Graduate / "Accomplishments lie within the reach of those who reach beyond themselves" - SOP [7]


- Sam, you need to use the actual names of the companies or places where you worked in order to give credibility to your essay. I am not saying that the admissions officer will double check on that information. Just that by indicating the names of places you worked at and people you worked with, specially if they are notable names, you will be able to strengthen the claims that you are making in your essay about your programming prowess.Mention some of the freelance PHP projects that you worked on and supply the url if the website still exists and your coding is still in use. It gives it an air of credibility which is very important in these essays.


- Much better :-)


- Considering that you do not have any notable academic achievements of your own to present within this essay, I would refrain from mentioning this. It makes one wonder why you were not able to achieve more academically. We do not want the academic officer to be questioning your academic abilities so don't give him an opening to do so :-)

Undergraduate / Explain how Kalamazoo College's approach to education will help you explore your ideas [17]

- This should become your first paragraph because it carries your intention of studying at Kalamazoo with a definite mode of study indicated which is based upon their academic teaching strategy. That makes this paragraph highly effective and eye catching.

- This is a secondary paragraph because it generalizes how you will be able to advance your academic and social skills using the other programs available at the university. The closing statement remains the same.

Now flip around the paragraphs using the format I indicated and then read it over. See if there are any changes or additions you want to apply before I come in with my own suggestions of revisions and edits. That way we save you one editing movement :-)

Essays / truth, hope, despair, faith, and hate - Definition essay [2]

Shelton, when I write definition essays, I often start with the basic definition from the dictionary and then present my personal definition of the word depending upon how it applies to the past or present events in my life. By using my personal experience as a basis, I am able to present a unique definition of the words given to me by the teacher. This is what she meant by picking up a lens. You need to see the definition of the words on a far deeper basis than just the simple dictionary explanation. Learn to find the presence of the word in your life and discover how you can explain it to other people in those terms. That is how you write a definition essay. You could simply use your own understanding of the word to explain it or you can explain it by using personal experiences as part of your personal definition. Either way, a definition essay uses more than just the dictionary or encyclopedia explanation of a word or term. It is an explanation that comes from within you and your understanding of the word based upon your own terms.

Undergraduate / "A Ladder" - My name is Alina and the age doesn't matter. Welcome to my world [4]

Alina, I know that you are capable of editing the punctuation mistakes in this essay on your own so I won't point it out for you. Just review the essay and you will see where your obvious mistakes are, then correct it :-) As for cutting out certain parts of this essay, I will be making suggestions as to where that can be done. If yo ulet me know what the word count is, I might be able to better cut down the paragraphs for you.

My main advice for now though, is to cut out the redundancy of saying "My name is Alina...' There is no sense in constantly reintroducing yourself in an essay. Since you are telling us about your age ladder as these events happened to you, simply say, When I was..." or "I was...". You could even say "At the age of...". or even "By the time I was..." There are more variations to introducing yourself than you think that don't require the same, long character count phrase that eats into your word count.



- leisure activity .


- We were beaten ...
- Stop saying IDt, nobody understands that acronym except you. Simply say, "team", that is a word everyone understands and applies to all teams in general. You only need to mention ID once.


- You need to rephrase this paragraph. You specifically mentioned that you were allowed to join even though you were no longer a first time participant. So reflect that in the essay. The reason this paragraph got lost is because of your insistence at constantly introducing yourself at the start of every new paragraph. That is what is causing this essay so many problems. I will not reword this part. Do it yourself and I will let you know if it works :-) I am trying to develop your creativity in word paraphrasing.

You need to stop rehashing information such as the decathlon team and your participation in "Civilization" because you have already mentioned those activities and explained these to death in other essay prompts. So the admissions officer has other sources for information about those things. He will not take kindly to the constant mention of those two activities in your essay because it shows that you definitely do not have any other talent or accomplishments in life. Which will definitely limit your abilities as a student. So talk about something else. Something non-academic that you can present to them. Do not fall back on the death of your landlord either. Every essay needs to present some new information or facet of your personality in order to be effective as a part of the collective common app essays.

Writing Feedback / Repairing our current roads would lead to many positive consequences [6]

Why are you arguing points in an essay that is not asking you to debate an issue? It is simply asking you to discuss the one thing in your hometown that you would like to change and explain why you want to change it. You were to use examples to support your claim. You chose 2 things that you want to change in your town instead of one. Read your essay prompt again and then review your essay. You will see that you accidentally presented 2 issues that you want to change in your town instead of one. Your reason about wanting to repair the roads is not a supporting reason but a secondary reason that you are discussing. If you were to discuss only one thing to change in your hometown and explain why, then choose the road because of the improvement in the economy that it will bring instead of the museum. When you choose the museum and then have to discuss the roads in support of it, you end up choosing 2 things to change in the town, not one :-)

Undergraduate / Today young people don't have to be afraid of fierce competitions and face of challenges bravely. [3]

Ding, you need to practice expressing yourself properly in English. Your sentences are quite weak and do not have any ability to clearly explain your points of reason. I think I was able to deduce some reasoning from your statements so I will try to restate your essay below in a more coherent manner. I hope that it will help you understand and learn how to properly develop your sentences and paragraphs in the future. I am almost sure that this is for the TOEFL practice test so you have time to practice and get to that level of coherence and expression in the English language :-)


- It is common knowledge that the factors needed to succeed these days include knowledge, good interpersonal relationships, and financial support. These conditions were hard to come by in previous generations but seem to be in over supply for the new generation of young people.


- Education is more easily acquired these days due to the abundance of scholarships and student loans. A college education is no longer limited to the people from families that can afford to send their children to school. Even those who do not have the money to acquire a formal education can achieve a sense of education through some simple keystrokes in Google, thus providing some free education to those who don't have the money but wish to gain information about topics of interest to them. That is why these days, a formal education is not necessarily required in order to get ahead in the business world or career-wise.


- While more challenges face the new generation of young people, it is still easier for them to achieve success compared to the previous generations because of the programs in place meant to help them succeed in life.

Writing Feedback / Compulsory Service and why is Necessary in the U.S. [2]

Tia, the essay is good, but it centers on only one reason for the need or benefit of compulsory military service in the U.S. There are actually a number of other facets that you can discuss which would further establish the benefits of compulsory service aside from economic and mental conditioning benefits. One of the main reasons that compulsory military service would benefit the United States is because it would help to build the character and leadership skills of the youth. These days, the young people think themselves too economically privileged and above certain menial jobs that they need to be taught how the other side lives. This is something that can be learned through compulsory service. It helps to rebuild character and discipline in the young which they can carry with them into the civilian world, after the completion of their service. You could have taken a look back at the history of the United States, whose hey day as a super power was developed during the time when the young men of the country were drafted into service. Their future presidents, economic leaders, and other important leaders had something that helped them develop their skills, military service. All of them were bred to become future leaders with an eye towards the future during the time that the draft was in effect. By using some of the good points that were established by the draft, you could have given more varied reasons to support the compulsory military service at present. Do some research, you will see that there are more than just 2 basic points that can provide excellent reasons for the return of the draft or compulsory military service.

Undergraduate / Throughout life, everyone is forced to encounter obstacles that may seem impossible to overcome [4]

Morgan, on the contrary, this essay is not a cliche because it did not end in the divorce of your parents. Instead, it showed the resiliency of your relationship as a family and offered us an insight into the lessons that you learned during this tumultuous time in your life. I would advice that you shorten your introduction though. You have spent too much time introducing the topic and not enough time on developing the paragraph about the lessons that you learned from the experience. You should work more on developing those lessons on a per paragraph basis in order to better answer the prompt. Once you have completed those changes, we can work on fixing the grammatical problems that exist in the essay :-)

Graduate / What are your specific post-MBA short-term and long-term goals? Why Smith? Why an MBA? Why now? [20]


- Sam, the reason I quoted this text is because I feel that it should be your introductory paragraph. Showing that you failed but have not lost hope establishes the fact that you are looking towards having a more definite direction for your career over the coming years. It clearly establishes the purpose for your application for an MBA as well. That is why this paragraph needs to be the highlight of your essay.

Let's try to read the essay with the new introduction and see if it works the way I feel it should :-) Let me know what you think of the new paragraph order as well.

Undergraduate / My Unique schooling story [3]

Dominique, aside from the punctuation problems that Morgan pointed out, your essay also suffers from lack of content, focus, and direction. It is almost like you did not really give much thought to writing this essay. We can help you fine tune the essay and give it more content but we first need to know what particular prompt you are trying to answer. That way we can suggest topics and themes for you to choose from which can help you in developing a more centered / focused essay. Don't be afraid to let us in on the prompt. We are here to help you out :-) You are supposed to tell a unique story about your schooling, so we need to find something in your past school experiences that could be considered as such. Is there any exciting experience that stands out for you? We can help you spin that into a unique story for this essay. Let's see what we can do to help you out :-)

Undergraduate / Explain how Kalamazoo College's approach to education will help you explore your ideas [17]

Pratibha, I read thread number 5. I am still not sure about what I am supposed to review it for you because you posted one thread after another. I'd appreciate a push in the right direction prompt-wise so that I will know how to approach advising you :-) Both essays are quite good and can actually be used for common prompts, depending upon the question being asked. You really need to give me a clue about the prompts that you are answering when you post the essays :-) I look forward to finding out what the prompt is so that I can better advise you on how to further improve it.

Undergraduate / Encouraged to test a spectrum of activities - including dance, softball, basketball, choir, and art. [3]

Morgan, your essay is takes us on an interesting trip down your life and development as a person. Knowing that you have a well rounded development and exposure to activities that help you develop your character and abilities is always a plus in these types of essays. However, you haven't clearly made the connection between the activity that you participated in and the way that it can help you achieve your future goals. For example, if you say that Karate taught you all about discipline and self reliance, connect that to your future as an employee who knows how to work with minimal supervision, or something along those lines. That way you get to show exactly how your current abilities have allowed you to create a foundation for a successful career in the future.

Writing Feedback / Effect of popular events on our life [8]

Shaimaa, is this a TOEFL response practice essay? The reason I ask is because it seems like you wrote this essay under time constraint. Which led to a poorly developed essay because you failed to thoroughly discuss the topic presented. You spent too much time on your introduction. Instead of simply following the IBC method of essay writing which dictates that you simply restate the prompt along with an overview of the discussion and your opinion on the topic, you went on and on about discussing events on a superficial level. Generalizing the essay makes it very informal and shows a rush in writing it. There was not much analysis involved in writing it because you went for the obvious reasons rather than using personalized examples which would have helped the reader understand your own personal understanding of the prompt. I believe that the essay would have benefited from your using the effects of popular events on your personal life. For example, when there is a holiday or international event in your country, how does your personal life change? Does it affect your personal life on a positive or negative aspect? You could have actually discussed the essay from that angle and provided a stronger argument for yourself in the essay.

Undergraduate / Female Characters in Video Games - Common App Essay #1 [10]

Natalie, I think you have aced this essay :-) It comes across as highly informative about your passion for video games but went beyond that by showing how these games helped you develop an analytical personality that recognizes social and identity problems veiled within the world of video games as well. The fact that you drew something positive out of the experience shows that you know how to extract learning experiences from situations that people would not normally be able to identify or identify with. I would certainly consider this experience as one that helped you define who you are. Specially since it clearly helps the reader to understand how your mindset developed from the experience. I believe that the essay is ready to be used. If you are as confident as I am, then you should go ahead and use the essay already. Otherwise, we can work on it until you feel it is ready :-)

Undergraduate / I have had a passion for helping people to improve their quality of life since I was thirteen [2]

Christine, I believe that your essay would be best served y personalizing the experience that led to your decision to become a physical therapist. In the portion where you mention that you are an outdoor enthusiast and roller derby participant, you should mention the kinds of injuries that you had and the kind of physical therapy that you had to undergo. These experiences would show a more than average familiarity with the inner workings of a PT, a kind that cannot be gained by simply shadowing other therapists during their rounds. By discussing your desire to become a PT on a more personal level, you will be able to make the connection that for you, PT is not just a career but a vocation, a calling that you cannot ignore because it has become a part of your life. Due to the fact that you had to undergo physical therapy yourself, you can explain that by becoming a PT you hope to be able to help the others who need the help as well. It is a way of giving back on your part which would make you stand out and set you apart from other Physical Therapists.

Graduate / "Accomplishments lie within the reach of those who reach beyond themselves" - SOP [7]

Sam, reading the way that you wrote this essay tells me that you are simply an average student who dabbles in computer programming. You don't have an extra ordinary talent to present in the field, nor do you present any accolades or awards for your programming achievements. You really down played rather than played up your participation in various programming endeavors. I would suggest that you spice up your essay and make it sound more exciting in order to entice the reader. Right now, the essay is not interesting at all to read. Rather than simply saying that your GIT program was well received, you should play that up by presenting it in a unique manner that makes you sound like you accomplished something truly important and worthy of attention from your peers. Wordpress and Photoshop usage does not necessarily make an impression since those are programs that anybody can learn to use. Play up your software development aspect. Show a side of you in relation to programming that is unique and notable. That is the only way to gain the attention of the admissions officer.

Writing Feedback / Repairing our current roads would lead to many positive consequences [6]

Vns, again, you misunderstood the essay prompt. You mentioned 2 things that you want to change about your hometown, you are only supposed to discuss one aspect of the town that you feel is most important and thus needs to be changed or rehabilitated. Choose only one between the two changes you discussed, make sure you choose the one most important to you and then develop that point completely within the essay. 3 paragraphs should suffice for that discussion. Don't forget to write an effective conclusion to the essay. Remember, either you write about the need to improve the roads or the need to preserve the historic parts of your town. You can't write about both.

Graduate / I witness numbers of people being rude or mistreating others - outrages [3]

Maureen, you are kind of going in all directions at once in your introduction. That will make it difficult for your to develop your essay properly. I suggest choosing only the one topic that outrages you the most when it comes to seeing it happen in front of your and then discussing that. Make sure to develop your plan of action from the start. Meaning how you felt when you first witnessed such an event, what you felt that you had to do about it, and what you actually did. Then work your way up to your current status of observing the same trend getting worse over the years and what you plan to do about it in the future. That should be a good start for a working draft :-) It will also help if you can post the completed essay, even if it is in disarray in this thread so we can get a clearer idea of what and how you are trying to discuss the topic.

Graduate / Life stages are a natural part of life - Statement of Intent; Speech Pathology MA [3]

Hanhn, there are some portions of your essay that can do with some revision or additional work. Please refer to my comments below :-)

Life stages are a natural part of life. Preparing for ...

- This introductory statement would have been more effective if you had used speech impediments as a hook. Explain your understanding of life stages in terms of speech development and how these stages are sometimes disrupted by speech problems at an early age. Then explain that these are part of the reasons why you chose to enter the world of speech pathology and why you feel that you now need a masters degree in order to deal with the more complicated cases coming your way.

I took a course called CSD 317M Communication with the Multi-Disabled

- Cut back on your trilingual experience and expand instead on the aforementioned course because it directly relates to speech pathology, shows your interest progression, and the need for your advanced studies after college.

At present, I am a speech language pathologist-assistant at Resource Therapy Center. I plan over 24 sessions with patients on a weekly basis from the Spanish-English bilingual community in Pasadena, TX in a clinical setting. My most interesting case is addressing the needs of a 3-year-old boy that had moderate to severe speech impairment, a language delay, and attention deficits. After a year of speech therapy, he is now enrolled in a preschool for two days a week. His mother reports progress that he is able to play more appropriately at home. Moreover at school, she reported that he attends to structured tasks for at least 10 minutes, and is able to follow directions with moderate cues. I believe that my professional experience in working with children played a part in improving his communication, however I know that the graduate course offerings at your university will take me to the next level in helping more children like this young boy.

- Before reporting the results, tell us how you treated this child first. What was your therapy plan? How did he respond? Then talk about how effective it was in the treatment of the child. This way we can get a grasp of your professional abilities in an active case setting.

Let's modify these portions for now and see if there will be any parts that need to be further developed in relation to the updated version :-)

Undergraduate / Prosperity. What makes a country prosper? Application Essay for HKUST - PERSONAL STATEMENT [4]

A business student should have an interest in economics and the way that business works from the small enterprise all the way to the corporate conglomerates. He needs to have an interest in mergers, acquisitions, supply chain, management, and business technologies. The personality of a business student in my opinion would be that of one who sees more than just dollar signs and economic advancement for himself. He is a person who sees how the world is changing because of the way that people interact with one another through business. This creates his desire to develop a business model, plan, or opportunity for himself and others that can help society further evolve in terms of cooperation and unity among people of the same interests and needs in life.

Now that I have given you my opinion on the question, can you tell me what you took away from it? How can you apply it to your current essay question? Post your response here so we can help you develop your essay answer further :-)

Undergraduate / Explain how Kalamazoo College's approach to education will help you explore your ideas [17]

Prabitha, this essay is highly confusing to read. You go from meditation, you something that was either a dream or an actual event, then the mention of something sad (details are needed), and then an explanation that the man was a landlord and not a real blood relative. If you want this essay to be more effective, you need to stop trying to be creative and instead, just present the facts as needed. That way the reader gets a clear idea of what you are trying to discuss instead of guessing about what is going on and how the events relate to one another. Clarity is important in any essay, more so when it is a common app that is supposed to teach us more about you as a person. Truthfully, I do not get how his death became a turning point in your life. If you presented it in the essay, it became quite vague. Do you think you have room for a revision? I really think the essay has potential, it just needs to be rewritten for clarity purposes :-) BTW, I already responded to your other essay, I guess you have not seen it yet? It is about the woman carrying a child on her shoulder right?

Graduate / What are your specific post-MBA short-term and long-term goals? Why Smith? Why an MBA? Why now? [20]

Sam, you need to work your way backwards with a Statement of Purpose, which is what you need for an MBA application. The thing about an MBA is that you need to present your future goals first and then work your way backwards in order to show that you have first, the proper work experience that requires these types of advanced studies, and second, you need to show that you have the academic background to back up your claim that you are qualified for further studies in this field. From the looks of what you enumerated, that should not be a problem for you to accomplish.

The reason for your MBA is that you have background in the Supply or Operations management field due to your 6 year work experience as an SAP LM consultant, be sure to name the company and the work you did for them during your time there. After that, you can mention taking off on your own and the failed experience that you had. I would not mention the online math teaching job as it is irrelevant to your application. After stating the information that I suggested, you can then explain that you fully intend to continue to work in the business management field but you understand that even business technologies change at a rapid pace these days, hence the need for your retraining through higher learning.

That is what I can think of for starters. I may be able to help you adjust the essay once you finish a draft and post it here :-)

Undergraduate / Throughout life, everyone is forced to encounter obstacles that may seem impossible to overcome [4]

Morgan, the story of your dog's battle with Lyme disease is a very touching human interest story that will tug t the heart of any pet lover. However, it does not apply to this essay prompt mainly because you were not personally involved in the treatment of the dog. As the instruction states, you need to provide an event in your life that forced you to overcome an obstacle using your personal qualities in terms of skills and resources. In this case, going from vet to vet and administering medication is not the same. In more ways than one, this is a shallow essay that uses a touching event to show that you will use other people's skills and resources to solve a problem rather than your own. The essay is trying to get you to talk about your problem solving skills in relation to your own complicated issues. So try to pick an event from your life that actually forced you to develop your problem solving skill and discuss that. Again, this essay is a very nice essay, it just does not provide the kind of answer that the prompts requires you to present, which is why it needs to be changed :-)

Undergraduate / Explain how Kalamazoo College's approach to education will help you explore your ideas [17]

Pratibha, I am not sure about how to comment on what you wrote. It seems to be based on a totally different prompt from what we were originally reviewing in this thread. Am I right? If that is the case, please give us a copy of the new prompt so that we can better review the essay. It seems to be based upon a highly personal experience and contains some very interesting but overly dramatic information about your personal life. We need to review the content in order to make sure that it adheres to the prompt. The last thing you want to do is seem overly dramatic in the eyes of the admissions officers, who can tell when you are exaggerating a story you are telling in your essay or not. There are some portions that I think can be either deleted or shortened, but I want to make sure that it won't affect the overall message of the essay if we do that so I will refrain from pointing those sections out until I know what the prompt we are dealing with is :-) I'll be waiting for the prompt and will be making my official comments once I know what to review the answer you wrote for :-)

Undergraduate / Born and bred in Nepal, I am familiar to myriad diseases people fall prey to all year round [23]

Suvekcha, I admire you for having written a highly personal essay. Your sense of compassion and responsibility, your desire to help the children, is quite evident in the essay and provides the solid foundation for your personal statement. I do not think that there is anything left to revise or delete from the essay. In my opinion, you have written the best essay that you can and the time has come to put it to the test in the hands of the admissions officer. This is the best version of the essay that you have written for a different school so far. It is different enough in presentation from the other one that it stands out as an original piece of writing once again. Be confident with this essay. It will do the job that you need it to do. At least that is my opinion :-) You are welcome to have a different one from mine and I will work with you for as long as it takes for you to gain the confidence that you need in your essay :-) What matters the most is your opinion about the work that you did :-)

Graduate / What are your specific post-MBA short-term and long-term goals? Why Smith? Why an MBA? Why now? [20]

Mandeep, we need details before we can help you out. What are the parameters for the essay? Word count? Prompt? What area do you want to concentrate on presenting in the statement? I'm not really sure what kind of help you need from us at this point. It just sounds like you threw together a bunch of incomplete information about yourself at this point which is not really leading towards a big build up for your wanting to pursue an MBA. Any chance you will be given a chance to expand upon those reasons? You need to write an effective statement of purpose and what you wrote is a good start, but can't be the whole essay unless you are only required to present a statement. So which is it that you are trying to write? An essay or a statement? Those have two highly different requirements. Let us know exactly what you have to deal with and we will help you cope with the essay requirements :-)

Undergraduate / I frequently find myself to be a very Yujyufudan person - essay elaborating on 'My biggest flaw' [6]

Kristy, the last paragraph is actually entertaining and is an obvious dig at your inability to make a decision so there is no need to add more hints to it. Ending the essay this way closes the paper on a fun note. Denoting that even though you are filled with indecision, there is one thing you are certain about, you know how to have fun with that flaw in your personality :-) Adding more hints could remove the effective humor that the paragraph now contains. So if I were you, I would leave it alone. Unless you want to try something new for the closing paragraph, while keeping in mind that you can still use the original one that you wrote. Experiment, but don't go all Yujyufudan on me. Otherwise we may never finish editing the essay :-)

Undergraduate / Dreams and Ambition - TOPIC C APPLY TEXAS [3]

Your essay beats around the bush too much without really addressing the topic prompt. You have chosen to write an essay that depicts only your memories of education in the school system is. The essay is asking you to discuss your current academic and out of school activities that are relevant to your desire to become a teacher, you have not addressed that. You need to show the admissions officer the reasons that you believe you will become a good teacher in the future. That is done through the early training and development towards that career that you get through your academic and extra curricular activities. A sample of the extra curricular activity would be tutoring classmates or friends after school, joining a club or organization that volunteers their time to teaching the children of the underprivileged community, and the like. You should revise the essay to reflect such activities in order to meet the prompt requirements. You already presented a portion of this, a glimpse into your academic and extra curricular activities at the end of your essay. You need to build up those parts and revise the beginning.

Essays / I want to work for Google (do cool things that matter) - NEED GUIDANCE ON COLLEGE ESSAY [2]

You should look into the course offerings of Florida Tech online and learn about the training programs and internships that they provide to their students. Choose which programs you are interested in and applicable to your chosen major and then write your essay based upon how you see those programs, internships, and mentor programs helping you advance your knowledge in computer science with the end result of helping you develop your own idea of cutting edge technology and how it can be applied to the further development of computers and the word wide web. In order to write this essay, you should at least have have an idea or inkling of what your future career should look like, where you will be working, and why. Then tailor the essay to answer those questions based upon the training and academic offerings of the school. You already said that you want to work at Google, so explain why and how you hope to achieve that with the help of Florida Tech :-)

Undergraduate / Female Characters in Video Games - Common App Essay #1 [10]

Natalie, my advice, is that you should take the lessons you learned from the video game character Miranda Lawson because it seems like she had the most effect upon you. Then take those lessons and observations for application in your real life. Explain how the game characters seem to help feed the gender stereotyping of women in the eyes of men and how you came to realize that it has to end because you found yourself being treated similarly in real life. Yes, by all means, keep the first and third paragraphs. Those are the most important parts relating to you. We just need to fix the paragraph about the game character because that is the foundation for the development of your central identity. If you can revise that part and post it with the new version of the essay here, we can see how the new versions or what needs to be improved in order to make it flow better :-)

Undergraduate / I frequently find myself to be a very Yujyufudan person - essay elaborating on 'My biggest flaw' [6]

Kristy, on the contrary, I believe that you have described a unique flaw in your personality. It is because of the many fields of interests or extreme excitement about new things that you are prevented from promptly and accurately making decisions about things presented to you. This is a major flaw in a personality once you know how to spin it. Within the essay, skip everything explaining about your interest in Japanese culture and how long you have been studying Japanese. Instead, focus on the weakness that the word connotes, that "flaw" in your decision making process. Explain how you are unable to make up your mind because of the many ideas in your head and how that has led to some very uncomfortable situations or failures in your life. Like i said, the "spin", or how you use a term to make it either positive or negative, is what is important in this essay. Your reasons may be positive, but the outcome of the inability to decide on your part has for sure, resulted in missed opportunities, failed attempts, and confusion on your part in certain instances. Show us that side of your personality, that weak side brought about by your indecision and you will have successfully discussed the flaw in your personality :-) I suggest keeping the Japanese term to describe indecision. It makes for a very interesting hook in the essay :-)

Undergraduate / Born and bred in Nepal, I am familiar to myriad diseases people fall prey to all year round [23]

That being the case, I hope you will remember to post your revised version, with the correct word count here so that we can make sure that the essay did not get lost thematically during the word editing process. I am not saying it will happen to you but it does happen sometimes so we need to make sure that we prevent that. If you have any further problems with reducing the word count, or you feel that you need a template to follow in doing the word reduction, let us know so that we can help you by providing a template for you to follow. We just need to know what the minimum and maximum word count is in order to be able to help you out :-) The best of luck with your revision! We are here to help anytime you need us :-)

Writing Feedback / TOEFL - more happy live and more chance to become successful for kids raised up less strictly [4]

Mophicyao, your essay is flawed in reasoning. You have failed to consider that children, at very young ages do not have any study habits nor do they know that they are supposed to study after school and complete their homework. Two activities which are the basis of discipline and worth ethics in a person's life that eventually leads to success for them in the future. You spoke of an example of a person who was given control of his study time at a far more advanced age, when the foundation for discipline in relation to studies had most likely been established by his parents already. You have therefore used a weak example in your essay. The best example to use is always based upon personal experience due to the insight that it gives you about the topic you are discussing. I would have chosen to discuss a comparison of my own study habits as a child and how the strict supervision of the parents was necessary at the start, slowly working up to the fact that eventually, the strictness can have its negative effects on the child who could no longer know how to be a child because of the incessant strict rules the parents apply to their study habits and the like. If your can prove that a slow, relaxing of the rules benefits the child in terms of his future success, then you will be able to better argue the points being implied within the essay.

Grammatically, the essay needs work. Since you need to revise the content though, it is best to do the grammatical corrections when the revision for the content has been finalized. That way you only correct the grammar once instead of throughout the theme revision process :-) Good luck with your revision! We look forward to reading the next version. It is not easy to self teach yourself for the TOEFL test. We will be here ot help you with your review as long as you need us to :-)

Graduate / What is my "gift" and what is my purpose in this world? Master of Social Work [8]

Betsy, you have the essay written in reverse order. That is why the hook is missing at the beginning of your essay. My suggestion is to strengthen your first paragraph by giving us your closing paragraph instead. The part that reads


.

From there, you begin to answer the prompts in chronological order which, as far as I can tell, will help bring a sense of order and smooth transitions to your paragraphs. Remember that there is a particular order in which you write an SOP for masters studies. Normally, you start with your most current work experience, working your way back to the first and then explaining your desire to attend masters studies. Now, since you did not graduate with a degree in social work, you need to develop your extra curricular activities relating to the field in a stronger sense in order to prove that you can handle the demands of the course even though you do not have the background for it. The main reason that your application becomes weak, is because you do not have the strong foundation that the studies require. You do not even have prerequisite courses in your transcript of records to show that you have a background in social work. Hence the difficulty in your application.

You graduated from a very different major in college. As for your negative grades. It is good that you were able to present an explanation for it. However, you did not own up to your shortcoming. Instead, you blamed the failure on something else. Own that failure, show them that you take responsibility for your actions. Remember, as a social worker, you will handle far worse cases so you need to prove that you are mentally, emotionally, physically, and socially capable of handling the demands of the course and the actual job.

The essay needs to be revised for theme and prompt adherence at this point. Once you have done that, and the essay finally behaves the way the prompt requires it to, corrections to your grammar issues can finally be applied. There are a number of words that needs to be replaced or deleted in order to make the sentences behave or make more sense. There is no sense in doing those corrections at this point as there is a strong need to replace the content of the essay and as such, asking you to correct the grammar errors at this point would be a waste of time. That process can be saved for the last part :-)

Undergraduate / Female Characters in Video Games - Common App Essay #1 [10]

Natalie, now that I know the essay prompt, I believe that you should cut the discussion down to only one character and how it relates to your personality or interest in your field of study. Choose wisely and make sure that you choose the character that embodies all that you have learned from playing video games. You don't really need to discuss 3 female characters because that would end up making the essay too long and a bit confusing to read. By concentrating on only one character, you will be able to you fully develop your essay in such a way that your central identity will be fully developed and discussed. I cannot choose the character for you so I hope you can make the right choice by yourself :-) Please try to revise the essay based along those lines and then post it here so that we can help you with the clean up and polishing of the content :-)

Undergraduate / Prosperity. What makes a country prosper? Application Essay for HKUST - PERSONAL STATEMENT [4]


- The main question you have to answer in this personal statement is, why HKUST? What is is about the university, its programs, curriculum, or internship programs that makes you sense that you will be able to achieve your objectives in taking this particular college degree? What set the university apart in your mind, from the others in the sense of how it can help you evolve and grow as a student and person?

You truly gave us an insight into the background of your interest in Economics and how you plan to achieve the best kind of training possible in order to ensure a successful career for yourself. However, you failed to mention how HKUST will be able to help you achieve these personal ambitions and goals. There is a need for you to show us the career path you wish to take in the future in order for us or the admissions officer, to get a deeper understanding of the motivation behind your actions and your goals. Without those kinds of information, the essay just feels long and slightly informative instead of highly informative.

Undergraduate / Born and bred in Nepal, I am familiar to myriad diseases people fall prey to all year round [23]

Suvekcha, that suggestion that you read would actually have worked if we were doing a flashback essay. Since you are not writing one, it is best to just keep it in chronological order. I am glad that you saw the change in flow the way I saw it :-) I really believe it works best for this type of essay. Having read the whole paper once again, this time in the new format, I believe that you have successfully altered your original essay already. This version is fit for submission to the university of your choosing and should work well for your intentions. However, if you feel that you need to add information to the essay, go ahead and do so. We can work on fitting it into the overall feel and context of your essay if possible :-)

Undergraduate / What single activity listed in the activity section of Application are you most proud of why? [3]

Nikita, is this a word limited statement? I ask because you have posted quite a short response to the question. So I am not sure if you just under developed the essay or if you really need to keep the answer short :-) If you are not interested in teaching then I do not advice that you use this particular activity as the one you are most proud of mainly because it does not relate to your chosen major. All of your answers to the common app essays and statements should somehow tie in directly to your chosen major in order to show the development of your interest in your chosen field and your dedication to further improving your craft in that area of study. If you can choose another activity, I suggest you do so. Otherwise, try to find a way to relate this answer to your desired major to make it work better with the common app, SOP, and personal statement essays.

Graduate / Let me first express my deep appreciation for your government help for Syrian refugees [4]

Ahmad, let me start off by saying that this letter is too long. It presents way too much information about you that tends to run on and on and on. Not all of this information is necessary in a scholarship application essay. I strongly suggest that you whittle down the information provided to only the most important bits and pieces that will present you in the best light to the scholarship committee. Try not to go over 500 words, or 2 pages maximum, double spaced. Even such a letter would already be considered a bit too long but is still within acceptable limits.

In your essay, you need to concentrate on explaining why you feel you deserve the scholarship. This is usually based upon academic merits and social awareness, added to the financial aspect of your application. Whatever your intentions for the future, after you complete your studies through the help of the scholarship should also be mentioned in order to show that you have a career planned for yourself.

You should devote a paragraph or two to explaining how the scholarship can help you achieve these intentions. By representing the way that the scholarship foundation can help you, there is a chance that you will also be able to discuss how you plan to repay them for their act of kindness either by giving back to your community or becoming a scholarship sponsor yourself in the future. Those are just some ideas that I believe you can present in the essay. You can discuss anything you want.

Right now, our main concern is cutting down the word count, lessening the paragraphs, and making the essay more interesting to the reader. The grammatical errors can be fixed after those problems are cleaned up :-)

Undergraduate / Born and bred in Nepal, I am familiar to myriad diseases people fall prey to all year round [23]

- Suvekcha, the essay will flow better if you make this paragraph your third instead of first paragraph. There is a certain flow, chronological order, and feel that creates a seamless read to the essay for the reader. In this particular case, I believe that the flow I pointed out will work best for you :-)

The reformatted essay works to a certain degree. Applying my suggestions should make it work best :-) Shall we see if you will like the new order?