Scholarship / Perspective in the US - studying in country that value the research and the technological innovation [2]

Caique, are you supposed to discuss your general perspective of the United States? Or can you discuss the social, political, and educational aspects of the U.S. as you understand it? The reason that I ask is because the prompt you gave is too general and broad to be discussed properly. You need to narrow down the focus and concentrate on only one aspect of the perspective which you feel will best shed light on your understanding of the United States and its citizens. Do you want to discuss their politics? Their society? Or maybe their economics? You could even discuss their history as a nation. The essay is about your understanding of the United States as a country. It is not about your idea of why a U.S education will suit your needs, which is what your essay is currently discussing. So if we can narrow down the perspectives topic, we should be able to redirect the essay in a manner that will allow you better offer your understanding of the country.

Undergraduate / Dartmouth - interdisciplinary spirit, excellent education, and unique location; it's what I look for [2]

You need to revise the essay to remove all references to your desire to study at Dartmouth and the reasons why you feel that you will do well at the school. That is not a part of the essay requirements. Instead, focus the essay solely on your interest in economics. Choose only one of the stories that you are trying to simultaneously tell in the essay in order to give a better answer. Focusing on the most important piece of information about you that you want them to know about will accurately answer the essay prompt. There is no need to constantly connect yourself to the university. That is not the main concern of this essay. The admissions officer only wants to get to know about you and some information that was not presented in the other common app essays which you feel needs to be brought to light in an effort to make your application look even better. Take advantage of the opportunity. Don't waste the essay by trying to suck up and offer information that is not required in the essay. You are the main focus of the essay so don't deviate from that. You can either discuss how you developed an interest in economics or how economics affected your business due to the changes in regulations, causing it to shut down. Those are just some ideas for topics that you can discuss in this essay :-)

Undergraduate / Learning in the school of life - College essay [4]

Louisa, what is the prompt you are trying to answer with this essay? It is kind of hard to decide how well or not you wrote this essay without any basis for comparison regarding your answers. I hope that you can supply that prompt to us as soon as you can :-) There are a lot of adventures going on in this essay which are inter related but I am not sure if they are relevant to the prompt as this point. Basically, this is a better effort at writing an essay than your previous one although it can use some tightening and grammar advice. All of which I will provide to you once I know what direction to help you bring the essay in :-) I am looking forward to finding out what the prompt is so that we can get started on editing this :-)

Undergraduate / There is a soldier who sees the world [5]

Fiona, when you apply to particular universities, they ask you to agree to an honor code. This means that you promise to never cheat on your test, plagiarize your papers, or do anything that is against the student code or rules and regulations of the university. Normally, an honor code essay will either present a fictitious situation to you that asks you to recall one of the honor codes of the school you are applying to and then asks you discuss how you would deal with the situation, knowing how the honor code deals with such violations. Another type of honor code essay will ask you to discuss an experience in your past, if you have any, which deals with the honor code of your previous school or your personal code of honor and how you dealt with it. The essays tests your honesty and ability to adhere to rules even without supervision. It is an essay that tests your character and respect for authority and rules.

Undergraduate / The Appeal - Some students have a background story that is so central to their identity [4]

The way I see it, your essay should only come in a number of parts. I see it as follows:

1. You took the test
2. You failed the test
3. You contested the results
4. You passed the test after score verification.

Those are the most important parts of the essay that should be discussed. The way you were treated by others, how you felt waiting for the test, etc. are all fillers that detract from the point of the essay. Sticking with an outline that represents your event in a quick yet concise manner always helps to retain the interest of the reader.

Undergraduate / Mathematics major; It took me quite a long time to finally realize what I wanted to study in college [18]

Azucena, the essay works better now. However, there are certain portions that you can still develop. I refer in particular to your involvement in the scholarship. After you mentioned that you won the scholarship, you did not elaborate on how it helped you develop further in your interests or how it helped you achieve academically. As scholarship is normally a highly defining moment in a student's life that often dictates a transition from one point of his life to the next. Is there any chance that you can discuss something unique about yourself that developed through the scholarship? It is a pivotal moment in your life, an academic achievement that you should be very proud to discuss :-)

Undergraduate / Discipline; At the time, I was unaware of my father's drug and alcohol addiction - UC Prompt #2 [7]

Sorry about taking so long to get back to you. Let me help you whittle this down some more so that it does not seem dragging :-)


- But cutting out the word fillers at the start, you immediately hook your reader into your essay because you present your answer at the very start.


- Can revise this paragraph to mention something about how you learned about self-discipline through watching your father fight his demons? His demons being the alcohol that made him act irrationally and torment you. The paragraph in its current form just does not relate to your point of view about self-discipline.


- This paragraph says a lot without really having any meaning. What we need to learn from you in this paragraph is how your engagement with books helped you learn self-discipline. My advice is drop the reference to books and instead talk about the school projects and book reports that had deadlines, thus teaching you the value of time management in relation to self-discipline.

The last paragraph works well for now. If you can apply the changes I am suggesting to the other paragraphs, we might end up editing the concluding paragraph a bit to better suit the new content :-)

Undergraduate / Northwestern Supplement - Future Bio Major [4]


-Chidera, don't waste time with fillers. You don't need to over explain things. Just answer what the prompt is asking for directly and you should find yourself in a position to better answer the essay. Delete the paragraph above because it does not help advance the information in your essay about why you chose Northwestern. Imagine that by taking down that paragraph, your word count went down to 201, allowing 99 more words to help explain your choice of university.

You need to get specific in your essay. Mention the exact programs and classes that drew you to choose Northwestern and why. If there are mentors / professors you look forward to working with, explain why their influence upon you is important. You mentioned research projects and other activities in the school related to your major, explain how you feel that will help you achieve your main goal. What you have to do is explain how important you consider a Northwestern education and why it will set you apart from the graduates of the same major from other schools in the future.

Undergraduate / "Pass me the ball!" I shouted as I sprinted across the gray concrete driveway. [12]

Prashanti, I suggest that you write two versions of the essay that contain the sentence I am suggesting as an addition. By writing the essay in two ways with that sentence, you will be able to compare the two versions and decide which version seems to flow better with the sentence or which version in general you feel more comfortable using. Don't forget that I can't make that decision for you. I can only guide you in writing your essay, you have to decide how to make it work best for you :-) I am merely a guiding light and an impartial observer in this situation. The final decision as to how the essay should look and feel depends upon you :-) I'll be here to guide you until you feel that you have reached that state ;-)

Undergraduate / "Pass me the ball!" I shouted as I sprinted across the gray concrete driveway. [12]

Having an anecdote as a second paragraph is not weird. I can however, understand why it reads that way to you. I also sensed it when I reviewed your essay but I did not want to comment on it as you may have preferred the essay in your format. My suggestion, now that you ask :-) is that you add a closing paragraph. A third paragraph that you can use to close the statement. Just a few sentences will do as a closer. Emphasize that the contentment you feel stems from the sense of family that the basketball court at your Georgia home extends to all of you :-) As for the additional sentence, I am not sure where you would want to place it, but here is my suggestion:

Sometimes it is not a single place, but a location in a place that makes a person feel the height of contentment. For me, the place I feel most content in is the basketball court at the back of my step-family's home in Georgia...

Do you think you can use a similar sentence in your essay to tie the two places together? You really needed a sentence like that to create the connection. You can use my sentence as a sample for your own version if you wish :-)

Undergraduate / Extraordinary documentary called 'Twitch' - American University Essay [4]

Lauren, I hope you won't mind if I tweak a few sentences for you :-) Just to make it flow better or sound better.


- All of a sudden, something...
- English grammar rules dictate the no sentence can start with "But".


- ... seeing, forcing them to have him admitted to a mental...


- At the tender age of nineteen, my best friend was diagnosed with Schizophrenia.
- Always find a way to make the sentences about you and not your friend.


- Having him admitted to the mental ward seemed t be the right action to take at the time ,


- I hope to increase awareness of the conditions found in the American mental facilities in an effort to help raise awareness and provide doable solutions to the issue.

Overall, this essay finds itself in tune with the prompt and offers a very good insight into the kind of cause that you are hoping to undertake as a student at American University :-)

Undergraduate / "Pass me the ball!" I shouted as I sprinted across the gray concrete driveway. [12]

Prashanti, you have definitely fallen almost in line with the prompt. There is only a single sentence addition that I will be making at the start of the essay thatwe need to develop to help you finally meet the requirements. By the way, excellent way of merging 2 locations into one essay in such a way that it creates a vivid description of how you feel perfectly content during your time there. I think we can achieve this if we flip around 2 paragraphs.

Try the essay out this way, make this particular paragraph your introduction:


Then make this the second paragraph:


I flipped the paragraphs around in a word doc and I felt that the flow of the essay became smoother and the answer to the prompt became quite obvious. Try it out for yourself and see if this new format will work for you. Note the single grammar correction I made in the essay for you and apply it as well :-) The past tense of "cast" which means "to throw" (e.g. "to cast a fishing line", "to cast off in a boat", "to cast a ball into the air") is the same as its present and future tenses. So we had to drop the ed at the end in order to become grammatically correct :-)

Undergraduate / Relentlessness and Dedication that led to Success [4]

Wow! This is a tremendously long essay and definitely needs to be cut down in terms of content and word count. You can start by lessening the reference to your sister and her friends, they take up half the essay space already. If you can avoid it, just concentrate on your struggles and how you overcame it. The admissions officer does not want to hear about how your sister took the SAT's before you. You need to discuss your skills and resources that helped you overcome your obstacle in life. So your sister's story and her friends has no place in this essay. You should remove as much reference to them as possible and try to revise the essay to center solely on your accomplishments and methods of overcoming your obstacle. Once you do that, we can review the essay for content and theme problems again before we delve into the grammar issues that exist in it :-)

Scholarship / Education and training - I have bachelor in Pharmacy from Damascus University, Faculty of Pharmacy [4]

Sama, let me try and fix this up for you. Don't worry, your statement meets all the prompt requirements :-) See if this version works for you:

I graduated with a Bachelor's degree in Pharmacy from Damascus University where I attended the complete course over 5 years, a record for a student at the university since the course takes longer than that to complete for most students. When it came to my choice of specializations, I chose to go with Laboratory because I wanted to prepare myself for masters degree studies.

Upon graduation, I came to work as an assistant pharmacist. I immediately enrolled in masters courses concentrating on laboratory and diagnosis after landing my first job. My master research was on the topic of "Study of Vitamin D Receptor Polymorphism in Type 1 Diabetes", which earned me an honor degree in the field of research. I graduated from my masters courses with an 82 % average while training at the Al-Assad University Hospital as well.

My work experience includes working at a private diagnostic laboratory, scientific translator for a private office, and as a teacher teaching practical sessions in the Faculty of Pharmacy at Damascus specializing in Microbiological Pharmacology and Molecular Biology for a semester each.

You have two choices, you can either use this statement in its entirety or you can use it as a template to further improve your current one. Whichever method you choose, I will be here to lend an assist if you need it :-)

Undergraduate / My freshman year as a member of the class of 2019 - VCU Essay [5]

Lauren, there is a lot of redundancy towards the end of the essay because you mention VCU so often. You could actually mention the university once or twice and then use alternate terms for college and university afterwards. Just to remove the repetitiveness of the term in the paragraph. That said, you definitely managed to insert the answer to the last prompt quite properly and fast :-) I believe the essay is ready for you to use now. What do you think? We will always go with how you feel about the status of the statement or essay because it is your confidence in your work that matters here and makes the essay finally ready for submission :-) Shall we go for it? What do you say? Let me know if you still want to work further on the statement. I'm always here to help :-)

Undergraduate / Wrestling with my fears - Essay for University of Washington, Seattle [7]

Louisa, try to concentrate only on yourself when writing this essay. Your sister should only be a mere mention if need be. Prompt B is very specific. It has to be totally about your experience and what you learned from it. Be very sure to pick a personal story that portrays your character development in a very positive light. The experience should be something that really shows a serious degree of development in your personality and makes your character transformation very noticeable and important. Some themes to consider are:

- Recovering from failure
- Facing an obstacle and overcoming it such as
- a family tragedy
- social issue directly related to you (bullying, etc.)
- completing a task people thought you were not capable of doing

I hope my suggestions help you some more. I look forward to reading your revised essay in the coming days :-)

Undergraduate / To become neurologist that specializes in neurodegenerative disorders that affect physical movement [4]

Lauren, your essay is ready content and theme wise. I just caught a few grammatical errors that we need to address before we can call the essay a final copy.


- having learned from both...


- American prepares me for this rigorous...

Remember, my opinion is that the essay is ready. If you think otherwise, let me know and I will continue to work with you towards improving the essay to the point you will be comfortable with :-)

Undergraduate / I come from a family whose most common cause of death is cancer. Rutgers Undergrad Admission 2015 [4]


- You can skip this paragraph because it does not tell the admissions officer anything related to the prompt provided. Unless you mention that you came to know your calling through one of these methods, there is no real reason to mention these in such a long winded introduction.


If you feel comfortable with my suggestions, you can already consider this essay ready for submission. Otherwise, let me know what else you want to add or remove and I will continue to work with you on it :-)

Undergraduate / My freshman year as a member of the class of 2019 - VCU Essay [5]


- What courses are these and how are these courses relevant to your chosen major? Don't enumerate all of the courses. Just mention the ones that have some sort of connection with your chosen major and quickly discuss it.


- How did you manage to do that? What seminars did you attend? Any internships or shadowing?

Lauren, let me jump in at this point to tell you that your essay speaks too much in general terms and very little in the specific terms that you should be presenting in this essay. You need to remedy that mistake by presenting the actual courses you took instead of mentioning non-related AP classes.


- Do you have any volunteer experience that exposed you to cases that further fueled your desire to study this particular field of medical science? Present it and discuss it as an important and integral factor in your decision to enter this field.

You forgot to answer an important question. Owing to your previous experiences, how will those experiences help you do well at VCU? Remember the last prompt? How do you feel you will do at VCU? You haven't answered that question yet :-)

Undergraduate / Northwestern Supplement - Future Bio Major [4]

Chidera, I would love to know what the essay prompt that was provided to you was so that I can better help you with the revision process of your essay. It would really help not just me, but the other forum members as well, with the review process of your essay. We also need to know what your word limit is so that we can help you work within the word count parameters. Since we do not know that information yet, I will give you an overview of what I think your essay is like at the moment. These are the comments that I am sure will change once you present your prompt and word count limit to us :-)

Your statement is quite shallow in the sense that you merely provide the information about the university that the admissions officer already knows about. It would really work in your favor if you do not rehash well known information about the university in relation to your chosen major. In fact, your essay would do better if you could discuss certain factors regarding your choice of Biology as your major. What those topics may be will be dependent upon the requirements of the essay prompt. Don't worry, we will help you with that aspect of developing your essay. We are all here to help :-)

So get the prompt to us, plus the word count, as soon as possible so we can get started with helping you whip this essay into shape :-)

Writing Feedback / Success means that the desire was strong enough? To what extent do you agree or disagree? [4]

Tina, you argue the essay in a manner that does not really answer the prompt. While you present reasons and arguments in support of a stance, you failed to properly agree or disagree with the statement provided. You spoke in general terms about the opinions within the paragraphs, which is good for your essay but became a liability the minute you ended the essay without truly discussing your opinion on the matter. Do you agree or disagree with the statement? Make it clear and argue it. In fact, that should have been the only argument that you presented in the essay. Your opinion and no other opinion matters in this essay because the prompt clearly states that YOU need to discuss your opinion on the matter. This is something that you could have done within one or two paragraphs. Instead, you went on and on discussing other people's opinions. A revision is really necessary so that you can better align your essay response to the prompt :-)

Adding your opinion as a part of the conclusion as a single sentence does not answer the prompt at all. You need to better develop your opinion and remember that you are not allowed to introduce new ideas in the conclusion of the essay. If you wrote this for your TOEFL practice test, you will most likely not get a very good grade on it. Try to revise the paper so we can see how we can help you respond to the prompt better :-)

Undergraduate / 'combination of personal and professional development factors' - why Undergraduate Psychology [4]

Tanya, this personal statement is way too long and contains too much information.Was an essay prompt provided to you for this essay or are you just winging it? If you are winging it, you need to keep your personal statement simple by sticking to the basic points that the admissions officer usually wants to know about you. The information usually includes:

1. The foundation of your desire to enroll in your chosen major. This includes any personal experience that opened your eyes to your field of interest.

2. Any extra curricular or volunteer activities that you participated in that relates to your major. Add a statement about how it further fueled your desire to learn more about the field.

3. Your personal goal, mission, or objective in pursuing the course. Do you see yourself as a game changer in this arena? What are your plans after college? Provide an overview of the information.

Basically, your personal statement should offer an insight into other aspects of your personality that is not covered by the common apps. If you have to make up the thesis for your personal statement, use the information above as a guide. If you have a particular question you have to answer, do not deviate from answering it. Your current essay really needs to be edited for content. It is too long and contains too much information that is not really relevant to your chosen field. Those irrelevant parts need to be removed from the essay. Review the essay and you should see what I mean. If you can't find it, let me know and I will point it out to you :-)

Undergraduate / Competitiveness is an important personal quality that had shaped me into the person I am today [7]

Michael, competitiveness is a trait that is to be admired in a person. However, your essay did not touch on the way that you developed a competitive attitude, why you had to develop it, and how it benefited you in the process. It is alright for you to explain how you take competitions seriously but without the underlying factors, the reasons behind your actions do not make much sense. Instead of making you come across as impressive, your desire to compete just makes you seem like you are a person who cannot accept losing. I know that you have some serious reasons for becoming competitive and you should present it in the essay in order to create a stronger personality explanation for yourself.

You need to develop a stronger introduction to your competitive attitude by laying the foundation for it. This means that you should explain what kind of person you were before you became competitive and then presenting the reasons why it became necessary for you to develop competitiveness. Eventually explaining how that attitude has helped to improve you as a person and has prepared you to face the academic rigors that college presents.

Undergraduate / "Pass me the ball!" I shouted as I sprinted across the gray concrete driveway. [12]

Prashanti, you just need to mention that the place you feel most content is the basketball court. From there, you can use the rest of the information about how this place offers your family a place to bond and spend quality time together. Concentrate on the sense of family that you feel while playing on the court. Describe the areas on the court that are special to you and your family. What makes it special? It is not so much the activity as the place that you need to describe in relation to the sense of contentment. Perhaps there is a special spot where your family just sits and watches the other players. What goes on there. What kind of contentment does is bring to you or the group? These are just some questions that you can use as guides as you revise the essay. If you have any questions, feel free to ask. By the way, you can go over the word limit for your essay drafts. You will be able to cut it down to the required word count as we help you edit the paper. That means you can write everything that you want to say and we will help you compress the essay into the required word count :-)

Undergraduate / To become neurologist that specializes in neurodegenerative disorders that affect physical movement [4]

Lauren, the essay is very redundant in the sense that you are merely repeating information that the admissions officer already knows about their university. What he wants to find out is how you will specifically use the opportunities offered by the university in furthering your education. Specifically, which two fields of study would you find yourself participating in, why, and how will those two merge into one unique major for your. Remember, you are allowed to attend classes across departments so you are going to be in a unique position to educate yourself on a far wider field than other students attending other universities. Try to develop the essay more around the available training programs, seminars, and mentors who will be available to you in specific fields. Explain how this exposure will help you directly develop certain skills and talents. Right now, you have a general discussion and overview which is not quite effective. I recommend that you use one paragraph to discuss the two fields of study you wish to attend and how it will help you as a professional in the future. Then use the second paragraph to discuss the offerings of the university in a manner specific to what you know about your necessary training and academic development. That manner of writing should better respond to the prompt provided :-)

Undergraduate / Extraordinary documentary called 'Twitch' - American University Essay [4]

Lauren, you need to come up with a better title for the essay. You can't give the title as being related to a documentary film because that documentary is not the reason why you chose your major, it is the theme of the film. "Twitch" is the tittle, not the term for the illness or what interests you. Please develop a new title when you can. One that better suits the theme of your essay as you have written it. Now, about the essay itself.

I have a problem with accepting your explanation that you decided your college major based solely on the viewing of a medical documentary. There is no personal connection between you and the documentary film because you did not go out of the theater and begin to engage in activities that would somehow show a personal relationship between the influence of the film on you and your desire to make this a global issue of notice. There is a certain shallowness to the way that you present the importance of the issue surrounding Parkinson's in your essay. In fact, the way you presented the issue does not make it seem like a global issue that needs to be dealt with at all. Now, maybe, if you had presented some volunteer work or membership to some organization related to the disease after the film viewing, such a relation could have been made. Right now it just does not exist in the essay.

It is this disconnect between the prompt of the essay and your actions after viewing the film that makes me feel that the essay will not work to your benefit in its current form. If you can find a way to improve upon the development of your interest in the field and present ways by which you have already participated in calling attention to the issue, then we might be able to spin the essay to conform with the prompt. Otherwise, I think you would do best to choose another global issue to discuss in this essay.

Scholarship / Education and training - I have bachelor in Pharmacy from Damascus University, Faculty of Pharmacy [4]

Samah, I am wondering what the prompt is for your scholarship application? There is nothing in your essay that makes a direct reference to the normal requirements of a scholarship app such as your need for financial assistance, your current sources of income, and how the scholarship can help you with your studies. Without any actual idea of what the prompt requires you to answer, I cannot give a proper review and comments about your essay. Kindly provide us with the necessary prompt information so that we can better formulate our advice for you :-) Don't forget to tell us the name of the scholarship so that we can also base our advice on the scholarship requirements for its applicants.

Undergraduate / My oddly way I'd want to spend my free Saturdays - CommonApp extracurricular essay [4]

Emily, I agree that the way you presented yourself in this essay is quite abrasive. However, I believe that it came out that way because you described the activity to the reader without first describing what it is and what it is all about. By first informing about the activity, you prepare the reader for the additional information and prepare the mindset of the person for the way that you might be expected to present your additional information.

What I am trying to tell you is that you can revise this essay but still keep on track with the information. Just switch it around to let us know that you enjoy debating on Saturdays and why first. Then try to soften the blow of what is currently your first paragraph as your second paragraph in order to make it softer in presentation. I understand that debates can be very intense and straightforward to the point of rudeness at times. Remember that you are not in a debate as you write this paper. You are in a formal interview where you should only present the most respectable and impressive side of yourself.

The keyword here is respect for the reader. Try not to step on any toes by coming on so strong as you do now. Redirect the energy in a more amiable manner while presenting yourself as the great debater just the same :-) Concentrate on the fun side of the extra curricular activity known to you as debate :-) Present a friendly side to the competition while still informing the reader about your sense of victory when you argue the winning side. Remember to explain that you view the activity as friendly competition and that after the debate, the friendships resume, or something to that effect. I believe and know that you can do this all within 350 words :-)

Scholarship / I`m Architect, I want to apply to Masdar Institute - "Statement of Objectives" [7]

mAwad, most of the Chevening essays that have been advised upon in this forum have been done so on a 4 question essay format instead of a collective essay covering all four questions. This is because each question has a specific word requirement. Is there a chance that you might have misunderstood the essay by trying to combine your answers into one collective form?

By individually answering the questions, as the others applying for the same essay has done at this forum, you will be able to better address the prompt requirements as you can give definitive answers to support your claims per question. I think that you should do that in this case. I have not yet come across a collective essay answer to a Chevening scholarship application. Kindly double check the essay requirements and let us know the word limit per question and also, provide us with your individualized answers to each question provided. That way we can better assist you with your review needs :-)

Writing Feedback / Along with job, marriage, having a child comes the moment when you cannot escape from being an adult [5]

All throughout the essay, you made it clear that you were speaking on general terms, that means you were discussing a point of view that was not your own. Since you presented the essay in those terms rather than using the first person pronouns in your explanations, the essay lost your voice, your opinion. As such, the need to create a separate paragraph that includes a first person pronoun as an explanation with example became necessary. You can adjust the essay simply by using "I" as your first pronoun word whenever possible. You could start off the essay by saying "I believe" instead of "Generally speaking" the whole tone of the essay will change to your opinion and examples from that point on. A simple revision should fix the problem :-)

Undergraduate / "What would you do if you knew you couldn't fail"? Common App Questions for VCU [6]

Sarah, don't fret. Essays pass through numerous drafts before they become perfect enough to consider for submission. Here is a thought. Try your best to develop the paragraph using the information I provided. I don't care how you do it at first, just get it done the best way you know how. Once I see how you treated the suggested changes, I can jump in and work with you on a better presentation or cleaning up the paragraph to suit the additional information. You are the only person who knows what information you wish to present in the essay. I can only help you with regards to improving that aspect. Give it a try. There are no right or wrong ways of presenting information about you in an essay. There are only clear ways of presenting it. That is what we will work on once you have written the new paragraph :-) You've only written the essay once so far. Expect to write it about 3 more times before you start to feel comfortable with it. If you are willing to keep revising, I am willing to keep helping :-)

Undergraduate / Growing up I was always an uncaring and irresponsible kid - about one interest or experience [3]

Luis, while you have written a very touching story, there is a problem in the way you presented it . The story revolves more around your father and his American adventure prior to your family joining him. So we are learning more about your father's experience rather than your own experience. Try to revise the essay in such a manner that it concentrates on your own experience instead. You can talk about the academic and social adjustments that you had to make when you arrived in the United States and how the move altered your family dynamic in your mind. Have the reader join you on the experience. Let us in on what it was like for you to experience America the first time and to have to deal with a culture really different from your own. You claim your parents provided for anything you wished when you live in Mexico, explain how and why that changed in the U.S. and how that change helped you develop as a person. Present your development as a person, what traits changed and what improved? Show us how the move created an improved version of Luis 1.0 :-)

Undergraduate / Wrestling with my fears - Essay for University of Washington, Seattle [7]

Louisa, I have to have to ask you is whether you have a choice between the topics presented as A and B. If you had a choice, which prompt did you choose to answer? Or did you decide to answer both prompts in one essay? The reason I ask is because your essay needs to be tamed in such a way that it responds to only one of the two prompts. It is cluttered with too much information right now and your stories are not smoothly connecting with each other. The grammatical errors and the informality of the application essay, which serves as an interview on your part, also need to be corrected and/or toned down. However, those problems can only be addressed properly once you have developed the correct theme for your essay. Let's work on developing the theme first shall we?

Writing Feedback / UM-Twin Cities Educational Interests American Studies [6]

I believe that this is a very good version that you can already use for the essay app. There are just a few grammatical errors that need to be addressed in order to make the essay read better. I have noted those suggestions below:


- Being of Korean descent born in Japan,


- I learned of my Korean and Japanese heritage through the immigration lens


- I hope to learn about the...


- UM- Twin Cities offers me the opportunity to learn on an interdisciplinary level that is sure to benefit my students once I return to Japan to teach them the benefits of welcoming immigrants to Japan.

I am wondering if we went over the character count at this point. Would you mind double checking and letting me know if we did? I will cut down the character count some more if needed :-)

Undergraduate / Red Cross volunteering - a huge step towards my goals in the medical profession [6]

Lauren, this is a very good essay. It clearly shows the participation that you had in the activity and the kind of personality development that arose from it. As an extra curricular activity, it certainly portrays your willingness to work with a group and the ability to interact with people on various levels. In my opinion, you were able to present yourself in the exact manner that the prompt requires and I believe that it will be an asset to your application. That said, I do not think that you need to mention wanting to continue such activities at Washington and Lee mainly because the prompt is not asking for such a response. It only wants you to relate the story of your activity. One of the rules of common app writing is to just answer the questions being asked and try to avoid too much information. In this case, the reference to activities at the university becomes irrelevant to your response :-)

Writing Feedback / High salaries and not disturbing during work are the key factors of encouraging people to teach [2]

- Abdurasul, I suggest that you learn how to discuss each of your reasons as separate paragraphs so that you can present the full idea behind your reason. When you number the essays this way and then compress them into one paragraph, the line of reasoning gets blurred and needs to be developed further. You solve the under developed line of reasoning simply by discussing each reason in a stand alone paragraph.

- You only present one solution to the problem so there is no need to number it. Just discuss your reason for the increase in salary in a manner that shows logic was used in developing the solution.

Scholarship / I`m Architect, I want to apply to Masdar Institute - "Statement of Objectives" [7]

mAwad, you totally missed the point of the essay. You need to describe the current activities that you are engaged in that showcase your leadership abilities and proves that you will be returning to your home country after you graduate in order to help your motherland. The objective here is to represent yourself as a future leader who, at this early stage, has already set up a method by which the country can benefit from your untapped leadership abilities as your overseas studies will be sure to make a leader out of you in the future. Discuss your idea of what an effective leader is and inform the reader as to whether you believe that you embody these traits already or hope to embody them in the future. Then explain how the scholarship and the studies abroad will help you further enhance those traits. Closing with an explanation of how these traits are very important for you because it will help you become a leader of sorts in Palestine in the future.

Writing Feedback / People should use phone in correct occasions and should not use it in specific public areas; IELTS [6]

Shu, there is actually another way of discussing your personal point of view in this essay that you could have used. There are times when the use of cellphones in public places is discussed from an etiquette or social norm point of view. This dictates that mobile phone usage should not interfere with the movements, actions, or enjoyment of the people around the user. This means that the phone should be set to vibrate or text messaging only when in public places such as buses, libraries, museums, or even at home if you know that the people with you in the house wish to rest. It is typically seen as rude behavior to be talking loudly on your phone in public because it disrupts the others. While the use of cellphones cannot be banned, these establishments have the right to set a degree of decorum for the benefit of their clients. Therefore it would be best to not ban the use of cellphones in public places, but merely, regulate its use in order to balance the need to use technology with the needs of the other people.

That is just a suggestion on my part. I hope you consider it for inclusion in your personal point of view in order to give it more strength :-)

Undergraduate / I had my mind set on going abroad for college, and all before that has felt like an intermission [3]

Shane, this is an essay that is unique in the sense that it tackles a topic which is not normally openly discussed in common app essays. As such, I believe that it will make you stand out in the mind of the admissions officer reading your essay. After all, you successfully presented the situation you found yourself having to deal with, successfully I might add, and then related it to your interest in particular fields of study. This is truly a story that is so central to your identity and presents a side of you that the other common app essays may not have given you an opportunity to discuss. I would however, like to see a part towards the end of the essay that discusses how you have started to rewrite your history in preparation for college. I know that you are now more accepting of who you are as opposed to your mother, but I am hoping that she has somehow come to terms with who you are? Part of the central identity story in this case is the reaction of your family that is pushing you to attend college if only so that you can rewrite your history and live a new life on a fresh slate :-)

Undergraduate / Before going to Vipassana (a silent meditation retreat) I was trying to find myself. CommonApp Essay [2]

Lili, is there a way that you can tell this story without having to muddle the experience with the meditation retreat story? It just takes attention away from your true story, of being a person whose identity was lost and is now finding her way back to who she truly is. From my point of view, it seems that the central identity story gets lost because of the way that you insert the meditation in the story. It really does not help move the story forward. You should revise the essay to speak directly to the admissions officer and tell the story of your lost self-mage from the time you left for the United States, returned to Nepal, and felt that that you did not belong anywhere. It does not take meditation to figure that out. Since the meditation did not help you find your identity either, you can simply skip it. I tried to cut and paste your essay in a word document and removed the references to the meditation aspect. It really came out more interesting and smooth that way. I suggest that you try it :-) Don't worry about any bumps you might have in the essay. If you bring up your concerns, we can work with you to resolve it :-)