Hey guys!
I am doing SAT prep right now and just wrote an essay. I want to get a general feel of how collegeboard scores these things.
Would any of you mind scoring this essay for me?
This is taken verbatim from my practice test. It was my first stab at writing and I am unclear what they are looking for so I wrote this in a cheap off Malcolm Gladwell sort of way. In hindsight I should have taken the 5 paragraph approach with more concise and organized language. What can I do to improve?
Thanks,
FievProko
PROMPT: Should people take more responsibility for solving problems that affect their communities or the nation in general?
I walked into a group of 5 friends, gathered around the math building, talking animatedly about the “injustice” of a math teacher ensuring the inability for them to get anything above a C. I listened to the tirades of complaints against the teacher’s teaching, grading, choice of dress and knew without a change in attitude, these people were never going to see an A.
One of the common traits all successful people share is that they hold themselves responsible for life’s course of events. Knowing that the only factor one can control is oneself, successful people take responsibilities. The uncompromised result is that successful people end up with incredible work ethics because of their belief that they can change their situations, that responsibility is held in their hands.
On a look at the nation, independence and self sufficiently of the citizen is vital, that every citizen feels responsible for their courses of action. A whole is a sum of the parts; if each person took responsibilities to solve problems in their lives, the nation would be better in general.
The 5 friends were never going to get better test scores without a change in attitude because they didn’t hold themselves responsible for their test grades. Instead of improving themselves and studying harder, they merely blamed the teacher. If a grade is representative of achievement and a student doesn’t hold herself responsible to improve, how can she expect good grades?
I wrote another one today and it is much better. I’m pasting it here verbatim. (There are quite a few spelling and grammatical mistakes HAHA)
Essay #2
PROMPT: Can knowledge be a burden rather than a benefit? Plan and write an essay in which you develop your point of view on this issue. Support your position with reasoning and examples taken from your reading, studies experience, or observations.
"ignorance is bliss" is the topic of Jim Carry's movie The Truman Show, where a man blissfully lives a life in a virtual reality show, until the knowledge of his state creates dissonance that ultimately drives him nuts in his pursuit out of his state. Knowledge can be a burden rather than a benefit. It creates disparity of thought that leads to the destruction of mental peace.
Take the example of John Nash, a genius mathmatitian driven to the brink of insanity. To say John Nash had an extensive knowledge of math is an understatement. In the elite Princeton, he knew more than even his professors, skipping class claiming it would ruin his creativity. Nash's genius was ultimately recognized in a noble peace prize for economics. Though publicly recognized, Nash's personal life was a mess. He was unable to relate to others due to disparity in knowledge and suffered hallucination where too much observed information allowed him to create a pseudo reality where he was pursued by Russian spies. Nash's extensive knowledge turned out to be more of a burden than a benefit and ultimately ended in his hospitalization.
The industrial revolution started as an expansion of technological knowledge, of the development of cotton gins, spread of crops like potatos, and increased understanding of mechanicalization. However the burdens of the industrial revolution were tremendous. London developed a reputation for being a black city of smog, factory workers become injured by the thousands, cholera spread rampantly as people flocked to the cities without improvements in heath, and the environmental well-being of Earth was shattered forever as humans tramped over mother nature to build "bigger and better" things for some short term profits. For the long term well being of our race, was the industrial revolution really that great? Is the event that exponentially increased the destruction our environment which houses is really going to help with the survival of our race. In the case of the industrial revolution, it is arguable that the knowledge of better technology and more efficient crops became a burden rather than a benefit; it fast forwarded the human race's path to self destruction.
Although knowledge is universally given a positove conotation, it is important to recognize the burdens of carrying it. This is demonstrated even by the small gossip flying around school that has the potential to annihilate a persons reputation. Knowledge IS power, power than be used destructively.