Prompt: Does the success of a community- whether it is a class, a team, a family, a nation, or any other group- depend upon people’s willingness to limit their personal interests?
Essay:
A Japanese axiom, “In order to accomplish something, you must be willing to give up another thing”, cautions us that we cannot have everything. A successful community truly dependent on the efforts that those in the community put forth in limiting their personal interests. By doing so, their main focus on strengthening on the community would not be cluttered with distractions from their personal interests, thus ultimately leading to success. This is shown through an examples in history, literature (didn’t have time to do this), and through an account in my personal life.
The Civil Rights Movement was definitely made successful by the meticulous efforts put forth by those of the black community of Alabama, particularly those of Martin Luther King Jr. As an activist in the 1960’s, Martin Luther King Jr. spent his whole life leading this movement every single day. This left him an insufficient amount of time to bond with his wife and children. He spent most of his time gathering followers to support his movements and peaceful protests in order to create a more equalized community. As he had to give up his personal interests, he motivated his followers by proving that giving up things now would be worth it in the end. They sacrificed their personal interests of sleep and privilege of riding the bus in order to get their point across. For example, they needed to get up way earlier in order to arrive on work on time by foot instead of by using the bus as a source of transportation. They had to wake up particularly early on days of protests as a way of showing the public that they were determined and faithful to their beliefs. The struggles of the Civil Rights Movement paid off as supporters were granted their wish in having more privileges available to them. Had Martin Luther King Jr. and his devout followers not given up their personal interests, this movement would not have been as effective and influential as it was. Many would have thought it was not serious and would have dismissed it in a glance. The efforts placed by the Civil Rights activists proved that success is dependent on putting “all hands on deck” in trying to accomplish the goal, which can be attained by putting personal interests aside.
Similarly, my soccer coach follows the axiom and believes that the team would be at its best that all personal interests be forgotten on the field and during practice. He prohibits the use of cell phones as well as talking about anything besides the sport of soccer. As limited as that may be, I personally believe that it does help the team get better- a distraction-free environment helps the players focus on the game, and thus, improvement was easy to spot. Not only did we improve our skills, we were able to have longer strains of concentration since we did not have our phones as a source of distraction. This was evident in many of the games we played since in one game, a audience member’s cell phone rang and the players on the opponent’s team were looking around trying to decipher if the ringtone was theirs while my team used this to our advantage. If my coach had not implemented that rule, we would not have won and improved as much as we have last season! Success of a team requires commitment which can be strengthened through the limitations of distractions such as personal interests.
The efforts of the Civil Rights activists and those of the players of my soccer team indeed prove that a community can accomplish anything if its members put in their all. Putting in their all involves limiting or even letting go of personal interests. However bad it may be at first, the results are indisputably worth it.
Note: Sorry for not putting this in the post itself- I accidentally clicked post before typing out my essay.
I wrote this in about 30 mins… This is my 2nd essay and I’d love any feedback that would help me get 11/12! I’ll need to improve on time management for sure since I didn’t even get to my 3rd example!
Thanks for reading!
5/6. That’s a 10/12. One thing that you may want to focus on are your transitions. Look between the soccer and Martin Luther King’s examples. You said “Similarly” and started a new example. This is a quick transition. The transition can be strengthened by writing “Mr. King changed the entire United States. However, sports teams often sacrifice their personal interests for the good of the team. A specific example would be my soccer team.” See how it is smoother? I lost points on transitions, and I wouldn’t want anyone else to lose points on something so basic, especially since the rest of the essay is so good.
Another thing that you may want to know: you need only 1 example. 2 examples are magnificient. 3 examples might be too much. You only get 46 lines to write on, and you have 25 minutes. You alone can judge your writing speed and handwriting size, so I can’t say for sure if you can do it. But I can say that 2 strong, fleshed out examples are better than three weak ones. I have seen essays where people get 12/12 with one example and this really goes to show how even one strong example can net a good score. Quality, not quantity!
Also, try to flesh out the conclusion a bit more. I don’t think you had enough time to write it, which may explain why it is so small.
Otherwise, your vocabulary is great! Axiom is a word you regularly use that shows that your vocabulary is well developed.
The examples you used are good too. They really show how people gave up personal interests for the benefit of the team.
Thanks very much for the feedback!
Your essay is good. I think if you want a 6, you need a final overarching point to ice the cake.
Your Thesis: Introductory statement , Answer the Prompt, FINALLY Why it matters/what point can we conclude. I think you’re missing this last part which can be referred in your conclusion to tie all the evidence together.
So you agree that limiting personal interest will benefit the community, so an example of a overarching point can be… Because limiting personal interests benefits the community, this shows that altruism creates the greatest impact in society. OR Pursuing personal interest prevents harmony and shared ambitions.
Then in the conclusion, rather than reiterate the thesis, you can talk about this overarching point. Go in a bit more depth. This allows for an essay that has depth, rather than one that just answers the prompt. So when you’re writing an essay, remember to write why your answer to the prompt matters!