discover people potentials, leadership essay [5]

Hadeer, there is no real ledersgip skill involved int his essay. There is not even a direct reference to influencing in it. What you did is not leadership work but rather Human Resources work. You accomplished the task of assessment and trouble shooting but you referred the final solution to people higher in rank than you. Therefore, you only made suggestions to resolve the issue, you did not decide on the proposed solutions and implement the needed changes, someone else did. So that is not a leadership skill on your part. Note that you had to discuss the ideas with facility managers and trade staff, they had to agree with your suggestion before it could be implemented. Therefore, you were not a leader in this instance. You were only an adviser on a "take it or leave it" scale. Hence, there is also no influencing skill to be found, even after numerous readings of this essay. No. this essay is not pertinent to the given prompt. You need to write a new one that is better at showing off how you managed a team situation and influenced a solution, without referring to a higher authority. The buck has to stop with you at all times in order to make your essay work in terms of relevance to the prompt.

Scholarship / Establishing network over the years had helped me to find valuable information and resources [2]

Rabab, do not confuse the reader with your terms. You did not do a medical project, you had an interior design project for a "hospital, clinic, doctor's office..." pick one and use the term to describe the interior project. By the way, you did not clearly establish how and what kind of networks you developed since your college days. In order to prove an effective and stable network, you first need to establish that you are a member of official interior design organizations in your country. That is where the professional network actually finds its foundation, development, and growth. There is no indication in this essay that you are a professional interior designer at all. This networking presentation is too generalized in presentation and does not really provide adequate information to serve as a valid network. It is not professional sounding enough to depict a clear work related network that helped you with your undertakings. Neither does it prove of any value to Chevening to be considered as an additional asset to their already admirable network of international connections. You need to revise the content based on my observations above in order to make this a workable version.

Scholarship / Career plan in HIV management programs - Chevening Essay [5]

Christi, you should consider explaining what sort of UK research projects could be done specifically in your area / province and what the participation of these organizations would be aside from research and funding. What would you offer to group/s in order to convince the reviewer that the participation of the UK in this field will be worth their while and effort? You can remove the reference to the PhD studies. That is not really relevant in this instance because the PhD grant may or may not come from Chevening in the future. Although, if you can point out that you plan on applying for Chevening sponsorship for PhD in the future, should you win the scholarship now, will allow you to continue to promote both the Chevening and UK interests in your country on a long term basis, which could be considered part of your ultimate career plan.

Scholarship / For Chevening - Networking at different levels [4]

@sofzah your early education network does not qualify as a real network because you failed to represent a professional utilization of these networks upon your graduation. Chevening requires only profession related networks so you have to remove all the college references since these do not tie in with your existing professional network. Develop your networking discussion in relation to your being a medical officer. Balance the networking that you had to do between the local villagers and the head of the village with the heads of your health department and other related organizations. Expand the discussion in order to present better evidence of an existing network in relation to say, a local government health project. Create a convincing statement at the end that will ensure that the reviewer knows that the networks you created will be of use to the future Chevenin scholars because of your medical background.

Scholarship / Being a part of Chevening absolutely will strengthen my network globally. [3]

Shofia, there is a disconnection between your networks. Somehow, in your presentation, they do not really interrelate and the reasons why you would consider these usable networks is not clear. You should start the essay with the second paragraph since that is where your professional exposure to networking was supposed to start. Just because the company is family owned does not mean that you should not use it. Go ahead and say that your dad owns the company. That doesn't change the fact that you had to create a network of contacts to fulfill your job needs. The problem, is that none of the information you share about your contacts show any real time use or benefits from having these networks to call upon when you need to. In fact, it doesn't seem like you needed their help anytime at all. Since that is the case, then these companies and people cannot be considered a part of an existing and effective network that you created. There is also a lack of supporting evidence to prove that Chevening should consider your contacts an improvement to their own network because there is no reference as to how the network that you have will improve the current pool of Chevening alumni.

Scholarship / After finishing my scholarship, I intend to develop my organization and serve my country [3]

Mai, there is no clear professional plan for yourself upon your graduation. The presentation "implies" a series of plans, but no real idea as to how it can be implemented. The post study plan needs to accomplish two things:

1. Depict a clear plan to elevate your career by working for specific organizations or companies upon your return that will help to hone the skills that you picked up in the UK.

2. Portray a UK government subsidized project in your country that relates to your profession / UK training which can allow you to help promote the UK interests in your country.

Neither of the two most important components of the prompt are represented in this essay. You also went overboard with your long range plans. Keep it down to 5 years. That is long range enough for a masters degree graduate. The 7-10 year plan is more related to a PhD course. Stay within realistic time frames for a professional with an international masters degree. You say you will develop your organization. Does the organization already exist? In what capacity? How do you plan to move it forward? Can it be integrated into a UK sponsored project? If yes, how? These are some of the elements that you need to represent in your essay. Hopefully you can reflect all of these in the revised version.

Writing Feedback / "Leadership and learning are indispensable to each other" - Chevening essay [2]

Yomna, your presentation is too greenhorn. The one problem with presenting an academic leadership and influencing presentation in this essay is that it isn't based on a professional reality. Academic leadership does not require influencing abilities. It is not leadership that can be noted as experience because all college leadership presentations neglect to mention that all these activities have an academic mentor on the other end who helps in the decision making process and guides the whole project from afar. That is why Chevening is very specific about requiring work experience of no less than 2 years as one of its qualifying requirements. Therefore, this experience cannot be used for the essay. It is too old and does not really reflect an impressive leadership discussion. You need to present a leadership and influencing experience that is more recent in nature and more impressive in presentation.

Scholarship / Leadership is getting people to know about their undiscovered capabilities [3]

Esraa, while this story is highly interesting to read, it doesn't reflect any true leadership and influencing skill in the discharge of your duties. As a teacher, you need physical interaction, not virtual interaction with your students in order to have a true leadership and influencing experience. There was no leadership or influencing going on during your session. Influential is different from inspirational. An influential person is defined as having great influence on someone or something. While an inspirational person provides or shows creativity or spiritual inspiration. That is what you did in the story you referenced in your essay. Don't you have any professional experience that has you more in an actual leadership and influencing role to share? This essay simply won't work for the prompt you are trying to respond to. Try to refine the essay to contain a real reference to a leadership skill and an influencing action.

Scholarship / STUDYING TO BETTER HEALTHCARE-CHEVENING COURSE CHOICE QUESTION [4]

Nzalie, would you consider revising the essay in a manner that better aligns your study goals with each course that you have chosen? The course you have chosen to study feel incomplete in presentation because it does not have an academic background, professional foundation, and forward thinking career goals attached to it. While I appreciate that you presented the whole essay in a paragraph format instead of an outline, the problem, is that you did not categorize your presentation to reflect its importance in relation to every course. So you need to address that situation in your revision. Each university and course should be grouped together with its own relation to your academic background, an example of your professional training in relation to the course, and your future career plan in relation to the completion of the MS course. Lengthen the course discussions and shorten your lengthy discussion. The discussion part should actually only cover 2 paragraphs. One is an academic summary and the other, is a professional summary. The rest of the information should be integrated into your university and course discussions.

Scholarship / I am ready to share networking and communication skills and experience with Chevening community [4]

Wael, your first paragraph is a definition and lecture on networking that the reviewer does not need to know about. That is purely a word filler that is totally unnecessary in the essay. Kindly remove that from your revised version. Your representation of networking skills are not really effective because most of it is within the same company. An effective networking essay shows a clear importance for the development of an exterior network, allows the writer to deliver a clear example of how this network has helped him with important aspects of his profession, how he has returned the favor to the network in some manner, and indicates whether or not the network is still existing today. If it is still existing, you need to explain how you keep that network active. Towards the end of your essay, please justify the importance of this network to the future Chevening scholars that you will be mentoring (should you get the scholarship). The essay always asks for this justification because your network will become a part of the Chevening network through the alumni program. So strengthen your presentation as best as you can. Right now, this essay is not just grammatically problematic, it is also information deficient.

Scholarship / I was fortunate enough to have direct leadership experience while working at a private law firm [3]

Miihammad, do not include information about future potential leadership roles because that has no supporting evidence yet. Only current and previous leadership experiences will work for this sort of essay. It is also important that you use the strongest example of your leadership and influencing skills. I see that potential in the first discussion you presented in the essay. Your leadership skills in the first part of the essay is tremendously strong. However, you failed to fully realize the potential of your influencing skills in your explanations. These influencing skills come into play when you discuss the way that you had to interact with other offices and government units in order to enact the changes that you needed to complete. You don't need the second presentation anymore because it is really weak. Remove the last 2 sections of your essay. Fully develop the first presentation instead. That will create the strongest possible leadership and influencing essay for you.

Graduate / The highly qualified faculty members and their research work in different fields has impressed me [2]

Pradeepika, you might want to consider discussing more of your college academic achievements in this essay. That will allow you to prove that you have the educational foundation to succeed as a masters student. If possible, discuss your graduation thesis so that your potential as a Petroleum Engineer trailblazer will be highlighted. You may want to consider going further with that project as your masters thesis. A SOP normally contains an overview of your potential master thesis because it shows the reviewer that you are serious about the course and you will not suddenly drop out of the program. There is also the matter of your immediate plans after your graduation. A 5 year career plan summarized presentation will work. You have to relate your career plans to the reasons why you chose this university so you can expect to change the closing statement totally from what you have at the moment.

Writing Feedback / Vegetables are the best thing you can eat. [4]

Nguyen, this sounds like either an IELTS or TOEFL essay. I wish you had identified which test you are taking and what the full prompt provided to you was. That is the only way that I can help you better your writing skills in preparation for your exam.

I can understand what the discussion topic is and I can see a discussion instruction in your opening paragraph. However, I am not certain if you are approaching this essay the right way because you did not provide the original prompt for my reference. Kindly remember to do that next time. It is important because I need a baseline for the assessment of your essay.

The overall presentation is effective and informative. It pleases me no end that you knew to separate your opinion from the other presentations. The 3 sentence explanations are alright but I feel like you were making enough points to create at the maximum 5 sentences per paragraph because that would have increased your overall score, regardless of which test you are taking.

Good job. Next time provide the prompt so that I can give a deeper assessment of your work.

Writing Feedback / A letter of reference to my English teacher from the previous school (IELTS TASK ONE) [2]

SG, let me revise the letter for you because it will be more difficult to show you how to correct your mistakes if I do not do that. Don't worry, I will still be using your original work so you can see how it can be improved from its current format.

Dear Mr. Smith,

The last time we spoke was at my graduation. I told you back then how much I appreciate your tireless efforts in educating me because it helped shaped me into the person I am today. I am also a better English speaker because of your never ceasing support as I learned the language. I am coming to you today to ask for your help one more time. I hope you can find the time to assist a former student who is still in need of your support.

I am applying to become an English teacher and my application requires me to submit a letter of recommendation. Naturally, my first thought was to approach my favorite teacher from my college days. The application is for a primary school near my residence. The opening is for an English teacher for children ages 6- 12. I am sure that you are quite familiar with the requirements of the job so I won't be repeating it to you.

This will be my first job. You already know that I have been inclined to become an English teacher ever since my college days. With your help, I could make that aspiration a reality. All I need from you is a simple letter of recommendation regarding my academic results and study preferences.

It is with great hope that I look forward to a speedy reply from you.

All the best,

Scholarship / How your choice of degree will empower you to pursue a career that addresses issues in your country? [3]

@rev2017 Since the focus of your opening sentence, the topic sentence, is food insecurity (non in-security), then you should explain your personal interest in that subject. In the essay, you start with food insecurity then somehow end up discussing the employment possibilities in your country. You went off track. Just target the development of your interest in food insecurity and how it relates to your desire to pursue a degree in BS Agricultural Science. Don't focus on your country alone, talk about the worldwide impending food shortage instead and how it will affect all countries, not just yours. That way you depict yourself as a self-less person who wants to help change the world instead of only wanting to save your own country. You should have enough word allotment in the essay to do that. Normally, essays like these have a 300 word minimum. If not, then you can adjust your current essay to accommodate the changes that need to be done to the presentation.

Scholarship / My networking capacity helped to reduce child marriages - essay for Chevening Scholarship [3]

Mushfiqur, while you did speak to a wide range of people in an effort to resolve these women's issues, the depiction that you have in this essay is more attuned to the leadership and influencing essay instead of the networking essay. You may want to reconsider the information you are presenting here because it is not really prompt relevant in presentation. For the networking essay, you should be discussing how you contacted other organizations who are on the same quest as you are. NGO's and other privately funded organizations usually help with these sorts of causes which is why I am wondering why your networking essay isn't more representative of such networks and their ability to help you towards the resolution of the situation in your country. Please give my suggestion some thought. Write a new essay instead of using this one. I already explained why.

Scholarship / Career plan for improving my life and my community - Chevening essay [4]

Mohamed, this is a pretty strong essay. However, your reference to UK NGO's won't be helpful to your essay. The instruction is specifically for a UK GOVERNMENT related / sponsored project in your country. An NGO is an acronym for Non-Government Organization. The term non-government is the reason why this reference to UK cooperation will not work. Right from the start of the presentation, you should consider a UK government agency sponsored project. Refer to your current employer for more references regarding this. They should know which projects the UK government sponsors in your country, if at all, in relation to your profession. Doctors Without Borders is not a UK government sponsored medical mission so that reference isn't relevant to the expectations of the reviewer. Please find some better aligned UK government sponsored project to present in this essay in order to create a more prompt responsive presentation.

Undergraduate / Moving from one country to another is a CHALLENGE [5]

Paola, this is too short to be an effective personal statement. That is usually written within 250 - 500 words. I hope that you can share the original prompt that was given to you to help you write the PS. I am not really sure how I can help you develop this essay further because you have not given me any instructions to consider while I review your paper. How soon can you upload the prompt for me? I can't really tell you what you change and what to add to at the moment because I do not know what the university is requiring you to present to them in terms of information.

Normally, the personal statement indicates a lengthened explanation for the development of your passion in relation to your chosen major. Right now, it seems that this pivotal discussion was brought to the end of the essay when it should have been the central presentation of the essay from the first paragraph to the last. I need to understand how you developed this interest before you came to America, after you came to America, and at what point your passion for Math is at now. If I know what the instructions for the development of this statement is, I should be able to help you better align the information you have now with the prompt requirements.

Scholarship / A strong connections network is essential to ensure the advancement of my career. [2]

Sleem, your essay has good and relevant content but suffers from a bad presentation. It might help if you consider hiring a professional service to edit your essay in order to make it more efficient in presenting your networking skills. Right now, due to the inconsistent grammar, the essay is difficult to follow and understand.

I can see the potential for networking in your essay, the problem is that the poor presentation is hindering the clarity of your message. For instance, you speak of a time after your graduation when you became a site engineer. We need the background of the problem in order to understand the importance of your networking skill. Explain what the project was like when you arrived, why it was delayed, how you came into contact with this sub-contractor, and the reason why he chose to accept your job offer. Remember, you are writing a networking essay so you need to show how that network is developed and used on both ends (if it applies) in your presentation.

You don't have to bring up your military service if it is not directly connected with a networking reference. In this essay, I am unclear if you are referring to a network you created through a friendship with a fellow military member or what. How does that story connect with your friend? It is important that you don't muddle your presentation with useless facts just because you think it is important, even though it is unrelated.

Try to review the essay again. Figure out what you really want to present and the clearest way to present it. Remove all extra information that does not help to advance your presentation. Try to just present this in the clearest manner that you can. Don't be afraid to ask for help if you feel you need it.

Scholarship / The most important time that shaped my professional leadership skills [5]

Ra, there is a big difference between "being involved" being a "leader". What I see in this essay, is a proactive person who is willing to do what needs to be done in order to complete a task. Anybody can do that without being a leader. In fact, such a position is simply a subordinate / follower position written all over it. There is no clear definition of leadership in the essay. You have to deliver only one representation of your leadership and influencing skill. The reviewer is not interested in all your accomplishments and tasks. What he is interested in is how you displayed leadership and influencing skills during a time of critical need. With all of the experience that you shared in this draft, I am absolutely sure that you can think of something that would fall into that line of presentation. You only need one effective representation of the 2 skills required. Tell us a story, one that makes us realize that the Arab Spring is something that made you an up and coming leader in your country. Or think about your profession. What aspect of your work has left an impact upon you because it required you to come up to the plate to become an influential leader in the company? Those are two prompt ideas that will work well with your given qualifications for this essay prompt.

Scholarship / Communication is a key element of leadership - Chevening essay [5]

I found this essay to be very confusing. Here is what you can do to make it better. You must remove the references to the military service, your undergraduate activities, and your services overseas. Try to clarify what job you took on after your army and college experience. First, you have to tell us what company you worked for and in what capacity. We need to understand what kind of work you did that took you all over the world and even allowed you to assist in such an important negotiation. Then, you need to look at the situation from an outsider's point of view. In what aspect do you think you really influenced the important people whom you were tasked to assist? Please relate that story in detail so that the reviewer can better understand why you were "leading from behind". A more concentrated effort to clearly present your leadership and influencing story is necessary for the proper development of this paper. You still have a few days before the deadline, you can still make the necessary changes to make it the best essay for your application.

Scholarship / My networking essay for Chevening - A valuable networks for a better future [3]

Alvin, the network that you should be discussing is one that you developed within your workplace. That means you should think about the way you function at your office in relation to needing some beyond the company help. You make a reference to your company being a small company under an umbrella organization. Usually, companies like these tend to work together through cooperative and inclusive activities. Something like exchanging relevant information so that each company can function smoothly with the help of the sister company and vice versa. Unfortunately, you cannot use the information about the CEO in this essay. However, if you can prove a method of exchange between your company and the others, then you should be able to come up with a decent networking essay. If you have ever been called upon to work the a sister company in order to help them accomplish a task, then after, you had to call upon someone from the other company to help you at your own company, that comprises a simple network reference already.

Scholarship / My leadership has significantly arose since my work as a project officer at the learning institute. [4]

Otdam, the leadership story is acceptable. However, it doesn't really have a strong sense of leadership style because it is based more on theoretical management rather than people management, which is what the leadership essay is all about. Maybe you can try to create a more team management related story that integrates the theoretical aspect of this problem with the actual leadership aspect of the job. What happened after you presented the methodology to the team? You can create a more focused leadership and influencing essay if you do not try to insert the story about the community and instead, focused the connecting the leadership story with the team influencing story. That would create a more connected and smoother presentation in the essay instead of presenting two separate stories that cover two different topics. The current presentation, because of the separate stories, makes the presentation ill effective and cuts the interest and attention of the reader midstream. A more connected presentation helps to make the essay memorable for the reader.

Scholarship / My first traits of leadership emerged from the beginning of my studies at school [3]

Sameh, please tell me that you are joking and you are not actually planning to use this essay for the Chevening scholarship. Have you not had the chance to look at the examples of leadership and influencing essays in this forum yet? Your essay does not even come close a draft submission. This could be considered more of an outline than an actual draft. Please revise your draft to be better suitable for the Chevening program by focusing more on presenting more of a profession based leadership and influencing essay. Use a more professional tone if possible because this current tone is too collegiate to be considered the work of a potential masters level writing student. Again, it will do you well to learn from the mistakes and improvements of the others here. Please take the time to read the sample essays, both the incorrect and correct versions in order to gain a better understanding of what this prompt requires as a response.

Writing Feedback / Essay: Do the advantages of shopping online outweigh the disadvantages? [4]

Bau, when it comes to these English writing tests, it is not enough that you can write in English. You have to prove that you can, first and foremost, understand English instructions. That is why the opening paragraph requires you to give an understanding of the original prompt in your own words. Based upon your presentation of the prompt, it appears that you only have a partial understanding of the original prompt. You understand what the essay topic is about, but you do not understand the instructions that were given for the discussion. Let me point it out to you:

Topic - Buying things on the Internet...
Instruction - Do the advantages ... Give reasons for your answer...

There are two main discussion points that you need to provide based upon the original prompt requirements. What you did was:
Topic - More and more people are doing shopping online ...
Instruction Response - I totally agree with this notion...

Based on the two outlines above, I am sure that you can tell where the mistake is. It is highly obvious. The instruction was a discussion of advantage and disadvantage. You chose to "totally agree". There is a clear failure to understand and address the task provided for you to complete in the essay. Therefore, there is no other recourse but for this essay to receive a failing score.

You need to work on your English comprehension skills. If you don't understand the question, don't write just because you need to write. That is how you fail the test. Instead, since you are still practicing, ask someone who understands and speaks fluent English to explain the topic of the prompt to you. That way you can understand what the different instructions mean. Don't get me wrong, you still need to understand what the topic sentence is all about. However, if you can understand how you are supposed to discuss the topic, then maybe, you can develop a simple understanding of what the prompt is all about as well. Then you can properly discuss the prompt in a simple manner within the essay.