Undergraduate / The place we come from determines the person - UC admission essay [9]

I'd like to see you focus more closely on place. You define environment as people but then, somewhat contradictorily, say that California offered you opportunities you would not have had in Ethiopia. To make this essay really stand out, describe both Ethiopia and California vividly. Show that you understand how not only people but places shape us. Then the essay will be more consistent with its title and first line as well as more intellectually complex.

Scholarship / 'Bournemouth University has one of the most advance educations in the world' - BU scholarship essay [31]


Mentioning teaching English addresses #3. Your discussion of Nepalese culture and your own passion for travel begins to address #5. Don't skip #7; it is very important, and only you can answer it.


I'd like to see you flesh this out. Tell us more about each of these experiences and, as Sean says, then tie this into your goals as well as what you will bring to BU.

Student Talk / Eye surgery messed up my grades and I couldn't attend the dates of the exams (second chance appeal) [14]

Treat your appeal as you would an essay: Brainstorm, then outline, then draft. Post your draft on this forum for feedback.

As to specific advice, look on your own university's website to see if it offers any guidance. You might also want to consult your academic adviser or someone in the office of student retention, if your university has such an office.

Good luck and I will look forward to seeing your draft!

Essays / Having trouble with understanding an essay ("Is This the Promised End?") [10]

I can see why you are having a hard time! The essay is very densely written, with lots of long sentences. That it is online, rather than on paper, compressed into such a tight space, makes the task even more difficult, as there are more line breaks than there would be in a standard page layout.

Sean's idea is good. Go sentence by sentence until you understand each, jotting down your understanding of what each sentence means in short, simple sentences.

Joyce's paragraph-long first sentence, for example, probably could be broken into four or six short statements.

Another thing you can do when you don't understand a text is to Google the name of the author and the title of the text to see what (if anything) others have written about it. This can't substitute for your own reading, but it can sometimes help to see how other people have understood what you are trying to understand.

Another problem is that Joyce's essay is extremely erudite, making reference to all manner of events and characters from other pieces of literature. Use Wikipedia or a similar source to get a quick idea of what Joyce means when she refers to some character or mythical figure you've never heard of.

Concentrate on the beginning and the end, remembering that most essayists introduce their main theme at the beginning and/or summarize their main theme at the end. For sure, the most important things are almost always at the beginning or the end, with the body of the essay reserved for arguing and proving the points that the essayist is making. It's okay if you don't grasp every nuance of the body paragraphs so long as you understand the primary message(s) of the essay.

If you want to post your own summary here, for us to compare against the original, please do!

Student Talk / Eye surgery messed up my grades and I couldn't attend the dates of the exams (second chance appeal) [14]

I hear you. I hear the frustration you are feeling. Let's take things one step at a time.

It sounds like you maybe committed plagiarism accidentally and, for whatever reason, your communication with your professor about that spiraled into mutual miscommunication. Read you school's plagiarism policy carefully. Usually, there is a procedure that professors are supposed to follow if they suspect plagiarism. If your professor didn't follow that policy, you can follow your school's procedure for grieving (or protesting) a grade. If your professor did follow that policy, you should have the opportunity to present your case before an unbiased panel. (I don't know your school's specific policy, but that's probably how it goes.)

In the meantime, you need to write your appeal. Keep it simple and clean. Confess what you did here: That you went astray and neglected your studies due to too much social activity for some time. Say what you have done to get and stay sober. Talk about your sincere wish to go into computer forensics and your determination to do whatever you must to achieve that aim.

As for art and music courses, the goal of a four-year college (rather than a trade school) is to turn out well-rounded, educated citizens who can not only do their selected jobs but also participate fully in the civic and cultural lives of their communities. Hence, every student must take introductory level courses in lots of different subjects. In the long run, knowing something about art and music, for example, will not only increase your enjoyment of the arts but will also allow you to converse more easily with other college graduates in professional or semi-professional settings, such as a social event sponsored by your employer.

Another benefit of being forced to take courses outside of your narrow field of interest is that most young people don't know enough about all of the fields of endeavor out there to know for sure when starting school what they will want to do or what they will be best suited to do for their whole lives. Some students come in thinking vaguely of accounting or forensics and then, in the midst of a course they wouldn't have taken if they hadn't been forced to do so, discover a true talent and passion for anthropology or finance. Required courses introduce you to the wider world. See them as opportunities rather than burdens and you will get the most out of them.

Undergraduate / My UCF undergraduate admissions essay...I am dying to go here critiques? [6]

Why lead with what you can't say? One strength is your community work. You allude to others in your conclusion. Undoubtedly, you have other characteristics, talents, or experiences that you will bring to UCF. Use the space where you now talk about not overcoming adversity to talk in more detail about what you have done, the talents you do have, or what you will do at or after graduating from UCF. Do continue to mention your sister, though, as some universities like to accept siblings. And it doesn't hurt to mention your grandmother's philanthropy, as this will give them the idea that your family is a good prospect that they should cultivate by accepting another sibling.

Student Talk / Eye surgery messed up my grades and I couldn't attend the dates of the exams (second chance appeal) [14]

Notoman is right. It's a matter of making a decision and then doing what you need to do to move forward. Whether it's for college or a job, you need to maintain your sobriety and treat people respectfully to get ahead.

On the question of whether college is right for you, the answer lies within another question: What do you want to do with your life? What kind of work would you enjoy? If it's carpentry or auto repair, then trade school rather than college is the place for you. If it's accounting or art history, college will be required.

Having a larger goal, envisioning the life you want to lead, that's what will get you through college if you choose to attend.

Student Talk / Eye surgery messed up my grades and I couldn't attend the dates of the exams (second chance appeal) [14]

I'm confused: What sort of appeal are you needing to make?

I notice that the tone of your remarks about Prof 1 is hostile from the start. You sound aggrieved about things that he did right: giving you the incomplete, giving you a lot of latitude in what to write about, etc. If such hostility and resentment was in the tenor of your verbal contacts with him, then I'm not surprised he eventually asked you to leave his office. You were, in fact, feeling like hitting him. He probably could sense that.

So, if you do have to write some sort of appeal, my first piece of advice to you would be to make sure you phrase your account of events more kindly. For example: "Prof X considerately gave me an incomplete and generously allowed me to write a make-up paper on a topic of my choosing. Unfortunately, due to some misunderstanding, he came to believe I had plagiarized the paper. I stand by my words as my own and that ask Prof X either give me a passing grade on the paper or refer his charge of plagiarism for formal investigation so that I can clear my name."

Book Reports / The Death of Cordelia in Shakespeare's King Lear- Shakespeare's intended purpose [6]


If, in answering the prompt, you want to say that Cordelia's death contributes to the theme of an unjust world, then you ought to marshal other evidence of this theme in the play, briefly listing other evidence in order to show that this is, indeed, among Shakespeare's themes of the play.

Similarly, when you say "there is a sense of redemption in all of the other deaths in the play, but none in Cordelia's death" then, obviously, you will have to talk about the other deaths in order to make that point.

In order to answer the questions "Why does the death of Cordelia in King Lear matter?" and "What was Shakespeare's purpose in Cordelia's death?" you must talk about other aspects of the play. In order to talk about Cordelia's death in the context of the play, you must talk about the rest of the play, or at least other elements that support whatever it is that you are arguing about Cordelia's death.

Book Reports / The Death of Cordelia in Shakespeare's King Lear- Shakespeare's intended purpose [6]

Don't worry about "exact validity" in determining Shakespeare's purpose. Since he (or whoever wrote the plays attributed to him) is not around to tell us, any defensible idea will do.

Your two ideas refer to two different levels of purpose: thematic and structural. Of the two, the first -- the thematic -- will probably prove more fruitful, as it offers you so much to say. You'd have to say why you think Cordelia's death represents an example of an unjust world. (Pretty easy to do.) And then you'd have to talk about other elements of the play that further the same theme. I can think of several, starting with Edmund's monologue.

Book Reports / The death of Ophelia in Shakespeare's Hamlet: how and why it maters - prompt [22]


Right, and that is why I specifically did not comment on content. I've seen you, on your own and in conversation with Sean, raise and drop a plethora of perfectly good ideas. You just need to choose a theme and stick with it, keeping the prompt in mind while framing how you will write it up.

Graduate / Statement of Objectives (Supply Chain Management department) [4]


Is XXX a company name or a place? If a place, then "in" is correct, but if XXX is a company, then the preposition you want is "at" or "for."

Do you still work there? Either way, your verb tenses are askew. If you still work there, then it should be:

"As a procurement team leader in the Supply Chain Management department, I have worked in XXX for over three years and a half. My working days are packed with unexpected situations, which range from material shortages to vessel rerouting."

If you no longer work there, then it should be:

"As a procurement team leader in the Supply Chain Management department, I worked in XXX for over three years and a half. My working days were packed with unexpected situations, which ranged from material shortages to vessel rerouting."

Grammar, Usage / In Need Of Writing Resources! [12]

Yes, and then write in response to what you read. Keep a journal in which you jot notes about or your thoughts in reaction to the things you read. If you like, you can use the same notebook to keep a list of new words and/or especially nice sentences encountered while reading. (Remember to put quotation marks around any passages copied from readings and to note the source, in case you want to use them as quotes in the future)

Book Reports / The death of Ophelia in Shakespeare's Hamlet: how and why it maters - prompt [22]

If those are the things that you want to say, then the next step is for you to organize them into an outline.

Scholarship / 'Bournemouth University has one of the most advance educations in the world' - BU scholarship essay [31]

Students who are uncertain writers themselves sometimes have difficulty feeling competent to critique others' work. They may feel hesitant to point out mistakes if they are not confident in their own abilities. That may be true for you. One thing that you can do for an essay that you like, instead of finding and fixing errors or coming up with criticisms, is to ask yourself: What would make this essay even better? A stronger conclusion? A more interesting introduction? More examples?

You can also ask yourself: What do I think about the topic of the essay? Then, if you have ideas that aren't in the essay, you can share those.

Scholarship / 'Bournemouth University has one of the most advance educations in the world' - BU scholarship essay [31]

Since you've only got 300 words, the first thing to do (as you've begun to do) is to state simply and clearly the answer to each question.

Next, look at all the questions and ask yourself for which of them do you have things to say that will make you a more attractive candidate. Have you done especially exemplary volunteer work? Do you have an especially altruistic plan for what you will do with your degree? Whatever it might be, go back and say more about that question or those questions.

The key is to answer some of the questions as briefly as possible, so that you will have more words to sing your own praises in the areas of your greatest strength.

Once you've got them all written, post the whole draft here, in order, so that we can see and critique it. Don't worry about running over the word count at first, as we will certainly be able to find ways to make your answers more concise and bring you in under the limit.

Writing Feedback / "Going overseas for the university" essay [7]


Structure is easy. Your chief problem is with wordiness. You pile so many words into each sentence that, ironically, they end up saying very little.

For example, your first paragraph does nothing but restate the prompt. You fill it and other paragraphs up with empty phrases such as "to be precise" and "with reference to" while saying very little. Perhaps you were worried about the word count? Don't be! Just answering the prompt clearly and coherently will necessarily take the requisite number of words.

Now, structure: For An IELTS essay, you have just enough time to pound out a five paragraph essay, as follows:

I. Introduction, including statement of thesis.
II. First argument, with supporting evidence
III. Second argument, with supporting evidence
IV. Third argument, with supporting evidence or refutation of a counter-argument
V. Conclusion, including restatement of thesis

In your introduction, try to say something interesting about the topic rather than simply restating the prompt. In your thesis statement, be sure to include the three arguments you will be explaining in the rest of the essay. The formula is "X because 1, 2, and 3."

Begin each body paragraph with a topic sentence that states its argument clearly. Then support the argument with logic and/or an example or two. If you are going to raise and refute a counter-argument in lieu of a third argument, do so simply, again prefacing the paragraph with a topic sentence such as "Some people believe ... but ..."

Begin your conclusion with a summary of your thesis and arguments and then offer some concluding thoughts. Here, and in your introduction, is where you can let your personality and unique viewpoint shine through.

This is, needless to say, a very formulaic way to write an essay. I don't recommend it for real writing that is going out into the world to be read by an actual audience, as all of the overt thesis statements and topic sentences lead to dull and heavy-handed writing. But it is the formula for timed essays of all sorts, some of which are actually graded by means of rubrics that give points for things like clear topic sentences.

Essays / From Kyrgyzstan to Oxford [23]

Hmmm... Normally, we have to encourage students to more strongly sing their own praises but I find myself in the strange position of counseling greater modesty.

I know that Kyrgyzstan is in sore need of political reform. I suspect that Oxford will be eager to be part of the process by helping to educate an emerging leader such as you. But for your claims to be credible, you must show that you understand that's what you are: an emerging leader, someone who hopes to start a new party and one day gain the presidency, someone with many of the skills and characteristics necessary for such an achievement, but not yet someone who has done more than win student-level awards and elections.

So, my chief piece of advice to you is to show that, along with charisma, intelligence, dedication and ambition, you have the other essential characteristics of true leaders, including willingness to share credit and awareness of your own limitations. Otherwise, you run the risk of sounding like the egomaniacal politicians who have ruined more than a few countries, coming in as reformers but then doing nothing but aggregating power and glory for themselves.

Undergraduate / The direction I want to take my education; UWashington Bothell - PS/software systems [8]

This is a strong start. You seem to have plenty of the characteristics and experience they will want, plus a splash of oil for flavor.

I think you're right that less is more, but don't go so far in that direction that you skip details that will help you. Tell the reader more about the video game(s) you invented. And, for sure, tell more about your interests beyond games.

I'm of two minds concerning your disclosure about being slow on timed tests. First, if this is a significant difficulty, it may be due to an undiagnosed learning disability. Students with such disabilities can, after admission, go to the campus counseling center or office of disabilities, get tested, and get a letter mandating teachers to give them extra time on tests. That's something you might want to think about doing after gaining admission, but I'm not so sure you should mention it here, unless you need to do so to explain low scores on standardized tests.

And by the way, "fast" is an adjective. Adjectives modify nouns and pronouns. You need an adverb, such as "quickly" to modify a verb like "write."

Undergraduate / "I want to attend Chapel" - provide advice on how I can better my essay. [5]

I like this piece a lot! It's lively and unique. But it both loses steam and becomes confusing in the final paragraph. What "addiction that would spawn overnight"? Better to leave that out, whatever it is, in favor of filling out what you say about why you want to attend Chapel Hill.

That said, here are a few minor suggestions/corrections:

"Awesome" is technically correct but not quite right due to the associations of the informal use of the word to mean, vaguely, "especially good." Find another word.

The trapeze, however, requires both the bar and the acrobat to move

I couldn't think clearly; my mind was being driven by pure curiosity. I stepped onto the platform and allowed the instructor to fasten my harness to a rig of bungee cords.

Undergraduate / Georgetown School of Foreign Service Transfer Essay [11]

Try finding some synonyms for ominous that might say more precisely what you mean.

Also think twice about using the same word (or a variant thereof) twice in a title: Privatization, Private.

Book Reports / The death of Ophelia in Shakespeare's Hamlet: how and why it maters - prompt [22]


Once you know the things you are going to say, we can help you come up with the best method of organization.

Here, again, is your prompt: "The death of Ophelia in Shakespeare's Hamlet: how and why it matters."

Here, again, is what your teacher told you to do: "talk about where it fits into the play (like it being in act 4) and how that matters. and then talk about the implications of her death for the rest of the characters."

You've gotten advice from both Sean and me. Taking that advice into account (or not), decide exactly what you are going to say. Then organize your points into a draft outline and post it here. Once we see your outline, we can help you tweak it into shape and also offer ideas concerning what you can use for your introduction, conclusion, supporting evidence, etc.

Essays / Management Essay - Self-chosen topic: "Power - Strategic Management Tool". [16]

Where did you get the idea? Look in the reference sections of the books, articles, or other course materials that led you to the idea. This is the way that scholarship works, finding trustworthy sources from other sources.

You can also augment your Google Books and Google Scholar searches with Jurn and Scirus.

Writing Feedback / Libraries are not just a collection of books: Are public libraries important? [4]

Right, the question is not what roles libraries play in general but what roles public libraries play in your community. If you don't know, you might have to do a little research, by going to your local public library's website (or even -- gasp -- getting offline and out of your chair to visit) and checking out what kinds of programs and events are there. Do they have computers that low-income people can use? Read-along groups for children? Do community groups use the meeting spaces?

The more I think about it, the more I believe a visit is in order. Walk around, noting not only what special collections are available but also who is using the library. What does the place feel like on a Saturday afternoon, a Wednesday morning, or a Thursday evening?

Use these impressions when you write your essay. Start with a vivid description of the library in use, then say three specific ways the library contributes to the community.

If, instead, you elect with the content you have, here are a couple of grammatical fixes:

Libraries house collections of books as well as various storage media such as CDs, cassettes, video tapes, DVDs, and Internet.

The way you had worded that sentence, you were saying that libraries are CDs, DVDs, etc.

At present , many public libraries face significant budget cuts.

The way you had worded that sentence, your verb tense conflicted with your prefacing phrase. "Recently" means in the recent past. "Face" is a present tense verb.

Undergraduate / 'The dean and the award ceremony' - common app essay- open topic [5]


Excellent use of specific albeit imaginary numbers instead of vague delimiters like "hundreds." That make the sentence pop and gives it a twist of humor.


"Shrieked?" Really? Even if her voice did sound hurtfully shrill over the sound system, you're better off choosing a different word. "Shrieked" colors the sentence with horror rather than glee.

Undergraduate / "My Hidden Treasure" - University of Illinois Essay [9]

Take out every instance of "truly" and "really."

Book Reports / The death of Ophelia in Shakespeare's Hamlet: how and why it maters - prompt [22]

I think you may be working backwards. It seems your teacher wants you to show how the death of Ophelia operates within the overall theme and framework of the play. So, first, you need to decide what you think Shakespeare was trying to convey with this play and then say how the death of Ophelia -- as and where it occurs in the play -- expresses and/or helps to set up that message.

Essays / Universities should strive for gender balance between male and female students in every subject [17]

Even highly educated people mix up the basics such as the difference between mean, mode, and median. I recently spent I-don't-know-how-long convincing a tenured full professor in English not to claim that half of all cases necessarily fall below the average. Even after I gave examples and explained outliers, the sentence interpreting "average" as if it meant "median" was still in her text. I finally had to just say, "You cannot say that. It just isn't true."

Dissertations / Business Management / Databases topics [15]

You're going to need not only a topic but a research question about which it will be possible for you to collect relevant data. For a PhD, you'll need either a question that no-one has yet addressed or a new approach to a question that has been researched but remains unsettled.

Before you even start brainstorming, you need to do some preliminary research. This will stand you in good stead, as your reading at this stage will form the basis of the literature review section in your proposal and the literature review chapter in your dissertation.

Read the literature review sections of several of the most recently published studies in the area of risk management. If you find a topic that intrigues you, go deeper on that by reading as many studies as you can. What ought to happen is that, as you read, research questions will begin to form in your mind. In order to facilitate that, make up a little worksheet on which you list the topic and research question for every study that you read (or read about).

Once you've got a few possible topics/questions in mind, we can help you frame and assess the viability of various research questions so that you choose one that will be feasible for you to research and write up.

Undergraduate / Georgetown School of Foreign Service Transfer Essay [11]

I'm glad you feel confident about this. Good luck!

Writing Feedback / IELTS essay: Newspapers will soon become a thing of the past [7]


Use two of your three body paragraphs for arguments in favor of your position and then use the third body paragraph to offer and counter an opposing argument.

Essays / Universities should strive for gender balance between male and female students in every subject [17]


Too true. And a challenge for essay writers, in two ways: (1) We must ensure that we use statistics accurately and non-deceptively, which it can be difficult to do if we don't understand them ourselves; and (2) we must explain the numbers that we do use, keeping the likely numeracy (or lack thereof) of our target audience in mind.

Scholarship / I need some advice on ideas - "Why do I deserve the scholarship" [42]


It's difficult for me to rephrase too, because I don't quite know what you mean.

Everything changed when we got a new teacher?

Writing Feedback / IELTS essay: Newspapers will soon become a thing of the past [7]


Liebe, just FYI, the IELTS essay is a timed essay that tests for English proficiency for learners of English as a second language. Because of the time constraints, writers usually only have the chance to proofread for grammar but not to make major changes. Also, again because of the time constraints, the essay has to be relatively formulaic: introduction, three body paragraphs, conclusion. Content counts, and does have to be coherent, but grammar and punctuation are more important than nuanced arguments.

Trang, good job. Here are some grammatical fixes:

The internet has become more and more popular in recent years, providing people with a huge amount of information.

Some people, however, still believe that newspapers can exist for a long time; others disagree, arguing that newspapers have lost their competitive advantage to sustain their prolonged existence .

Personally, I am inclined to agree with the latter view for the following reasons.

Although, it would be better to say, "I am inclined to agree with the latter view," and then summarize the three reasons you will be presenting in the body of the essay.

Undergraduate / Re-admission appeal statement (Reasons for Unsatisfactory Performance) [10]

When it was obvious that I couldn't fight my addiction, I should have sought counseling but I did not.


I like this idea.

My grades this past year demonstrate that I can succeed in academics;and I will continue to so even without supervision at UCSD because I am more disciplined now.

Undergraduate / Georgetown School of Foreign Service Transfer Essay [11]

The more I think about it, the more I come down on the side of: Either. Whichever you feel most competent to address. This is a highly competitive program, from what I understand about it, and they are looking most especially for sophisticated thinking about complex topics as well as a good grounding in international affairs. Write from your strength, knowing that either of these topics is fine.

Writing Feedback / 1st essay in 13 years. Disadvantages that working mothers give to their children [12]

Googling popular press articles is not going to resolve the question, as cultural and political factors strongly influence which studies are reported. You'll have to query an academic database, such as PsychNet, or find a recent book (published by a reputable scholarly press, such as SAGE) that includes a review of relevant literature. Why recent? Because times change. Studies done before the widespread availability of high-quality daycare and after school programs, for example, will tend to differ from those done when working mothers had to rely exclusively on neighbors and family or just give their children a latch-key!

Essays / Management Essay - Self-chosen topic: "Power - Strategic Management Tool". [16]


This is an intriguing insight, and might be worth a section of its own. At least in the States, where democratic ideals hold sway, power is sometimes deliberately camouflaged in service of an illusion of workplace democracy. Managers who themselves have democratic or communitarian values may feel uncomfortable with their own power and thus downplay or disguise it. How do such dynamics factor into the use of power in strategic management?

Writing Feedback / 1st essay in 13 years. Disadvantages that working mothers give to their children [12]

The negative impacts of working mothers on their children, what are they?

That fix cleans up the punctuation, but the lead is still weak.


Hmm... How is data collection different than research? Also, I think that statement's not quite true. Scanning your references, I see one 26 year old book, one newspaper article, and one 38 year old scholarly study of a measure -- a research tool -- that doesn't even directly address your thesis. This hardly adds up to sufficient support for such a strong statement.

I'm relatively certain that the overall trend of the research is against your thesis but some small subset of the research supports your thesis. When arguing a position supported by only a small subset of the relative research, it's unwise and possibly unethical to suggest that a vast body of research supports you. Better to frame your argument very carefully, stating exactly and only what you can prove.

Even better would be to acknowledge that yours is the minority position and explain why you believe the larger and more recent body of research ought be ignored in favor of your viewpoint. Are the outdated studies you cite stronger methodologically than more recent studies with opposite findings?

Undergraduate / Topic for my personal statement (characteristics, family history, culture) [3]

By environment, I suspect they mean things like whether you grew up in a big city, small town, or rural farming community; what region of your country you grew up in; whether your neighborhood was affluent or rat-infested; whether you walked to school without fear or had to duck drug dealers or warlords along the way; whether your school had top of the line computers for every student or not enough decades-old textbooks to go around, etc., etc.

As for characteristics, universities what to know what you will bring to the "mix" of students. Since they are usually choosing among more than enough qualified applicants, universities look for a blend of students that will include students with interests in the arts, sciences, and athletics; students from different regions of the country and different parts of the world; students from a variety of socioeconomic and cultural backgrounds; etc., etc.

What will you bring to the mix? If you play the tuba, say so, because the marching band might just be looking for a second string player. Are you likely to join the physics club? Paint stage sets for the drama club? Join the dance team? If you've had unique experiences or have unique talents, list them.