<p>Often I see essay contests for which you can get a lot of money and say you must submit an original essay. I understand that means that you have to write it all yourself, but are you allowed to submit essays you submitted to colleges as a part of the application process?</p>
<p>I re-used and re-worked my essays over and over. I used essentially the same personal statement for the 7 universities to which I applied, changed only to address specific parts of the prompts and/or word-count limits. The scholarships (I applied to about three dozen) tended to have more diverse prompts, but I always saved the essays and re-used them wherever possible.</p>
<p>Unless the scholarship rules/directions specifically say you cannot have used the essay elsewhere, I see no reason you should not. (And I agree that "original" simply means that you wrote it yourself.)</p>
<p>I have applied for MANY scholarships over the past 1.5 years. And, yes - I agree with Tocollege. You definitely can re-use any essay that you have personally written, unless the scholarship provider's requirements specifically state that you can not use an essay that you previously used elsewhere. Personally, I can tell you that I have never seen this listed as a requirement/rule on any the scholarships that I have applied for ... but it's not to say that there aren't scholarships out there that could specify this as a requirement.</p>
<p>As long as you are using something that you yourself wrote, that's all that matters. It's wise to recycle and continue to improve essays as you apply to college and for scholarships. Of course, one wouldn't apply for a college's merit scholarship by using the same essay that you used when applying to that college.</p>
I enjoyed reading your posts. I am in the process of writing my personal essay. Do you happen to have a copy of your essay? I am not very good with organizing the body of my writing essays and tend to get long wind. I would like to see one just as a sample guide please.
This thread is over 7 years old nor has the OP been on CC since then. Please use old threads only for research.