<p>never thought i'd be such a whiny person to do this but...</p>
<p>my friends don't like my UC personal statement.
they said it's "too academic" and it says "I'm smart" instead of "please let me in!"
i do tend to right in elevated language, but that's only because i tend to think and talk that way too, i'm not trying to impress the adcoms or anything, but "dumbing it down" just feels unnatural and not .me.</p>
<p>plus, i chose the "academic preparation for college" essay (#1) as my extended answer, and went over on both it and the one about my contribution, so my open-ended essay is only 150 words and i know i haveto redo that</p>
<p>I'm ranked 1st in class of 129 with a 4.0 uw
2220 SAT
800 Spanish 780 Bio M 750 US history
president of chorale, member 4 yrs
ballet, member 12 years
girl scout international exchange with japan
APs: 5s on Spanish, Bio, and US History
enrolled in Calc AB, Art History, Eng Lit</p>
<p>Do I need to worry about my essay, or will I get in to UCLA even if it is "haughty and unfeeling?"</p>
<p>I suppose I could PM anyone who wants to critique it... I should have a teacher look over it but I guess there's still plenty of time.</p>
<p>but seriously, even my AP english teacher tells me to dumb my essays down a little so he can understand what i'm saying when he's grading essays and is too tired to think at graduate level</p>
<p>Or not. Write how you feel -- don't ever feel like you should dumb something down (unless you're writing to a specific audience that wouldn't understand it). A person statement is what it is. Personal. You have great stats so I doubt that even if they somehow thought you were 'haughty and unfeeling' it wouldn't really matter that much anyway. Don't worry about it and just be yourself.</p>
<p>it's hard to tell with friends because they're sick of me already : ) it's hard to tell when they're kidding and everything. And they all put "Please let me into your school for this major! (hint hint)" -- please tell me that's not what adcoms are looking for!</p>
<p>I will get a teacher to read it -- I should ask a teacher who I never had, then they can give me an unbiased opinion</p>
<p>It's hard to talk about myself when I'm talking about "using the educational opportunities I've had to prepare for college," and still be specific (i wrote a lot about how preparing for study of filmmaking = preparing for college, and then described the process i went through to prepare myself for filmmaking)</p>
<p>you cant help but chuckle a little but your write about righting the essay in your own voice,</p>
<p>but dont make it look like you went to a thesaurus for every word to find a more impressive word to replace it with.. the adcoms can see right through this......</p>
<p>I think that's enough teasing over write/right ;)</p>
<p>Makkuroi, I believe that it is not productive to say "let me into your school for this major". You're supposed to show who you are and sell yourself that way, not beg and plead. Don't say "let me in"; show them WHY they should let you in.</p>
<p>That being said, if you are interested in a particular field of study and are very passionate about it (e.g. a school has a great environmental studies program and you are very interested in the environment), it may be appropriate to focus your personal statement over why you're passionate about the field, what you have done in the past, and what you hope to do in the future in regards to the field. This is not the same as "please let me into your school for this major".</p>
<p>You can PM your essay to me. Maybe your friends are just jealous that you're eloquent and intelligent, or maybe they're right and your essay sounds haughty. Let's see.</p>
<p>this is just a gut feeling, but my even in your original thread, i feel like you're trying to impress us with your language. ask yourself: is this really, truly how you talk out loud to other people? the fact that you mention 'dumbing it down' for your ap lit teacher makes me think you like to impress people with your language. that's okay, but it might seem a little pompous in a college essay. if you can somehow find a way to include the eloquence of your language with the candor of the person who says calls herself a 'BLONDE' and laughs over a silly mistake, however, I think your golden.</p>
<p>obviously, this is all said never having read a word of your essays. pm them and i'll read them, if you even want to bother with the opinion of a person who sort of just insulted you... ;)</p>
<p>Even if your message is genuine and sincere, you won't make it seem that way if you have the wrong voice. Just (I know, it's entered cliche-dom already) be yourself and articulate.</p>
<p>just to clarify, "dumbing it down" isn't talking about the vocabulary i use, it's the sentence structure, which for me can tend to be very complex if i'm trying to make a specific point that interrelates multiple subjects which i hate to separate into separate sentences, especially in the case of a limit on word-count
(i can imagine thats a very convoluted thought right there)</p>
<p>and i think i have decided to reWRITE them and make them more about my personality.</p>
<p>it's just stupid because i don't even know if i am even planning on going to UCLA because they won't take film applicants until junior year and i don't want to go there for 2 years and not get one of the coveted 15 spots</p>
<p>With your GPA and SAT scores, unless you do your essay in crayon and it's about advocating the violent overthrow of the UCLA Chancellor's office -- you're in. </p>
<p>So what, if there's something in your gut that tells you that you should go with it, then go with it, **** what your friends have to say, because when you follow your gut you're usually right.</p>