Undergraduate / Contributing to the Bryn Mawr Community - college with rigorous intellectual stimulation [2]

What you have given are simple introductions to your academic and extra curricular interests. As introductions, these are alright, but you need to develop your possible academic and extra curricular contributions in order to highlight the possibility that you will be an excellent addition to the Bran Mawr community both academically and socially. Unfortunately, you are hindered by a word count that will not allow you completely present and discuss your academic and extra curricular prowess. Instead, choose your best academic and social endeavor that you feel will best highlight your abilities as a Bryn Mawr student. Make sure that you expose the side of you to the admissions officer that you know will be best received. Usually, these are characteristics or traits, or activities that you participate in that resonate well with the goals and objectives of the university.

Your introduction is too long and does not help present anything that will help advance the introduction of your essay. It is almost a separate part of the discussion as it is a series of exchanges between you and your friend. Essays like these need to be direct to the point and interesting. Exchanging dialogue between people at the start of an essay does not usually work to hold the interest of the admissions officer. Don't repeat information about the university that is common knowledge. Instead, try to offer an idea as to how you are looking forward to changing the landscape of the school by some specific academic and extra curricular goals that you have which currently does not exist in the university. That should help to perk up the interest of the reader in your essay and make it more prompt adherent as well.

Undergraduate / "Don't Forget The Lyrics" (A Cheesy Common App Essay About A Bad Audition - Prompt #2) [5]

So Sabrina, the first thing I noticed about your essay is that it lacks the back story that will lead the reader to the ultimate audition that you participated in. The introduction lacks a sense of importance and urgency on your part. You need to make the admissions officers feel and understand why doing well in this audition was important to you. What were the underlying circumstances? Were you planning on a professional singing career in the future? You mentioned having an agent, are you on the look out for a record deal? Establish the reasons why you have an agent and why you felt compelled to attend this audition. Develop the hook that you feel will make the admissions officer interested in learning more about this story of yours and also, try to find a better title for the essay. Your current title is a good place holder, but not a very effective final title as it is too common in feel. It lacks impact. Remember, the title is the first thing that will make the admissions officer interested in what you have to say. The title is the first part of your introductory hook :-)

There is also a lack of clarity regarding the catalyst of the essay. Were you overcome by stage fright? Why did you forget the lyrics? Were you star struck by the judges? What were their comments? How did those comments affect you? You need to explain those things because you clearly state that this bad audition persuaded you to make changes in your life, but there is a lack of discussion about the reasons both personal and professional, that could have pushed you towards that decision. When you discuss the lessons you learned, make sure to indicate or offer examples relating to how that bad audition and the changes you made to yourself because of it have helped you become a person today. Let the admissions officer in on how you are now a better, self improved version of yourself today because of that failure. Then in conclusion, you can offer a hindsight point of view that perhaps says something about how you are thankful for that bad experience because if you had not failed, you would not have become the person you are today and oh, you just might audition again for The Voice in the future.

Remember, the key to making this an effective essay is to make sure that you deliver the following:

1. The importance of the event to you.
2. The reason you believe you failed.
3. How you overcame the failure and became a better person afterwards. This would be the lesson learned.

Tell the whole story behind the experience without regard for the word count in the drafting stages. You need to make sure that you get your point across completely. Edit the essay for word count as you revise the drafts. I don't care if you go over 650 words, as you edit the essay for content, you will find that you will start deleting unimportant parts and compressing parts that will eventually help you meet the word count. If you have any problems meeting it, we will be here to assist you with the editing of the essay if you want our help :-)

Graduate / Responsibility as a lifelong member of the Mendoza community - To ask more of business! [3]

Okay, here is the thing, the essay prompt is not asking you refer to a past business team work experience as a response to the question. Rather, it is asking you think forward. Imagining what the business world will already be like after you graduate and enter the workforce armed with this new knowledge. Consider the possible new business problems you may face at the time, develop a feasible scenario around it, then explain how you will deal with it. Solve the situation using the basis of


. The proper response to the essay requires you to address a business future where those character traits will be necessary to call upon in order to fairly resolve a business situation. Explain how you would approach dealing with your business community in the future should you be called upon by a situation to forget or violate those rules. How would you still be able to function and apply those traits in your regular business dealings? That is what the essay is asking you to respond to.

Undergraduate / Wrote about Trip to Italy, made me want to be independent.. Common app essay - Background story [6]

Wow! That is a very powerful statement that you developed back there. It actually helps improve the essay that you wrote a thousand times. You know what? You can actually delete your second and third paragraphs in favor of this one. The explanation and emotional attachment that is quite evident in this piece of writing did not exist in the first version that you wrote. I can sense that you did your best to connect yourself to the writing and allowed yourself to show a sheltered part of your sentiments in the process. Trust me, when you write as openly as this, the essay cannot help but improve. Here is what I would like you to do at the moment, place this paragraph in place of the second and third one while keeping an original copy of your first version. Now, read both versions. Compare the two and decide for yourself which version you prefer to use and wish to spend a bit more time improving. I will work with you on improving whichever version you opt to use :-)

Undergraduate / My best friend, whom I love dearly, felt ashamed of being himself. He admitted to me that he is gay. [2]

The essay contains a number of punctuation issues that you must address. I would like you to review the essay for comma placements and periods as right now, those two punctuation marks are necessary but not in use or visible in the essay. As for the content, You spent too much of the word count on discussing the way that you met your friend and his coming out, including his depression. The way that you hope to shed light upon the LGBT issues at American University practically became an after thought when it should have been the center of the essay. Revise the beginning of your essay to reflect a simple summary of the fact that your friend is gay. Then discuss how the community that the two of you move in accepted or rejected him as the reason behind your desire to shed light on their cause. Finally, present ideas about how you can use Active Minds to bring a spotlight upon their problems and how you hope the organization can help you solve or at least alleviate the problems the American University LGBT community must also face. I almost forgot, you also need to identify yourself as either heterosexual or a member of the LGBT community in order to give further strength and emotion to your written word. Refocusing the essay and presenting the necessary responses is the best way to revise the content of your paper. After that, we can review the paper again for grammar and punctuation errors that must be addressed and corrected.

Undergraduate / Family in Atlanta? Then upon research I discovered what an amazing institute Georgia tech is. [12]

That is a very nice addition to the statement response. Why don't you try to revise the essay by using that paragraph as your opening statement. It really has an effective hook that you should take advantage of by placing it in a more noticeable position within your written response. You can even revise the whole essay to better reflect the supporting reasons that you have for that particular statement of yours. Just change the content of the statement by using the response you wrote as your new template and everything related to your response should finally fall into place. If you end up in excess of the word count, don't worry, I will help you meet the word count requirement as soon as you post the revision here. Just tell me what word count you need to meet.

Graduate / I am an undergraduate from Electrical background with 1.5 years of experience; Statement of purpose [21]

I see only one version of the essay posted in this thread. It is actually a version that can actually work in your favor. While still too long, I believe that you can already use it. How well it will be received by the admissions officers though is what I am not able to predict. I believe that you should delete the reference to the project that you participated in while in college in order to bring down the word count, tighten the essay, and focus the reader only upon the most important aspects of your statement of purpose. Without that college project paragraph, the essay feels like it flows better and leaves the reader better informed about your potential to succeed in this field sans and related work experience or education on your part.

Undergraduate / Wrote about Trip to Italy, made me want to be independent.. Common app essay - Background story [6]

The latter part of your essay deviated from the prompt and no longer built up the idea of your central identity development. It began to focus on the reasons that you feel you have to get away from your family instead. Never stray from the expected discussion. In this case, all you had to do was explain what you learned about yourself and an independent individual during your trip abroad and how even after returning home, you felt the need to cut the umbilical cord from your family in order to begin living your life. Clearly define the central identity that you came to discover during your trip. In this case, that would be the independent part of your personality and how it has helped you become a better person even though it sometimes means defying your family's dictates.

Graduate / I am an undergraduate from Electrical background with 1.5 years of experience; Statement of purpose [21]

No. Not when it is not related at all to the masters course of studies that you are trying to gain admission to. Remember that you do not have a college background that will relate to the logical next step for your career. You are basically changing careers totally, and skipping returning to college in order to complete a related degree before you take masters studies in the process. Remember that you admitted yourself that you do not have the background to connect your masters interest with your college academics. So why use information that would just make the admissions officers wonder what you will be doing in the masters course or, even more importantly, make them question your ability to complete the course in the proper manner. Since you do not have a background in it among other shortcomings on your part for your admission to the line of study, you should downplay it as much as possible rather than highlight it. It will not be an asset to your statement of purpose. Believe me, it won't work. I already told you in the past that you need at least 2 years of RELATED professional experience before you apply to this line of study. You told me you don't have the background for it. I am trying to help you spin your statement of purpose into what might become an acceptable essay for the admissions officer given your lack of qualifications for admission. If you wish to really include your college information then so be it. I won't try to change your mind about it. I will just support you if you want to do that. Use the essay as it is, in its current form. If we follow your line of reasoning, then this essay is ready for submission.

Undergraduate / The key to a successful performance by a group depends largely on its dynamic and chemistry. [5]

You have made a good point of pointing out that soft spoken people and their opinions often go unnoticed in today's world. However, you should point out how the fact that people ignore you have affected your self esteem. Remember that you have to explain to the admissions officers about why this issue is important to you and one of the most important reasons will be the effect that the ignoring has upon your way of thinking or attempts at having yourself heard during the discussions. The fact that you learned to listen to other people because you are often ignored is not as important to this essay as the discussion of why this is important to you. I would not add any information that you got from research and psychologists in this essay because that deviates from the personal opinion that the essay requires. Try to keep all of your reasoning along the lines of a personal point of view. That is what the essay prompt requires after all.

Undergraduate / Write about your personal and education background and what you expect from a university education [4]

Hussain, you made a mistake in your essay prompt response. Rather than telling the admissions officer about the reasons why you have chosen to seek admittance into AUS, you should have been discussing what your idea of a college education is. That means you do not discuss the qualifications of the university but rather, your concept or notion of what a college education is all about. What do you feel you should learn during your four years of college? What subjects should the university offer which would tie into your idea of a balanced academic education? Surely there are some extra curricular activities that you expect to participate in at the university level, so let the reader know what those activities are. Basically, you should be able to relate exactly what you feel the correct college education for you will be like. You can base your response upon the information that you already know about the university, but you need to rephrase it in order to make the answer better suited to the prompt.

Graduate / I am an undergraduate from Electrical background with 1.5 years of experience; Statement of purpose [21]

Omit all references to your college background. Your essay works best without it. At this point, we are trying to sell you as a possible candidate for graduate school based upon your work experience merits. Don't remind the admissions officers that you are not academically qualified for the masters course you are applying to. That portion of the essay also removes the impact that the earlier portions of your narrative created which, I might add, was quite beneficial to your application. Don't keep trying to insert your college education into this statement because, as you said, you did not finish a college course relevant to the masters degree you are applying to. Why would you want to lessen your chances for consideration by offering information that is not being asked for in the first place? Just present the purpose of your application, then, based upon the 4 guide questions I gave you earlier, cut down the length of your essay to only the most salient points that will work to your benefit. Again, remove the reference to your college education. That does not help your application in any way. Next, about the project that you discussed, you need to create a connection between the masters course you are taking and that project. Without the connection, the statement just does not make sense and only serves to clutter the page and confuse the reader.

Undergraduate / Duke's campus, combined with Gothic-style and Georgian-style architecture, is unparalleled in beauty [3]

Carli, your response to the prompt is too vague. Trying to touch on all the aspects of Duke that attracted you to apply to the university is not exactly the best way to respond to the prompt. The prompt itself is quite clear, you should have chosen only one aspect of Duke and built your essay upon that. If I were the one writing this essay, I would definitely have chosen to build upon the academic aspect of the response. Specifically, the chance to have lunch with Ms. Alberts as this would be in direct relation to my chosen major and, quite possibly, help to define my future career path. The proper response to the essay lies in the way that you would take advantage of the educational opportunities, both formal and informal, that Duke has to offer and how you feel it would benefit you. Those are the reasons or that is the reason why you chose to apply to Duke.

Undergraduate / Family in Atlanta? Then upon research I discovered what an amazing institute Georgia tech is. [12]

Like I said, don't be afraid to go over the word limit at the moment. Respond as best as you can, making reference to the aspects that you found information about within the Georgia Tech program of study. Did you rely solely on the student brochure and website for the information while you were researching? The reason I asked is because when I ran the keyword "aerospace engineering at Georgia Tech", not only did I come up with the department website at the university, but a host of Youtube, facebook, and news articles about the cutting edge offerings of the university also came up. So I suggest that you run the same keywords I used in Google, then look into every link that comes up in order to gather more usable information for your response. Go over the word count. Don't be afraid to do that. By limiting yourself to the word count immediately, you are also limiting your chances to give the best possible reply to the prompt that you can. The response you give can always be edited for word count, provided the essence of your response exists throughout the essay. I can help you with that situation once the response is finalized in content.

Undergraduate / Family in Atlanta? Then upon research I discovered what an amazing institute Georgia tech is. [12]

While it is good that you consider your personal needs in the response to the prompt, you could have actually done better and discussed some important aspects of the academic department of Georgia Tech that have piqued your interest. By now you have probably chosen your college major right? So talk about the facilities that Georgia Tech offers your college major, or important internships that can help you in the future. Make sure that the admissions officer will know how you plan to take full and total advantage of the learning facilities that Georgia Tech has to offer. That is what the prompt is asking you to explain, in 150 words or less. When you draft the essay again, go over the word count. Answer as truthfully as you can and then we can work on bringing the word count down to the acceptable level it needs to be.

Scholarship / The community where I live in right now is notorious for gang violence, especially for the youths. [3]

The question you should be asking yourself is this: What is my chosen career?" Once you have decided upon what your future career will be you will be able to analyze how your career relates to the influences in your community life. By doing so, you will see the clear connection between your career and what you can do for your community and beyond. Don't try to discuss the problems of your community and then try to relate the career to it. Reverse the discussion. Choose the career and then figure out how that career will help you solve your community problems and beyond. I actually did not read what kind of career you plan on pursuing in this version of the essay. I suggest that you lead with that in your next version and then work your way backwards. Sometimes, knowing what you want to be in life is the answer to the question " How can I make a difference in my community?" and "What does my community need help with?". You should be able to better focus your essay if you follow the format I am suggesting.

Scholarship / Everything we do affects our success and our failure as well as our future. APIASF Scholarship [7]

Yes, you need to focus the essay on only one situation so that you can properly develop the essay. Right now, trying to tell two stories at once tends to confuse the essay and your development of the central theme of the paper. I know it is difficult to choose the topic that you would like to best discuss because the stories you presented seem to carry equal weight. Of the two however, I believe that you should develop the language barrier story the most because that was the biggest obstacle that you had to overcome. It was only after beating that situation that you were able to further progress with your studies, which in turn led to the problem with Dysart. So my advice, is to discuss the root obstacle only because overcoming it enabled you to progress with your studies and improve your learning abilities.

Undergraduate / As a child my first favorite big word was paradox. The word offered both understanding and confusion [3]

What I gather from your essay is that you consider ignorance to be bliss. I guess that is a good thing. However, I am missing the development of your central identity in the essay. How did all of these life experiences combine within you to create the person you are today? More importantly, do you know who you are and how you reached this point in your life? What events and factors have led to this self realization? Don't waste your first two paragraphs with filler topics. You need to focus the essay on a single life defining event. Right now, the essay is quite wide in scope and does not really focus on developing a central identity for you. My advice, is to revise the essay to represent what you feel is your central identity and why you feel that is important and why. Perhaps it is the way that you dealt with having a single mother growing up, the influence of your grandparents, whatever the main reason for your identity development, discuss it as best as you can. Try to focus on only one reason so that the essay will not seem like it is trying to discuss one too many topics all at once.

Graduate / I am an undergraduate from Electrical background with 1.5 years of experience; Statement of purpose [21]

Omit the detailed description of your previous projects and how you accomplished the goals. Just mention that you were involved in such a project and what the outcome of the project was. Mention your participation in the project, but not in the method you have done so now. Your extremely detailed description of your participation in these projects have made the essay extremely long and redundant. Keep it simple. Name the project, what your role was, what the outcome was. For example," I participated as the battery operator in a simulated banana powered battery experiment which was conducted with successful results." That simple, that informative. This way you can provide and draw more attention to the future project that you wish to undertake. Detailing the method by which the university facilities will be able to help you achieve the best results in the process. Your drive and desire to attend the university should be brought up to an earlier part of the paragraph. Maybe the introduction or second paragraph. Wherever you feel it will work best. What is important, is that you give out that important information early within the essay, hopefully as part of the hook that you need to reel in the reader.

Undergraduate / "The beautiful diversity of multicultural enviroment" APU essay #1 [2]

The first part of your essay sounds a lot more like a student brochure selling you on the positive points of the university and why you should choose to study there. The essay responds to the prompt in a number of ways but misses the complete point of the essay. The complete point being, how you plan to approach your studies at the university since you are going to be a foreign student in a Japanese university. Speak of the program that you plan on majoring in and how you are looking forward to studying its related courses. Explain how you see yourself participating in the various student academic and social activities with the goal of immersing yourself in a cultural study of Japan and the way that foreigners adapt to the community. There is a lack of hypothetical ideas as to how you will approach your studies at the university because you have not chosen to discuss and concentrate upon the programs attached to the study of your major. A revision of the whole essay is in order because of those missing requirements. Once you address those needs specifically, you will be able to use the essay to your benefit as a student applicant.

Undergraduate / I close my eyes and see blue skies and luxuriant trees.I see sunlight and a sense of vitality... [3]

The Department of Medicine is the college department that houses the major that you want to enroll in. Therefore, it should not become a part of the programs that you will be looking forward to taking advantage of. Rather, point out some programs, internships, and activities within the college of medicine or beyond that you will want to take advantage of and explain why. Be specific and detailed. Right now, your essay has a very general, generic feel to it that does not really speak much about what you know of the university opportunities and programs that could keep you interested in the academic and social offerings of the university. Try to revise the essay to become more detailed and specific in the information you provide in order to provide the admissions officers with a better idea of the reasons you wish to join their student community. It will also show you well you may be able to fit into the campus lifestyle they offer.

Scholarship / Everything we do affects our success and our failure as well as our future. APIASF Scholarship [7]

Kezzo, kindly review your essay for tense usage. You are writing an essay about events that occurred in the past. Yet you have a mix of past and present tense usage in the sentences. Please revise the sentences to ensure that the reflection of the statements are only in past tense as that is the proper tense usage for this essay narrative. You should also separate the topic paragraphs clearly. At the moment, the paragraphs seem to be mixed into one long paragraph which makes it difficult to read and does not prepare the reader very well for the topic changes in the paragraphs. Try to explain the lessons that you learned from every obstacle at the end of the related paragraph before finally closing the essay with the collective single lesson that all of the combined situations provided you. That will make the essay feel better thought-out and developed. This is definitely a better version of the first one but can use some more editing to bring down the word count so that you can provide more detailed explanations of the areas I pointed out. Review the essay and from your personal choices, choose which portions you think you can omit in order to further improve the essay. Let me know if you have a problem with that so that I can offer some suggestions regarding which portions to omit :-)

Undergraduate / I had few matchpoints. How I met a failure in my tennis career [3]

Your essay comes across as very self-centric and shows the bruising of your ego very well. Letting the admissions officers know that you worked hard to better your game after each failure is also a good touch as it shows resiliency on your part. However, there is a lack of intellectual and moral maturity in the development of your essay. After every game loss / failure, surely there was a lesson you learned, possibly about humility or the importance of sportsmanship. These are the important character building elements that are developed by a sports person through his experience in playing his sport of choice. Try to develop these aspects. Explain the lessons that you learned with every failure because that is how you learn to accept and deal with failure / loss after each tournament. Lessen the discussion about all of the competitions you played in as Reza pointed out. The unspoken part of this prompt is that you need to explain the lessons that you learned from these failures and how you developed as a person from those life lessons. Address those points in order to better develop your essay theme and discussion.

Letters / When I was born, my dad has founded his computer based company called ''Intuis Computers'' [4]

A motivational letter is still formatted as a regular academic essay, not as a formal letter addressed to a particular person or body. So that is a formatting problem that you need to address. Your motivation is clearly the only topic that needs to be discussed in this essay. Remember, you are not writing a personal statement or a statement of purpose. What the admissions officer needs to read about is the motivation or foundation for your desire to major in computer studies. What were the influences in your life that led you this point? That said, discussing every detail of your high school education not related to your interest in computers becomes irrelevant. Try to focus your attention on the way your father's company influenced your desire to pursue this major. You don't have to write a detailed CV in this letter because you have other documents and common app essays submitted that will provide that information to the admissions officer in greater detail. Focus the content of your essay and complete the theme that you wish this motivational letter to deliver. Build up your motivation for this major. That is what works best for this type of essay.

Undergraduate / Imagination - lazing around or dozing off at my grandmother's home [4]

While it is alright for you to describe an abstract place in this type of essay, it must be based upon an actual truth on your part. The essay is asking you reveal a part of your personality through the prompt. So suddenly telling the admissions officer at the end of it all that you just made up the information will not work in your favor. Mostly because you did not properly address the prompt and you obviously did not take the requirement seriously. My advice is this, tell the reader at the start that the place or environment you feel most comfortable in is your imagination. Then explain why it is that way for you. By telling the truth from the start, you will have used an abstract idea to respond properly to the prompt. From this abstract response, you can then use the stories about your grandmother's house, the concert, and other activities that take place in your mind which results in a clear sense of contentment for you. Remember, it is not good to save the truth for the end, that may work negatively towards your application. Yet, by revising the way that you wrote the paper, you just might be able to use the abstract idea of your imagination as the place where you feel most content to your benefit. Give it a try, revise the essay. I am sure you will sense the difference in the way it may be received by the admissions officer.

Undergraduate / Why Colgate - academic programs and diverse community [8]

Sam, here is a 192 version of your essay. I took the liberty of editing the content to make it shorter and more representative of the prompt requirements. I hope you don't mind.

I am drawn by the unique courses on offer by Colgate's economics program as they provide an insight to global and modern topics that are most relevant to economists today. Niche courses such at The Japanese Economy and The London Economics Study Group will offer me an opportunity to gain valuable insight into the economic forces governing the global economic hub. Coupled with an internship either in New York or London as only Colgate University can help me attain, I am sure that my international working experience will be off to a good start.

I would like to continue exploring my passion in volunteering in universityby patticipating as a tutor voounteer at COVE. With COVE's generous support and grants, I am also eager to spearhead the expansion of the tutoring programs to more schools, making a positive impact on lives in Hamilton and beyond.

Among Colgate's diverse and tight-knit student community, I will be able to comfortably engage in an environment where different perspectives are shared and valued. This will cultivate in me the skills to learn with an open mind and develop personal maturity during my four years in Colgate.

As always, you can either use this version for your application or you can use it as a template for your own version. You decide upon what works best for you :-)

Undergraduate / When we least expect it, life sets us a challenge to test our courage and willingness to change [2]

Camila, you need not constantly introduce yourself in every common essay prompt that you write. You are not writing a legal document, you are writing an academic essay and believe me, the admissions officer already knows you are because the attached documents and forms tell him exactly who he is reading about. Saying your name at the start of every essay is not an effective hook. It does not serve a definite purpose that could help advance or enhance the content of the essay either. Delete the start of this essay and instead, set up the scene inside the chancellery for us. What was is like as you stepped into the hall? How did you feel? What were your misgivings? What were you excited about? Those as the things you have to say which may create an interesting hook for the reader, compelling them to read more about your experience in this arena.

This is all about a central identity story and using the MUN as a platform is something unique. What you need to do at this moment is build upon that identity that you have come to realize you have. Tell us how you became socially inclined through your experience at the MUN. What solutions did you personally develop and how was it received by the committee? Are these the reasons why you became socially conscious? What were you like in terms of socio-civic mindedness prior to your MUN exposure? Show us who you were before so that we can understand why the MUN experience helped shape a new identity for you as a person. That is an idea that is rather under-developed in your current version.

Graduate / I was fifteen when I first used a Computer - Personal Statement for MBA - Southampton [4]

Garrick, when you apply for a masters degree, it is important that you concentrate solely on the discussion of your current abilities, immediate and recent training experiences, as well as a simple discussion of your college background and the reasons that you feel you need to undertake higher studies in this field of interest. I can see from your narrative that you have ample current computer experience to not warrant a discussion that goes all the way back to the time you were fifteen and the first time that you used a computer. Don't even discuss the time you spend working at the start up. As you are currently working in a related position, I believe that your essay will benefit from a discussion of your current work position and how your chosen masters course will help you benefit from that exposure. Normally, a person looking towards a masters degree has at least a years worth of professional work experience in a related field. From what I have read, you have more than that years of experience under your belt. What is impressive is that you amassed the related knowledge while still being a student. So you definitely have a notable application here. You just need to shorten it and focus on your most recent experience as relevant to your masters degree. Don't forget to offer a paragraph relating to your short and long term goals upon completing your masters degree and explain how the university can be of assistance to you in this quest.

Undergraduate / "One never stops learning until one dies" USC academic interests essay by "Undeclared" major student [5]

It my understanding from the prompt requirements that you must and have to present at least 2 possible course majors that you wish to take in the realm that interests your the most. While your essay proves to be an interesting read, it does not really tell us what your possible majors are. Normally a student is torn between a number of majors in his field of interest. In your case, you spent a great deal of time detailing your experience at Pricewaterhouse so I suggest that you present a discussion of your two possible business majors. Your possible majors stem anywhere from Business Administration to Economics, both of which, you were surely exposed to during that time interning at the company. As an "undeclared" major, you are just not sure about what major you want to take, your field of interest however, should be clearly defined. That will make it easier to expand in a way upon your possible "Jack of all trades, master of none" discussion as an "undecided" major by giving it at the very least, a centered field of interest and making it easier for the admissions officer to understand where your possible career might be headed as a future USC student.

Undergraduate / Why Colgate - academic programs and diverse community [8]

I always tell the students who write these sorts of essays to never bother with meeting the word count when working on the draft of the essay. Why do I tell them to do that? By constantly striving to stay within the word count, the essay suffers in terms of content and accuracy. You are unable to properly express yourself, your desires, and cannot communicate your reasons for choosing this particular university to the best extent. Forget the word count for now. Just develop the essay as best as you can, paying attention to grammatical errors and sentence structure as you do so. I always work with the student to accurately bring down the word count once the essence of the response has been finalized. I would like you to do the same thing. You know what information the essay requires, expand upon it. When you have satisfied the prompt in the long form, I will then step in and help you bring down the word count.

This essay version contains a number of improvements over the first but is still wanting in the sense of clearly explaining how you plan to benefit from the opportunities offered by Colgate. Respond in the long form and then post it here. We can work on properly reducing the word count while getting your message and response clearly across :-)

Writing Feedback / The internet has caused a considerable discrepancy between modern life and past life. [2]

There are obvious capitalization errors in your paper. You need to learn to proof read your work and use the spell checker that comes with all word processing programs. These programs help you limit the grammatical, simple punctuation, and sentence structure errors in your work prior to in-depth editing which we can help you do. The essay talks in great detail about the problem posed by the internet but it only skims over the solutions possible for the problem. You have not properly developed the solutions portion because you only mention a sentence or two about an article that you read about the problem and possible simple solution. There is nothing in the essay that shows you have considered any solutions to the problems based upon your own analysis and conclusion regarding the problem. You need to write the solutions part of the essay as a separate paragraph so that you can better develop the ideas pertaining to the discussions you have presented. Your possible solutions can be based upon research that you conducted or common sense and logic. It is not difficult to figure out workable solutions to the problem that excessive internet usage has presented to our modern society.

Undergraduate / I come from a community where work isn't referred to as a career, but a job. [6]

The edited version of your essay works very well. However, there is a line that I feel does not need to be included in the description of your community as the season for that has already passed. I refer to the following line:


Try to focus your essay on the way that you come from an under serviced community that is striving to get itself out of the economic cesspool that is drowning its residents using relevant information only.I was not kidding when I told you that you had a place in your community and I am very glad that you found it :-) If you still can, try to describe the kind of life the teenage boys in your community live their lives so that they will appear in stark contrast to who you are and what you want to be as a part of your community. Let me know if you have gone severely over the word count, what the maximum word count is with expansion, and if you will agree to cut some portions of the essay that seem redundant and thus unnecessary in the description of your community if need be.

Undergraduate / MIT short answers; I'm dominican; cultural backgroung essay [3]

What out for your capitalization errors. You have the word "Dominican" written in small letter when the letter D should be capitalized in some sentences. Make sure to double check for spelling errors as well. The essay seems very underdeveloped in my opinion. You seem to be throwing descriptions at the admissions officers without really building up your explanation. They seem like stand alone sentences instead of complete paragraphs. I believe that you can solve that idea development problem by choosing the 2 most vital cultural descriptions of the Dominicans and then develop those cultural traits in paragraph format. You don't need to try to describe all of the Dominican traits. Just the ones that you believe are most important. Then towards the last paragraph, you can try to describe how you embody those two important traits, which makes you a typical Dominican in the eyes of everyone who knows you and are familiar with your culture.

Undergraduate / I come from a community where work isn't referred to as a career, but a job. [6]

Your community is very interesting. Unfortunately, you lost the admissions officer towards the end when you said that you don't have a place within your community because your community is within you. That is not a proper response because you are being asked to definitely explain what your role is within the community, if you feel that you do not have a role in the community because it is within you, then you must take at least a paragraph to explain that mindset. Thus offering up an idea as to what kind of position you do have in your community. Believe me, you may not think that you have a place within the community but you actually do. Any sort of contribution that you make within the community defines your purpose and place in the community. With any luck, you may be able to find that place, no matter how abstract the explanation within the community.

Undergraduate / A nurse who fights for the wellbeing of their patient is worthy of the honor she possess [2]

Lindsay, the essay is asking you to discuss the reasons that you decided upon the University of Michigan as your nursing school of choice. When you were considering your choices from a plethora of nursing university choices, do you remember what made you decide to apply at University of Michigan? What attributes did the school have, when compared to others, that made you decide that their course curriculum and training programs were the kind of academic exposure that you feel would help you become the nurse that you want to be in the future?

Your current essay does discuss some of these aspects, but in a general way which makes it a run of the mill essay. By delving deeply into a comparison and relating those reasons to your personal objectives and goals as a future nurse, you will be able to better defend your choice of University Michigan as the university that best suits your needs as a future nursing student. That sort of discussion will just require a few adjustments to the content of your current essay. Go from general to specific in your discussion.

Undergraduate / Unique integration of a minority female, computer science, and psychology [15]

You already have my previous comments regarding how to best organize and discuss your essay. Use it as your reference point. Go ahead and discuss the part about sports since it responds to the extra-curricular prompt requirement within the essay discussion. You need to show me how the next essay, with the sports part developed, developed for you. I understand that you are working on a time constraint and I am doing my best to work with you in the shortest possible time in improving your essay. Remember, you have to develop the second paragraph to reflect the way that JHU will help you excel in these specific areas. Talk about the academic side and extra curricular side of the university and hope you hope that it will be able to help you achieve a well rounded education within the next 4 years.

Undergraduate / Diversity was something that was not part of my vocabulary until the day I came to the U.S. [5]

If you are questioning whether you are going to be able to successfully contribute to the diversity of the campus, the answer is yes. Your story is good, although a bit troubling because you seem to be lost in the sea of diversity, not really knowing if you are still Peruvian or already American. That is the point of your essay which leaves me worried about the way that the admissions officers might perceive your essay. After all, you are being asked to exemplify diversity as a characteristic of yours and yet you are unsure about how to portray that diversity. I have given it some thought and here are some of my suggestions that I hope you will be receptive to.

While you are discussing the confusion that you are feeling in terms of whether you are still Peruvian or American, try to develop an opinion that leans towards the idea that diversity, in your case, comes from the fact that you are confused about who and how you should define yourself at this point. Diversity is all about the successful mixing of two different cultures in one person. Which is what I see as happening in your case. Your diversity comes from the fact that you are caught in the middle. Not really Peruvian, but not really American either. Discuss that confusion as a strong point in reference to your diversity. Don't make it sound like a weakness because it isn't. The strength of your response actually lies in your perceived weakness.

Undergraduate / The welcome atmosphere that I feel the first time I walked in the campus. Why Virginia Tech? [2]

I was counting the reasons that you have in the essay for becoming a Hokie and realized that you have more than 5 reasons listed in it. the breakdown, for your understanding is as follows:

1. Welcome atmosphere
2. Small class size
3. Student diversity
4. Enthusiasm and passion of the students
5. Wide range of opportunities
6. privilege to study in a foreign country
7. Hands on experience
8. Campus residence
9. Diversity of clubs

You need to review your current essay and choose only the top 5 reasons that you want to include in your statement. I know that you are running on a word limited statement and that will hinder the complete discussion of your choices. I strongly advice you not to pay attention to the word limit at the moment and completely discuss the choices you made instead. We can work on editing it for grammar and word count when we already have what you want to say finalized.

Undergraduate / Why Colgate - academic programs and diverse community [8]

Here is the thing, with this type of essay prompt, you need to analyze the reasons that led to your decision to apply for admission to Colgate University. Your responses are not really well developed and are short on information about your personal reasons that led to this choice. Perhaps you can look into your personal objectives and goals for studying Economics? Discuss that point of view and then directly relate it to some of the classes and research opportunities that Colgate offers it students. Any internships of interest to you? Talk about how you feel that participating in it will help you become a better economist in the future. Sometimes the essay is not all about how well you fit into the college. In this case, it is about the reasons that you feel Colgate will be the best university for you to attend given the set parameters of your study goals and objectives. Expand upon the discussion you have presented about the Japanese Economy, London Study Group and, as Heather said, the COVE center. Show us the reason that you will develop best academically and socially during your time at Colgate University.

Undergraduate / Music help me to be who i am [2]

This is a good response to the prompt. It does have a number of grammatical errors though. I have taken the opportunity to point it out and correct it below.


- ... that I heard and liked because of he focuses his songs on the real world .


- ... in my life... my home country lived under the ...


- ... the song I realize how true the lyrics are


- ... not so obsessed with power... would never have taken my country... people not have died .