Undergraduate / In Israel I found a type of spirituality and gratefulness that has remained with me to this day [5]

Liora, while the story that you told is quite engaging and informative, there was nothing in the story that your related or information that you provided which could be considered as an answer to the prompt. The prompt asks you to relate an event that marked a transition from child to adult. I am now beginning to think that perhaps you should have told the story of your Kabutz instead. That is if you actually took one because that is a traditional rite of passage that signifies the transition from child to adult among Jews right?

What the admissions officer is looking for here is not a spiritual awakening or a connection to your people's past, present, and future. He is looking for that moment in your life when you felt that something that told you "Look at me, I'm an adult!" In some of the essays that I have read, these stories usually relate to more responsibility from the parents, taking responsibility for their actions, proving that he is capable of doing something that only adults thought they could do,falling their first animal during a hunt, or, like I said before, a rite of passage in the community or within the family.

If you have a story in your past that falls along those lines, remember, those are only examples and suggestions, meant to serve as your guide in choosing a topic, nothing more, then please revise the essay to reflect that story. Right now, this essay is more applicable to an essay connected to a "your story will be incomplete without it " or "Tell us something about you that will tell us something unique about you" kind of prompt.

Writing Feedback / TOEFL: constructing public transportation systems in cities is good? [9]

lephuc, I apologize for being so cross with you. I know that you can do better and I have read a better essay from you so I was really frustrated to have read this paper that you seem to have completed halfheartedly. See more of my suggestions for editing the essay below.



- Going directly to your example makes more of an impact upon the reader.


- bus fees cost as much as gas if one uses a private motorbike. The longer the distance, the more savings one will have once he takes the bus instead of private vehicles.



These edits ought to polish the essay :-)

Undergraduate / "Guys, strive for the best!" - The experience of Volleyball Team; Rice supplement [8]

Nicole, the problem with the statement is that it does not have a conclusion, I was able to whittle down the word count for you but I found that it did not have an ending because your experience does not tell us if the team won or lost the game. That information is needed to complete the prompt answer. This is what I have come up with so far:

I learned all about the difference between passion and perseverance while I was a member of my high school volleyball team. I had progressed through the ranks from a bench warmer, all the way to chief spiker. So I was quite excited when my team made it to championship during my senior year. I had long looked forward to facing the ultimate Shenzhen champion and proving that with passion and perseverance, any team can take on the unbeatable team. A voice echoed in my heart, "We are infinite."

It hangs at this point because I don't know how to end it. It is 88 words so you have room to play with the conclusion. It's all yours :-)

Undergraduate / I hate keeping a diary. I record what I actually go through, rather than empty talk. [3]

Dominic, this is a very interesting quirk. You did well choosing to discuss it as part of your supplemental essay. It shows the kind of serious thinking and observant attitude that you have which will come in handy as you attend to your college responsibilities and tasks. That said, I feel that I can help you further improve this essay. Let me get started below :-).


- I knew that my classmates and I had the same schedule. So I was puzzled as to how they could always find an old lady to help across the street, or pick up money that they could hand over to the police, everyday for as long as we had to write in the diary. I was not like them. I never did write about my thoughts, neither did I have the same admirable experiences that they did with strangers. They got high praise from their teacher I got the worst grade possible. Somehow she could not accept that my diary was filled with street advertisement catch phrases or the drawing of a leaf. These meant nothing to my teacher, but those meant a lot to me.


- She could not understand that by taking notes about the things happening around me, I learned about a new life truth everyday. I recorded what I went through everyday, rather than making up stories or filling the pages with empty talk. Don't get me wrong, I still keep a diary sometimes, but not in the way other people do. I use it to log my understanding of life and human beings. I record things because I want to write them. Just like I study for knowledge instead of high grades. I guess that is why I consider myself to be a person who lives life instead of living for money or fame.

Feel free to use my suggestions as the basis of your revisions if you think it works for you :-)

Writing Feedback / Firstly, on a safety level, traveling with a guide is most important [4]

Odon, you were able to write a very well developed and reasoned essay within 30 minutes. While your English usage is not at a native speaker level, you were able to use the correct English words to get your point across. The essay is informative and shows that you were able to consider important aspects of the prompt in developing your answer. This is an essay that will be sure to score quite highly in the TOEFL. If I were the examiner, I would give this a 10, only because of the grammatical errors, which I feel can be overlooked in this case due to the excellent reasons you presented in defense of your stand and opinion.

If I were to pick out one portion of the essay that you need to improve upon, I would have to say that you need to work on developing your introduction paragraph. In this particular essay, you just needed to improve upon this portion:


- Nowadays , people have become...

Graduate / I always found myself to be at the bottom, during high school. My SOP [5]

DS, please allow me to make some suggestions that will help you clean up the look and content of your statement of purpose. You will find my suggestions below.


- I always found myself at the bottom of the social chain when I was in high school.


- ... hooked on the subject and surprised people when I became one of the few students who could program...

- DS, you have spent way too much time discussing your accomplishments as a student. While you did develop an interesting program, that is not the focal point of a statement of purpose. Instead, you should be talking about your future plans and how your masters studies fit into that quest. Talk about your future program development and and how the university can help you accomplish your future goals. That is the kind of information that makes an effective statement of purpose. Just skim over your educational attainments and projects, an in-depth discussion is not necessary because those are past achievements. You should be looking towards and discussing your future plans instead.

Undergraduate / Considering your lifetime goals...Apply Texas Essay C [2]

Samantha, the first thing that I noticed about your essay is that your sentences are too long. You can't keep using commas to separate your sentences. You need to learn to use periods in order to separate your sentences. This will allow the admissions officer to absorb the information you are providing individually. Right now, it is quite difficult to read the essay because you only have pauses instead of endings for your sentences. You should also remember that grammar rules dictate that you cannot start sentences with "And" or "Because", this is one of the early errors of your paper that I will be pointing out below.


- So I did...


- Before you introduce this paragraph, you need to use a transition sentence to help prepare the reader for the change. You need to present the development of your academic interests and show the development of your participation in decathlons. You can't just hit us with the information. You need to ease the reader into it.


- Rephrase this. You do not know the background of the person reading your paper, so make sure you do not accidentally offend your reader. Being politically correct in written form is of the utmost importance because you never know how your statement will be taken or understood by the reader.

The essay is really informative and answers the prompt. The problem with it is that it provides too much information that needs to be processed by a very busy admissions officer. That is why I am suggesting that you only choose the most important extra curricular activities that you feel will create the best impression of you with the officer. This will make the essay more interesting to read and will provide the best information in the quickest possible way.

Writing Feedback / TOEFL: working alone appears to be better. It helps us to be more responsible. [9]

lephuc, you need to concentrate on the revision of your essay. Do not just concentrate on the portions we advise you to change. Concentrate on the overall effect of the revisions to your paper. Make sure that the suggestions we made helped the paper improve and flow more smoothly. Most of all, double check any new errors that may have arisen as you revised the paper. I caught more than one new error that stemmed from the revision you did to the paper but failed to catch. Let me point those out to you right now.


- ... arranging meetings and explaining ideas which can cause a lot of arguments and disagreements which take time away from completing the task.


- This divides the team and makes people work on their own, without regard for the team output.

[quote=lephuc]On a social pointview, working alone helps people with responsibility. [ /quote]
- From a social point of view, working alone helps people learn about responsibility.

Writing Feedback / TOEFL: constructing public transportation systems in cities is good? [9]

lephuc, your revision is a mess! You most certainly do not know how to properly revise an essay. When we make suggestions for revisions, you are supposed to incorporate it into the actual essay and then submit the newly written essay to this thread for our further review. Please note that you have to upload the complete essay for review and not the bits and pieces that you have here, which is even mixed in with the comments and suggestions that we gave you. We don't need to know what we told you about, we can refer to our response thread to you or, as in my case, I always remember the suggestions and comments I made in the essay. You need to fix this before we can properly review your essay again. Once you have properly revised your essay, post it here for our review.

The reason that we need to read the whole essay again, with the revisions we recommended is because we need to see if there are any flaws that need to be corrected due to the revision. We will need to help you correct any errors that stem from our suggestions. So just giving us the bits and pieces that you revised will not help in polishing your essay. I hope you understand what I am trying to explain. I look forward to reading your fully revised essay soon :-)

Undergraduate / Vacation should be memorable and meaningful, hence it need to be longer rather than short one. [4]

Vns, yes you can. It is part of the advanced English language usage rules. Beginners follow a specific set of writing and speaking rules, intermediate have another set, and those of advanced or almost native speaker level, have the most freedom to get creative with their use of the English language. You will find that as your advance in your grasp and knowledge of the English language that the rules will begin to relax for you in the written and spoken sense. However, that kind of leeway only comes with years of extensive practice because you have to be able to identify when you can be creative in the use of the English language and when you should not. If you continue to practice your essay writing, you will find that the opportunity to use certain relaxed grammatical rules will eventually present itself. Knowing when and how to use it though, is something else. The way I used the term "Imagine if you will" is something that is acceptable in creative English writing. I found it applicable to the situation you described so I thought of suggesting its use.

Undergraduate / Almost dead - A ruff lesson; interesting interaction you've had with someone different than yourself [5]

Alina, in answer to your question, yes, you can definitely use this essay to answer both essay prompts. It has all the factors that will help you deliver a very vivid statement to the admissions officer. However, for the transition to adulthood, I would suggest that you expand upon the discussion somehow, varying it a bit in order to better depict the event as an adult defining moment for you. Perhaps you can expand upon it by explaining how it helped you change your point of view by taking everything that adults say as a sacred fact. Or you can explain how it helped you learn to be more responsible for your neighbors in need.

Right now, the essay is perfect as it is. You have shown a great maturity in your actions and have allowed the admissions officer to see a side of you that may not have been visible in the other common app essays you filled out. Good work on this essay. You should be proud of it :-)

Now for the comments and grammar corrections. Sorry about that, I could not help myself :-)

- Clarify who Aleksi is from the very start. Don't just give us a name. His character is important. So tell us what his position of authority is in the class.The part about going on with the class, who is talking? Aleksi or Anya? That is a bit confusing to the reader.


-It was our senior year...
- Let test your knowledge of tense usage in this essay. You have some improper tense uses in this and other paragraphs that need to be corrected, can you spot the mistakes and correct it yourself? I want to see if you were just in a hurry while writing this paper so you forgot to use the correct tenses of if you really do not know how to use the right tenses. I have corrected those mistakes for you before.


-I did not want to lose the golden medal for excellent studies that I had been working on for so long but I felt I needed to do something.



- ruff, is the sound a dog makes, rough is a word that explains the difficulty of a situation. I am sure you did not mean to make the sound of a dog :-)

- ... rough lesson...

Let's work on these problems for now and proceed with more edits after alright?

Undergraduate / In Israel I found a type of spirituality and gratefulness that has remained with me to this day [5]

Liora, it would help in editing your essay if we knew what the prompt was. Without it, it will be hard for us to decide which portions of your essay are superfluous and can be deleted and which portions can be merged so that the word count can be brought down. Would you mind providing that as soon as possible so that we can help you with the word count? In the meantime, I will offer some grammatical corrections that will fix some sentences that you may have overlooked in your own proofreading. It will bring your word count up even further but I assure you that we can help you bring down the count as soon as we know the prompt :-)


- wearing a black skirt...


- I later spoke to my friend about the purpose of his visit to Israel.


- attempting to get a better wifi connection.

Undergraduate / The Me I am Today - Common App; background or story of an international student [11]

Silverw, in my opinion, the essay is ready for submission. It already answers the prompt, does not contain grammatical and sentence structure errors, and is polished to the best it can be. I do not think there is anything more that we can add to this paper. Have the confidence to submit this paper in its current form. It should work well for you.

However, if you feel that there are certain elements that you want to add to the paper, or you think that there is more than can be done, you will have to show me what those are by adding it to the essay and then posting it here. Then I can advice you regarding its relevance to the prompt and whether it helps to enhance the paper or not. Remember, the only one who can really decide if the paper is ready would be you. If you are confident with the content and form of the paper, then go for it :-)

Undergraduate / 'My eyes have been opened to endless possibilities' - which communities do you belong? [2]

Anastasia, please mention the specific low income community that you grew up in so that the admissions officer can have a clearer idea of how to imagine the highly descriptive words that you used in your essay. You have given such a vivid description of the world that you come from, and the chaos that surrounds it that the reasons you wish to further yourself academically become quite evident.

That said, I believe that you need to divide the essay into two paragraphs in order to show the chaotic community that you belong to and also highlight the community that you are trying to develop for yourself within this negative world. By showing the admissions officer that you have managed to create your own peaceful community within this world, you will be able to portray yourself as someone who is confident of eventually leaving the world that society says to belong to. This is the part of your statement that will show your drive to get away and succeed in a community where you feel you really belong.

Undergraduate / 'inspiring chat with a Syracuse Admissions Officer' - What influenced you to apply? [4]

Kerry, the admissions officer is not interested in reading about you in this particular essay. He is more interested in finding out why you chose to apply for admissions to SU.Let me point out the parts of the essay that you can develop in order to best answer the prompt.


- What major are you planning to take? What subjects, programs, or internships at the university makes you feel like this is the place for you to call home for the next 4 years? You spoke about the location of the university, write about that in a separate paragraph, build upon the immediate community surrounding the school and how you feel it will help you become a better student.


- You can offer SU this, but does Syracuse have programs that you are interested in joining that will help you further develop these traits of yours? Discuss.


- This should be the opening statement, the hook of your essay. Everything else should come after this. In fact, delete the statement about the chat with the admissions officer. That is irrelevant at this point. I believe this should be the opening statement because it immediately answers the prompt.

Undergraduate / 'Carrots. I don't like them.' - "Who are you?" - Georgetown personal statement [3]

Shannon, there is nothing that needs to be corrected in this essay. You have perfectly summed up your diverse personalities in every paragraph that you created. You also gave the admissions officer a deep insight into who you are as a person. The many facets of your personality shows that various capabilities that you have and how you will be able to survive the rigorous and demanding college life. The statement about knowing how to be alone and how it benefits you shows that you are a person who knows you abilities and limitations and how to best use these to your advantage.

Congratulations on creating a well developed personal statement. It is an excellent preliminary interview. If there is one thing that I would like to have seen in this paper, it would be facet of Shannon that your parents know about. Only her voice is missing in this essay in my opinion. Her missing voice does not deduct from the excellence of the paper though. So adding her voice is a choice that you should decide upon.

Undergraduate / Ever since I got my first phone, my interest in computer science has increased tenfold. - GMU essay [4]

Tirth, the best way to answer this essay would be to pose your vision of the world in let's say the year 2030. What field of computer science do you hope to have conquered by then? What is the importance of conquering that field in terms of the survival of mankind? It is the information contained in your answer to these two questions that will be the introduction and thesis statement of your essay. Then you can move on to the body of the essay.

Your first paragraph should indicate your background in your chosen field. Let the admissions officer know that you have a basic background, but don't get too technical in the usage of terms in case he is not too familiar with what you are discussing. Use layman's terms only. Then move on to the second paragraph.

In this paragraph, you will discuss what classes you plan to take at GMU leading towards your goal. Mention specific training regimens or programs, even internships that they offer which can help enhance your skills. Most importantly, let them know that there are certain mentors / professors you look forward to exchanging ideas with as an intern or apprentice. This will show your future development and potential as a scientist in your chosen field.

Finally, discuss how you plan to use what you learn from the professors and the school in achieving your end goal. Give them an idea of where you see yourself say, 5 years after graduation. Explain to them what point you will already be in by that time in terms of developing answers to your question or goals. You should at least have laid out a solid foundation for your final objective by that time.

Undergraduate / 'not wasting lot of time attending classes' - I support of building a new high school near our home [4]


- ...will be arriving for their classes on time... gain thetrust of others ...
- Vns, I am unclear as to how being on time for classes will build trust in others. I think this will instead build the time management skills of the children. Perhaps you should consider revising that statement?

- ... the school mightbe situated far from your... You can allow yourself to sleep...After all, having a good night's rest is pivotal to the learning process

- Vns, in this type of essay, you should choose only the most important reason or the best benefit for the student to discuss. In this case, it is the need for extra sleep time. Develop that paragraph with another statement mentioning the professional point of view about the importance of sleep to the learning process and then conclude.

There is a marked improvement in your essay thought process this time around. You have shown that you are capable of creating well thought out and semi-developed essay thoughts already. We just need to work on your reasoning skills :-)

Undergraduate / Tea with Pancakes - Story that changed my life [13]

Alina, here is a tip for essay writing, when you think the essay is becoming too difficult to write or you think it is not working for you, the best thing to do is throw the essay you are working on away. Throw it away and start on a new one. This time, write it from a different standpoint or change the subject of the essay. When an essay is misbehaving for you, most likely it is because you are either afraid of how you are writing it, or you are not sure of the topic, or worse, you are not really inspired by the essay you are writing. Anything that is difficult to write should never be the essay that you submit for consideration. So, here is the question I need to ask you, "Do you think this essay will catch the attention of the admissions officer? Does it does it do justice to the story you are trying to tell?" If your answer to one or both questions is no, then it is time to write a new essay. I'll hang back on commenting about this essay until you figure out if you really want to use this paper or not. It is no use editing it if you can't get it to work or you are not satisfied with it. Let me know your final decision about this essay and I will proceed accordingly :-)

Graduate / 'Alzheimer's and Dementia seemed peculiar to me' - Occupational Therapy Grad School Essay [2]

Kim, your essay is extremely long and thus, difficult to read. I strongly advice you to whittle it down content wise. One way of doing that is to choose only the most important volunteer activity to discuss in the essay. Also, cut down on the story about your grandmother at the beginning. Instead, bring up the statement about being exposed to Occupational Therapists early in life, skimming over your grandmother's illness in the process. Too much space and time was devoted to discussing it when you needed to make the reader concentrate instead on the way the illnesses in your family helped you develop an outlook about OT.

The essay is really informative. It just needs to be rearranged in order to make it more interesting. Try to speak directly to the reader instead of beating around the bush. The admissions officer does not have too much time to read the submitted essays so you will be doing yourself and the officer a favor by making sure that he reads the important parts as soon as possible.

Undergraduate / Tea with Pancakes - Story that changed my life [13]

Alina, the essay is too long because you discussed it in chronological order. You should have simply jumped to the very important part, the climax of the essay which is what happened during the competition itself and your reaction to it. Then how you overcame the grief stemming from the event. Let me list it down for you so that you will know how to discuss it:

1. Introduce what ID is and what the competition is about.
2. Jump directly to the competition, to the part where you failed. Set up the basis for the failure, then present the failure.
3. Discuss how you felt, how the team felt.
4. Discuss the aftermath and how you dealt with it.
5. Conclude the essay.

I hope this advice helps you. I look forward to reading the revised version :-)

Essays / I've been thinking about the prompts for days but still got nothing yet; personal essay! [28]

Fiona, revise the whole essay, Concentrate on the creation of the club, the reasons behind it, the objectives of the club, and the eventual results of your work with the club. If you concentrate on just those parts, you will manage to deliver the requirements of the prompt which state that you have to discuss an accomplishment that marked your transition from child to adulthood. Remember to mention the specific parts or events that you feel forced you to transition or helped you transition. Tell us how it felt when the club achieved the objectives that you set out to reach. Don't be afraid to discuss some of the failures that you may have had along the way. That will show us the path towards maturity that you underwent. It will make your essay more effective. It will also help if you made the essay take on a more serious tone instead of the current light point of view that it has. We are going for academic writing, not casual statements :-) I hope my advice helps.

Sorry about having taken so long to get back to you. I had some personal errands to attend to last week that took up almost all of time. I'll be here if you still want to continue working on this essay :-)

Writing Feedback / The problems that Facebook can cause for us. [6]

Vera, all I can advice you is what I often tell the kids here. Use formal English words in your essay. Do not use text spelling, emiticons, or internet word shortcuts when spelling or writing your statements. Practice format writing by reading English newspapers. Read the opinion columns, those columns are written in formal, academic English and will help you sort out how to properly write formal essays. More importantly, don't forget to keep practicing. Just keep writing your essays and you will eventually achieve the academic proficiency in the written word that you hope to achieve. Essay writing is not a skill developed overnight. You will need years of essay writing before you even achieve an almost native speaker level of writing in English.Don't lose heart. It will be a bit difficult at first but if you persevere, you will achieve the level of proficiency that you wish to have :-)

Undergraduate / FELLING OF COCOON TO ADULTHOOD [8]

Adebanjo, the essay just lacks an emotional connection that you can create with the reader. Maybe it is because of the way the essay is written as a matter of fact. Maybe it is because you failed to actually connect the essay with your emotional and intellectual growth. I am trying to put my finger on it at the moment but I am unable to do so because I keep going back to the redundancy of your essay. You could have told us that your mother, the pillar of your strength had died in one simple sentence. Instead you harp on it by repeating it twice at the beginning of the essay. Then you beat around the bush by constantly telling us about how you had to take responsibility for your family and how you did it. An essay like this requires more than just you going through the motions. You need to make us believe that you realized the need for a transformation on your part, you began to transform, and eventually, that you successfully transformed into an adult. Unless you are able to do that, the essay will remain unsuccessful.

Writing Feedback / Argumentative Essay on "Jeremy" by Pearl Jam [2]

Rebecca, what you have written is more of an opinion essay than an argumentative essay. That is because the video is only discussed and seen from your point of view. This makes your work weak and inconsistent with the prompt provided. Have you given any thought to checking the online comments, opinions, and reviews of this music video? That would be one of the good ways to approach this essay.

Read the online comments from both the professional and amateur websites regarding the video. Take note of the top 5 arguments from each source. See if you have any opposing opinions for their point of view in your original essay. If you do, use their comment to create the argument within your own essay. Remember, an argumentative essay is only effective once you have both sides of an opinion represented in the paragraph. Without it, you only present a one sided point of view or opinion paper.

Give my suggestions some consideration and see if it will work for you :-) I look forward to reading the opposing side of the arguments.

Graduate / SOI - Masters of Counselling Psychology "My Commitment to the field of Mental Health" [4]

Gavin, you have obviously done your research here at the forum. You have made sure to dot your I's and cross you T's so to speak. This is an almost perfect statement of purpose. Almost perfect because I believe that there are still some information considerations that need to be addressed in in. Information such as your current profession and how it relates or connects to your desire for higher studies. How will these studies benefit you in the future? What is the ultimate career goal for you? Your essay will further be helped if you can connect some of your relevant past studies to your future classes. That way your career path will be clearly spelled out for the reader.

Aside from those little suggestions, the essay itself does not require so much work. Like i said it is almost perfect and therefore, almost ready for submission :-) You did some pretty good work here. I am looking forward to the next version. That is, if you decide to consider and work on the suggestions I made :-)

Undergraduate / A woman, carrying her newborn on her shoulders, was selling utensils - Making a difference essay [10]


- Pranu, this actually sounds more effective as an opening hook than as a closing statement. Would you like to reconsider the hook? You can add this as a sort of reflection moment for yourself that leads us into the essay discussion.


- This line is actually already effective as a closing statement as it is. Perhaps you can just add a line indicating that you can't help but think back to those days when you think about how far education for yourself and your country has come?

Scholarship / Personal Statement - Applying for scholarship - Stuck in life [3]

Mohamed, while your essay tells me most of the basic information that you can be expected to present, you did not provide any information as to why and how you can be considered to be a future leader in your home country. What the essay wants to be assured of is that you plan on returning to your home country after you graduate from your course. That said, the essay will greatly benefit from examples of your leadership skills from your home country work experience. That is what you should be presenting instead of telling the admissions officer that you wuit your job and took a chance. A responsible and effective leader will never take a chance on the future of anybody. He most certainly will not risk his family's future to pursue his own ambitions. So you need to rethink the essay. Revise it in such a manner that you will only present your leadership abilities and your plans for becoming a future leader in your home country. Make leadership plans and discuss those in this essay.

Graduate / Keep fighting, don't step down and cower, step up and shine - your hard work will pay off eventually [3]


- this sentence is too flowery. Simply say "My grandfather was the principal of a small tribal school in India". You should know when to be flowery and when you be direct to the point. In common apps, direct to the point is best.


- The day you were born is implied in the sentence already.

Middya, your hook does not work at all. It is all about your grandfather. It does not tell me anything about what you will be discussing in the essay. That hook should direct the content of the essay and tell me what to expect. Right now, the essay just bored me and left me wondering where you were going with this statement. You need to work on the introduction. Improve its content.

Middya, I have now completely read the essay and I must tell you, it does not work at all. It is shallow and does not really pose a problem or situation that you had to resolve. There is nothing about character building that can be found within your story. However, I was able to find a large portion of the essay that you should develop in order to create a highly interesting, engaging, and character building essay that totally shows a predicament that you had to overcome.

Undergraduate / "stereotypical" white American kid - MADISON WISCONSIN ESSAY [2]

Thalia, this is an essay that depicts the conflict that every bilingual child faces in his or her life. You perfectly described the way that you were conflicted as a child when it came to choosing who you were. You wanted to be like your friends, but somehow, you also knew that you had to be who your parents taught you to be as well. So when you said that you insisted that they speak English in a public setting, I could almost see the way your parents looked at you. Unlike other essays to this effect though, you managed to present a well grounded and thought out conclusion to your story. The fact that you learned how to be a "stereotypical " white American kid while still holding on to your roots and what makes you special has made this essay highly successful. It is an essay that you should be proud to present to the admissions officer. It is truly a unique story about yourself that could go unnoticed by most people.

Undergraduate / A woman, carrying her newborn on her shoulders, was selling utensils - Making a difference essay [10]

Pranu, here are my notes on your essay.


- Setting the book...


-... woman's circumstances...


- That day, as I weighed the pros and cons of the government's futile attempt to awaken the masses to the value of an education, a long forgotten memory returned.


- Stick only to references pertaining to your education advocacy.


-... neither the school uniform...

Just apply these corrections and then we will do one final review of your essay :-)

Undergraduate / I wish to continue to expose myself to different cultures in Duke - application essays [5]

Shachar, you should start a new thread for the Duke essay. The forum rules clearly state one essay per thread. Don't risk getting your account suspended because you broke the rules. Start a new thread before the admin takes action. Now, about your previous essay;


- Professional what? We need to know what your plans for the future are. This point will be the best time to indicate that.If you are interested in starting your own business, then mention it here to establish the reason for your studies then continue it in the next paragraph. This is known as a transition sentence.

Aside from the comment I made above, I am of the opinion that your essay is informative and ready for submission.

Undergraduate / 'I live by the Iguana Rule' - Stanford roommate letter [5]

Oriyan, don't worry about your letter being unique. It just needs to contain the qualities and criteria that you are looking for in a roommate and how you would deal with them because the housing committee will use the letter to pair you up with a roommate. The ideas you have thrown in here will be used to find you a suitable roommate whom you hopefully, will be able to turn into a life long friend. Your roommate probably won't get to read the letter until he reports to the campus to move into the dorm. So don't worry about being unique in your letter.

This is not about the most creative roommate letter. This is all about making sure that you are paired up with the right roommate for the rest of the semester. Believe me, a roommate will either do one of two things for you. Either make your semester fly by quickly, or, make the semester seem like it is dragging on forever. So, the more information that you can provide to help them find you the best roommate possible, the better your chances of an unforgettable school semester :-)

Writing Feedback / Factory and its aftermaths [8]

Vns, when it comes to verifying the content of your essay, I cannot assure you that the TOEFL examiner will not double check the information. The reason I advised you to add factual information to your essay such as the Pan Pacific Electric data, was because it was an internationally popular class lawsuit in the United States. As such, it would add to the impression that you are quite familiar with the history of the United States, it's pop culture, and its relation to their current events. Always remember that you need to impress your examiner, not with big words or simply filling up the screen with words. You need to prove your intelligence, familiarity with the language you are using, and a knowledge of the history and culture of the United States.

When I took the TOEFL, I scored highly in the essay portion because I was able to relate the prompt that was provided with Benjamin Franklin's kite experiment and their modern use of electricity. My answer so impressed the examiner that I almost got a perfect score on the essay portion.My essay was creative, informative, and proved an intelligent grasp of the United States as a country. Hence my extremely high score. That is why I always advice you guys to make the essay intelligent without using big words that may or may not impress the examiner. It is the information contained in the essay that they analyze, not the words you used or the number of words on the paper.

Undergraduate / Vacation should be memorable and meaningful, hence it need to be longer rather than short one. [4]


- Vns, did you really mean to restate the prompt in its totality as a question? Did you really not have any intention of rephrasing it into a statement for your introduction?

- Students would rather spend their time on long vacations because vacations are all about creating memories and trying to apply to practical lessons learned at school. That is why... in their stance of supporting longer vacation time.


- Vacation is the time when people want to rest after long months of working hard.
- Vns, a weekend, is different from a vacation. A weekend is only 2-3 days. A vacation is at least 1 week.


- When describing a situation, it is best to appeal to a reader's imagination by saying "Imagine if you will", rather than "By Illustration" which makes a casual essay sound very formal and academic.


- You might even pick up a new language as you learn to converse with the natives of the country.
- Don't assume that you already know and will be fluent in the language of the country you will be visiting.


-... how it tastes .





- What can you do...


- Your likely choices as to stay home or visit a nearby place. Choices that apply to most students on vacation.


- ... that I firmly support...

Scholarship / For me to say, "I am interested in art" is not enough to express my true feelings about this subject [2]

What interests you about Art and Design? You talk a lot about wanting to learn to do certain forms of art but you are not telling us if you have the foundation for this type of program. What have you done in the past related to the Arts that would make the admissions officer think that you are qualified to attend such a s specialized program? Why are you interested in art? Is it the ability to show emotions through the use of lines and curves? Thea way that Art depicts life in such a way that one can understand what it happening through a mere scene without any words to describe what is happening? These are considerations that will directly answer that question. Your first statement does not answer that prompt.

The prompt also asks you to let the reader know about your future plans after attending Parsons. They want to know if you have ambitions for the future and most specially, they need to know precisely how Parsons can help you achieve that goal. Again, there is nothing in your essay that answers that portion. A good answer would be to tell them if you plan on becoming a cartoonist for Pixar or Disney in the future then go on to explain about something so unique to the school teaching method that only a Parsons student can bring to these companies. That is the kind of answer that they are looking for.

Your essay definitely needs to be rewritten with nothing of this original work being left behind. No part of this can be used in the proper answering of both questions posed by the prompt. Post the revised essay here so that we can help you out some more :-)

Undergraduate / My leadership role was to introduce and mentor incoming cadets to facets of Culver life; AIR FORCE [4]

- By simply restructuring this part to mention CMA, you will have not only properly introduced the academy, but also the code of ethics you live by while there.


- Let me rephrase this for you:
Jordan was a rebellious student who could never adhere to our code of ethics. In trouble from the first day he stepped into my life as my roommate. Eventually, he tried to involve me in his shenanigans by asking me to join him for a smoke.Needless to say, I turned him down and warned him of the consequences of his actions.

- By writing it this way, you will be able to save word count for the CMA part that you want to do. Does it work for you? Feel free to use it.

Undergraduate / 'I live by the Iguana Rule' - Stanford roommate letter [5]

Oriyan, you are right about leaning towards the first essay. I would suggest however that you include a particular portion of the 2nd version that shows how much fun it can be living with you. I specifically would like you to add this:


Don't you think that by combining these two parts of the essay, your fun and easy going personality will more than shine through in the letter? Just my suggestion though. The final word belongs to you :-)

Student Talk / What are the ways to improve my essay writing? [17]

Jessie, the only way you can improve your essay writing is through constant practice. Keep writing your essays and then have other people review it for content and grammar problems. Just like Alina said, you can greatly benefit from posting your essays here for our review and comments. Aside from constantly writing essays though, you should also make sure that you are up to date on current events world-wide and that you read a lot of magazines and books on diverse topics. You never know what sort of information you might come across while reading that will help you with your essay writing in the future. Watching news programs will also help you keep up to date about current events as they relate to you everyday life. Note those events just in case it comes up in as an essay topic.

Just keep writing no matter what happens. Seek the help of people who can help you advance your writing skills, enroll in creative writing classes, these are just some of the ways that you can improve your essay writing skills. The most important thing you have to do is "Keep calm and just write" :-)

Writing Feedback / Factory and its aftermaths [8]

Vns, I just have some suggestions to make :-) Study the way I reworded the essay that you wrote. I gave it a more academic and professional approach in order to make it more effective.


- People these days would rather live far away from factories because of the noise pollution and health risks that its operation exposes the community to. That is why I am joining the other community members in opposing the building of a factory near our community.

- Written this way, you cover the prompt restatement, discussion presentation, and your personal opinion in a mere 2 lines :-)


- Factories cause an uncontrollable amount of noise because of the equipment that is used in their production line. Opening the factory will remove the peace and tranquility of our community. Coming to noise and air pollution after a long day of hard work is not the way community members want to spend their rest time. They wish to have a peaceful atmosphere conducive to rest and relaxation, not stress from machine noise and air pollution.


- Health issues also about for those who live near factories. The health problems have been attributed to the extreme amount of chemical substances released into the water and air of a community. The Pan Pacific Electric and Gas Company was one of the largest lawsuits ever before brought the courts that more than proved the ill effects of building a factory of any sort, near a community, can cause.

- By using a solid example rather than third party information, you add academic credibility to your paper.


- It is because of the aforementioned reasons that I strongly support the opposition to the building of a factory near our community. Noise and health issues are not supposed to be a daily part of our lives, by allowing the factory to rise, these will become part of our daily activities instead. Therefore, the factory should not be allowed to open near the community.