Are you one of the many seniors in high school who is now applying to colleges? You must be under immense pressure with everyone, from your teachers to your parents, trying to get you into a good college and the stress of formulating an excellent college application.
During all this time, the hardest part, without a doubt, is writing a college essay. And therefore, you must be wondering why college essays are so hard?
There are multiple reasons for a college essay being hard: the word count is too limiting, it is difficult to find the ‘uniqueness’ in yourself, and high school doesn’t teach you to be diverse in writing. All of these reasons combined can make writing a college essay seem like a difficult task to you.
All the reasons that make college essays so hard to write:
The word count is limiting:
Let’s take Yale as an example: the word limit given to seniors to write a college essay for Yale is only 125 words. Yep, we are as astonished as you are!
In the college essay, colleges expect you to stand out and persuade them why you will add value to their college. However, as you can imagine, that gets particularly hard when all they allow is as little as 125 words. (You can hardly call that an essay).
It is difficult to find the ‘uniqueness’ in yourself:
Colleges expect you to convince them that you stand out in the crowd using the college essay. For this, you have to persuade them there is something unique about you that they need in their college. Many students have a hard time finding that particular ‘unique’ quality about themselves as they are merely discovering themselves at that stage.
Highschool focuses on a particular type of writing:
High school English classes don’t teach students to be diverse in their writing. Instead, they teach students a particular format of a five-paragraph essay or a three-paragraph essay and tell them to stick to it. Therefore, when students sit down to write their college essays and are met with a 125-word essay (referencing Yale’s college essay), they get stuck and don’t know how to proceed with it.
A few tips to help you along the way:
However hard the college essay might seem to you, no need to fret, as we have compiled a list of a few tips that can help you along the journey of writing your college essay:
- Brainstorm all the qualities in you and write them down separately before writing your essay.
- Do the same for your college too; write down the things that make it your dream college and your first choice.
- Visit the college and observe all the things that appeal to you, and incorporate them in your essay.
- Read the college student newsletter and list down the events that tempt you. You can later refer to them in your essay.
- Mesh the college mission statement with your qualities in your essay to convince them that you are indeed a perfect fit for their college.
You can also watch this video for more tips:
Now that you have an idea of why college essays are hard, we hope you can overcome this thought using the tips we have given you. So, get writing!
