UT Austin Transfer/Statement of Purpose Essay - extra elements which complete my applicarion

Hello! I'm currently wanting to transfer to UT Austin and I need someone to look over my paper for me, I'm open and happy to take any comments, Thank you so much!

Essay Prompt: The statement of purpose will provide an opportunity to explain any extenuating circumstances...

the oddball of the classroom

In the first grade, I was the oddball of the classroom. While everyone sat around the rainbow carpet reading fun books like Junie B. Jones, I sat in the corner testing my reading knowledge. In my elementary school, we had a program called Accelerated Reading where students competed by quizzes for reading the most amount of books. So, while my friends ate lunch, I was consuming book after book in the library and I managed to claim first prize all five years. All I have to show from this, besides extensive knowledge on elementary school novels, is my high level of determination. Through my years, I've learned to love taking challenges head on. Transitioning from a bookworm to a full fledge leader was a long process that started with my time as a yearbook editor. My first year being an editor, I was in charge of a group of ten students who were notorious for never completing their work. Starting out, I struggled to get any of them to complete their work. The writers hated writing and the photographers pictures were sub-par. Yet, by evaluating their strengths, I quickly began to lead the most efficient group in the class. I found out our writer that hated writing was an amazing yearbook salesperson and the photographer who took poor pictures was extremely talented at Photoshop. By employing their best strengths, I helped them all get A's in the class and the yearbook received hardworking staff members. Yet, being a senior year editor was a whole new ball game as the job description included leading class lectures. Twice a month I had to prepare a lecture about design or writing skills for the class. Over time, however, I enjoyed it. Knowing my lecture helped students score A's on concepts like anecdotal writing. Public speaking was always a challenge for me but I quickly began to be confident with speaking in front of a class of 20 people. Though in front of 250 people it was a whole different story. In my freshman orientation class at Baylor, all 250 of my classmates and I were asked to write a paper on ethics in business for the annual Baylor ethics Slam. The top papers would be selected and asked to participate in a spoken second round. I was one of the few selected and on the day of the competition I was all nerves. After giving an ethical scenario, I told the class how I would respond and the students voted on who did the best. At first, I felt like I did terrible but later found out I placed third out of everyone. This validated my gut feeling of always taking every opportunity that presents itself to me. Opportunities like taking heavy course loads in school. Instead of taking classes to boost my GPA I opted for courses that spiked my interest. Taking interesting courses meant I had a larger knowledge about European renaissance art and Napoleon Bonaparte than most of my high school peers. I actually knew about the implications of environmental policy change in the news because of my AP environmental science class. Even when I could not fit AP government into my schedule, I learned it on my own and ended up getting a 4 on the AP test. My trend of taking numerous tough classes continued as I attended Baylor. I decided to get my basic level business classes over with first semester so I could dive into the major-specific courses. This meant taking Intro to Business, Management Information Systems, and my freshman intro course all at the same time. This was certainly a challenge as I balanced Calculus and a lab science as well. Yet, I managed to pull it off and decided to take on an equally challenging second semester including an intensive advanced Spanish course. As I go through life, I've learned the hard parts are what make life living. With that in mind, applying to be a UT longhorn is certainly no easy task. As someone who wants to major in advertising, I can't help but want to be able to market myself as best as possible. I know that an advertising degree from UT would essentially be the best advertisement campaign I could run for myself. If accepted to the Stan Richards School of Advertising and Public Relations I look forward to surrounding myself with like-minded students in organizations like TAG (Texas Advertising Group) and being enrolled in a top ten program in the country. Being surrounded by professors who are top in their field such as Terry Hemeyer, an extremely successful communication executive, and Tracy Arrington, a media director for a large advertising agency, is an exciting prospect for my education. Thinking about the challenge that is UT excites me and I know it's a challenge I'm ready to face head on. I've been preparing for this my whole life and I can't wait to start facing it.

Cailyn, since you are looking to be a transfer student, use this essay to build up the reasons why you feel that your transfer to UT is imperative for the purposes of your educational and career goals. Explain your growth as a student at your current university. Explain why, despite these events that took place in your current university, you feel that the educators there have taken you as far as they can in terms of what you can learn from their educational system. Discuss what your actual purpose for studying this course is. Then explain the reasons behind your choice to move to UT. Why did you choose to transfer at this point in time? What do you hope to accomplish as a student there? What makes UT special in relation to your career goals? The extenuating circumstances for your transfer can be presented in response to that question.

Basically, this essay that you wrote would work for a normal college application. Since your case is that of a transfer student, you should not be presenting your statement of purpose in a similar manner to that of a college freshman. The instructions I have given you will help you to better utilize the SOP for the purpose of transferring from your university to UT.

I changed my essay to this! Thank you @Holt

The fourth of November began as Friday's usually did with my freshman intro course. Sitting in my chair, the teacher began announcing events occurring in the business school. Yet, all I could think of was that I was two for three in symptoms of anxiety that Eminem sang about in Lose Yourself. Palms sweaty? Check. Knees weak? Check. If my arms started to feel heavy, I'd be a walking song lyric. Soon enough I was pulled out of my daze when I heard my name be called to come to the stage. Here's the reason why I was nervous: Out of 250 papers written in my class mine was one of the few selected to compete in an annual Baylor ethics competition in front of the class. Looking out into the large crowd while trying to speak off the top of your head about how you'd respond to a hypothetical ethic situation is a serious case for the nerves. In the end, I pulled off with winning third place and I'm glad I took on the experience because of my growth from it. My time at Baylor has helped me grow tremendously through the challenges and experiences I had here. Challenges like taking all the entry-level business courses in one semester and finishing them all with an A. Joining clubs like Delta Sigma Pi, also helped me grow, as I learned how to be a professional. I got used to dressing professionally quite often during my pledging process and I learned skills such as interviewing and conducting a meeting in an appropriate manner.

If given the choice of going back and changing my decision to come to Baylor, I would not change a single thing. My experiences in Waco have led me to be the person I am now. But, I feel as if my path has run its course here and that my next path lies at UT Austin. My reasoning behind this is because my true dream vocation lies with advertising; a major Baylor currently doesn't offer. Advertising's appeal to me stems from my mix of two interests- journalism and psychology. Journalism because of my four-year intensive involvement on yearbook staff. My journalism skills to this day permeate into my daily life. I can't even take a picture on my iPhone without automatically thinking about the rule of thirds and every essay I write I have an automatic tendency to start with an anecdotal lead. (Example A: See above) With the subject having so much saturation in my life, I know it is a path I will enjoy and succeed in. Where psychology comes into play is my interest in how the brain works especially in correlation to advertisements. Seeing the impact on human behavior because of an advertising campaign tends to cause me to geek out. Like how the truth anti-smoking campaign with their stunt-ad styles (placing body bags outside of a tobacco company ect.) helped with reducing the teen smoking rate from 23% to 8%. Thinking of these two interests drew me into the world of advertising and it just made sense.

So, why UT? Thinking about my life in terms of managing my own personal advertising campaign this university is the perfect fit. With my target market being future employers, an alluring tag line with the phrase graduate of the university of Texas at Austin, and the knowledge that the advertising program there is one of the highest ranked in the country there is little to go wrong. I know that I'll become an extremely marketable student under the teachings of professors like Terry Hemeyer, an award-winning educator who has led as a communication executive, and Tracy Arrington, who has on-the-job journalism experience and her research has been published in numerous amounts of publications. Arrington also is in charge of a class that if given the chance I'd sign up for in a heartbeat. The course Psychology of Advertising gives students the chance to study consumer behavior and persuasion. Carrying on the legacy would also give me a sense of pride as my aunt graduated with an advertising major from UT. Being enrolled into the Stan Richards school of Advertising & Public Relations in relation to my life is comparable to landing an advertising slot in the Super Bowl. With the schools vast network I know I will reach many people, the quality will be above and beyond, and it is definitely something worth waiting for.

Good work Cailyn. There are some commendable points in this essay, just as there is one point for revision left. As a statement of purpose, you have managed to show off your development as a student at Baylor. The explanation about how far you have come and what you expect to achieve in the future comes out as well balanced and offers the reviewer an insight into who you are a student and where you hope to be headed. It is interesting to read although it does take a while to get to the point. If you can just shorten the anecdote at the beginning so that the reviewer gets to the point as quickly as possible, then the essay should finally be in its submission form. The statement of purpose should actually open with the purpose of your application but, owing to how the anecdote helps to explain some facts about your purpose, it would be best to shorten that paragraph so that the focus can immediately transfer to the target information your last 2 paragraphs contain.

Okay thank you so very much again, you've helped so much!! Have a nice day :) @Holt