Are you writing your college essays and wondering how not to completely tank your chances of admission? In this blog, we’re going to be looking at 4 ways that students completely ruin their college essays.
1. Sound Like a Snob
One of the issues that we sometimes come across when reading college essays is that students are working so hard to try to impress colleges, that they sound like a total snob. We understand that it’s hard to write about your accomplishments and write about them in a way that doesn’t make you sound like you’re bragging but you’ve got to figure out how to do it. Remember that you’re goal whenever you write your college essay is to make someone fall in love with you and be your biggest fan. The way most college admissions offices operate is that they have 1-2 people be your readers. They will read your application front and back and go to committee to vote on who gets admitted or not. The readers will be the ones advocating for you and making their point across as to why you are a right fit in order to get everybody in the room on board. So don’t be a snob. People do not like people who think that they are better than everyone else. Be really careful with how you write about yourself and be kind and thoughtful. The more detail you give and the more truthful you try to be about things the better. Sounding like a jerk can deter readers no matter how impressive your wow factor may be. Be specific, be down to earth, and tell the story how it happened. The more honest and straight-forward you are about things will make you relatable and favorable in the admissions process.
2. Mentioning the Wrong School
This one is really easy and it’s a total ruiner. This happens when you begin copy/pasting the same format of essay into different applications and you forget to replace every mention of the other school’s name. This is a total application killer so make sure you proofread and make sure you delete out any instances of other colleges and name the college what it’s actually named and don’t misspell it.
3. Being Too Negative
One of the things you have to be careful about in your essays is that you have to make sure that there is a balance of tone. This doesn’t mean you can’t talk about the hardships in your life but readers want to know that you see the light at the end of the tunnel. You’ve got to be positive and establish in your essay that you are learning from your hardships to accomplish more, using education as your avenue.
4. You Tell a Story, But the Story Is Not About You
Remember that the whole point of a college essay is to reveal something about who you are. Remember that this essay should be a revelation of your character, personality, of the kind of choices that you make, and what kind of actions you take. Don’t just write any story, write a story about you and know that whenever someone reads your story that they will be looking for you and what kind of person you are.
