26 Outstanding College Essay Examples 2020

26 Outstanding College Essay Examples 2020 I don’t remember a single time that they argued about the games.Afterward, we would gather in the living room and Danielle would play the piano while the rest of us sang hymns. It would be fair to say that this was all due to Shellie’s upbringing. My room was on the first floor,right in front of Shellie’s hair salon, a small business that she ran out of her home. I became entranced by the world of nutritional science and how certain foods could help prevent cancer or boost metabolism. I’ve spent most of my life as an anti-vegetable carboholic. For years, processed snack foods ruled the kitchen kingdom of my household and animal products outnumbered plant-based offerings. The Dirksen family had three kids.They were all different. Danielle liked bitter black coffee, Christian liked energy drinks, and Becca liked sweet lemon tea. The host mom Shellie was a single mom who had two of her own sons and two Russian daughters that she had adopted. The kids always had something warm to eat, and were always on their best behavior at home and in school. Dawn, the host mom didn’t like winter, and Mark, the host dad, didn’t like summer. After dinner, we would all play Wii Sports together. I was the king of bowling, and Dawn was the queen of tennis. When he reveals each lesson at the end, one after the other, we sense how all these seemingly random events are connected. We realize this writer has been carefully constructing this piece all along; we see the underlying structure. Of course, those 28 months were too short to fully understand all five families, but I learned from and was shaped by each of them. I don’t remember a single time that they argued about the games. Afterward, we would gather in the living room and Danielle would play the piano while the rest of us sang hymns. The host dad Michael was a high school English teacher and the host mom Jennifer (who had me call her “Jen”) taught elementary school. She had recently delivered a baby, so she was still in the hospital when I moved into their house. The Martinez family did almost everything together. Within two months I was calling them mom and dad. In the living room were six or seven huge amplifiers and a gigantic chandelier hung from the high ceiling. At first, the non-stop visits from strangers made me nervous, but soon I got used to them. I remember one night, a couple barged into my room while I was sleeping. My second family was the Martinez family, who were friends of the Watkins’s. Eager to figure out the whole “vegan” thing, the two of us started binge-watching health documentaries such as “What the Health” and “Forks Over Knives”. We read all the books by the featured doctors like “The China Study” and “How Not To Die”. The Happiness Spreadsheet doesn’t only reflect my own thoughts and emotions; it is an illustration of the fulfillment I get from gifting happiness to others. Finally, I am a strong proponent of hands-on experience for learning what good food looks and tastes like, so cooking is one of my favorite ways to teach the benefits of a plant-based lifestyle. Our society has taught us that delicious food has to make us feel guilty, when that is simply not the case. The best feeling in the world is falling in love with a dish and then learning all the health benefits that it provides the body. My room was on the first floor, right in front of Shellie’s hair salon, a small business that she ran out of her home. We made pizza together, watched Shrek on their cozy couch together, and went fishing on Sunday together. On rainy days, Michael, Jen and I would sit on the porch and listen to the rain, talking about our dreams and thoughts. My transformation began with my mom’s cancer diagnosis. My mom went on a 100% whole food plant-based diet. I fully embraced this new eating philosophy to show my support.

College Essay Package

College Essay Package The best college essays deal with specific examples from the writer’s life. They are not general or abstract, the more details the better. A great college essay combines creativity, excellent writing, and honesty. It’s important that your essay be a solid reflection of you as a person and as a student, and that you follow the guidelines provided in terms of topic and word-count. A great college essay is one that makes your reader want to get to know you better, to engage in a conversation with you. It is an essay that makes your reader laugh or cry or think. You may want to try outlining your essay in multiple formats or the same format multiple times. You may do pre-writing for several different answers to a topic and then pick the best one to write the actual essay. You might want to plan to do one pre-writing essay, wait a few days, and then do another pre-writing exercise. As mentioned in step 2, writing a college essay takes time, but with enough pre-planning the actual essay writing will be easier. When you can show the reader a slice of your genuine self â€" you are on your way to a great college essay. The uniqueness of an essay stems not from some external experience, but your internal responses. The importance of college essays has increased in the past few years. Twenty-six percent of college admission offices consider the college entrance exam is of “considerable importance” in the admission process . They convey on paper a sense of who the writer is as a person. After reading a great essay, I feel as if I have just had an enlivening conversation with the person even though it was entirely on paper. , any other graphic organizer, and/or pre-writing technique that works for you will help you to focus your ideas. The best essays are 20% about the “topic” (the “what”) and 80% about the writer. It is well-written with college bound vocabulary and style, but easy to read and somewhat unassuming. Like great works of fiction, these essays clearly paint a picture in the reader’s mind. The main character is developed with depth and detail. Great essays are memorable because they distinctively portray their subjects without relying on clichés or formulaic topics. Hamilton has a long tradition of emphasizing writing and speaking as cornerstone values, and students come here to find their voice. We seek students who embody that aspiration and demonstrate that potential in their application essays. I truly love helping high school seniors find the perfect topic for their college essays and then guiding them through the process of writing it with honesty, voice, and style. The ten-hour Essay Package also includes tailored support for supplemental essays and the Common Application, critical opportunities for students to showcase their backgrounds, interests, and passions. The teacher told Tiso that someone she knew had been talking to an admissions counselor at the University of Delaware, who was praising one of the best college essays they'd read. What questions do you have about writing college admissions essays? If you’re already in college, do you have any advice for current high schoolers? Share your thoughts in the comments section below, or post about it in the College Info Geek Community. Some colleges weigh essays higher than other parts of the application. However, the essay is not the most important part of your application when you are applying for college. Your overall Grade Point Average , college preparation, test results, and the strength of the high school curriculum all outweigh the essay . However, teacher recommendations and extracurricular activities rank below the college essay . Therefore, it is extremely important to submit a well-written college entrance essay.

College Essay Package

College Essay Package People think that students who get accepted into top colleges have to be extremely well-rounded and accomplished in multiple areas. Julie helped my daughter take her essay from a disjointed, boring story to an essay with great flow and flair that college admissions readers must have enjoyed enough to accept her into a very competitive program. A thoughtfully crafted essay and a clean, clear application can make a tremendous difference in the college admissions process. Read the top 147 college essays that worked at Stanford, Harvard, Princeton, and more. We hope these essays inspire you as you write your own personal statement. Even if you’re only applying to a couple schools that you know you can get into, it will still serve you well to write a compelling admissions essay. Standing out from everyone else could put you in the running for additional scholarships and will also simply make a good impression, which never hurts. So treat a college application essay as a tool for standing out in ways the robots can’t. It’s a lot like the cover letter you write when applying for a job â€" it’s your chance to reveal the person behind the accomplishments and statistics. Now that you know a little about college essays follow a couple steps to get you started. There are several simple list of dos and don'ts for college essays. All colleges take integrity and honesty very seriously. Any uncovered dishonesty would have serious consequences on your future. Anyway, writing about something due to of personal experience will be much easier than writing about something you have had to make-up. If you choose not to disclose your disability in your essay or college application, remember, you may still disclose at any point after you are accepted into the school. You will need to do this to receive any of the accommodations and support services that you might need to be successful. To help youth applying to college navigate the college essay in order to submit their best work with their college application. Watch that you are using the same tense and point of view throughout your essay. Always read your essay over for grammatical and spelling errors one last time before you submit your application. Trust that you are interesting and have powerful stories to tell. Do not make things up or use things that have happened to other people. A strongly written essay about a fight you had with your parent and how you solved the problem will be much better than a made-up story. For the most part, it’s unlikely that you’ve experienced anything extremely uncommon in the relatively short amount of time you’ve been a human. Most high school students lead lives that don’t deviate too far from the norm â€" except that one quiet guy in your class who sits next to the window near the back. He’s almost certainly either a genius mech pilot or the subject of some prophecy in an alternate dimension that he’ll be transported to. Everything I’ve covered in this article matters only if you give yourself enough time. If you start the day before the application is due, all I can say is good luck. After you’ve written a few drafts of your essay, go back to make sure you’re following them. Remember the tips discussed earlier in the module and try not to get overwhelmed by all the information included in these lists. It would be tragic to turn in an essay that includes all of the above but is littered with misspellings and grammatical errors. Use the proofreading skills that you have developed to carefully read your drafts. Just remember to be original and creative as you share your story. After showing their essay to everyone, students edit it again and again to make each reader happy--and before you know it, their story has been ground down and their voice has vanished. If you're applying to an Ivy League school, or in fact, any school at all that is selective, then you need to pick up this book. Not only is Bauld knowledgeableâ€"I learnt far more than I thought conceivable from a volume this thinâ€", but he is also a tremendous writer. He illustrates the nature of admissions offices by simple dialogue, and exposes the mindset with which admissions officers often make life-changing decisions. Try reading it out loud to yourself or have someone else read it. Make sure you are reading it carefully and specifically for grammar and spelling.

Nacac National College Fairs

Nacac National College Fairs Inside Higher Ed, a popular website monitoring issues in higher education, estimated that 20 percent of members will eliminate the essay requirement. Spellcheck won’t catch every spelling or grammatical error! Jager-Hyman notes that every writer has an editor, and editors can help select topics, tell students where the essay is lacking and help them organize their thoughts. In this competitive climate, many students think their essay must reflect an earth-shattering achievement, like curing cancer or ending world starvation, but that’s not its purpose. It’s also not a place to reiterate one’s résumé or explain away a bad semester (there’s a section in the application for that). College counselors weighing in on the college review website Unigo indicated that, depending on the school, up to four people could read a single essay. For the application season, the Common Application announced that their 600-plus member schools, which include many private and public universities, need not require essays . Spelling and grammar errors can take away from an otherwise stellar essay â€" so be mindful. When tailoring responses to individual college prompts, it’s important to use specific details you’ve learned through visiting and research. Not only does this show colleges that you’ve have done your homework, but it also demonstrates your interest in the college â€" and colleges want to admit students who are likely to enroll. Your essay may be the ultimate product, but before you start worrying about the final edition you’ll send off to colleges, take some time to work on the process. Free-writing will help you hone your skills and practice for the real thing. Good editors help students describe what makes them different and special. Still, Jager-Hyman says that some parents who get their hands on their kids’ essays go too far and change the tone or tenor. Some essays she read were “too stiff, too adult and too formal,” â€" not the student’s work. Choose something you care about and it will flow more naturally. There’s no such thing as the perfect college essay. Just be yourself and write the best way you know how. The essay is one of the few things that you’ve got complete control over in the application process, especially by the time you’re in your senior year. Combining your larger reasons with the specific details paints a clear picture of why this is the right college for you. Prompt invests thousands of hours identifying top Writing Coaches. We help thousands of students gain admission to top-50 colleges every year. You can write an excellent essay, but if you don’t focus on answering the question that the college is asking, you will likely not be admitted to the school. If the prompt of the essay was “Who is the most influential person in your life and why? ” don’t start the essay with “The most influential person in my life is…” It’s dull and the admissions office created the prompt, so it’s telling them the info they already know. Show your knowledge of the college by mentioning specific courses, professors, places of interest, and more. Show how you fit into the campus culture and how you will impact the community through specific examples. Read the top 147 college essays that worked at Stanford, Harvard, Princeton, and more. Alex Tiso, 18, wrote his college application essay on burrito bowls and got into his dream school. New York teen Alex Tiso wrote his college essay on burrito bowls and got into his dream school. The purpose of the prompt is to help you reflect on something that matters to you. Your application will be full of information that illuminates dimensions of you and your abilities, but only the essay gives you a vehicle to speak, in your own voice, about something personally significant. Jose may have been a big man on campus in high school, but here at UCLA he's just another college essay. Choose the prompt that comes closest to something you’d like to write about. Take the time to read over all your essays carefully and keep an eye out for things like “out” when you meant to say “our” and other common typos. Have a parent or counselor read over the essay, too, to catch any errors you might have missed. Use the details to ground the bigger-picture aspects of your story. For instance, if you’re applying to Cornell’s School of Hotel Management, you might describe how you’ve been collecting hotel brochures since you were a child in the hope of one day opening your own. That, combined with your desire to be on a large, rural campus with deep ties to the surrounding town â€" and work every job possible in a student run hotel â€" made you know Cornell was the school for you.

The Only Four College Essay Writing Tips Youll Ever Need

The Only Four College Essay Writing Tips You'll Ever Need He is thorough, highly knowledgeable and patient. He has so many tips about writing a solid college essay. Emily guided me through the revision process of my writing and helped clarify my drafts for a supplemental college essay. You want to reveal that you can think logically and objectively; the reader shouldn’t come away thinking you’re myopic. Additionally, you must remember that, ultimately, admissions officers are using these essays to gain insight into you. You should relate your opinions and arguments to your own life and experiences. Before you begin to tackle this essay prompt, there are a few points of which you should be aware. Admissions committees really want you to speak to the experience and really explain the impact it had. Finally, you’ll need to be able to strike a balance between being self-effacing and being a braggart. While colleges often pose different essay questions to their applicants, there are typically a handful of traditional queries that many schools employ. First off, don’t reiterate information that can be found in other parts of your application. Instead, use this opportunity to showcase an additional side/aspect of yourself. Secondly, you must recognize that schools don’t only view “big” achievements as a viable topic. You don’t need to have worked on a cure for AIDS or helped send a rocket into space to write a compelling essay. Don’t just say that volunteering in a soup kitchen allowed you to see the importance of helping others. He has appeared on MSNBC, CNBC, CNN, PBS, Fox Business and Lifetime. Over 70 percent of students choose just three of the seven Common Application prompts . That is because three of them work well if you write your essay first and pick the prompt second. The college essay is a page-long assignment given to you by a school, to be completed by a certain date. Your college essay gives you the chance to talk about your best assets. While your essay should convey your best qualities, you want to avoid bragging too much. If you write about an activity or an experience, focus not on how good you are or what you have accomplished, but instead on what the experience/activity means to you. We serve students who have not yet begun the college application process, students who may already have a draft they want to polish, and students who are anywhere in-between. My 17-year-old is working with Russell on a college essay. She provided thoughtful feedback and kept prompt communication to meet my deadline. I highly recommend Emily if you need assistance for your college essay. Keith Berman is the President of Options for College (), which he founded in Harvard Square right after working in the Harvard Admissions Office. Digression isn't always wrong in a college admissions essay. Sometimes a colorful aside or anecdote can help engage the reader and enhance the reading experience. Another very simple tip, but many of the less compelling essays we read each year fail to focus. Think about the special nugget of information you want the reader to know about you at the end of your essay and write with that central theme in mind. Finally, colleges can use the essay to begin picturing how you’ll connect with and make the most of resources within their specific campus communities. The essay is valuable to you and the colleges to which you are applying. If you think of the application as pieces of a puzzle or as independent voices coming together to tell your story, the essay is part of the puzzle over which you have complete control. The essay also provides you with an opportunity to say what hasn’t been said in your application and do so in your distinct voice. In order to respond to the best of your ability, it’s important to understand what universities are driving at/asking. Membership includes a 10% discount on all editing orders. When writing your admissions essay, be careful to avoid overusing flowery language . Too many adjectives and adverbs can ruin the reading experience.

College Essays

College Essays Join PrepScholar co-founder Allen Cheng and writer Melissa Brinks as they walk you through the essentials of applying to college and succeeding in high school. I used the services of Great Expectations for over two years and am so grateful for every session. These FAQs will provide answers to your most commonly asked questions and concerns. My Pathway to CollegeTM really broke down everything with me and really allowed me to understand the college application process. Also, I would say the most helpful part was that my counselor really made sure I stayed on top of the deadlines, and helped me with my essays. My Pathway to CollegeTM takes the stress out of applying to colleges by breaking down the process into manageable timelines on how to discover, navigate, and explore a student’s pathway to college. After a careful set of assessments, My Pathway to CollegeTM will work to encourage, guide, and motivate your student to put his or her best foot forward in the college admissions process. Our students come from a variety of experiences, backgrounds, and cultures â€" aspects that are important to a rich educational experience and your success in college and beyond. Of course, we review the rigor of your curriculum and your achievements in the classroom, but beyond academics, we consider other attributes that define you. We want to know the way you navigated your high school years, your involvement in your community and your commitment to your interests. It may be time consuming to do all the research and the really writing might be tedious, particularly if it is a sub-topic that you aren’t significantly obsessed with. It doesn’t matter how pressing the order is; we always manage to deliver distinctive work on time. That’s because we hired a flexible team of writers with proper knowledge and direct access to high-high quality research sources. Throughout our time as a paper writing service, we’ve got worked with so many different assignments and requirements that we’re assured we will do it all. Colleen works with a student to craft the perfect college essay. The Educational Opportunity Fund program is open to eligible New Jersey residents. We want you to make an informed decision and have the time to make the right choice. Architecture applicants must have completed a minimum of one year of geometry and two years of algebra in high school. During this unprecedented time, we understand that students are facing new challenges regarding completion of the admissions and enrollment processes. Given the extensive disruption caused by the COVID-19 pandemic, we are continuing to evaluate and adjust our admissions and enrollment policies at Boston University. Call My Pathway to CollegeTM for a consultation meeting to determine which pathway package will be the best fit for your student based on his/her college and career interests. There is no one-size-fits-all template for advising students, as each student has a different pathway. Tim has been accepted to EVERY school to which he applied; including his top choice! Tim is a proud member of the Class of 2023 Wolverines! I’m amazed at how much you accomplished in a limited amount of time. It was very convenient to only have to call one place for all our college prep assistance. When I had a specific question about something in the application process, Jen always offered me quick and useful advice. Transfer students are encouraged to have successfully completed college-level calculus. Proficiency in trigonometry and physics is necessary for students to take required college-level courses in calculus and structural systems. My tutor helped me with everything from testing to the application process. My test scores improved dramatically in each section because GE helped me understand the nuances of the tests and how to attack each section in the way that best fit to my skills. In addition, the college application process felt so smooth with the help of my GE tutor. I was confident in my essays and knew that I was turning in the best applications I could. There are no words to say how much I appreciate your counseling with Tim during his college application process. Students who lack this proficiency are eligible to apply but must complete the necessary course work before taking calculus and structural systems. Courses taken at RWU in preparation for calculus and structural systems may not count toward degree requirements. If you have not yet earned a high school diploma or equivalent, you will be considered as a first-year applicant to the university. The admission process for first-year students is a competitive and personalized process.

Saturday Essay

Saturday Essay CFNC can help you figure out what interests you and ultimately help you choose a career you will enjoy. Don’t be afraid to take classes that will improve your skills and make you more confident. Every class you take does not have to apply to your major. If you are a communications major, but computer science has always interested you, take a computer class. Overcome your fear of public speaking by taking a theater or speech class. Exhibit #2 is the Operation Varsity Blues scandal. As we enter a new admissions cycle one, of the challenges for our profession is mitigating the damage done by that criminal conspiracy and trying to restore public confidence in the college admissions process. Editing for grammatical errors and spelling mistakes is fine, but don’t change the voice of the essay. If an essay is too “polished” it may seem inauthentic, creating confusion in the reader. Activities can also help you build confidence while developing important leadership and teamwork skills. If you’re interested in politics, try joining student government. Last year's Operation Varsity Blues scandal means that college admissions can't return to business as usual. We need to ensure that the admissions process is fair and equitable, that we don't allow those with money to cut in line and that we don't reward those who make things up or embellish their credentials. We shouldn't abandon a process based on trust, but we also need to make decisions based on information that is verifiable. We would expect a nursing applicant to have had academic training and extracurricular choices that support a desire to help others. A student who highlights their love of community service but has only one or two short-term service opportunities is probably not as committed as he or she wants to claim. It’s best not to offend them or make them feel uncomfortable. Living away from home for the first time can be intimidating. Try joining clubs and organizations to develop a new community and to make new friends with similar interests. He has been at St. Christopher's since 1990 and was previously an admissions officer, women's basketball coach and philosophy professor at the college level. Jim is a past president of the National Association for College Admission Counseling. If you just want a break from studying, find out when the Ultimate Frisbee Club meets. Clubs and activities provide endless ways to broaden your horizons. Consider taking a community college course while you’re still in high school. That will allow you to gauge your interest in a field of study while earning college credit. Make sure that you are confident in your essay and accept feedback, but don’t allow others to change your essay in any way that will cause it to lose its original message. Parents should always help their child in a positive way as long as they are not writing the ideas for the student. Editing is vastly different from original writing so this needs to be clarified first, as it has to be the voice and personal memories of the applicant not the parent. The sooner the family treats this as a team effort it will be much easier for the 12th grader to feel as though they are not alone in this process. My preference (and admissions officers’) would be that parents are minimally involved in the essay. In most cases, your essay isn’t the factor that determines your admission to college. However, an offensive, off-putting, or forgettable essay can hurt your chances. By avoiding the topics listed above, you’ll ensure that your essay helps â€" instead of hurts â€" your chances of admission. Make sure that your essay is more than a recitation of the accomplishments, activities, and experiences already hashed out in the application. If your essay doesn’t present any new information, it will be dull and forgettable. If you really want to make an impression, let your personality shine through. The essay is supposed to reveal information that you haven’t had a chance to discuss elsewhere in the application. It’s meant to be a deeper dive into who you are beyond the numbers and accolades. As we mentioned earlier, you don’t know who is reading your essay or how they feel about these subjects.