I am planning on applying to UCSD, UCLA, UCD, Cornell, Johns Hopkins, Emory, and some other very good schools for biological engineering. My SAT score, Subject tests, and extracurriculars are extraordinary, but my GPA is lacking (3.75 UW, 3.96 UC, 4.03 W.) To make up for this low GPA, I want to talk about my dad having cancer and how it affected my grades and focus it on how it inspired me to do research, which is supported by my ECs. Do you think this is a good idea and will it significantly help my chances, and will admissions officers see this as a valid support for my low GPA. If so, how do you suggest I go about doing this essay, and what should the focus of my essay be?
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College essays are very difficult because it depends who is reading on the other side. I am in my third year of college and when applying to colleges I worked with a William’s College english professor to create a solid essay topic. Your essay idea about writing about your dad’s cancer and how it affected your grades, then inspired you to do research is a great starting idea, however I would be careful. Think about the millions of people applying to college that has endured a hardship and then has succeed. The more you can do to create an essay that stands out of the crowd, the better it will be for you.
Your essay needs to be unique, yet demonstrates your writing ability. Everyone loves a good success story, but in the college application world, success may be too “cliche.” Don’t be afraid to talk about how much you struggled, use metaphors, and paint a picture for the reader. The more your essay draws in the reader, the better chance you have. That will help create a great college essay.
@juliawingate0 so do you think I should talk about my struggles and how I got over them which led me to success eventually?
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I have to agree with the previous poster that you don’t want to sound like a cliche success story. Also, you have to make sure to write your essay in a way that it seems more like an explanation than an excuse. You don’t want to sound like you’re only talking about your dad having cancer to make up for your GPA. Having had my own dad go through a traumatic illness myself, I know that this isn’t just an excuse, but you don’t want to make it sound like one. You really shouldn’t talk a lot about how your dad having cancer affected your grades, at least not directly (in my opinion), but it is compelling to talk about helped shape your interests. Be wary that this is a relatively common topic for an essay though (some sort of personal anecdote regarding sickness or medicine inspiring one to pursue a career related to that), so be sure to have some sort of distinguishing characteristic so that your essay stands out. Good luck!
It’s a unique topic, but make sure you don’t talk about your dad’s suffering as much as your own transformation. That’s the hard part. Many applicants have good topics but end up explaining another person’s own ordeals whilst forgetting to centralize themselves in the essay.
I agree with @beachykeen because the essay isn’t about your dad, it’s about you. Discussing how your struggle has shaped some unique interest and formed you to be who you are today is better then saying how you were very upset about your dad. I remember writing the essay and how it had to be a certain length… if you could briefly touch on the subject of your dad then i think that is ok… but as said before it is not a unique topic so make it into one. For example start off with key words such as imagine yourself ___ (doing something). You want to draw more of a picture for the reader instead of just telling them how you succeed because there are thousands of essays that touch on that.
@juliawingate0 thanks so much for the help! How do you think I could successfully convey my ideas indirectly. For example, how would I talk about my dad’s disease influencing me into the medical field without saying this directly?
One technique that I learned was: begin with painting a picture. Draw the reading in by telling a specific moment in your life where you knew you were about to break down or you found out about your dad’s cancer. You could start by talking about that one moment you fell on your knees and instead of crying you stood there blank as if a ghost just pushed you down…
Okay obviously not that because I just created that but tell about the one moment you knew your dad’s disease would affect you. You need to think creatively here because writing the above took me .5 seconds and imagine how many people talked about falling to the ground and crying.
Maybe another idea that could be a good start would be to take your personal experience and write it as if it was a dream. At the end in like the last couple of sentences have a powerful ender about how that creative, bold, extreme dream was your reality (or nightmare) that your ready to embark on.
For a couple of examples, i know people that took their life and related it to a chipotle burrito, a wort that related to people’s judgements.
Just be creative!