College Essay Writing Tips

College Essay Writing Tips Be sure to attend to your essay's style, and in most cases you're going to want to avoid these ten bad essay topics. If you've said all you have to say in 500 words, don't try to pad your essay to make it longer. Regardless of length, and even if yours is a transfer essay, the best writing will tell a compelling story, provide insight to your character and interests, and are written with crisp and engaging prose. Again, use the essay to narrate an engaging story. Then on the second day, you can look at the essay with fresh eyes to do your final edits. Cell phone restrictions in classrooms should also include specific disciplinary actions for breaking the rules. If a student is caught using the phone in class, he or she should be excused for the rest of the day. What organization is issuing the scholarship, and how can you tie that into your writing? What is the underlying information they want to learn from your essay? Write in a way that shows you are the best candidate for the scholarship. Get all your thoughts on paper, and you can extend or shorten the essay during the editing process. Students should be permitted to keep their phones in their bags, pockets, or other belongings as long as the phones are on silent in class. Vibrate settings may be permitted if the instructor does not believe it will distract him or her, since the noise of the vibration may not be noticeable in a large classroom. If a student needs to answer the phone during an emergency, he or she can step out of the classroom to do so. Make sure it highlights something you care about deeply, and be sure to provide a window into your interests or personality that isn't already obvious from the rest of your application. For years the Common Application had no length limit, and applicants and counselors frequently debated whether a tight 450-word essay was a wiser approach than a detailed 900-word piece. Give yourself at least two full days to write the essay. You can use the first day to write a draft and do some minor editing. They’ll want to know that you can reflect meaningfully and think critically about yourself and the world around you. Finally, keep in mind that what you say and how you say it is far more important than whether you have 550 words or 650 words. Use your 650 words to tell a focused story and help the admissions folks get to know you. Once they have written the first draft of a paper, they might compare their paragraphs to the list, noting what is missing and rewriting the paragraphs as appropriate. In the five paragraph essay, each paragraph had a topic sentence and then a bunch of support —support which often consisted of a hodgepodge of examples sort of thrown at the reader in a kind of barrage. Always think about your audience when writing a scholarship essay. Professors should refrain from physically taking possession of a student’s phone because of liability conflicts. If the phone is damaged while in the professor’s possession, the school or the instructor could be held responsible for the repairs. It is safer to ask the student to leave the classroom than it is to take the phone away completely. The best solution is to create cell phone usage rules that allow devices to be accessible without disturbing other students’ educational opportunities. No longer can applicants attach an essay that goes over the limit. Instead, applicants will need to enter the essay into a text box that counts words and prevents entering anything beyond 650 words. In 2011, that decision was taken away as the Common Application moved to a relatively short 500-word limit. With the August 2013 release of CA4 , the guidelines changed once again. CA4 set the limit at 650 words with a minimum of 250 words. And unlike earlier versions of the Common Application, the length limit is now enforced by the application form.