I have beeen helping young people with their essays for a few years. The most common problem is that they tend to try to write creatively when a simple direct answer would be better. You could have him answer out loud while you write down what he says, to illustrate this. Colleges are interested in the answer not the style.
I would question a third party doing they editting to cut the writing down from 500-200. That is doing the assignment and well across the line.
Editor should give tips like “be more precise in this paragraph,” “too much detail,” “awkward phrase,” etc.
While in theory I agree with you @Sportsman88 , in practice most students have not been taught how to do this kind of ruthless editing. After I showed my kids how to do it, they learned how to do it themselves. In any event, at least one of the colleges my younger son applied to, actually said that you should get someone to help edit the essay - apparently they were more interested in what you said, than how you said it.
@Sybylla They call it personal statement. I’ve always wondered it means a short essay, or just simply answers.
It’s a statement. Statements are short. Statements aren’t essays.
I would probably go the other way vs what @maya54 suggests. The point is to get your son to write very succinctly about difficult issues. At a 2.5x initial quota, it is easy to spread events and ideas across multiple sentences using extra words (which while it might make for better prose, is not the point of the exercise here). I agree with @Sportsman88 that you then run the risk of an “editer” in fact doing a rewrite based on the gist of the concepts.
I’d have my son break it down into an outline first and apply a “quota” of words to each section, e.g.
Situation: 1 sentence 15 words
Response: 1 sentence 15 words
Why:
Reason 1: 2 sentences 30 words
Reason 2; 2 sentences 30 words
Reason 3: 2 sentences 30 words
Result: 2 sentences 30 words
Reflections/done anything differently: 3 sentences 50 words
Of course the word allocation will be dependent on the substance of the outline (but I would definitely say keep the background description of the situation short), and he may run a bit over or under by section, but at the end, he’ll be very close to the word limit. For short answers like these, especially the prompts listed above, the schools are interested in the applicant’s thought process in solving problems and maybe something about the character of the applicant in terms of what he/she thought was a challenge and what was unfair, and what he/she thought was a proper solution. It’s not a pretty prose exercise, although you do need to write clearly.
I have to say you all are such wise parents!
I also agree about not editing for him. It’s his application. But you could practice with him on a different example, written or verbal.
It’s completely different to show how certain descriptions aren’t needed to make a point, in this 200 word piece, than to do this for submission. (I’m entirely in favor of help. Knowing when to ask is a needed skill in college and many jobs. But not doing it for him.)
When he hits Submit, he needs to know he gave it his own best shot.
Good essay advice-givers can do this, get a kid to see for himself. No one here should be sending back a finished page.
It’s like a postcard, in ways. Cut out what’s not essential…not just write smaller to fit in every bit.
I feel that targeting bloated word counts and then editing creates its own problems. Condensing the themes of a 500-word essay into 40% of the words is a very difficult task. In most cases, items that appear to be critical will have to be cut, and you end up with disjointed statements as you squeeze into the box.
I don’t think such small counts are by chance; they give very quick insights into the applicants’ ability to succinctly express complex thoughts and emotions. It’s a lot easier to differentiate in 200 words than it is 500+. The elevator pitch is a common business conversation…and it significantly differentiates depth and understanding of issues between colleagues (and applicants).
I would start with statements about the core of the essay, and then build those statements into a tight story. The one “trick” I received in high school and still use is to ask “so what?”. If you read a sentence and can’t answer that question with a positive reason to keep it…cut it.
- What happened. 2. What was your reaction. 3. What you then did. 4. What you now realize. And in there, show the attributes they wany to see. Challenge, reaction, change. It's not story telling. As mathmom said, not the 5 para format. No thesis statement. Quick and down.
You can practice the old, tell me in 25 words or less. Then 200 seems generous. 
The advice from lookingforward in #29 is great. At 200 words, it’s not an “essay,” unless your son is accustomed to “essay” exams with about 8 short essays in one hour.
It may help to step back and think about what the admissions staff members are looking for–basically, they want to see whether the applicant is a reasonable human being who is able to take action to resolve problems, is aware of the situation when others are being treated unfairly, and thinks about what he has learned.
PS: I am the least qualified poster on CC to offer the upcoming advice, but: in this case, don’t overthink it.
A statement, not an essay. He needs to read the instructions. Even in this thread, there is too much emphasis on essay. That is just a distraction from the need for actual content.
I think breaking down how to approach the word count with the different parts is good, but I am going to argue against “Reason 1, reason 2, reason 3”–that’s carry over from bad, formulaic standardized testing essay form. No reason to try to shoehorn this artificial essay structure into a short statement.
The sooner he realizes that the world is not made of three reasons, the better (or really, any simple list of reasons). I am in the midst of figuratively beating it out of my first year comp students at the moment.)
I’m coming back to this because I have a bit more time to respond. As a journalist, one of the first things they teach us is something called the “nut graph.” The nut graph basically tells you pretty much everything you want to know in one paragraph - everything else just expands on the nut graph. You might have your student pick up a newspaper and read several stories to understand how you can read just 2-3 paragraphs and get the message. If you don’t have a newspaper subscription lying around, try the Associated Press website. I’ll give one example: https://www.apnews.com/26f35c8abeea49ce931e82f0e29b7d5b/Nobel-Peace-Prize-awarded-to-anti-nuclear-campaign-group Here, the “who, what, when and where” are told in the first paragraph, and three additional paragraphs tell the “why,” similar to what the OP’s student is being asked to do. The first four paragraphs tell the entire story and come in just under 200 words. The rest of the story contains quotes and some elaboration, but an editor could easily cut them out completely.
@tutumom2001 Thank you! That is great advice.
Write it as a vignette, not a courtroom drama. “I’m at Starbucks, watching a panhandler hassle people for money” vs “Once, as I sat in a Starbucks, I saw a homeless man hassle everyone who walked past him…” The first example has 10 words and puts the reader into the story. The second uses up 18 and distances the reader from the action.
Use short, declarative sentences. Imply, rather than state directly: Instead of “If I could do it all over again, I’d buy that man a coffee and muffin,” say something like “I walked out of the store empty-handed.” The reader will get the writer’s regret.
The readers aren’t looking for art and eloquence. They just want to know if you can write and think clearly.
To put you (your son) in an editorial frame of mind, “Get the little book”: Strunk & White, “The Elements of Style.” Read it cover to cover, twice. And remember the line, “Vigorous writing is concise. . . .”
“Omit needless words. Vigorous writing is concise. A sentence should contain no unnecessary words, a paragraph no unnecessary sentences, for the same reason that a drawing should have no unnecessary lines and a machine no unnecessary parts. This requires not that the writer make all sentences short, or avoid all detail and treat subjects only in outline, but that every word tell.”
—Strunk & White, The Elements of Style, 1959 (2000)
Your son should read the entire book just before writing the essay. Read it again when he is about to edit the draft – and eliminate needless words, use the active voice. Notice that Strunk didn’t write short sentences. But he wrote direct and concise sentences.