<p>I've been browsing these forums quite a bit lately and I always find that people suggest to "make your essays exceptional" if you already qualify for everything else (grades, tests, etc) at a HYP-level. As an applicant for the college class of 2014, I think the only thing left for me is to write the essays and I've started writing several drafts...</p>
<p>However, my problem is: how and when do you know your essay is great and not simply good? It seems to me that there are infinite ways to approach the subject, especially in writing style, and I honestly don't know how I'm supposed to write this. I have a pretty good idea (IMO) in mind but am I supposed to be completely direct and state the facts, twist it into a story, add a bit of humor, or be completely professional? And the list goes on... The thing is, I can write in all of these ways, but since I only have one shot when they read my application, which one am I supposed to lean towards? And after writing drafts and revising, how do you know when THE essay is ready? I can just always keep on revising and changing it....</p>
<p>And yes, several people have read it and critiqued and offered me very different suggestions but still, what determines if an essay is good? Obviously no grammar problems, but once you get past voice and organization and all that jazz, whatever you write will seem good to one person but not so much to the next, right? How do you guys feel?</p>
<p>Sorry if this post is somewhat unanswerable but I'm really kind of lost amid the essay mayhem...and thanks if you have any words of advice or suggestions. :)</p>
<p>My opinion is that you’re chasing something that doesn’t exist. You’re of the assumption that this so-called “perfect” essay will get you admitted. I posit that there is no such thing as a “perfect” essay that gets anyone admitted per se. My point is that you want to be able to craft an essay that best reflects you as a person, as a member of your community, as a person who is interesting.</p>
<p>If you can do that excellently, that will be your “perfect” essay. However to be frank, who is to say that who you are as a person isn’t boring and staid. The well-written essay of an uninteresting person will be — uninteresting.</p>
<p>Are you interesting? That will determine much more the oomph-level of your essay rather than any writing pointers you’re able to pick up. </p>
<p>The problem with this is that you can’t change this fact about you at this point. Good luck to you.</p>
<p>I agree w/ T26E4 that there is no “perfect essay,” but that doesn’t mean that you cannot be very satisfied with your essay at some point.</p>
<p>First of all, you are very early in this process, so you have plenty of time to continue to revise, restart new topics, etc. I believe that I had a REALLY good essay, and it took me weeks and weeks to perfect it and I scrapped essays that I’d completed five drafts on.</p>
<p>At what point did I know that I was done?</p>
<p>Obviously you should follow the general rules of a good admissions essay:
E.g. Start and end w/ powerful sentences, concision is better, don’t use cliches, show don’t tell, etc etc. DON’T try to sound too impressive, use thesauruses too much, say you are “passionate” w/out giving examples or real reasons, overstate things or overwrite sentences, etc etc.</p>
<p>However, the real point at which I think you know that your done is when the piece is very easy to read but leaves a powerful thought in the reader’s mind that will last. In a word, you want to be “memorable” (obviously not memorable for being “stupid”/silly though). You know you’ve written a really good essay when it really conveys a slice of who you are that will linger with the reader for hours or days later.</p>
<p>^ Thanks guys, that really helped me a lot. I guess I had been approaching it wrong and now I understand more of what and how I’m supposed to think for something like this. </p>
<p>Another question that may or may not be significant: Would it be a good idea to write an essay (for supplements) about some personal experiences and why they helped me realize what I wanted to major in? Or is a concept like this too overdone?</p>
<p>I greatly appreciate any other comments and suggestions anyone has. They’re all a tremendous help!</p>
<p>See Yale FAQs for their take on supplemental materials (are you talking about supplemental materials or the Yale supplement to the Common App?). Additional essays are not the type of stuff they’re looking for and they generally discourage the submission of supplemental material. </p>
<p>My take on a great essay is one that would make me feel like I really got a taste of your personality and you’re someone with “winner” qualities. I think a great essay would leave the admissions officer thinking to himself/herself, “Not only would I want to be tristan’s roommate, but I think s/he going to change the world!”</p>
<p>i would suggest that you write one more draft of what you think is a good essay, put it away for several weeks, and then take it back out again and see how it impacts you while reading it…that will give you a better idea of what an admissions officer will feel when they read your essay.
the most important thing to do is to be engaging while simultaneously revealing as much about who you are as possible without phrases like “this is how i show my passion” and bland statements. i wrote my common app essay on a significant person, my first soccer coach who was also a victim of 9/11 as a firefighter, and while this may seem to be a dark topic, i made it into one of triumph and perseverence, showing through a narrative first-person viewpoint how he changed my life and made me who i am today, all the while telling a story.
my Yale required supplemental essay i wrote about living with my family of 8 in a very small apartment while i was rebuilding my own home. I made that one a little more light and comical, but maintained the overtone of serious insight into my character.
what they are looking for is the ability of a young person to appreciate the things they have been through, and to show that they understand how everything in your life has its purpose. make that clear and you should be fine.
you WILL know when it’s done, you’ll just have a feeling that you’ve made your point and you hit it home.</p>
<p>I’ve said this before, but my personal take on this is that your essay should leave the reader with an image (if fuzzy) about who you are and what your passions are. In that way they shouldn’t only tell about what has happened to you, but show how you have learned and developed from them. If you can show how these experiences have shaped you as a person, to draw the reader into that fleeting memory and enrapture them with your experiance, you give whoever is reading a feeling for who the person behind the application is and what that person cares about. If you can demonstrate that passion, you have done it !</p>
!</p>