Undergraduate / Stanford Intellectual Vital; "world free from the barriers of social prejudices" [9]


What on earth makes you think that the world is freeing itself from either of these things?


Because China has, as you pointed out at the beginning of the essay, spawned two major pandemics in recent memory, one of which it tried to cover up even at the risk of spreading what could have been a devastating plague around the world. Because the Chinese government is not a democratic one, but a tyrannical one, and acts accordingly. Because it executes political dissidents, persecutes whole groups of people, and suppresses free speech, even going so far as to try to control the Internet. Because while it has embraced many capitalist policies, it has done so for the wrong reasons, and because that is the last temptation, which is also the greatest treason.

Sorry, I just wanted to point out that the question you posed was in no way rhetorical. Ending a paragraph with a non-rhetorical question is a mistake, because it invites the reader to supply his own answer, as I have done above, which may not be the answer you have in mind.

Undergraduate / "my love of learning and compassion for others" - fsu vires artes mores essay [6]


Irrelevant statement to open. Not a good sign.


At least you move right into saying which value you plan to talk about, and you keep the definition mercifully brief. Still, you are telling, not showing, and so the statement isn't very gripping.


Decent topic, but again, the delivery is a bit flat because of the telling thing, as above.

The rest of the essay isn't too bad. You have some specific examples and you stay on topic. Better yet, you don't take up too much time saying what you have to say. A couple of expanded narrative anecdotes might be in order though, to add a bit of depth to what you already have.

Writing Feedback / TOEFL: Should parents make an important decision for their children?? [5]

Now expand your introduction by summarizing your reasons.


You need to polish your grammar throughout your essay. In the above quotation, for instance, "parents", as a plural word, necessitates that you use "adults" later on in the sentence. Also, it is not grammatically clear here who should be prohibited from making decisions for whom, as the pronouns you use could easily refer to either the parents or the children.

Undergraduate / page 217 of your 300-page autobiography. (holland memories) [3]

Your sentence structures tend to be all the same, short and staccato, and you rely heavily on weak verbs. This makes your essay seem too simplistic. Worse the essay doesn't really demonstrate any particularly good quality about you. So, start over, this time focusing on a narrative anecdote that says something good about you. As you write, try to vary your sentence structure, and use the strongest verbs you can think of.

Undergraduate / Stanford intellectual vitality essay - Bridge game [2]

Okay, I've actually played around with regular bridge a bit, and even I found your essay difficult to follow. Those who have never played bridge, and who are unfamiliar with any variant of the game, won't really know what you're talking about. They'll probably understand a lot of your overall points, as you could have written much the same essay about poker, but the specific connection to the game (the whole point of the essay) will tend to get lost. So, I'd suggest spending a bit more time explaining the game of Floating Bridge, preferably interspersing your explanation with the things you've learned from the game, so as to avoid making the first half of the essay seem like an off-topic essay on how to play a particular card game.

Writing Feedback / toefl-Live performance or TV, which is more enjoyable; 'annoying advertisements' [3]

Oh dear. The grammar here is bad enough that it hinders the readers' ability to easily follow your ideas. So, you need to work on polishing your grammar. To start, try phrasing your ideas more simply, and without taking recourse to extra words. For instance:

Before: "As entertainment becoming a necessary part of daily life an accumulating number of people contribute a large amount of money to short-time relaxing , such as live performance."

After: "Many people spend a lot of money to be able to watch live performances."

Writing Feedback / Toefl; What I would change in my hometown? Improve transportation system [4]

This seems like the sort of thing you want to do in a TOEFL essay. A few minor grammatical mistakes, but nothing serious. A few fixes to get you started:

"If transportation vehicles arrive at stations on time, a great amount of people will use them."

"This will cause fewer people to use their own cars"

"You can also use your time to read a newspaper or book "

Writing Feedback / Critique of woman in documentary [2]

Your first paragraph consists entirely of sentence fragments. I'm assuming that your professor asked you to write it that way, or that you are modeling your work after an example given in class. If so, great. If not, I'd go with grammatically correct complete sentences.

Apart from that, you seem to have summarized the documentary (I haven't seen it, so I have no idea if you summary is comprehensive, or even adequate), and reflected on it, which is what you say you were asked to do.

Undergraduate / "I opened up little by little" - Describe the world you come from [18]


Sure. Start here.

Undergraduate / "I opened up little by little" - Describe the world you come from [18]

Telling: "I am a very compassionate guy."

Showing: "As I walked down the street, I couldn't help noticing the homeless man sitting on the street corner. He was wearing an old brown t-shirt, torn and ragged, and ripped blue jeans. How cold he must be in the November wind, I thought to myself, as he shivered violently. As I passed by, I stopped impulsively and took off my jacket. 'Here,' I said, thrusting it towards him. 'Take this."

Note that even a very rough first-draft example of showing is so very much more interesting than telling.

Writing Feedback / toefl--making decision by ourselves [4]

The grammar is unfortunate. While your work doesn't suffer from the sort of extreme butchery of grammar that some TOEFL essays do, the mistakes you do make tend to throw off the reader. For instance:

"Once when I was participating in a mock interview contest,"

"I concede that consulting other people's views when making decisions is a sensible means for the reason thatbecause you can get many valuable advices and avoid making mistakes."

"how to make the optimal decision sanely has become a standard by which the society to measure the ability of a person." I'm not even sure what you are trying to say here, and so will simply advise you to rephrase.

Also:


Review the rules for parallel structure when writing sentences that list items.

Writing Feedback / "My future job" - revise an essay; I allways want to be a designer [5]

Also, there is no excuse for making really obvious spelling mistakes. Run your work through a spellchecker, which will at least fix errors such as "fashon" and "allways."

Undergraduate / A Personal Statement- father's birthday [8]

The important thing is that you've got a strong topic. Polishing the essay isn't likely to be very fun, but the you don't have to start from scratch, so it's just a matter of putting in the editing time.

Undergraduate / My Life according to Edward Elgar- Common App! [11]

Well, the content seems solid enough. You need to work on polishing your grammar, though. For instance, in your first part, you switch back and forth from past to present to past tense again. I assume you are trying to use the present tense for dramatic effect, but it doesn't really work well, and I would recommend putting everything in the past.


Replace the semi-colon with a comma. Semi-colons separate two complete sentences, and the second half of this is not a complete sentence.

Undergraduate / "I opened up little by little" - Describe the world you come from [18]

At the moment, this essay doesn't really say anything particularly good about you, which immediately makes it a poor admissions essay. Start, then, by asking yourself what you want the essay to say about you. Do you want to show that you are determined? Resilient? Intellectually curious? Then, revise the essay to show this quality through a narrative anecdote. The one you have could potentially work very well for "resilient," if you discuss what you learned from the experience. Just remember that, as Noto says, you must write it in such a way as to demonstrate the experience's influence on your dreams and aspirations.

Writing Feedback / talent is a natural gift or from practice [3]

As I just commented on someone else's essay on this topic, this essay should really have a thesis, antithesis, synthesis structure. Your essay hints at this, and in fact the quotation you give only makes sense with such a structure. It actually works against your current thesis, as it emphasizes hard work over natural talents.


The saying is "Genius is one percent inspiration and 99 percent perspiration." The rhyme makes it work a lot better than your version.

Undergraduate / uofi professional goals essay [3]

The content is really very good. You just need to polish the grammar. Here's some revision to get you started:

Being born and raised in the Congo, Africa, I witnessed the many worstmany horrible ongoing humanitarian crises and the horrible reality that followed: I sawunfolding in a lawless, criminal, corrupt state. The economy of this state was marred by inefficient businesses, huge inflation and very low living standards, to the point that, for many citizens,when even buying a new pair of shoes was a big event that, like a birthday, would come only once a year.

Writing Feedback / people are born with talent or not [2]

This topic cries out for a response that follows a thesis, antithesis, synthesis structure, and in fact your essay comes fairly close to having just that. I'd refine the essay to make that structure more explicit, though. So, start out by saying that both natural talent and hard work are important elements for success in any given field.

Undergraduate / Who am I and what Do I want from College? [2]

The second half of your essay is considerably stronger than your first half. Your first half is fairly dull, because you are just telling us things about yourself, and those the sorts of thing that any student might say when trying to paint himself in a good light. Perhaps you could show those qualities through narrative anecdotes instead? Also, find a better word for your third desire than to become "activated." "Activated" makes you sound like some sort of computer that needs to be booted up.

Undergraduate / Common Application Essay: The Life of a Mind Detective [17]


You've hit the proverbial nail, as it were. The essay is too long. I like the way the essay opens, and how your childish questioning led you into a deep and abiding interest in the philosophy of mind, which is indeed a fascinating subject.

After your first three paragraphs, though, you should deal more specifically and concisely with how you plan to pursue this interest when you get to university. The rest of the essay at the moment just isn't particularly relevant to you as a candidate.

Undergraduate / Live, Laugh, Love [8]

Simone is right -- you need to replace your last two paragraphs with ones that talk more specifically about your academic aspirations, preferably in a way that connects with what you have written about your family experiences.

Undergraduate / You could say that I had college fever!; Transfer Reasons [2]

Why do you talk about how badly your first college experience went? Do the admissions officers really need to know about that? And if you insist on mentioning it, why should they believe you would do any better the next time around? Because you say you've matured? What evidence can you give that this is so? You say you have succeeded at community college, which is good, but you have done so from home. What makes you think you would be any better at living on your own this time around? I'm not saying that you haven't matured, or that you won't do better, but you haven't provided any reasons for the reader to believe either of those things. As a result, the essay is more likely to make the admissions officers not want to admit you than the opposite. So, you need to revise the essay to put yourself in a better light.

Writing Feedback / Toefl iBT writing - Integrated task: Global warming [12]

It's just a bit informal for this sort of essay. You don't need it, at any rate, so I suggested you get rid of it.

Writing Feedback / First Amendment and the Freedom of Speech [2]

This is a write up of facts about freedom of speech, draped loosely around the overly simplistic thesis that freedom of speech = good. I generally agree with your main points, and I still found the essay unconvincing. I have to imagine that someone who disagrees with you would react much more negatively.


Why not start by defining this right off the bat? Really, how can you defend something without first deciding what it means? You mention that freedom of expression has limits at the end of the essay, but of course, if you put limits on something, it is no longer really free. You might frame your defense of freedom of speech as a valuable liberty, bearing in mind that liberty and freedom are not synonymous. You could then look at how the responsibilities inherent in the concept of liberty imply certain restrictions on speech, but that beyond those restrictions, it should be free. So, making your views available to the public is a right. Forcing other people to listen to them, by say yelling through a bullhorn at 3:00am in front of a hospital, is not. However, this restriction is "content-neutral," in as much as it applies to everyone. You are also not allowed to use speech in ways that would cause public or private harm. So, no yelling "fire" in a crowded theater unless there is actually a fire. No accusing a doctor of being incompetent without proof (libel and slander laws)either.

You might then look at how most debates over free speech are really debates on over where to draw the line between valid public discourse and harmful speech. Hate speech, for instance, often includes material that explicitly calls for violence against certain groups of people. Should it be banned? What about hate speech that denigrates certain groups of people based on race or religion, but that does not explicitly call for violence? Does such speech nonetheless create an atmosphere of violence, in which violence is more likely to occur? But doesn't this line of questioning lead to a slippery slope in which anything that could cause dissension or offense can be banned lest the debate spark violent reactions? And is it not the case that the law holds each person responsible for his or her own actions? So, though speech be meant to incite violence, or even merely create an atmosphere conducive to it, yet it is not the same as an act of violence, and the expression of it should not therefore be a crime. If someone commit an act of violence as a result of speech, then let that person be punished. And so on. All of which leads to the question of where the line should be drawn, and what principles should be used to determine this.

Put another way, it's much like the debate over gun control, which really could be called the debate over weapon control. Clearly, nuclear weapons, biological and chemical agents, and the like, should not be available to anyone who wants them. Just as clearly, banning knives would be stupid. Guns fall somewhere in the middle. They are powerful enough to be very dangerous, and have little use beyond killing. However, a reasonable case can be made that an armed populace is the best defense against the possibility of tyranny, and that guns are common enough among the criminal element that they are necessary for those truly interested in self-defense. Some forms of speech clearly deserve to be banned, as mentioned above. Banning other forms of speech is clearly tyrannical. But its the stuff in-between that causes all the fuss.

Finally, your examples, while very topical, seem to have been chosen at random. If you want a topical example that is more on topic, look at the debate over the anti-Obama protests that have been taking place. Here are some links:

nytimes.com/2009/09/30/opinion/30friedman.html?_r=1&scp=8&sq =Obama&st=Search

news.yahoo.com/s/uc/20090930/cm_uc_crbbox/op_2311458

The first one advocates throwing someone in jail for putting an opinion poll on facebook. Not some nutcase, either, but a venerable New York Times columnist, who is in fact cheering on an actual Secret Service investigation. The second one points out that the left doesn't seem to mind overlooking violent speech, and even violent acts, when the protesters are on their side.

Also, read John Stuart Mill. utilitarianism.com/ol/two.html

His defense of freedom of speech is excellent, and worth reading and citing.

Sorry, this post is getting a bit long. Hope some of this helps you.

Undergraduate / Kinds of family do you want- a large family or a small one [3]

What is this for? What were the instructions? It is a very simple, short paragraph. Is it meant to be, or is it meant to be a full essay? If the latter, you will need to do a lot more work and add much more to it.

Undergraduate / 'Emergency rooms; I was attacked' - UCF topic number 1 [11]

Change the essay so the first part is in the first person. Then, replace your current conclusion, where you switch into the first person, with deeper reflections on what you learned from this experience.

Writing Feedback / Toefl iBT writing - Integrated task: Global warming [12]

You shouldn't use a capital after the word "plus." You should delete the word "plus." This will make the word that is currently after it the first word of a sentence, and the first word of a sentence is traditionally capitalized.

Undergraduate / UCF admission; "I don't care how poor a man is; if he has family, he's rich" [2]

Why have you written this essay? To tell the admissions officers that your family has influenced you? But they could already have guessed that. The majority of college applicants have supportive families. I'm assuming this is an "influence on your life" type prompt that you have to work with. Start over, choosing a more original influence to work with.

Undergraduate / "That is intellectual exhaustion." - Stanford Short Essay: Intellectual Vitality [10]

I see what you are trying to do, but I would focus more strongly on describing your experiences in Germany. If you are already intellectually exhausted before even finishing your application, then how will you handle actually attending a university? The problem is that "exhaustion" has negative connotations, and you do not want to associate yourself with any word that has negative connotations in these sorts of essays.

Undergraduate / 'empty refrigerators'; QuestBridge - experience that intellectually excites me [5]

The essay seems unfinished because you don't actually give your answer to the question you have posed:


How would you answer that question? How do your experiences in Nicaragua inform your response?

Undergraduate / World of Difference- CommonApp 150 Words [3]

I like the ending the way it is now, actually. This is clever and original. One thing, though:


Do heat waves spread? Or do they more persist? I'm not sure that the metaphor is quite right, here. Perhaps you could alter it a bit.

Undergraduate / My reasons for transfering to WM [2]

The content is pretty good. Your writing style could use some tightening, though. Get rid of all the "I believe"s (we know you believe it, otherwise you wouldn't be writing it, we presume) and avoid overusing the same word, such as "challenge," too many times in close succession. For instance:

Before: "I want to transfer to William and Mary because I believe I will be challenged. My senior year in high school I took all my classes through Pierce college because I wanted to challenge myself. I am looking for a university that will challenge me beyond my limits. I want to study at a university that will give me the best tools for my future. I want to go to a place where learning does not stop at the classroom but it continues beyond its walls. I believe William and Mary not only provides the academic strength I am looking for but it also provides a student body as passionate about making a difference in the community as myself."

After: "William and Mary will challenge me both to improve myself academically and to become more involved in the local community."

I'm pretty sure that one sentence says virtually everything you said in the entire paragraph. It omits the Pierce College reference, but that's about it.

Writing Feedback / Toefl iBT writing - Integrated task: Global warming [12]

Plus,T he lecture provides some data which make the reading passage more convincing .

You seem to be discussing both. It is difficult to say for sure, as I haven't read either the passage or the lecture, but you have a clear thesis and examples to back it up.

Writing Feedback / Help with Rogerian Style Essay- "The Entitlement Generation" [2]

Your essay is a bit disorganized at present. Why should those born between 1979 and 1994 have a particularly strong sense of entitlement? How is this linked to narcissism? Clearly not everyone born in those years lacks a sense of empathy, even if they have adopted an attitude of entitlement as part of a generational zeitgeist. You explain in detail why an attitude of entitlement would be bad, but you also say that some people believe it can be good, and you don't make a particularly strong case for this. Perhaps you could explain in greater detail how this could be seen as a good thing.

Undergraduate / 'My AA degree' - Vires, Artes, Mores - these principals have been emulated in my life. [4]

"Florida State University is founded on the principals of "Vires, Artes, Mores" or "Strength, Skill, Character". Through self evaluation, I've recognized how these principals have been emulated in my life. "

"Vires is otherwise known as strength. " You don't need to define these terms. They are already defined for you in the prompt.


What is the "it" that lacks physical strength?

"Artes is about arts, skill and craft. "

Okay, you need to go through and replace most of the weak verbs you use now, such as various form of "to be" ("is," "are," "was," "were") with stronger ones.

Essays / A Balance Development Should be Free from Corruption [6]

Then your thesis shouldn't be that countries should be free of corruption. That's a given. Your thesis should be your answer to the question "how can corruption disrupt the development of a country?"

Scholarship / IvySelect Scholarship Personal Statement [8]

More reasonable essay in terms of scope. Explaining why you want to contribute to the activities you list would indeed be a good idea. You could cut some of the stuff that isn't really relevant. Liebe did a good job in pointing out what might be cut:

Undergraduate / A Personal Statement- father's birthday [8]

I liked the idea that you end by making a note of the date, so you don't miss his birthday again. But, if you wanted to make it stronger, you might talk about what you did for his next birthday, to show that you really did change, instead of just saying that you did.

Undergraduate / 'Real people' - UT at Austin topic essay A. Important person [8]

This is much better, content-wise. Siblings don't get chosen anywhere near as often as parents for this sort of essay, so the topic is solid. You mention you have "humble beginnings" and that food was often scarce. If you and your brother had to cope with such conditions, then you should certainly elaborate on them, as overcoming such a hardship says good things about you. In fact, I'd go through and be more specific and detailed about every aspect of your essay. If you could throw in a narrative anecdote or two about you and your brother, that would great. Maybe you could even use one as a hook for your introduction.

Undergraduate / Common App essay for UVA, criticism appreciated! [4]


Why did you spend time begging? Remember, introductory clauses always modify the noun (or pronoun) directly after the comma, whether you intend them to or not.


I've mentioned this on other threads, but religious references in admissions essay carry a certain amount of risk with them. You can still keep them in, just be aware that, depending upon where you are applying, they may harm rather than help your admissions chances.


I'd leave out the FOB reference, if I were you. The term seems more derogatory, as if it shouldn't really be thrown into an application essay.