Brody's Guide to the College Admissions Essay

Put your best foot forward

Honesty is important, in college applications as much as anywhere. If you’re dishonest on your applications, you’ll not only face your own conscience, but you’re also likely shooting yourself in the foot: one call to your high school from an admissions officer and suddenly all of your applications—and your academic future—will be in jeopardy.

However, many students are obsessed with portraying themselves as directly as possible to the admissions committees. They feel compelled to help the committees get to know “the real me.” If they’re asked what their most defining value is, they write about their most defining value. If the application wants to know which activity means the most to them, then that’s what they put down on paper.

Of course committees want to know the real you! How else will they know whether you should be admitted or rejected? If you’re going to be a superstar in college, they want to discover the real you so that they can quickly admit you into their class. But if you’re a person with lesser credentials and promise, they want to know that too—so they can politely reject you and keep looking for someone better.

Unless you’re perfect, your job is to portray an idealized version of yourself to the admissions committees. That doesn’t mean you should iron out your faults and quirks to display a boring and flawless version of yourself. But it does mean that you need to exercise some control over how you are viewed during the application process.

Here are some tips for making the best possible impression:

• Avoid displaying major character flaws or weaknesses unless it’s necessary.

  If you don’t fit in socially or don’t speak English well, try to avoid discussing it. If you’re asked about your greatest weakness, don’t say you’re a compulsive liar—talk instead about something more benign, such as your trouble confronting people.
   

• Sound like an interesting person, even on the short questions.

  “Hanging out with my friends” is never a good answer for what you most like to do in your spare time, even if it’s true.
   

• When possible, choose your best activity instead of the one they ask about.

  You may be asked to discuss the activity that is the most important to you. For the purposes of your application, starting a charity is more important than babysitting. Creative writing is more important than shopping. Don’t avoid out-of-the-way interests that might make good essays, or feel compelled to write about your most “impressive” accomplishment. But remember to give your first priority to creating the best possible application, and not to deciding which of two activities is technically the most important.
   

• Think creatively about your accomplishments.

  Never lie about what you’ve done. But it’s happened at least a hundred times: we’ll be talking to a student in our offices and she’ll list the things she’s been involved with for the past few years. She’ll mention JV volleyball, choir, church youth group, and then—in the middle of a list of about 20 minor activities—she’ll throw out, “oh yeah, and in the summer before tenth grade my friends and I set up a Shakespeare class for inner-city kids, just once a week, as a project for our youth group.” Because it only lasted for a few weeks, took little of her time, and happened over two years ago, she’ll consider it almost not worth mentioning. But expressed properly to an admissions committee, this is gold.
   

• Pick the question for which you can give the best answer, not the one you can answer the most easily.

  Sometimes it’s tempting to write about, say, the person who has most influenced you (simple—your older sister!), when the other questions—such as “Please respond to the following quotation from Emily Dickinson.”—sound intimidating. But you need to resist the impulse to take the easy road. Spend some time and come up with your best answer, not the most obvious or “honest” one.

Putting together a great application is largely about writing essays that show committees what kind of person they’d be admitting to their school. When choosing a topic for your essays, focus on showing them an applicant they’d be proud to admit.
 

 

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