Approaching the Personal/College Application

Essay

How to Pick the Right Topic

• Something you are passionate about so that your voice comes out in your writing

• Something you can relate to your future goals

• Something few other people have experienced or at least a unique perspective

Guided Topic Free Writing

-You will have 5 minutes to write about each topic. -Use your own paper.-Don’t worry about proper spelling, punctuation, etc.

1. What is your biggest achievement? Why?

2. What is the biggest risk you have taken? What effect did it have on you?

3. What is an ethical dilemma you have faced? What impact did it have on you?

4. Describe a person who has had a significant influence on your life.

5. How would your personal background contribute to the diversity of a college/workplace?

Partner Interviewing

• Find a partner.• Take turns talking to your partner about all

5 topics.• As you listen, pretend you’re a journalist

and dig for more information.– Ask them additional questions to get more

details

Topic Decisions

• Tell your partner which topic they should write about and why.– Give them suggestions for how to develop an

essay about this topic.– Ask additional follow up questions if needed.

How much does the application essay really matter?

“In the mid-1980s we received perhaps two to three hundred essays annually, but now that count has increased at least fourfold – except that most of the pieces we receive are not essays anymore, but more like autobiographical narratives and reminiscences that read more like sentimental journal entries than thoughtful and rigorous considerations of experience. Everyone has experiences; we as writers must make something of them, in both language and idea.”

-Stephen Corey

(poet, essayist, editor of the Georgia Review through U of Georgia)

Looking at Samples

• What does the writer do well? • Is there anything you don’t like about the

essays?• How does the writer let his/her personality

shine through?• What about these essays would make

them stand out to an admissions official?

Tips

Avoid personal statements that focus on the following: 1. The class president essay2. Failure in sports essay3. Lessons learned from foreign travel essay4. The trials and tribulations of being yearbook

editor essay

Tips5. Don’t use a topic that everyone else uses.

Overused topics make for boring essays.

What are some examples of overused topics?

-Parents’ Divorce-Death of a beloved relative-Mission trip to Mexico to build houses-Moving-Car accident/sports injury

Tips

6. Don’t use controversial or potentially offensive topics.

7. Avoid bringing up your negative qualities.

8. Don’t write about something you don’t know about. “Write what you know.”

Tips

9. Don’t repeat things that are elsewhere in the application.

10. Use your own voice! Remember, this is your chance to “introduce” the real you.

11. Don’t tell them what you think they want to hear. Tell a story only you can tell in a way that only you can tell it.

Tips

12. Make sure that your writing, while it may be dramatic, does not drift into sappy melodrama.

13. Risks can set you apart from the other applicants, but they must be crafted with great care.

Mapping

How to make a good outline for yourself• First sentence: How will you grab

attention?• Thesis: What is your point?• Topic sentences: How will you refer back

to your thesis?• Last sentence: How do you want your

reader to feel at the end?

Your Assignment• Choose ONE of the Common Application

topics• Write an essay on the chosen topic that is

between 250-500 words• Edit and Revise. Then, edit and revise

some more.• Have someone who is not your teacher

read it and give you suggestions, then edit and revise again.

Your Assignment

• Type your essay:– Double space– 12 point font (a decent one)– Upper left corner: name, date, class period

• Due at the beginning of the period on October 25th

Grading

• Worth 30 points in Level 2• Graded using the district’s official 6-trait

rubric form– Ideas and Content -Organization– Voice -Sentence Structure– Word Choice -Conventions

• Graded essay will be included in Culminating Project Portfolio