The College Essay Lab | ACT Update

Here's a big hangup I hear from our college advisory students, year after year: 

"I can't come up with anything original."

To that I say, "Balderdash!"

Because that's not THE THING.  Not your job.   

A college essay writer's task is not to be "original." 

Think about it, the average admissions officer reviews 1,000 applications each year.  Some applications have two-five supplemental essays, each.

If the admissions officer has three years' career experience, that amounts to at least 3,000 essays, perhaps triple or quadruple that amount when supplemental essays are part of the equation.

Your chances of surprising your admissions officer?

Approximately the same as Joe Biden pulling a Tom Brady, "un-retiring" and winning the presidency.

That is to say, zero.

Ah, so what IS your task?

To write something fresh.  Unusual.  Something INTERESTING.

How do you do this? 

Generally speaking, an interesting...

The College Essay Lab

Things went pretty, pretty well, judging from the reviews and the chat for last night's webinar, Top 10 College Essay Mistakes -- How to write an essay so compelling that college admissions officers will practically crawl naked over broken glass to admit your student.

I did my best to walk everyone though exactly what needs to go into a strong, persuasive personal statement and a few of the more common supplemental essays, as well as a bunch of mistakes to avoid.

Some of my advice was fairly conventional, some was definitely out of the box, like my comments on "writer's block" and how to defeat it.

Approximately 45% of the 200 folks who registered for the webinar couldn't make it, so I decided to post the recording. It will be available here, later this morning.

At the end of the presentation, I made a one-time, "exploding" offer to get our help brainstorming, editing and polishing your child's essays (not "writing it for you", mind you) for a 20% off...

One of the toughest things about college essay writing is that kids have never done anything like it in school.

In English or History class, most of the assignments involve writing about something else:  a quote, an event, a book, whatever.

College essay writing is a PERSONAL statement.  You're writing about yourself.

One trick is understanding your audience.  What qualities are your admissions officers looking for? 

Once you get a handle on that, the rest of the task is to serve it up to them with examples or anecdotes that support your thesis, and ultimately your candidacy at each college.

Your English teacher may not grasp the truth about what you're REALLY doing when you apply to college, because in all likelihood, she has never engaged in this activity herself. 

What am I talking about?  What are you REALLY doing when you apply to college, and submit your essays, description of your extracurricular activities, recommendations and transcripts?

...

I was talking with one of my essay editors yesterday about a draft that one of our clients put together.

"I don't know, the essay checks a lot of boxes, but there's just something about it that's lacking," my editor said.

"Agree. It's like there's no there, there" I said.  "Just, first I did this, then I accomplished that, etc."

To be fair, that's kinda sorta your task in a personal statement, to talk about yourself. 

But a good essay is about more than what you did. You can't merely regurgitate other parts of your application.

What about failures?  Embarrassing situations that you resolved, eventually?

Self-deprecation counterbalances the braggy stuff and makes the essay more HUMAN sounding.  You don't want to come across as an arrogant d-bag, at least on paper. :)

So what you write is important, but what your reader FEELS is super-duper important too.

Tomorrow night, I'm conducting a free online class, called Top 10 College Essay Mistakes -- How to...

What goes into a "good" college essay, anyway?

Does it have to be about some enormously dramatic, Lifetime Move-quality event that occurred in a young lad's or lass's life?

Some gigantic, breathtaking obstacle that the young chap or damsel overcame before going onto accomplish scholastic glory?

Or an abundance of wicked smaht-sounding, multi-syllabic words such as "myriad" and "plethora" stuffed into every sentence?

I bet you know the answers to those questions.

What about "good" and "bad" essay topics?

Getting cut from a team, then working out extra hard over the summer in Rocky's old gym, coming back, making the team and kicking the winning goal or making a buzzer beater from half court?

Writing about grandpa's words of wisdom?

Or oing political?

This Thursday night, I'm conducting a free online class to answer all of these questions. Some of my answers should confirm what you knew or suspected, but then again, some may surprise you, come to think of it.,

The class is called,...

These days, I'm derriere-deep with college essay editing for our clients, and have noticed certain repeated, widespread and repeated mistakes.

(Repeated twice in the same sentence was an intentional joke. Alrighty, as you were.)

I figured I'd share a few of them, to help your child come up with a winning personal statement and persuasive supplemental essays.

This Thursday night, I'm conducting a free online class, Top 10 College Essay Mistakes -- How to write an essay so compelling that college admissions officers will practically crawl naked over broken glass to admit your student.

This class is for kids and parents alike.  Please feel free to share this with anyone you know who will soon be staring at that blinking cursor on their laptop, wondering "What the devil do I have to write about" (or 2024 equivalent expression)?

I'm here to help.  Go here to get the details:

Essay Class

- Andy Lockwood

P.S.  Just to get this out of the way, I'll be making a...

ACT Ch-Ch-Ch--Ch-Changes Webinar

The folks at the ACT just announced some pretty big ch-ch-changes!

I've been wondering why.  But in lieu of sharing my (cynical) thoughts, let me tell you about tonight's webinar.   (I'll probably blurt out my half-baked theories at some inopportune time, tonight):

I'm hauling in our expert, Lockwood Test Prep Head Tutor, Marissa U, to 'splain answers to questions such as:

What are the changes?

When will they go into effect?

Are they good for fast test takers?

Slow test takers?

Kids weak in science?

Kids who aren't strong writers?

And, overall...

What do they mean for your kiddo?

Tune in tonight, Wednesday July 17 --  Marissa will answer these questions and more, including your questions -- we'll be live in chat.

Here's where to sign up for ths one-time, breaking news event:

ACT Webinar

- Andy "Never a Dull College Planning Moment" Lockwood

P.S.  Please share this invitation with anyone who could use this...

Hot off the presses:

The ACT is changing!

What are the changes?

When will they go into effect?

What do they mean for your kiddo?

Tune in tomorrow night, Wednesday July 17 --  our head tutor Marissa U will answer these questions and more, including your questions -- we'll be live in chat.

Here's where to sign up for tomorrow's event:

ACT Webinar

- Andy "Scoop" Lockwood

P.S.  You are hereby requested to forward this valuable invitation to any and all of your pals who could use this information!  

Free SAT or ACT Class Promo 

Good morning - two quickie announcements.

1. A Few Financial Aid and Essay Faux Pas - Live at 10 AM

Join me and Pearl for our weekly program, College Coffee Talk, live on our Facebook page.

Today's topic:  

A Few Financial Aid and Essay Faux Pas

2. FREE SAT or ACT Class Promo Expires Today

Announcing:  a free, no-obligation "test drive" of ANY of our upcoming SAT or ACT prep classes, either in-person or online.  Here's how it works:

1. Check out our schedule in July and August.

2. Pick the class you want to sample, for free.

3. After the class, our head tutor, Marissa will offer our absolute best deal we can give and still keep the lights on and landlord happy.  This is a one-time, "exploding" offer that expires 24 hours after class.

4. There is no obligation or pressure to buy anything, just the forthcoming incentive to enroll with us.

Enrollment expires at 5pm today.  I'm not sure we'll try this...

Although the numbers are slowly dwindling, approximately 75% of colleges allow applicants to apply without sharing their SAT or ACT. 

Who benefits from this policy? The answer may surprise you.

I've said it before and I'll say it again:  there's a difference between APPLYING test optional versus being ACCEPTED test optional.

The three most important academic components of a college application are 1. GPA, 2. rigor of course load and 3. standardized test scores.  These three factors comprise approximately 60% of the entire college application.

Simple logic:  if you remove one of these three academic components -- test scores -- the other two take on greater weight.  So do the non-academic ones (40% of the application).

Mass marketing by colleges has created a tsunami of applications, year after year.  But are those applicants from QUALIFIED students?

Or is a huge chunk of them from kids who think, "Princeton doesn't need test scores, so I'll throw in an...