College 101

College 101 The earlier you can accomplish this, the earlier you can start on the rest of the application work. Do online research, visit campuses if possible, check out schools on CampusReel, attend college fairs, talk to alumni, etc. This is about you figuring out where it is you can academically flourish. Some students have a background, identity, interest, or talent so meaningful they believe their application would be incomplete without it. If this sounds like you, please share your story. The essay is a supplement and it should act as such. Use it to add to your application by showcasing another side of yourself. In order to give an essay a proper chance in the editing process, it needs to be crafted to the vision that you have for it. Great essays ideas are oftentimes thrown away because the first version of an essay was executed poorly and readers are unable to even comprehend the message behind it. Before asking others to give feedback, really try to finalize the essay to the best of your ability. Although you don’t have to make final decisions for your college list yet, you want to have a number of schools that you’re stoked to apply to and will stay on your college list. Once you have completed your application essay, be sure to find a couple of people you trust to look over your work before you submit it. I don’t recommend a friend who is afraid to correct your mistakes, or a parent, if you can help it. A teacher or family friend would be a great choice. Since you already know how it’s supposed to read, and you’re accustomed to reading it, it’s often easier for another person to catch your mistakes. But that doesn’t mean that setting goals and putting pressure on yourself early on isn’t going to help you get the ball rolling. Trust me, a little work now will go a long way towards boosting your confidence and overall preparedness throughout this process. If you’re getting any help from counselors or teachers for editing your essays, keep in mind that many of them will stop checking their emails once Christmas break starts. Make sure to get things into them ahead of time and be respectful of their time. If you didn’t get your drafts to them in due time to give feedback, don’t get upset if they tell you that they won’t sacrifice their vacation to help you. Acceptance into college is dependent on your strengths and academic abilities. Some students have a background or story that is so central to their identity that they believe their application would be incomplete without it. If this sounds like you, then please share your story. To identify key ingredients of a good college essay. Admission committees will have just read through your application; the last thing they want to do is read another form of your information, achievements and extracurricular involvement. You can fix mistakes and improve your writing in later drafts. If you are asking yourself, how can I impress the college admissions folks without sounding, you know, braggy? Also, I know that procrastination and writing fatigue are real obstacles in this process. You guys aren’t essay robots able to churn out quality drafts on a strict schedule. This timeline wasn’t meant to be followed exactly. Like I mentioned before, continue to look for opportunities to reuse drafts for other schools. You should be reaching critical mass around this time of having an essay draft for just about any prompt that a school will give you. You’ll just have to adjust word counts or the focus of the learning point a little bit. First off, make sure to get your early admissions applications submitted. A majority of deadlines are Nov. 1st, but some are Oct 15th, so make sure to not miss those. To be safe, try to submit your applications a week or two ahead of the deadline. If you’re really hesitant to work on essays because official updated prompts for your schools haven’t come out yet, then working on the UC essays can be a safe alternative. The UCs rarely change the prompts and even if they did change them, the changes would probably be announced by now. Just like it says, some students are still not satisfied by what they’ve come up with, but think they’re really close to finding the right topic. Remember, your main essay is the only essay that you put THIS much work into because of how important it is. In the event that there is something on your application that you do need to explain, your essay is the perfect place. If your transcript reflects a poor sophomore year â€" with improvement during your junior and senior years â€" talk about why you struggled that particular year.Be yourself. Your essay should consist of three parts - an introduction , body and a conclusion . Create an outline, decide where to include examples and write your first draft. Don't worry about making it perfect; just let your ideas flow.