<p>"I thought Divorce is one of the 4 Ds(Death, Depression,Drug, Divorce) that you are not supposed to write about. Anyway, your essay should be about you not about your parents."</p>
<p>I based my essay on my father being shot and killed. I was accepted into Yale.</p>
<p>But the actual part about my dad dying? It took two sentences of my entire essy. I didn't sit there and elaborate. Every sentence should move the reader forward, especially when these essays have such a restrictive word limit. If you spend half of your essay delving into the deep dark secrets of your parents' marriage, you aren't likely to have enough words left to talk about how it actually affected YOU.</p>
<p>Instead, state the obstacle. Then spend the rest of your essay analyzing the way the obstacle made you grow into a better person, and how you learned from it and made a positive from a negative. Write maturely, don't create a sob story. If it's too painful for you to still think about, it won't make a good topic, because you haven't truly accepted what happened and grew as a result from it. </p>
<p>Someone commented that an essay should be about you, not your parents. And while this is true, your parents' divorce DOES affect you. Focus on the WAY it affected you, and not too much on their flawed relationship, and how he did this and she did this. If you make it about you and your growth, it will be fine.</p>
<p>[The only question in an essay is, "What makes you a strong ACADEMIC applicant and why should we admit you?"] -vdiggs</p>
<p>With all due respect, vdiggs, but you are absolutely wrong. (I'm sorry!)</p>
<p>You have an entire transcript and your GPA and your ACT/ SAT and your teacher's recs and your EC's and all that junk to assure the college that you are a strong academic applicant.</p>
<p>Your essay is the one chance in the entire application to show the colleges who you are as a person.</p>
<p>If there's one thing you can do to ensure that you DON'T get accepted, it's that you make your essay a resume in paragraph form.</p>
<p>There really is no formula that can be bottled and replicated. The important thing is to be creative, responsive and to let yourself come through alive in your words.</p>
<p>If your parents divorce affected you in a negative way and you got through it and it made you a better person, exposed some hidden strengths or made you see life from a different perspective then I would talk about it.</p>
<p>I had a similar situation with my supplement essay for NYU.
I decided to write about my parents' divorce, but I was VERY careful to only include parts of their lives that are relevant to the point of my essay - Me.
I think "too personal" is relative, and the outcome depends on how well you utilize a sensitive, and possibly successful topic. IMO, if you are comfortable with it, and YOU like the product, I don't see any reason why you shouldn't use the essay.</p>
<p>"You have an entire transcript and your GPA and your ACT/ SAT and your teacher's recs and your EC's and all that junk to assure the college that you are a strong academic applicant.</p>
<p>Your essay is the one chance in the entire application to show the colleges who you are as a person."</p>
<p>I agree with this completely. They don't need a repeat of your numbers and more assurance that you have work ethic. They want assurance that you will be a beneficial addition to their collegiate community.</p>