My Essay, if interested

<p>I was disappointed that my previous thread about "US military transfers" received many views, yet insufficient replies: I hope the outcome of this one will not end in the same manor.</p>

<p>Here is my transfer essay; however, be forewarned, it has hastily proofread: ** please ** base your criticism on the content of the piece, not grammar; it will be ironed out later.</p>

<p>“Try and not be a man of success, but a man of value” Albert Einstein</p>

<p>A goal, a principal, an ideal that, until recently, never understood and was consequently ignored. As I graduated from high school, completed an internship and when into college, my primary goal and guiding principle gradually shifted: this principle has become crucial in the governance of my behavior—of my choices. </p>

<p>My high school experience and mindset can be described as a typical for a student planning to attend college: take relatively rigorous courses, do well in those classes and participate in extracurricular activates. I must unfortunately admit, when performing these task on some occasions, simply went through the motions in order to do well and put them in my application: I really never knew the significance or attempted to know the significance of what I was doing. I would simply attend and log in the hours to simply add them into my transcript; my essays suffered as a consequence. My sophomoric and apathetic attitude became evident when 7 out of the 8 college applications I set out resulted in rejection. </p>

<p>Interesting changes in prospective and attitude begun to occur when I graduated from high school and when on and became a college sophomore. My overall optimism, ethic, unrelenting persistence and analytical mindset remained unchanged—my foundational goal did. What triggered this revision, whether it be my independence, my self scrutiny, classes I took, conversations with others, observations of my environment and those around me, I do not know. What I do know are the effects: faith has played a more significant role, participating in activities that I regard with sincerity and influencing one of the most significant decision I have made, of which I am most proud of.</p>

<p>I am not a top student, a stellar athlete, a musical prodigy, nor the most gregarious and studious: this is obvious when reviewing my standardized test scores, extracurricular activates and my relatively disappointing 2 semester GPA; I make no excuses about it, I could have worked harder. As I have done in the past with the SAT and performance in college courses, I will progressively improve. What is questionable; however, just as it was in the SAT with effort and numerous times I retook it, if I will improve in within a timeframe to the satisfaction of others—of myself. </p>

<p>With each progressive year, I have always uped up the “ante” in regards to difficulties and in goals in order to remedy my faults. The duty and I service I will perform in the upcoming months and years, I hope, will make me a better a better adult, a better Catholic—a better American. When I was a child, I recall once saying to my father “Dad, I just want to be like you.” Utterly surprised, my father replied sternly, “No! Son, I don’t care what you do with your life or how much money you make: I want you to be better then me; if you are not and you become just like me or worse, I have failed as a father.”: since then, and especially now, I have trying to live up to that expectation. </p>

<p>As previous experiences in classroom performance, comparisons in achievement between myself and peers, performance in standardized tests and in the outcomes in the application process, I may improve, but may never be successful to the absolute level to my satisfaction: it is unquestionable; however, that I will be diligent and unflinching in the pursuit and eventual outcome in being the man of what my father expects— of what I expect.</p>

<p>I think this essay has potential. But.... It is a risky type of topic, imo, veering between highlighting your current motivation and record of improvement and apologizing for past poor performance. The latter is a tough topic. It is also hard to evaluate how well that will work without knowing how "low" you started and how much you have improved.</p>

<p>Suggestion: Lead with the slice of life in your second to last paragraph: "When I was a child.... expectation." That is a great lead, draws the reader in; sets up your whole essay and makes it all work better. It <em>almost</em> overcomes my worry about the risky topic.</p>

<p>Here are my stats if it helps overall evaulation of essay.</p>

<p>HS GPA: 3.64
SAT: took 5 times within the span of 6 months. first time 1010, last time 1260.
College GPA @ BU: 3.12
AP tests: took 5, all passed with a 3 and above (do not know if this still matters however)
Upcoming significant obligation: LTC training during summer (military).</p>

<p>What is questionable; however, just as it was in the SAT with effort and numerous times I retook it, if I will improve in within a timeframe to the satisfaction of others—of myself. </p>

<p>That sentence is so confusing. you try to go overboard making it look elegant in style. i suggest you re-do sentences like these because they steer the reader away from your main message. theres no need to go crazy, just make your point and move on. the more complicated it is, the easier it is for the adcoms to lose interest and overlook you.</p>

<p>I probably will not change my style; that is how i commonly write: you are correct, however, regarding that sentence, it needs to be revised.</p>

<p>..............bump....</p>

<p>seem's pretty good. I'm not a great essay writer but sometimes its better to end with periods instead of using a lot of punctuation. To me, it would flow better like that. </p>

<p>anyways, where are you applying to ?</p>

<p>Thank you for your input; when reading my essay out loud, it does feel a bit choppy: I will fix that. The numerous use of rarely used punctuation is probably due to the writing class I took here at BU as well as the number of 19th century novels I have been reading; the professor I had would take points out of your paper if you did not have a diverse use of punctuation. It has become pretty much a habit of using all tools in my writing. At its best, it keeps the reader interested in the paper and highlights pivotal statements, at its worst, it sounds pretentious, choppy and reads as a legal document: I hope in incorporated the benefits of diverse punctuation while avoiding the latter.</p>

<p>Schools that I am applying for are (listed from most wanted to least):</p>

<p>Notre Dame
Duke
George town
Cornell
University of Virgina </p>

<p>It may seem odd to many of you that I would have Cornell as 2 to last. Being in a non-denominational school and with the increased importance of my faith, I have elected to have a preference toward schools with denominational obligations.</p>

<p>Satistics:
College GPA: 3.15 (2 semester worth of courses, 1 semester complete via AP)
HS GPA: 3.7
SAT: 1280
US military cadet (army)</p>

<p>"a better Catholic—a better American"</p>

<p>That frightens me. American and catholicism should not be even close to synonomous. </p>

<p>Also, you never quite alleviate the bad connotation you set up for yourself. Essays are an oppurtunity to show how you SHINE and how you will fit in and contribute to the school you're applying to. You need to focus on more positives. Honestly, do they need to know you got rejected from 7 schools, that you put no effot into any of the extracirriculars, that you aren't the best student, etc.? </p>

<p>To be honest, I would imagine that essay alone--with its content--would get you rejected or deferred.</p>

<p>Good luck, just focus on the positive and your attributes as opposed to the negative.</p>

<p>
[quote]

Notre Dame
Duke
George town
Cornell
University of Virgina

[/quote]
</p>

<p>you need to rethink your list - your chances of getting accepted to any of these schools are virtually nil</p>

<p>i agree with soccerzoo for the simple reason that i have personal first hand experience with this kind of stuff. i did the same thing as you in my college essays but in my case it was right out of high school. i took the route of...i did really bad in high school, im really sorry, im not that student any more, i have such potential, ill never forget how irresponsible that was, look at my future plans, pick me pick me mentality. now this is all well and good. of course its important to show that you have changed and progressed. BUT...how in the world is that supposed to show that you are better than another applicant that has been stellar their whole academic career? it will not and can not with the approach stated above. like the other poster said, the essays are your time to SHINE.</p>

<p>
[quote]
"a better Catholic—a better American"</p>

<p>That frightens me. American and catholicism should not be even close to synonomous. </p>

<p>Also, you never quite alleviate the bad connotation you set up for yourself. Essays are an oppurtunity to show how you SHINE and how you will fit in and contribute to the school you're applying to. You need to focus on more positives. Honestly, do they need to know you got rejected from 7 schools, that you put no effot into any of the extracirriculars, that you aren't the best student, etc.? </p>

<p>To be honest, I would imagine that essay alone--with its content--would get you rejected or deferred.</p>

<p>Good luck, just focus on the positive and your attributes as opposed to the negative.

[/quote]
</p>

<p>The point of that statement was not to make being a catholic is essential to being a good American nor it being synomomus in anyway, but to point out the nature of my goal: to be good in both aspects. I really dont understand how you derived that conclusion based on that statement.</p>

<p>You make a good point; however, in your latter statement: i will fix that. </p>

<p>
[quote]

Quote:
Notre Dame
Duke
George town
Cornell
University of Virginia </p>

<p>you need to rethink your list - your chances of getting accepted to any of these schools are virtually nil

[/quote]
</p>

<p>No, i really do not need to rethink my list. I attend BU, why in the hell would i apply for transfer to a lower tier school? Your statement, at best, overzealous application of cynicism; at worst, a waste of bits with no meaningful message: I tend toward the latter.</p>

<p>
[quote]
i agree with soccerzoo for the simple reason that i have personal first hand experience with this kind of stuff. i did the same thing as you in my college essays but in my case it was right out of high school. i took the route of...i did really bad in high school, im really sorry, im not that student any more, i have such potential, ill never forget how irresponsible that was, look at my future plans, pick me pick me mentality. now this is all well and good. of course its important to show that you have changed and progressed. BUT...how in the world is that supposed to show that you are better than another applicant that has been stellar their whole academic career? it will not and can not with the approach stated above. like the other poster said, the essays are your time to SHINE.

[/quote]
</p>

<p>Agreed.</p>

<p>In all, thank you for all your responses with the exception of Jaek99. A revised essay will be posted shortly.</p>

<p>Glad you're able to accept criticism. When you use the hyphon, as you do, you are basically using it to elaborate or explain on the previous statement. You ARE making the suggestion that being a better catholic makes you a better American. If you choose to seperate them with a COMMA, there will be no association. Just brush up on your mechanical skills before you apply to these top tier schools.</p>

<p>Good luck.</p>

<p>Your writing style comes across as forced and stuffy. Loosen up and let your personality show through</p>

<br>


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<p>I have to agree with the previous persons comments. The 5 schools you mentioned have much lower acceptance rates than BU (refer to collegeboard.com for exact statistics). Also, did you use this essay to get into BU? No offense, but this essay gives the AdCom a whole laundry list of reasons to defer/waitlist you. Rule #1 on the list of suggestions for writing a good application essay is "accentuate the positive". (Actually I think it's #2 on the list - the 1st is "Proofread, proofread proofread").</p>

<p>I am more than aware of the lower acceptance rates and the difficulty of getting in; I also am aware of the satistics of thoes who dont apply. </p>

<p>Again, why the hell would I apply to schools that are of equal standing?</p>

<p>A revised essay will be posted shortly.</p>

<br>


<br>

<p>Good point. Go ahead and apply to those schools. They are probably in the "Reach" category, but then again, if you don't get in, at least you're already going to a good university. Keep in mind, I am basing this solely on your essay and low GPA (their standards not mine) and not on your overall application.</p>

<p>nice improvement on your SAT. If i could have added 250 to my score I would probably be at harvard haha</p>

<p>your essay, in my oh-so-meaningless-opinion, reads like pablum. it's limp instead of limpid. try to cut through the affectation and present the material more crisply.</p>

<p>
[quote]
your essay, in my oh-so-meaningless-opinion, reads like pablum. it's limp instead of limpid. try to cut through the affectation and present the material more crisply.

[/quote]
</p>

<p>....agreed......</p>