Application Essay Tips To Help You Stand Out

Whether you are applying to your dream school or for a college scholarship, you will probably have to write a personal essay. Personal essays can be a challenge if you don’t know what to say. Plus, every program has different requirements, so many times you can’t use the same essay to apply for everything and will end up having to write several. To help take the pressure off, here are some great essay tips to help you stand out from other applicants.

Read The Requirements

Every program has different requirements for their personal essays. There will be specific format rules concerning margin, typography, and word count. There will also be different rules about content. Some will have you answer a question, others will want an academic essay, and others may have very loose topic guidelines. When you are going through the application process, carefully read the essay requirements. The worst thing that could happen is you get rejected because you made an avoidable formatting mistake.

Get Organized

If you have to write several essays, you’ll have to keep track of all the requirements and the deadlines. So sit down and make a schedule and take notes on what is required. Then give yourself plenty of time to work on your essays. Next make a list of all of your accomplishments and successes, so you can organize your thoughts. If you get stuck on content, you can pull from this list.

Write As Yourself

You don’t want to attend a program isn’t a great fit for who you actually are as a person, so why write a paper as someone else? Instead, think about your unique voice and write as yourself. Many times students try to incorporate big words or complex sentence structures into their essay to seem smarter. This is a mistake because if you misuse these things, you’ll come off badly. So just stick to who you are and what you know.

Have People Read Your Essay

Once you’ve written your essay have people look over it. Have your friends, family, teachers, and counselors read over the essay for feedback. Proofread the essay for any mistakes and make any revisions recommendations that make sense. The more people that give you feedback, the more you will be able to gauge how you can improve your essay.  

Writing your personal essay can be very stressful. However, if you follow these tips, you’ll have no problem impressing the acceptance board.