How Not To Start Your College Essay

How Not To Start Your College Essay When you visit a site searching for boots, for instance, and all of a sudden start seeing advertisements for boots on other sites, it's because of tracking cookies. In the case of these schools, those cookies are used to gauge a person's interest in the university. It tracks their activity, on site and off, and can use data about the person's location and interests to determine who the student is. And it can be off-putting to readers, particularly to those who don’t share your religious beliefs . Simplify the process by asking yourself “what is my essay about? Think of 1-2 word responses and write a few options down. As the name suggests, this essay is all about the language - adjectives, similes, and metaphors. These kinds of essays are about describing as vividly as possible anything you are asked to write about. Many times however, when a parent tries to help, they do more harm than good. It is very easy to spot an essay that has been overly edited by a parent and that is not good for the students chances of admission. However, they should not write or re-write the essay. Essay’s should always been seen by someone else to look for grammatical and spelling errors. In most cases, we suggest writing your essay before you lock in a title. It’s much more likely that something will come to mind after you’re done writing. A lot of students think that the title of their essay needs to be something profound, thematic, and influential but it’s almost impossible to write freely with something like that looming over your head. I know this is the touchiest of topics, but I always beg parents to believe in their child. And then they are pleasantly surprised when admissions officers write acceptance letters with personal notes about their child’s fabulous essays. Editing is a part of the writing process, like development and revision, where another person can be helpful. There is nothing theoretically wrong with that person being a parent if they are skilled and sensitive to helping while allowing the student’s own voice to remain dominant. If you know writing is somewhat of a weakness, have teachers, guidance counselors, friends, and family members read it and offer feedback. However, colleges will generally understand that your talents lie elsewhere. However, you should still aim to write a strong essay, especially if your dream colleges are highly-selective. It is certainly okay for parents to help edit their child’s essay â€" with the key word in that sentence being EDIT. They can help catch spelling or punctuation mistakes or help a student better clarify an idea that isn’t fully fleshed out in the early draft. It is NOT okay for parents to WRITE their child’s essay or influence it unduly, however. He or she isn’t a full-fledged literary genius and the admission officers who read the essays are well aware of this. They are okay with thoughts and phrasing that sounds like it’s come from a teenager; they understand that not all of the ideas will be fully formed. But the main idea behind any essay is that it should reveal something of the writer’s (in this case, the student’s) character and parents can easily hinder that process if they edit too much. Parents can become emotionally involved and/or try to influence the content of the essay, which is something you DON’T want. No matter who helps to edit and proof your work, it’s essential that your writing remain your own. Parents can help their child brainstorm topics, encourage them to write multiple drafts, and help him or her meet deadlines. Some parents should not even read their kid’s essays as they want to change too many elements that make the essays lose their unique adolescent voice. You absolutely should have a second and even third set of eyes help you edit and proofread your essay. Be sure to pick readers who have strong skills in grammar and usage. If your parents fit the bill, there’s no reason they shouldn’t help you polish your essay, but students often find it easier to work with a teacher, counselor or other adult. When students used to write on typewriters, it was common for teachers to assign essays in number of pages. With the adoption of computers in the classroom, teachers switched from pages to work count because it was too easy for the computers to manipulate the font size and page size. By assigning a word count, teachers get a more accurate length of essay than they would if they assigned homework by pages. Join thousands of students and parents getting exclusive high school, test prep, and college admissions information. You still need to present a well-written and carefully-considered essay, of course. An example assignment would be to write an essay about your most recent holiday experience. This would be an ideal time to use a descriptive essay. But structure here, is just as important as any other essay because you are still in charge of leading the reader into, through and then back out of your world of description without waffling on too much. So, similar to an expository essay, you will require an introduction, body and a conclusion. The reason that teachers don’t assign a number of pages anymore is because it’s too easy to manipulate pages.