Should You Include an Activity Sheet? Quite possibly, YES!

What’s an Activity Sheet? Well, on The Common Application, you are given the opportunity to include “Additional Information” about yourself in the form of an Activity Sheet. This is in addition to the activity listing, where you have a dozen spaces to list extracurricular activities. The Activity Sheet is a page or more that you can format and write, and then upload directly under where you send in your core essay on the Common App.

The idea is that you can provide more details about your activities beyond those you listed in the extracurricular box. There’s considerable debate in the college counseling community as to whether you should include anything, such as an Activity Sheet or resume, and if so, how you should present it and what it should include. In a nutshell, the best advice I’ve seen is that it’s a good idea to include the Activity Sheet only if you have a specialty you want to showcase, and/or if you feel the listing of activities did not accurately represent all your interests and passions. If you do decide to include an Activity Sheet, most experts agreed on these points:

1. Don’t just duplicate what you already listed and explained in the extracurricular activities listing section. No laundry lists, please. (I would include a resume only if it doesn’t repeat what you already submitted.)

2. Keep the Activity Sheet short–one or two pages at the most.

The Most Common Supplement Question: Why College X?

Most of you will write one or two “core” essays for your college applications. These essays will focus on revealing who you are and why you are unique. But you will also write numerous supplemental (shorter) essays. The good news is that many of these “supps” ask similar questions. So if you are smart, you will find ways to re-use parts of your answers and streamline the process. At the same time, you also will hone, sharpen and improve your answers.

Here are some examples of typical sup questions that are looking for similar answers:

• Why do you want to go to OUR UNIVERSITY?
• Why are you a “good match” for OUR UNIVERSITY?
• What is it that you like the best about OUR UNIVERSITY?
• How will you contribute to OUR UNIVERSITY?

Basically, there are two parts to these prompts. One: Why YOU? Two: Why COLLEGE X? Your job is show how and why they fit together. Here is a short guide on how  to do this:

1. State your main goal for your education at your target schools. To be an engineer? To get a liberal arts education? To play waterpolo? To become a filmmaker? To earn a pre-med degree? To figure out what you want to do in the future?

Tags: Common Application Supplements

Five Ways to Bump Up a Dull Essay

So you have a rough draft for one of your college essays. You answered the prompt, read it many times and believe it’s a solid piece of writing. And you may be right. But even a solid essay can have one fatal flaw–it’s boring. The last thing you want is for the admissions person to toss your well-written essay in the “read later” pile. Here are a couple tips on how to bump it up:

1: Your introduction is the most important part of the essay, since it will either grab the reader or not. Often, writers start by providing background on their topic and then get to the good stuff. Try to take out the first sentence, or two, and see if you can start farther into your story. You might have to rewrite it a bit, but often you just don’t need that general background right at the beginning. It’s best to switch it up and get right to your best example or point, and then provide the background later. If you can start with your most interesting examples or points, you will grab your reader all the faster, and that’s exactly what you want.

EXAMPLE: “When I was in high school, I played the violin in the school band. It was my favorite activity and I never missed a practice or performance. But one day, to my horror, I left my thousand-dollar violin on the school bus…” You are building up to something exciting here. Try to start right at the heart of the action, the moment you left the violin and your reaction: “As I stepped off the bus, I had the vague feeling I was missing something. But I was late for my orthodontist appointment, and ran to meet my friends. It was only later that night that it hit me: I left my thousand-dollar violin under the seat.” (And then you can go on to background your history playing the violin, etc.)

Tags: "college admissions essay", anecdotes, college essay, common application, editing, how to edit college admissions essay, how to improve college application essay, how to improve personal narrative, personal narrative, university of california

Essay Karma

This fall, one of my tutoring students taught me a lesson about how cheating on these essays can backfire–even if you don’t get caught. He wanted to write his essay for the Common App on a trip he took to Guatamala to work with poor children. At one point, he confessed that he had not gone on that trip, but that his father had gone. When I looked at him as though I thought he was nuts, he told me, in his defense, “I helped him pack!”

What? Are you kidding me? This student kept insisting that he had no other interesting experiences that he could write about. (If you have read anything on my blog, you know that everyone has umpteen topic possibilities, and that you don’t need to travel the globe to have them.) I gave him a brief lecture about how this was completely unethical, but he only smiled and told me that “all my friends are doing this.” (If this situation weren’t more complicated than I’m describing here, I would have booted him out on the spot.)

Tags: "college admissions essay", admissions, cheating on college essays, Choosing a Topic, college, college application essays, college essay, common application, personal narrative, Tips, topics, university of california, University of California Essay, writing

How Far Will You Go for A Great Essay Topic?

 

I just read an interesting article in the New York Times about how high school students are seeking out exotic trips, usually to foreign countries, mainly so they will have an intriguing topic for their college essays.  (Article copied below)  I think these trips can be amazing, and that students learn a lot about other places, cultures and themselves. Yes, GO!!  But if you are lucky enough to take one of these trips, the last thing I would do is plan it so you can write a snazzy college admissions essay. I actually believe this approach can backfire. An instant turn-off to essay readers is a student who is trying to impress them.

To avoid sounding over-privileged, students should look for essay topics that focus on everyday subjects, often called “mundane topics.” Every time, the essay about a summer job where a student flipped pancakes at IHOP or washed dishes or sold shoes turned out so much better than the one where they went to Africa and lived in mud huts or helped farmers in Guatamala pull weeds. For some reason, the more basic topics feel more authentic and are naturally more interesting. And the writer comes across more humble, and likable, even.

That’s not to say that you can’t write a fine essay about a cool trip abroad. My advice is that in your search for a topic, don’t consider the trip itself the topic. Instead, focus on one thing that happened on that trip. Focus your essay on a specific experience, and just let the trip to the cool place be the background. That way, the college folks see how adventuresome you are, but you can focus your essay on something more specific and meaningful. College folks want to learn about how you think and what you value. So it’s not so much where you were or did something, but what happened, how you handled it and what you learned in the process. That’s why scooping gelato, parking cars or walking dogs can make more interesting topics than your travels around Timbuktu.

Tags: "college admissions essay", admissions, Choosing a Topic, college admissions essays, finding topics, mundane topics, new york times, personal statement, University of California Essay

SOS for The Short Answer: How to Write About an Extracurricular Activity or Work Experience for the Common App

The Common App requires one long essay. But it also has a short essay, a supplemental question that asks students to “briefly elaborate on one of your extracurricular activities or work experiences.”  And they mean brief, no more than 1,000 characters (about 250 words). That’s really short, about one medium-sized paragraph!

The tendency is to simply describe an activity or experience. Trouble is that this description often ends up as a broad overview–BORING!! But how the heck do you give details when you can only use a few words? Here’s the trick: You have to pick something within that activity or work experience and focus on that.

Let’s say you want to pick your cross country running as the activity. My advice is to pick something within cross country that means a lot to you, such as a quality you have learned. How about endurance? Or mental discipline. Now just zero in on how you learned that quality while running cross country, and then give an example. The example is key. It will be like a little piece of a story or a specific moment. “I developed mental discipline from the times I had to run when I had a cold, or when the last 500 feet of the race was straight uphill…I learned to use little mental games to distract myself from the physical pain and fight back the voice that told me to quit…” This will make your answer feel real and specific (and interesting), instead of general and vague (and boring.)

Tags: briefly elaborate, college application essays, common app, extracurricular activity, extracurricular activity or work experience, the short answer, work experience

Check out The Choice

If you haven’t discovered the New York Times‘ blog on college admissions, called The Choice, it’s worth checking out–for everything from how to narrow your list of choice schools to how to find discount college textbooks.

Here’s the link to The Choice, in case you want to bookmark it: http://thechoice.blogs.nytimes.com/

Below is a recent post from The Choice with some solid tips on writing college admissions essays. I really like the one expert’s advice about “loosening up” when you write your essay. I know that sounds easy, and actually can be pretty difficult when all you are used to writing are those stiff, academic essays for your English classes.  (Actually, the advice about writing an imaginary roommate sounds like a good idea, but I don’t know many students who have the time for a creative writing exercise like that. Most just want to get cranking on their actual essays!) My tip is to try to write like you talk, and just get out your story or essay or rough draft, and then you can always go back and clean it up later. (I have many other posts on how to “loosen up” and find your voice on my blog. Check out the indexed posts–listed by topic–over on the right of this page to find what you need.)

September 23, 2011, 3:53 PM

Crafting an Application Essay

That ‘Pops’

By REBECCA R. RUIZ

Stanford University’s application for admission includes a prompt directing students to write a letter to their future freshman roommates. The exercise is a good one for all applicants – regardless of their interest in Stanford – as a fun, fresh jumping-off point in the essay writing process, Rebecca Joseph, a professor of education at California State University, said on Friday.

“It’s all about loosening up,” said Ms. Joseph, who was on a panel called “Communicating Stories: Strategies to Help Students Write Powerful College Essays,” part of the National Association of College Admissions Counselors conference in New Orleans.

Jumpstart Your Personal Statement in 6 Simple Steps!!

If you are writing an essay that responds to a prompt that asks you to tell about yourself, or describe a quality, characteristic, experience or accomplishment (such as the Number 2 UC personal statement prompt!), here’s one way to approach your personal narrative. Remember, “narrative” means telling a story. I’m pretty sure at some point you learned in English class that to create a story you need at least two things: a character and a conflict. So one magic way to create a personal narrative is to search your recent past for a conflict. (You are the “character.”) Again, thinking back to English class, conflicts can come from many different places–from within yourself (internal: you have a personal issue or hang-up that caused you pain or trouble) to outside yourself (external: something bad happened to you.)

To put it simply, a conflict is a problem. Problems come in all shapes and sizes. They do not need to be traumas or a crisis, although those can work, too. (HINT: Basic, everyday problems work best!
Check out this post about “mundane” topics.) Here are other words for a conflict or problems: challenge, obstacle, mistake, hang-up, issue, dilemma, fears, obsessions, etc. Examples of conflicts or problems: you are shy, competitive, stubborn, didn’t make the team, got injured, have big feet, frizzy red hair, smile too much, someone quit at your work, don’t have own car, can’t spell, adhd, ocd, don’t eat meat, perfectionist, slob, lazy, drunk driving, have a mean grandparent, no money, etc…Man, there are a lot of problems out there! But for the purposes of writing these dreaded essays, that’s a good thing for once!

Once you remember a juicy problem, follow these steps:

1. Describe the time you had a problem or describe a strong example of your problem (Include what happened and how it made you feel. Try to start at the moment it hit, or happened for the best impact!  Include the 5Ws! Stick to one or two paragraphs.)

Tags: "college admissions essay", Choosing a Topic, college essay, how to write a personal narrative, how to write college admissions essay, personal statement, UC Personal Statement, university of california, University of California Essay

Lessons from another season of college admissions…

I haven’t posted anything in recent weeks. My role as a college essay tutor wraps up in January and February. But if you are still working on an essay or personal statement, I would read through this blog for ideas and inspiration!

This spring, I have also been in the thick of the college admissions craze because my son is a high school senior. And boy what a ride it has been. One of the hardest parts is the waiting–and I know some of you are STILL waiting to hear from prospective colleges and universities. Hang in there!! And then there are the rejections. My son certainly had his share, and it didn’t help that they were the first schools to report. And one was his top pick. But he cast a wide net, and now has three great options to pick from, which is the next challenge. So, it all works out! And it will work out for you, too!

We went through this with my daughter, too, two years ago, and she landed in a fabulous little liberal arts college in the south and loves it. (She’s going to study in India next semester for her study abroad!)

I’m not a college counselor, but I can share with you a couple tips that I wish I had known, or paid closer attention to, for my own kids’ college quest. I can’t say we have regrets, but we certainly learned some things as we went along. In case they resonate with you, here they are (in no particular order of importance.):

• Try as hard as you can to tune out others students and parents who talk up certain schools, especially the “prestigious” ones, and focus on what will be the best fit for you. Remember, you are the one who will go there, not them!
• Don’t let yourself get overwhelmed with all you have to do. Just keep up with the various steps, and it all works out. None of it is really that difficult. Stay open to learning about the different schools, and when you are in the area of a college or university (even if you don’t necessarily want to go there) your sophomore or junior year, drop by and check it out! Your opinions about colleges will change a lot in just a year or so.

Wordle Your College Essay!

I heard of Wordling from a gardening friend over at a totally unrelated blog, called Lost in the Landscape. (Believe it or not, I do other things than read college essays!) Wordling is a program where you can drop in some text and it creates a colorful collage of random words in unusual fonts, and it also makes the words you use the most the most prominent. The idea is that you can get a visual sense of what you emphasized in your writing. (Above is a Wordle of this post! Click the image to enlarge.)

So, guess what I thought would be fun to Wordle? You got it (see, that’s why you are on your way to college!!)–college admissions essays!  In my previous post, I told you my son just finished submitting all his applications. So I Wordled one of his two essays (for the University of California application–basically personal statements about 500 words each).  Then I dug out one of my daughter’s recent college essays. I bet you will be able to see that they are very different in their interests:

My son’s Wordle (click on it to make larger)