<p>Your essay reveals something important about you that your grades and test scores can't—your personality. The best way to improve your writing is to read good writing. Just remember to be original and creative as you share your story. It can give admission officers a sense of who you are, as well as showcasing your writing skills. That's all for now.</p>
<p>Here is a good sample essay. Do not copy this. It has been published, so every plagiarism checker in the world will catch it.</p>
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<p>My father alway told me that when others were laughing at me, to laugh at myself as well. It would give me inner strength. That advice worked well at a swimming meet when I was a junior.</p>
<p>When the crowd started yelling my name, over and over, it was not a good thing. I was swimming the 400-meter freestyle in a meet with a rival school, and I was second- to-last. Each repeat of my name seared the event deeper and deeper into my memory – the smell of chlorine, the echo of the chants from the roof of the pool building, the seeming increasing viscosity of the water as I turned for my last two laps. I swam as slowly as I could, but amazingly, the rival swimmer in the next lane would not pass me. I was almost at a standstill, making the motions with my arms and legs just enough to stay afloat. Everyone else had long ago finished the race except me and this other person who was insisting on drowning in front of spectators from both schools.!</p>
<p>I had tried hard to follow my coach’s instructions: “Come in last, no matter what you have to do or how foolish it makes you look.” I finally touched the pad at the end of the last lap, certainly a record - the wrong kind of record - for our school. Maybe even a state record, except for the other kid, who was being fished from the pool utterly exhausted. I climbed out of the water to massive cheers. “You made it! Hooray!” Horrible.</p>
<p>Our team had the state champion butterflyer, a V-shaped sculpture of a person who must have had genes rearranged just for that particular stroke. He was so fast that when a competitor false-started, our guy was beyond the rope they dropped to keep the swimmers from doing a whole lap before they found out they had to start again. After delaying as long as he could with arguments with the meet officials, the coach came toward me with a conspiratorial look. “Bob,” he said, “we’ve got to get Barry rested. I got them to delay the butterfly and insert the 400-meter freestyle in first. I need you to swim in this, but come in last, no matter what you have to do or how foolish it makes you look. Do whatever you can to delay this!”</p>
<p>When I got up for the event, I intentionally false-started. The Starter came over to me and said, “I know what you’re doing. One more false-start by anyone on your team, and you’re disqualified.” When the starting gun sounded and we all splashed into the pool, I began my quest to finish last.</p>
<p>Teamwork is not always about winning an individual event, but about the way strategies can be employed to maximize outcomes. We had plenty of freestylers, and had no trouble winning the 400-meter swim. But butterfly specialists are a rare breed, and our coach wanted not just the win, but a new state record. And I was the one chosen to embarrass myself to make that happen. Of course, no one else knew that, and I knew I would be the butt of jokes for the rest of the week.</p>
<p>But handle it I did, even starting to enjoy the laughter that came my way. Had my father known, his laugh would have been the loudest.</p>
<p>What are the elements above that make it interesting?
- It drops the reader directly into the action without a long introduction.
- It shows the writer in an embarrassing situation, but one which made him stronger.
- It is the antithesis of “I came through and won the match” type essays.
- It gives an insight into who the writer is, beneath the stats.
- It SHOWS and not TELLS. Look at the references to sounds and smells and “the viscosity of the water.” We can “see” this story in our minds and even smell the chlorine of the pool.
- Finally, it shows a strong person. This would be the type of person a college would want.</p>
<p>Yes, I have seen much better college essays. This one is far from “a perfect college essay,” but it is better than most I’ve read.</p>
<p>good stuff</p>
<p>This essay is well written and shows creative and fluent use of language. No doubt this student scored highly on the critical reading section of the SATs, and I would expect to see high grades in writing intensive subjects. Students can study this essay as an example of using description and dialogue to make a scene come alive.</p>
<p>The writer uses the story to make a point about teamwork. However, there are some troubling ethical dimensions that the writer ignores. He touches on them when he describes intentionally making a false start for the purpose of giving the butterfly champion a competitive advantage. The ref recognizes this exploitation of the competition rules and threatens the writer and his team with disqualification. The essay, while compelling and well written, overlooks the ethical aspects of complying with the coach’s directive. </p>
<p>I am concerned that some admissions readers could find this lack of awareness disturbing.</p>
<p>^ agree with above</p>
<p>Beautifully written and all that, but it makes the writer seem like a terrible person. Do whatever your coach says even if it’s tantamount to cheating. Rather than the star butterfly swimmer paying for his false start, the coach stalls the event. Seems unsportsmanlike to me. The writer didn’t have a problem with this? I can’t imagine a parallel situation in debate going over well. </p>
<p>The star butterflier did not false start; another did and the star was being punished for another student’s mistake. I don’t agree with an intentional false start but is intentionally going slow immoral? Maybe some adcoms would judge it harshly but I think most would appreciate the surprise ending of the story.</p>
<p>“Rather than the star butterfly swimmer paying for his false start”
“another did and the star was being punished for another student’s mistake”
Sorry but both of the above comments are misreadings of the story. The star swimmer (butterflier) did not false start, nor was he punished for another student’s mistake. </p>
<p>Rather, the writer of the essay false started and swam slowly, in accordance with his coach’s instructions, in order to delay the starting time of next race- the butterfly event. The writer’s deliberate actions were taken to give the star butterflier additional rest time and a better chance to win/set a state record. </p>
<p>Despite any quirks of interpretation, neatoburrito equates the writer’s behavior with a lack of sportsmanship, while lotsofquests argues that deliberately going slowly might not be immoral. </p>
<p>Is this unethical? I suspect many would say yes. (We could submit it to The Ethicist at the New York Times to get an analysis.) Typically, when participants in a race compete, each racer is expected to do his best to win, not manipulate the length of the race for the benefit of a later competitor. </p>
<p>That said, I think it’s fine for the writer to write an application essay about this event and he does so in a very descriptive manner. However, his essay does not show any awareness of an ethical dilemma. Given that universities tend to be very sensitive to issues of integrity in competition, I think proffering the story as an example of team work is somewhat risky. </p>
<p>Such an amazing essay!</p>
<p>Eh, so much narrative, describing an event. Not unique at all. Very little about feelings, motives. I was told to do this, I did it even though people mocked me. The laughing part is immaterial, the guy was doing it for a reason so why the heck would he care? Wouldn’t he be smug?</p>
<p>Agree 100% with “no ethical dilemma” “no major issue addressed”. </p>
<p>While I am not sure I agree that there were ethical issues involved, I TOTALLY agree that if the essay had gone there, introducing that conflict within the writer, that it would have gone from a good essay to a great one!</p>
<p>As for the "laughter: part, this was in response to “Discuss a piece of advice you were given that had an effect on your life.” This could be an off the wall supplemental prompt that would drive students crazy trying to remember ANY advice they have been given. BUT, the first and last sentences were stuck onto a regular C. A. personal statement to tailor that essay to the specific prompt. Read it without those “bookends” and you’ll see the original essay.</p>