<p>Just curious, what did you guys use as your examples for the essay?
This was probably the worst SAT essay I've every written, I couldn't think of any good historical or literary examples for the stupid praise topic. I ended up using two hypothetical examples (ya I know really bad choice) regarding politicians and boss/employee relationships</p>
<p>I got the beauty topic, but I would have prefered the praise topic. I could have used Plato's Republic as an example in that praise is part of the destroyer of true philosophers, etc.</p>
<p>lol i used one hypothetical, one boss/job, and one about monarchs in the 14th and 15th century (totally b/s) butI think I wrote it well though so that might help</p>
<p>I wrote about John Carnegie and Greame Lemaux</p>
<p>i had perceptions of beauty...i didnt want to talk about physical beauty for the whole 25 min so i just took beautiful in a broader sense. I talked about Roman military tactics (not beautiful but got the job done), Watson and Crick (not beautiful investigation techniques but they were more efficient than others), and American Revolution (not beautiful form of government at first, but it has grown to be a powerful country).</p>
<p>I used "The Red and the Black" by Stendhal and "Pride and Prejudice" by Austen. Basically I streched the topic a little wider by fitting in praising as a social phenomenon that is typical of a conformist society. Much eaiser that way because I just have to find two classics with rebellions as major themes.</p>
<p>i also had perceptions of beauty and also did not want to talk about physical beauty for the entire essay. so my intro was that there were different kinds of beauty and you shouldn't be influenced because your perception and experiences make you unique and a great person. i used Paul Erdos (famous mathematician - he basically lived out a cardboard box his entire life/career, with only a few pairs of underwear and a toothbrush that he kept as he went from house to house of other mathematicians to write papers - if you stopped researching math, he called you 'dead') who i said found beauty in mathematics and that made him v. unique and a great person (i.e. mathemeticians now rank themselves by their Erdos number - how close they are to having written a paper with Erdos). and then i also talked about Elizabeth Blackwell, who was the 1st woman doctor in the US, and how this generation finds beauty in her determination (applied to a bunch of diff. med. schools - rejected from all b/c was woman, finally accepted at Geneva Med. College as a joke, shunned by everyone, but became valedictorian, founded med. college for women, clincs to serve ghettos of NY) though her generation didn't and that made her beautiful, unique, and...great. right.</p>
<p>I used beauty, but I didn't really do physical beauty so I did perceptions of a person's inner beauty. I used Great Expectations (Pip's perception of Magwitch vs. society's views of convicts) and the Holocaust (Hitler's views of the "inferior" races).</p>
<p>I had the praise topic</p>
<p>I wrote about tennis player Andy Roddick and also made up a story about me in 4h grade finsihing 6th in a spelling bee and getting praised all over...haha</p>
<p>i had the beauty one and i wrote about Paris Hilton, Bush, and Kim Jong Il... slam dunk!</p>
<p>livinitup, niiice.</p>
<p>and its spelt "finishing."</p>
<p>I got the praise essay.. no actualy practical example. GOod thing the universities wont be counting the essay section this year..</p>
<p>question: if i used two personal examples from my life, will they pwn me?</p>
<p>So did I! I talked about losing a debate and ****ing up a music theory project. I said praise made me feel better and explained how both experiences have led to specific characteristics I possess today.</p>
<p>Eww I HATED that topic.</p>
<p>I got the beauty topic. i think i did pretty well BUT i didn't have time to write a conclusion at all!!</p>
<p>thesis: while it is true that superficial beauty is unique to the individual, true beauty is universal.</p>
<p>3 examples:
1) (english) shakespeare's sonnet 53 (talks about the Fair Friend's inner beauty transcending and overshadowing over all)
2) (us history) city beautiful movement (everyone needed a natural palce to excape to)
3) (religion/philosophy) plato's explanation of all good (or beauty) transcending everything else, so it must be univeral)</p>
<p>if i didn't write a conclusion, what do you think my score would be around???? thanks!!!</p>
<p>i got the praise essay</p>
<p>My two examples were:
1) hypothetical situation of a kid who slacks off and gets bad grades but his parents still praise him and how that is not good.
2) How the German people praised Hitler even though many of them probably didnt agree with his policies (encouraged Hitler towards more destruction)</p>
<p>Yep, that was the worst essay topic I've ever seen.</p>
<p>I hate the praise topic with a violent, flaming, unquenchable passion. I used some dumb examples from everyday life. I hope the essay graders don't mind my lack of intellectual material too much since otherwise my essay wasn't TOO bad.</p>
<p>The key to SAT essay is turning a bad topic into a good one. You can stretch it quite a bit. That way even if you say alot of BS it is still good BS and will get you a good score (like 11,12).</p>
<p>I think SAT essays graders are very lenient. Even if you make things up, they don't know whether its true or not. The most meaningful advice I got from my SAT class was: "If you can't think of anything, make something up." I made up a whole story about me finishing 6th in a spelling bee and being praised. Personally, I thought the topic was really easy. I think you people are just stressing. I am sure everyone did fine.</p>
<p>Good Luck</p>
<p>I wrote about discrimination and racism during the Civil Rights Era and mention the Civil War........</p>
<p>I connected beauty with skin color.......</p>
<p>Martin Luther King Jr. would say that all human beings are equal even though ppl disagreed and denied their rights ......</p>
<p>I tried something a little, ah, unorthodox. I opened by paraphrasing the song "America the Beautiful" and talking about what it meant when first written, what we'd like for it to mean now, and what it really means now in the eyes of many. So basically I spent most of the essay attacking Republicans specifically and our foreign policy in general.</p>
<p>We'll see what happens. </p>
<p>No offense, btw, to anyone of any particular political persuasion. I was just answering the OP's question. I'd insult Democrats or my own grandmother if I thought it would get me a 12 on the essay.</p>