Undergraduate / My Mom Isn't a Superhero - transition from childhood to adulthood [27]

Hi Mare. I hope you are reading this.

I literally JUST read and responded to your email from August 2.

Hopefully you'll see this note and then read mine.

I am very sorry about this.

Writing Feedback / 'Humans are bound to do mistakes' - I prefer machine made items [5]

I'm not sure how you define "prepared."

This essay is awfully repetitive, however.

Undergraduate / My past is what made me who I am; UW personal Statement [7]

I'm not clear on the assignment.

Are you saying that you need to write about each of the "required" sections within ONE essay?


You are correct that structure and content must be addressed first, but I see several writing problems, each pertaining to word choice or grammar.

(Grammar and punctuation are not the same things.)

Undergraduate / My past is what made me who I am; UW personal Statement [7]

How long does it need to be?

Undergraduate / My past is what made me who I am; UW personal Statement [7]

You could have conveyed every single idea here in fewer than 800 words. That's what I mean (at least in this case) when I refer to grammar.

Undergraduate / Arriving in Seattle was like a dream; University of Washington-Seattle [4]

You're right to feel as though this is a bit scattered.

With a couple phrasing changes, the essay could have started here...


...or even here:


What made the campus beautiful?
In what ways was the experience similar to one's first kiss?

Also, what do you mean by these phrases?





How, in your view, does the "idea of success" among Seattleites differ from that of people in other cities?

Undergraduate / Arriving in Seattle was like a dream; University of Washington-Seattle [4]

You're welcome.

The short answer to your question is YES.

If I'm understanding this correctly, you need to write about a situation that affected your life. Note that there is no "s" after the word "situation."

There are the beginnings of several essays here. You could have written about any of the following:

Your difficulty adjusting to school
Your time at Lane Tech
Your TRIP to Oregon
Your impressions of Oregon State
etc.

If you're writing about your visit to the city of Seattle, you need to focus on that. None of the above is relevant.

1. Tell that you went to Seatlle.

2. Discuss one WAY in which your visit affected you.

3. Discuss ANOTHER way in which it affected you.

etc.

4. In your conclusion, briefly tell why YOU belong in the city of Seatlle.

Undergraduate / feel honored to be a youth in this day and age; FSU [3]

I can't tell whether you've answered the question (and thus whether you've written an effective essay) until I know what the question is.

What I can tell you is that this looks to be about 250 words, which is about a third longer than necessary given that you tend the same things more than once.

Also, there's at least one place where you don't talk about yourself at all:

Graduate / Exercise and living a healthy lifestyle is my greatest passion in life; PT 2013 [3]

This essay has its moments, but it's pretty scattershot.

You need to outline your response.

I. Step one in the process of choosing this career. (This needs to be a feeling, idea, or REALIZATION.)
1. Cite an event involved in that step
a. Why that event was important?
2. If necessary, cite another event involved in this step.
b. Why was that event important?

II. Step TWO in the process of choosing this career. (This needs to be a feeling, idea, or REALIZATION.)
1. Cite an event involved in that step
a. Why that event was important?
2. If necessary, cite another event involved in this step.
b. Why was that event important?

Undergraduate / Conquering a Vacuum ; Common App Failure Essay [4]

This is a clever and descriptive piece of writing, but I'm not sure its tone is suitable for this kind of task.

If you decide to keep it, remove the cliches. There are three in one sentence:

My heart is pounding
moment of truth
hits me square in the face

Undergraduate / Child Abuse and what it did to me; Event that changed my life (Common App) [6]

The idea of writing about how your background of abuse affected you is a good one.

However, this essay reads like a short story about an actual boxing match. I realize that you meant it as an extended metaphor, but you went a bit too far in doing so.

Undergraduate / Child Abuse and what it did to me; Event that changed my life (Common App) [6]

You're very welcome.

If you wish, use the best of this stuff in your introduction and/or conclusion, but otherwise you've gotta play it pretty straight.

Undergraduate / My Hair; Common App Essay (Share Your Story) [5]

For the most part, I like this. However, before I go any farther, would you mind telling us what question you're answering?

Graduate / ELL and Bilingual Speech Therapy-SOP for Masters Speech Pathology program [3]


The main idea is that speech pathology is your passion, your purpose. You need to provide reasons WHY you feel compelled to pursue this field. By "reasons," I refer not to events (like what you did with Kay and Thomas) but to feelings, attitudes, etcetera.


Actually, it needs less of a hook. The stuff about Kay is nice, even useful, but with all due respect the essay's about YOUR purpose, not Kay's struggle. Lose most of that stuff.

Undergraduate / My Hair; Common App Essay (Share Your Story) [5]


Duh. I should've known that.

If I'm not mistaken, the Common App limits you to 500 words.

This looks to have somewhere around 650. You need to remove some stuff---there are quite a few facts that I don't regard as "central to [your] identity." In other words (although, admittedly I'm an outsider), some of these facts don't seem as important as others.

Don't remove anything involving feelings or attitudes.

Also, remove the verb "rocked" where you really meant "wore." Slang is a no-no on the CA.

Essays / Perfection is a privilege - essay to tell my school about me? [6]

For your first draft, try this:

INTRODUCTION:
Tell a little bit about your childhood.

BODY:
Tell about your life today. You might discuss your family life, your attitudes toward school, your extracurricular life...whatever.

CONCLUSION:
How do you view your future?

Undergraduate / Throughout my life, I've strived to be the best in order to reach my goals; UT Austin [3]

I'm not sure whether this comment will help, but I tell my students to take the prompt literally.

Is this the exact phrasing of the essay task? If so, I'd be concerned about the use of the word "current" in the assignment and your discussion of events from nearly two years ago.

Undergraduate / How Blogging Changed My Life- UC Admissions Personal Statement [5]


Can you list at least ten different phrases, clauses, or sentences pertaining to the question above? If not, we have a problem. (I think what I'm telling you is that the first paragraph seems to take up space better spent on developing some of the ideas you allude to later in the paper.)

I see some slang here ("put myself out there") as well as at least one cliché ("sight for sore eyes").

The good news is that this is a GREAT subject to write about.

Graduate / Fashion has always been a big part of my life; Fashion Management at Domus Academy [3]


Hi to you, too!

At least from what you say here, they're asking for what motivates you to go into fashion management. I'd prefer that you show me the exact prompt before you follow my suggestions below.

Look at the screen name you've chosen for yourself and then read this paper. The writing here is fine but aside from part of the first paragraph it doesn't tell me much about you that couldn't apply (pardon the pun) to any number of prospect students.


---Define "big."
---Tell me about some different aspects of fashion that you find intriguing, interesting, etc. (More important, tell me WHY these things appeal to you.)

Keep all the brand names out of it.

Essays / How to write a good scholarship essay about career & educational goals for accounting [4]

Well, it depends on what your career goals are.

If I were writing an essay about my career goal of becoming an astronaut, I might begin as follows:

Since early childhood, I've been fascinated with astronomy.