When I first read the essay by George Washington University Professor Samuel Goldman, I knew it would be a hot-button issue. Honestly, the direction of this debate could have an effect on me, since I'm deeply involved in the field of college-admission essays.
   But it's important to explore here.
   Simply put, Goldman says, "Abolish the personal statement," the 250- to 500-word essay that will put so many incoming high school seniors into a frenzy this summer.
   Using the essay as a tool to identify and admit poor students, Goldman argues, "is profoundly dishonest and

   And he doesn't stop there.   By placing a premium on "overcoming adversity," colleges encourage underprivileged applicants to seek more help with their essays to emphasize the challenges they've faced, and they push students in more comfortable financial situations to invent economic hardships to write about.
   Moreover, too many of today's applicants are getting too much outside help or revising their essays so many times "that the final versions are not very accurate reflections of their writing skills -- or even their own ideas," he says.
   That, I believe, is Goldman's strongest point. Your college essay has to be you. It has to be your voice. 
   Over the many years I've been helping students with their essays, that's my common message: "This is your work and your voice, not mine."
   The Internet is filled with countless services that will write essays "customized" to a student's activities, aspirations and hardships. But that's not his or her work and it's not his or her voice. When I help students polish, focus and fine-tune their essays, its still their work and, most importantly, their voice.
***
   Where do I start? How in the world do I know what to do first? And the list goes on . . . the list of questions the incoming Senior Class is asking as they go into the critical summer of college-essay writing.
   The last place to start is at your computer keyboard, according to Sharon Epstein, a writer, college-essay-writing and interview coach.
   The first step is thinking -- about yourself and about the subjects you'll write about, advises Epstein, of First Impressions College Consulting.
   Writing on the Hello Redding blog from Redding, CT, Epstein offers five things incoming seniors should do before they sit down to write:

•    Ask yourself questions. "The idea is to figure out not only who you are and what good qualities you possess, but also how you see the world and what experiences led you there."
• Develop at least one answer for each of the five Common Application prompts. "It’s easy to stop at the first answer. Often, in fact, first answers only skim the surface, and when students dig deeper and explore more possibilities, they often discover more meaningful and unique responses."
• Stay loose. "This is the fun part. Shake it out and get creative . . .  If you don’t push the boundaries you’ll never know how far you can go, and right now it’s the possibilities that count."
• "Keep yourself open to what’s going on in your life. The best topic may not have happened yet."
• Write down your ideas as they hit you. "Now is the time to record your thoughts and ideas so you don’t forget what you want to write about when you sit down at the keyboard."

***
   This time of year, everyone in the Class of 2015 is grasping for just the right topic for their college essays. It's got to be something that hasn't been done and overdone. It's got to be something that will grab the interest of an admissions officer rather than put him or her to sleep. And it's got to be something that opens a window on the person behind the words.
  Columnist Mary Bufe of the Webster-Kirkwood Times in Missouri thought she had the perfect topic for her daughter, Jane. It wasn't "Huiliation" or "My special gift,"  but "How I formed an important lifelong habit – and earned $1,000 – by keeping my room clean for an entire year."
   "What happened next has the pathos, drama and feel-good ending of a first-rate college essay," Bufe wrote. "I had struck college essay gold and wanted to share the good news. I went up to Jane's room, opened the door – and gasped.
   "In conclusion, she may need to tweak that title slightly."
    I hope the agonizing process of picking your essay topic goes better . . . with or without your mom's help!


Arnie Rosenberg is the founder of The Center for Essay Excellence. He writes regularly about college essays and their importance to the college-admission process. Contact him at [email protected].

                                                                                                                      
                                                         © 2014  The Center for Essay Excellence

   It's all about you.
   So what better way to have college admissions officers get a better look at you than by giving them a true look at you?
   That's the idea being video college-admissions essays. It's a concept gaining popularity, according to filmmakers Rosa Wolfe and Max Kiefe of ThisIsMeVideo.com.
   After helping their own children create video essays to supplement their traditional essays, the couple realized the potential for video in the application process. They found a growing popularity for essay videos, but also saw that many were poorly produced and, as a result, didn't put the students' best traits out front.
   "We knew we could help," the couple says in an interview on Examiner.com. "What makes a video application work? There is plenty of information about a written essay, but this is something new – a pretty exciting new challenge."
   In the process they created their website and created a guide, "How To Make A Winning College Application Video Essay: Everything You Need To Know From Idea To Upload."
   "I can't imagine any admissions officer not reading the (written) essay or being bamboozled by a video," the couple says. "If scores and essays aren't top-notch, the video won't help. Competitive grades and scores come first, and then admissions may consider the video.
   "In the case of a student with all great numbers, a video would help distinguish him, put a face there. How do 800 valedictorians get turned down by Stanford? Being a super-achiever is clearly not enough."
   Check out this video essay supplement, created by ThisIsMeVideo.com:

***
   Can your college essay help you make up for everything you didn't achieve in high school? Don't count on it.
   "It's an urban myth that a student who has goofed off his whole academic career can get in with a come-from-behind epic struggle in which the essay serves as the primary tool," says Barmak Nassirian, former associate executive director of the American Association of Collegiate Registrars and Admissions Officers, interviewed by The Associated Press.
   "It's not a substitute for a rigorous curriculum, good grades and evidence that you're going to do well," he added.
   Parke Muth, former associate dean of admissions at the University of Virginia, agrees.
   "If you have 18,000 or 20,000 applicants, for some of those students, the essay makes a huge difference, both positively and negatively," he said.
***
   There's a lot parents can do to be supportive and relieve stress as their children struggle through writing their college essays.Most of all, talk to your kids, advises Debbie Merion, founder of Essay Coaching.
     "Talk with your student about where you went to school, or where you wish you had gone to school. Visit colleges, and talk to admissions officers. Ask admissions officers for email addresses of students your high school student can chat with. 
   "This is an interesting time for parents, figuring out how much to push," Merion writes. "Most parents find it challenging.  Talk to professionals. Talk to school counselors.Talk to other parents. But stay involved."

Arnie Rosenberg is the founder of The Center for Essay Excellence. He writes regularly about college essays and their importance to the college-admission process. Contact him at [email protected].

                                                                                                                      
                                                         © 2014  The Center for Essay Excellence




  

   "You are a student of the world. What is it that moves you? What incites you, enrages you?"    That's how to approach your college essay, advises Lacy Crawford, a former independent admissions adviser and author of Early Decision: Based on a True Frenzy. "The first-person pronoun is a mighty tool. Use it."
   Crawford makes a critical point: Some students are being steered away from emotion by their high school counselors. Others have been coached to hide their privilege. Yet both approaches do a disservice to the students trying to show admissions officers some of who they really are.
WATCH THE VIDEO HERE
   "At the very moment when teenagers are invited to offer what they've learned and who they've become," Crawford writes in The Wall Street Journal, "their voices are hijacked by well-meaning adults who think kids can't possibly be allowed to risk answering these questions on their own."
   Crawford's advice is straightforward and direct: "Tell a story in your own voice. Speak an opinion with care and focus. Claim that "I" and write the hell out of it."
*** 
   When it comes to writing your college essay, everyone else knows best. Parents, relatives, friends, parents of friends, perfect strangers . . . they'll all have advice about what to say, how to say it, what to include and what not to include.
   So who knows best?
   College consultant Lynn O'Shaughnessy, writing for CBS Money Watch, asked essay expert Janine Robinson about the topics students should avoid when they begin brainstorming ideas for their essays.
   Included in Robinson's Top 10 topics to avoid:
   Inflammatory topics: It's unwise to write about politics or religion, two of the most polarizing topics, according to Robinson. Avoid any topic that makes people angry.
   Do-good experiences: Forget your church or school trip to help the disadvantaged, she says. Instead, focus on a specific experience within the broader trip.
   The most important thing or person in my life: Too broad and too loaded, whether you want to write about God, your mom or best friend. Robinson says these essays usually are painfully boring.
***
   How early is too early to begin thinking about your college essay?
   When it comes to getting ready and laying the groundwork, the time is now, according to Stacey Brook of College Essay Advisors.
   Don't short-change your end-of-year school work by spending hours now drafting your essay, Brook writes on NewRochellePatch.com.
   However, it's never too early to begin brainstorming and mapping out your "plan of attack," including a timeline  for your essay work over the summer, she advises.
    Also essential to do now -- hire an essay consultant. "The best essay consultants are always in high demand, and many advisors’ schedules fill up long before a student’s junior year comes to a close," Brook advises. "While students might not want to begin work on their essays until the summer arrives, it is never too early to lock down a coveted spot with an expert advisor who can help them set viable schedules, brainstorm fascinating topics and beat away writers’ block."

Arnie Rosenberg is the founder of The Center for Essay Excellence. He writes regularly about college essays and their importance to the college-admission process. Contact him at [email protected].

                                                                                                                      
                                                         © 2014  The Center for Essay Excellence

   Admissions officers at Harvard know they're seeing applications from the brightest of the brightest. Perfect or near-perfect SAT scores, straight-A transcripts and a list of activities that will knock your socks off.
  So they often look to the student's essay to get a glimpse of who he or she really is.
  "The essay is really the one piece, along with what teachers say about a student, that can be the most compelling and most exciting," says Jennifer Gandy, a senior admissions officer at Harvard. "The essay is usually the first thing that goes up on the screen, we say, 'Look at this kid, look at this thing he or she wrote.' So I would hope as students are going through this process, the essay would also be what most excites them."
   If there's one piece of advice for students beginning their essay journey, it's to write in your own voice, says Gandy, interviewed in the Write for the Future blog in the Huffington Post.
   "We are looking for the essay to shed some light on the personal qualities of the applicant and what their personality actually is, and how the person comes through in the writing is really important."
***
   Want to have a private conversation with an admissions department at the college of your choice? You can, according to college counselor Ralph Becker.
   "Think of the essay as if it were your chance to sit down with the admissions officer and unveil yourself," says Becker, founder of Ivy College Prep in Tustin, Calif., writing in the Gazette Newspapers in Long Beach Calif.
   For the very top of the candidate pool -- 29,700 students, according to Becker's complicated calculations -- your essay "must almost perfectly capture the key elements of who you are. This is usually best done within a narrative essay where your actions create character. You’ll need to edit, proofread, revise, get second opinions and make these essays as flawless as possible."
   "The essays must be personal and revealing, giving a sense of the true, honest you," Becker writes. "You need to allow yourself to be vulnerable. Nothing good is produced when you play it safe. The essay demands risk, adventure and bold, stark honesty."
***
   You need to be on the right side of the "bubble," and your college-admission essay is the key.
   "I don’t know that I’ve ever seen a student get into their dream school on the basis of the essay alone," says Donna Spann, writing in the Tyler Morning Telegraph in Tyler, Texas. Still, "sometimes, a strong essay can . . .  convince admissions officers that an on-the-bubble applicant has the ability to do well at the school."
   And for high school juniors already looking ahead to summer vacation, "it’s already time to be thinking about that essay," says Spann, CEO of Capstone College and Career Advising. "The prompts have been released, and it’s time to start turning that blank computer screen into a polished essay."

Arnie Rosenberg is the founder of The Center for Essay Excellence. He writes regularly about college essays and their importance to the college-admission process. Contact him at [email protected].

                                                                                                                      
                                                         © 2014  The Center for Essay Excellence