When I was writing my personal essay for my english class, I wrote two different versions. Version 1 is just a body paragraph, but it has more detail and personality. Version 2 is the one my teacher made me write; the body paragraph is just very cut down and I added a basic intro and conclusion paragraph. My original plan was to turn in version 2 to my teacher, use those corrections on version 1, and turn in a corrected version 1 to colleges. However, when I got my paper back, there were no corrections. My teacher absolutely loved it! This is the first time I’ve ever gotten a 100 on an essay. I absolutely suck at writing; I usually get low Bs to mid Cs. This made me wonder if I should just turn in version 2 to colleges as well. My english teacher told me that my essay needs to have an intro and conclusion, but my college counselor told me that colleges don’t care about that. I also feel that version 1 shows more of my personality. I had a friend read both and he said that he can barely hear me in version 2, while version 1 is much more me. So, which one should I send to colleges?
From what I know, colleges want to know more about YOU. If you put your thumb over your name on the essay and blurred out personal information, would someone you are close with know that you wrote it? So based on what you’ve written, I would go with version 1.