Step 1 is to get something–anything–on paper. For those high school juniors—or parents of juniors–who are facing the final push to college admission, now is the time to start thinking about the college essay.
Most students who plan to apply to a university will be facing a heavy workload come September, so putting off this very important requirement is not going to make the process easier. And, might I add, you should not be viewing this as “an” essay. You should, like a professional writer seeking the best story, write multiple essays. If you think it is too early, that the prompts for next year are not out, I would point out that there are a few prompts which, with minor changes in wording, appear over and over in college applications. I will summarize them at the end of this post. This post goes on to discuss exercises for getting the college essay started, and it includes the most commonly used prompt types for the last five years. To get full access to this post, copy or type into an e-mail “subscription please” and your name. Send the e-mail to:
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You will receive in response an invoice from Google Checkout/Wallet. After payment, you will get full access to all articles and college essay analysis appearing on this Site. The subscription for this year is 15 dollars. This includes all future entries through January of 2013. I will be writing 2-4 new posts per month and will include detailed analysis on all new prompts for the Common Application in 2012 as well as numerous Ivy League and other application prompts, including Stanford and and the most popular “elite” schools for the 2012-13 application period. I do write posts addressing specific prompts when multiple clients/subscribers express interest; feel free to contact me with your requests after subscribing.