Admit it: you, me, and possibly everyone else thinks the college application supplemental essays sometimes suck, and so you may be leaving them to tackle last, after your core essay is polished and powerful. Then (now!) you face a daunting sucky pile. But as is true for the rest of the application process, supplemental essays don't have to make you gag, stall, and then use hyperbole to compensate. It's up to you to make them work, and worth your time to do so, since many students have upward of twenty to write. Here are our tips on writing these essays successfully. First, why do they suck (and merit such a low-brow verb)? Because the supplemental essays violate an important maxim: Ask a good question, get a good answer. Unfortunately, the supplemental essay questions are often dry, and so get your dry responses. And the human urge to spout grand life plans and BS a bit. Students often get trapped responding to the "Why Our School?" essay, which can require anywhere from a painful 150 to a brutal 500 words, with one of the following unsuccessful moves: Copy-pasting text from the school's website (I think they may have read that already). Sharing your grand Life Plans (think ALL CAPS). Spewing a healthy load of BS praise ("This school has a STUPENDOUS anthropology program!!!!"). The issue with each of these approaches is: You told them what they already know. (But they are really glad you took the time to Ctrl-X, Ctrl-V). Your long-term ambitions and Big Dreams are not as relevant or important here as your immediate ambitions and actions. BS cannot sound like anything but BS. Admissions officers are hired for their BS detectors. Also, Schools are not like dogs-- they are not hoping for your praise. You are hoping for theirs. Luckily, we can call on a powerful, effective and simple recipe to get us through-- since we are stuck with these supplemental essay questions for now (Hallelujah to U Chicago, and the other schools Continue Reading …
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Supplemental Essays and Online Dating
The match has to be right Successful supplemental essays for college admission, just like successful dating and mating, but you're not there yet, are all about the suitability of the particular match made. After much skepticism and playing hard-to-get, I was matched with my amazing husband online--score! A good algorithm found the overlap in our particulars. By contrast, I've read about 600 mediocre supplemental essays in the past month that demo a weak match at best. A primer on better verbal flirting with educational institutions in these important supplemental essays is clearly needed for college applicants who are eager to be passionately and appropriately paired. False starts can be fixed Not the writer's fault: these essays, like dating, can be full of false starts. But here's how intentionally approaching the supplemental essays like you would online dating helps you produce convincing writing and persuade the target schools you're a good match. (And those of you more interested in dating than writing, remember this supplemental fact: wherever you enroll, you'll likely wind up in romantic relationships too...so consider the pool you enter!) Continue Reading …