Tim is a great student who knows how to write a good essay, but the suggested topic for his college application essay (which was simple and personal) made him confused. He knew that a good essay should have an introduction, three body paragraphs, and a conclusion. However, the prompt was so simple that any introduction sounded trite and… hmmm…. boring. The same boredom permeated his whole essay, which contained a list of activities and successes and looked like a resume.

“I don’t know…. What do they actually want?” asked Tim hoping to hear a clear answer.

I said, “Don’t think about them. Think about yourself instead: what do you want to tell the world?”

After a brief discussion we found out that Tim had no idea what he wanted to tell in his essay. For the first time he read the prompt attentively and… began to jot down idea after idea. I asked him not to worry about proper words or grammar (we could work on that later). What we needed at that moment was to accumulate ideas, examples, stories from his life, and to create a rough outline of our future masterpiece. Surprisingly, Tim felt inspired and even poetic! Later he confessed that it was fun to write something really important for himself, not for the teacher.

As a tutor, I advise my students to be honest, sincere, and personal while writing their college application essays: “Avoid general statements about your persistence and will to succeed. Instead of empty and meaningless declarations tell a story. If you like metaphorical language, do not avoid it. A good metaphor can tell a lot about your inner world. Be introspective if you feel like that. If you have doubts about your future career, do not hide it: nobody expects you to choose your future once and forever. In other words, do not try to please anybody but be yourself.