How to Write Stand-Out College Admissions Essays

Webinar Transcription

2025-09-04-How to Write Stand Out College Admissions Essays

Lydia: Hello everyone. My name is Lydia Hollon. Welcome to, “How to Write Standout College Admissions Essays.” I’m gonna be your moderator tonight and I am a senior advisor here is at CollegeAdvisor. Uh, I’ve been with the company for about four years now. And in addition to advising students, I’m a member of the essay review team.

Lydia: I’m also a graduate of NYU, and in addition to my work here at CollegeAdvisor, I’m an education consultant and a former high school teacher. To orient everyone with a webinar timing for tonight, we’re gonna start off with a presentation. Then answer your questions in a live q and a. On the sidebar, you can download our slides and start

Lydia: submitting questions in the q and A tab, and we are recording this session so that you [00:01:00] can review the webinar again late later. So if you miss anything, do not worry. Now let’s meet our presenter, Katie.

Katie: Hi everyone. I am Katie. Um, I actually should update this. I have now graduated from medical school and I’m a first year, uh, resident at Mount Sinai Hospital, but I did go to Brown for undergrad where I studied medical anthropology and then I also went to Brown for medical school as part of their BSMD program.

Katie: And I’ll be talking to you all today about essay writing. 

Lydia: Fantastic. So before Katie goes into her presentation, we’re gonna do a quick poll just to get an idea of what grade you all are in. So it should be open now for you all to answer. And while I’m giving everyone an opportunity to fill out that poll, Katie, I have a question for you.

Lydia: What was the topic that you chose to write about in your personal statement for college? 

Katie: [00:02:00] Yes. Um, so I remember I hemmed and hawed and I wrote like one personal statement for early my early schools, and then decided to change my mind and write a different one for regular, which I think was better in the long run.

Katie: I ended up writing about one of the extracurriculars that I was doing at the time, which was working at a suicide hotline. Um, and I’ll, I’ll certainly be talking a little bit more about this personal statement in a second so I can kind of provide examples of, of ways in which I’m giving you tips, but also giving you examples of how I enacted them, um, for my college essays.

Katie: But one of those things was talking about little vignettes of different stories that I encountered while I was on the working on the hotline and also as part of those vignettes, betting things about myself and who I was and how I thought about people, and also how I reacted to these really high tension of emotional situations.

Katie: Um. Yeah,[00:03:00] 

Lydia: very cool. So looking at responses, we’ve got 68% are in 12th grade, 21% in 11th, 4% are in 10th, 1% in ninth and 5% are in that other category, which usually is parents or teachers. So we got a nice mix, but unsurprisingly, mainly seniors who are getting ready to apply to colleges and probably are either starting or maybe if you’re really ahead, even wrapping up, uh, on your personal statement.

Lydia: So I will go ahead and pass it over to you, Katie, to get us started for the presentation. Sounds 

Katie: perfect. All right, let’s get started. So let’s start with the basics. Um, so for some of you seniors out there, hopefully, um, and if you haven’t, I would do it right after this, or tomorrow morning when you have a chance, open up that common application, um, account, um, and you’ll kind [00:04:00] of start seeing all these essays populating.

Katie: So the first and the primary one that most people will refer to is the personal statement. This is the one that most people think of when they think of college essay, and it’s the one that we’ll spend the most amount of time talking about today. In terms of, this is the one that kind of, I like to think of it as like the centerpiece of your application.

Katie: It’s the one that, um, all the other essays kind of float around and like, um. Like kind of add more on top of the personal statement. It’s also typically one of the longer essays that you get to write for colleges now, um, I’ll be going more in detail, but a personal statement typically has multiple different prompts, but it’s typically more about who you are as a person or how you grew up and less about your like, specific academic interests or your career interests.

Katie: Next though we have the Y School slash y major essay. These are under the category of supplemental essays, which are just meaning essays on top of your personal statement. Um, the reason why I separate them out though from other supplemental [00:05:00] essays is because the Y school and the Y major essays pretty much across the board, most colleges will ask you to write this essay.

Katie: Um, on top of that, I like to think about it or approach it a little differently in the sense that this is an essay where there are some research gather or like information gathering involved. When you are writing a Y school essay, and I’m gonna use Brown as an example ’cause that’s obviously where I went.

Katie: When you’re writing a Y Brown essay, you wanna be doing research into what is Brown known for, what is, what is Brown’s extracurriculars like, what are some traditions that Brown does, um, that you might be able to fold into your school essay? Because the primary purpose of that essay is to show that you are genuinely and truly interested in the school.

Katie: And as part of that, you’ve looked into it. And, um. Essentially you’re proving your interest and your love and your, you’re, you’re, that you’re a good fit for this school. Now second is the why major essay. So this is again, another, there’s a little bit of research aspect of it in terms of, I think that you’ll find, hopefully a lot of you as you’re doing research into schools and [00:06:00] discovering different majors, that there are so many more majors out there than.

Katie: There are high school subjects, for example, like if you’re someone who’s interested at all in, I’m gonna go with biology again. ’cause I, you know, I’m a doctor and that’s kind of like what my eyes were on throughout this whole purpose period of time. Um, but the, with the biology, you’re like, okay, I took biology in high school.

Katie: I know what AP biology is like. And then you’re thinking about a little harder and you’re like, wait, looking at these school websites, there’s so many different biology majors, like a human biology, there’s like a public health, there’s like a psychobiology at some schools and there’s like a neuroscience, right?

Katie: There’s so many different things, even within just like the umbrella of biology that it can be really overwhelming. And so that’s where you wanna, again, take your time, do your research, and again, you want to be writing this essay with the lens of. Not proving you’re interest in it, but, and sort of like you have to, you kinda have to back it up, if that makes sense.

Katie: Like you really wanna show that this is something that you’re genuinely interested in and how are you going to write a story and write an essay that really showcases this genuine interest of [00:07:00] yours such that when I’m reading it as on the other side as an admissions officer, I’m thinking, oh my gosh, this is a person who’s really passionate about the subject and someone that I really want to come to my school and be in that department because they’re going to be a player in the department.

Katie: They’re going to be intellectually curious in classes, they’re going to be in small group discussions and engaging and adding new material into these group discussions and helping everyone kind of learn. From each other. Last thing is the other supplemental essays. We’ll kind of talk a little bit more about what those can look like because there really is a huge range of, of, of, under the category of supplemental essays, um, really, really, really broad.

Katie: I remember one essay I wrote, for example, was a quote from Kermit the Frog that was like, it’s better to be green or something like that. And then I had to write an essay responding to that prompt. And on the other hand, there’s like a supplemental essay where it’s sort of like, what’s the most difficult hardship that you’ve had to overcome and what did you learn from that challenge, right?

Katie: So it’s like kind of diff very different spectrums of what kind of essays you might [00:08:00] be, you might be answering, right? So why is writing a strong essay important? And I will say I’m very biased to someone who, um, like, you know. Did the whole gamut of applying to all these competitive schools, liberal arts schools, and I really firmly believe that essays are a big portion of how you can stand out from your classmates.

Katie: When it comes to, when it comes to these like competitive programs, be totally honest me, to put it perfectly blunt. Um, I think grades, people can get really great grades and we all know that grades can often change also, even just from teacher to teacher. Standardized testing is obviously part of the picture, but those really, I think of as like a gateway, if that makes sense.

Katie: Once you, once you have the good enough GPA, the good enough test score, there needs to be something more that differentiates you from the next other student who’s also applying to this very competitive school. Um, and so that’s where, in my opinion, the extracurriculars which we’ve been building for the past, you know, three and [00:09:00] a half years of high school.

Katie: Make a difference. And also this is where essays also make that huge difference. And, and I think part of what essays can also do is help make those three and a half years of hard work that you’ve put together, it makes those shine. And I wanna say that also writing an essay is very close to my heart as someone who’s like, you know, I had to apply to residency, for example.

Katie: So I just went through this entire cycle, just like you all are going through right now. And so this is like very much the same mindset that I apply to my own life, my own essays. And when you’re doing applications, you will continually have to write strong applications, essays. And so it’s definitely a skill to learn now early and well because it serves you well in the long run.

Katie: Um, and the other thing that I will often say is that people often don’t realize that the way that admissions. Works is, there’s a little bit of like a, I guess like thinking about it from, again, the admissions officer sectors were putting their hat on or getting into their head, however you wanna think about it.

Katie: But the way it often works is that there’s an admission officer assigned to your area. So for [00:10:00] example, I remember there’s admission officer who came to, who came to my high school, um, and from Los Angeles, and she was actually mentioning that she knew a particular history teacher from my high school was infamous for giving particularly harsh grades.

Katie: So you would have a straight A student and they would get like a C in, in AP history and it would be like very much like out of the blue. This was a really great student else elsewise. And so it’s, it’s a, it was surprising to me because I was like, oh, the admissions officer, like not only knows my high school, which is I was already surprised by, ’cause I went to a public school, it was, they knew my high school and they also knew this particular teacher and they knew this teacher’s reputation.

Katie: And so there’s something to the fact that like, oh, these admissions officers are assigned to your area and are kind of familiar with your area and the high schools in your area. So with that in mind, thinking of them now as this one human or or couple of humans who are reading through your application, you also wanna be thinking about essays as an opportunity to really connect with that person.

Katie: How it often looks [00:11:00] at the as is that this admissions officer reads through a bunch of applications and they find the couple that they, I think of it as it’s the couple that they wanna fight for. ’cause then they have to go to the next level and the next level, next level. And they keep fighting for you as it gets, right, as the pool kind of narrows more and more and more.

Katie: And so writing a good essay is oftentimes really, it really is the only chance that you have to establish that direct pull and that direct storyline, if that makes sense with your, with the admissions officer and say, Hey, I’m a great candidate and you want them to like you, you want them to feel like a personal connection to you, that you’re gonna be a great candidate for this school, a great fit.

Katie: And that will kind of progress you if that through the rounds, if that makes any sense. Um. So they’re really your best advocate and you want them to fight for you, and essays are a great way to kind of build that rapport. Okay, so what are the personal statement prompts? So now these are, honestly, they’re just listed and they exist here.

Katie: I don’t want any of you guys to be [00:12:00] spending time sitting here right now and reading through them and being like, oh my God, these are the prompts. If you’ve seen them before, great. If you haven’t seen ’em before, no worries. Once again, and I will talk more about this in the future. Oftentimes I would say the prompts are a, um, a place to start.

Katie: I think that oftentimes what, especially when I first meet my students and we’re first starting a brainstorm together, there’s a lot of pressure to feel like, oh, I have to answer directly the question that they’re asking. Like, okay. If it says, reflect on a time when you question or challenge the belief, I have to ex, I have to think about a time and I have to reflect on it, and I have to write exactly to this, to this essay prompt because again, that’s what unfairly, that’s what you’re used to when it comes to writing essays in high school, right?

Katie: It’s like analyze the text and give me the evidence that backs up your analysis. And that is very fair for high school writing. Not so true for college admission writing. I think oftentimes a better place, and I’ve worked with students on this, is to really think of a bunch of different stories or topics or [00:13:00] things that really are stand out in your mind as highlights of your life or just highlights of like who you are and things that stand out about you.

Katie: And also always good to crowdsource from friends and family on that, on that department. Um, start with the topic. Start with writing a good essay, and I promise you when you’re writing a great essay. It’ll fit into one of these prompts. It’s not, it’s not gonna be a big deal. Exactly. Which prompt it fits into.

Katie: Um, and so what I, what I’m trying to say, hopefully is that this, I want these prompts to kind of be a ni a, a starting point for folks to think about what the personal statement is meant to be. Like. It’s meant to be a clearly a personal statement. It’s not, it’s not meant to be academic in nature. It’s not meant to be like a hey, like, I’m really interested in biology and here’s why.

Katie: Um, it’s much more meant to be about who you are as a person. And from there, honestly, kind of ignore the prompts a little bit and, and get to brainstorming, get to writing, and we’ll come back to the prompts at the end. Okay. So how should my essays be structured? Now, this is a [00:14:00] really tough question because there truly are so many different kinds of essays, and I remember I had some, I, someone was talking to me about how people can structure them differently.

Katie: Let’s structure their essays differently. And I will say, you know, back in the day when I was writing my essay, I didn’t know I was doing it this time, but I explained it to you all as vignettes, which is like the style of essay that I wrote. I think most people are not writing that kind of essay. Most people are writing kind of a more classic essay where you’re, you’re, you’re presenting us with sort of some kind of tension filled moment or some sort of like story or thing that’s engrossing about yourself.

Katie: And then typically there’s some sort of climax involved, like some sort of what’s the problem being presented or something that I’m following you through. And then at the end, some sort of resolution in terms of we’re learning a little bit more about you and who you are. Um. That’s generally how I’ve seen most essays run.

Katie: So if, if you’re looking for a way to structure your essay and you’re at the very sort of brainstorming and you’re brainstorming or brainstorming topics even, um, that’s the way I would think about your essay in the beginning. You want there to be some [00:15:00] sort of grab of attention for the reader, because oftentimes admissions officers are spending all of maybe 15 minutes the first time at least just like reading through and skimming through your application.

Katie: And that includes your extracurriculars, that includes all the other like words and recommendations and things that are on your application, right? So you get one chance for this essay to stick in someone’s mind. Um, and you wanna think about it being structured in a way that’s clear and concise. Like it doesn’t, you, we don’t need to reinvent the wheel here.

Katie: It needs to be clear and it needs to have a good pull for it to, you know, for it to be memorable as a story to me. Um. In general, I would say I like to recommend students starting, starting by dropping us into a personal error experience. I find that that’s usually a good way to, first of all, grab someone’s attention without being like, you know, doing one of those sort of cringey, like, what do you think life means?

Katie: Like, or like some sort of rhetorical question where you’re, you’re, you’re cringing a little bit inside, um, dropping us into the moment, painting us like a [00:16:00] little bit of the tension and the surroundings and what’s happening in the moment will kind of bring us in with you and then go off and shoot off from there.

Katie: Um. And then I would say that when it comes to the other, the ending, and I’ll speak a little bit more about this, but I think a common mistake that people often make is that in their conclusion paragraph, they think that it needs to be exactly that. A conclusion paragraph where you’re wrapping up like, and so that’s how I learned, or that’s how like I became a more responsible, more compassionate human being or, or something where it feels like you’re trying to wrap up all the loose ends and trying to present the admissions officer with a picture of all the good attributes about yourself.

Katie: And I will say a great essay, and I’ll speak more and more on this again, but a really great essay throughout. The sentences throughout the words, through the, the actions that you are taking and throughout the actions that you are relaying about yourself. All of those things are coming through without you having to outright say it.

Katie: And so by the time you reach your conclusion paragraph, it really shouldn’t [00:17:00] be about you stating attributes of yourself that are lovely. It really should be something about maybe what you learned through the experience. Um, or it can be something a little bit more subtle, something like kind of a restatement of what’s important to you.

Katie: Um, rather than being like, oh, I, and that’s how, like, you know, and I’m great at teamwork, for example. Um. So we’ll get into what factors make for a great essay. I would say that, and this is the good versus the great, right? What makes a really great essay is an element of surprise. And what I mean by that, I think some people maybe take that a little too far with a surprise.

Katie: I remember I had, um, someone told me about an essay that they read that was written in the form of acrostic poem. Um, and the acrostic was medicine spelled out. And then for each of those letters, they wrote out a sentence or something that was supportive of why they wanted to go into medicine. I think maybe that’s a tough one to pull off.

Katie: Um, if I’m being totally honest, what I can say about an [00:18:00] element of surprise more is that as someone who’s now been in the admissions business. For a lot of years now, probably like seven or eight years at this point. I’ve also read a lot of essays and specifically I’ve read a lot, I’ll be honest, of personal statements and essays about medicine and essays about like being interested in stem.

Katie: And there’s a certain beat in cadence to a lot of these essays. Um, some of, some of which is like predictable. It makes sense and I want to see, but some of which where I’m become, it’s to the point where I can predict the next sentence or the next idea that you are going to present. And when it gets to that second point, that’s where if someone can surprise me with a little twist or a little bit of humor or just something that goes not where it’s expected, the unexpected, really I’m immediately awakened and like paying more attention to this essay.

Katie: And again, in that 15 minutes, if you can spring on an element of the unexpected in that 15 minute read of your application, that is again [00:19:00] what makes an application stick in our mind. Um, there. Yes, there’s, there’s, I think there’s, there’s many trajectories to the way an essay can go, but I’ll kind of give an example of what the surprise is.

Katie: It can be in the structure of your essay. So the, across the poem was the example that I gave before that I thought was difficult, a little difficult to pull off. Um, I wrote one of my essays in the form of an autopsy report. So at the time, and I will say even still evidence now, um, I was really into crime TV shows, but I was also like genuinely interested in forensics.

Katie: And so I basically did, I did like a fake autopsy of myself and, and I was like, this is an autopsy of Katie. She is, I was like 18 at the time. And my date of death was like the day that college acceptances or admission, like acceptances or rejections came out. And I basically pretended like I was, I was doing an autopsy of myself and using that to.

Katie: Explain who I was, if that makes sense. So it was just, it was in a funky format, but at the end of the day, it was still about me. And I [00:20:00] think I talked in it about how my brain worked and how I processed things and like gave a story about that. Um, so that’s a way in which there was a surprising structure, um, to an essay.

Katie: Um, a surprise can be also a topic of choice. One of my best friends and roommates at Brown, her surprise of choice was that she wrote one of her essays. It was a shorter essay that was just like a talk about an extracurricular. That was the, that was the prompt of the essay. And she talked about learning to ride a bike.

Katie: And I can imagine for most of you out there, I can’t, I actually can’t ride a bike. But most people out there can ride a bike and feel that it’s a pretty mundane task to be able to do, right? Like, it’s kind of a weird thing to write about on a college essay. It’s not particularly impressive. It’s not like hearing cancer or anything like that.

Katie: Um, but in this way she was able to. Again, surprise us with the topic of choice. I’m like, oh my God. She’s writing about learning to ride a bike. But clearly there’s something in the content of her explaining how she’s learning to ride the bike, that’s telling us about who she is. And she was [00:21:00] someone who had grown, grown up in a different country, had grown up very independent.

Katie: And so talking about learning to ride a bike was a way of talking about who she was and her opinion, like independent spirit. And that really came through in her essay. And so that’s another way, again, of having surprise, but at the end of the day, it’s still about who you are. Last one, I’ll say as an element of surprise, is a bait and switch.

Katie: And that’s like a maybe one that can be, it can be diff either dif differently, more difficult or easier to pull off. So an example of a Bateman switch I’ll, I’ll kind of use again in one of my essays is for, one of my essays I was describing about, I was describing why I was interested in medicine. Um, and this is because I was applying to all these, um, medical adjacent programs.

Katie: And so I had to, the prompt was. Tell us about why you’re interested in medicine. And so I kind of opened up the story just like I gave it as an example. I dropped us into a moment. I dropped me into a moment of, I was talking about suturing up a mitral valve, I think is [00:22:00] what it was. And so I dropped into the moment.

Katie: I was like describing the experience and describing like how I was feeling pressured and my hands were shaking because I was trying to rush. And then at the end of that, I cut it off and said, and I’m, I guess it’s just my sense of humor. I don’t know if it’s like a, what kind of sense of humor it is, but I kind of made a joke.

Katie: I was like, how? Like this is, this was actually on a pig’s heart and I was not in the middle of a lawsuit or I’m not gonna, not about to. Can be doing something illegal. Um, I was a medic, I was just working in a lab and suturing up a porcine heart, and then the rest of it was very much, much more cut and dry and talked about my interest in medicine and what, what, what other my interest in medicine.

Katie: Anyways, so the point is I don’t know if I really told that story particularly well, but it was a way for me to drop us into an extracurricular that I did that was related to medicine obviously, and was specifically very related to, well, specifically very related to like thinking about, hey, like my, like this, like being good at hands on and, um, interacting with like objects and [00:23:00] sewing.

Katie: In this case, suturing is a major part of medicine and so I was talking about this as a way to jump into the extracurricular and then also segue into my interest in medicine, if that makes any sense. Um, so that was an example again of a bait and switch where you drop someone in and it’s kind of not exactly what they’re expecting you to go for and then you.

Katie: Are able to then kind of get into more of the nitty gritty, like more classic part of the story of like explaining extracurriculars and experiences that may have led you to this particular interest. Okay. That was a lot of words, I apologize. But hopefully those examples of essays that I have read or written, um, or even my friends have written and clearly gone into great colleges with, um, hopefully those are all examples that make it a little bit more concrete and grounded by what I mean when I say surprise.

Katie: Okay. Second thing for what makes a really great essay is that every word matters. And gosh, this is something that I was struggling with just again like a couple of months ago, where when you only have 650 words to communicate something about [00:24:00] yourself, you really need to make sure that every sentence is communicating something.

Katie: And by that, again, I don’t mean something like being blatantly upright and saying, I’m trustworthy. I’m good at teamwork. I learned that teamwork is important, right? The fact that you’re saying, I’ve learned that teamwork is important, should be already embedded in the actions, in the descriptions of the things above.

Katie: So, um, thinking about ways in which you can embed that in the sentence that you’re writing before this. Um, so whether it be, for example, um, um, in my personal statement, um, one of the things that I wanted to embed throughout it was the fact that I was calm under pressure. And by the fact that I was painting these, I was talking with these events and then talking about, you know, the next steps of what occurred.

Katie: I was able to display the fact that I am, I was calm under pressure or calm in these kind of like wild environments or calm in these environments where other people might feel fear. Um. And kind of illustrate that in my essays without having to come around and say like, hi, I’m someone who I [00:25:00] feel is calm under pressure.

Katie: Um, I’ll talk a little bit more about examples of that in my personal statement when I get to that slide as well. Okay. So typical supplemental essay questions. Um, why do you wanna attend to the school? Questions about specific programs or majors. And here’s an example of one that’s a little bit more common, which is describe a community you belong to.

Katie: So when you’re thinking about these essays, I really want most of you to think about them as two kinds of separate categories. Within supplemental essay questions, you can think about them, or even three. The first category you wanna think about is the ones that are Uber, uber short. So they’re like, excuse me, a hundred words, sometimes even less.

Katie: Um, I remember when I was applying Stanford for example, had a whole list of questions that were just like, list and explain, like all of the articles and books that you read recently and like what they meant to you and why you enjoyed them, for example. Um, and that was like a really short [00:26:00] essay if and if if at all.

Katie: And you kind of just, it was like a short essay where you needed to pack a punch and you need to pack it fast. Then there’s a type of essay where it’s about the school and the major, like I was saying before, and they’re a little bit more straightforward and more research oriented. And again. Tip for all of you.

Katie: Make sure you dig in deep per school individually as to what majors are offered, what courses are in their majors. A good example I’ll often give my students for anyone interested in applying to Brown is that you can find the courses, like the classes the students are taking online. And if you’re anything like me, for example, I found looking at the classes every single semester to be some of the most exciting.

Katie: It was really exciting to be able to see like, what is the breadth of class I’m able to take and what can I learn about? Um, I still think about those classes to this day. And so look through those classes, see what intrigues you and see what department they’re in. Like look through those syllabi, um, see what books and what topics they’re talking about.

Katie: Um, and you might find that you’re surprised as well. Like we had a class about the history of board games and I bet that [00:27:00] hist that class was actually really amazing, but it didn’t fit in my schedule. Um, anyway, so there’s, there’s that kind of category research, a little bit more research oriented essays.

Katie: And then the final one I would think about is. The ones where, again, it’s trying to get to know who you are. So describe a community you belong to as a common one. Um, tell us about an intell intellectual curiosity of yours might be a different one. So these are ones aimed, again, kind of like a, they’re like a mini personal statement in the sense that you want to think of a good cohesive story that relates to the prompt at hand and kind of relay that and, and describe it.

Katie: Um, so one of, I’m trying to remember what prompted it was for, I think it must have been an intellectual, or I think it was maybe like something that was like un unexpectedly joyful or something like, like that, that was the prompt. And I talked about, um, how I learned to sing and how learning to sing actually really benefited my skills and debate in terms of like also giving me more [00:28:00] confidence and giving, like how altering your vocal intonations and like, you know, like how you deliver.

Katie: Words in Song also made a difference for how I delivered Words in Speech, to be totally honest. Um, and then finally, I should have said this for them, I’ll add on our fourth category of supplemental essays. These are sort of like the really bizarre ones and that’s where I was, I was given the example of Kermit the Frog.

Katie: I think U Chicago every year comes out with some of the wackiest prompts that there are, and those are always really fun to read. My year, I think there it was, um, what’s like the similarity and differences between an apple and an orange, for example. And with those kind of more abstract ones, there’s a little bit more creativity and room for you to write what you want to write in terms of answering.

Katie: You don’t have to directly answer the 15 apple, orange. You can kind of use it as a metaphor to talk about something that’s important for you. Okay. All right. So I promised that I would talk about all these things about my personal essays, and then I ended up doing it way earlier than this slide. [00:29:00] But, so a little bit more about what I actually included in the essays for the school that I got into.

Katie: So I, um, ended up matriculating this, obviously to the Brown PMI program. Um, I can talk a little bit more about that if anyone has any questions. But basically it’s a eight year combined program. You do your undergraduate and then after that you do your medical school. So when I was applying, what I’m trying to say is that I had a lot of essays to write.

Katie: Um, they had a lot of things that they were evaluating me for, um, to make sure that I was a good candidate for both the undergraduate education as well as a med school education. So, for my personal statement, I actually, and I’ll kind of talk about hopefully my essays as, um, a whole kind of. Hosted different essays so that it comes together and it makes sense.

Katie: Um, my personal statement was primarily, it was a very straightforward essay actually, because it was just about an extracurricular. It was purely about an extracurricular that I did, that I really enjoyed and got a lot of out of. And I think in that essay, some of the things that I was able to communicate was, first of all, my interest in mental health.

Katie: That one I think [00:30:00] comes as an obvious for someone looking at a suicide hotline. Um, calm under pressure. But also I was able to communicate a lot about my interest in language and words. And at this time I was actually applying for a major in cognitive science, the focus on linguistics. And so part of what I was trying to communicate was an interest in medical humanities.

Katie: I was interested in this biology side of it, but I was also very interested in humanities as well. And so in this essay at least I was able to get across a couple of personality traits about myself. Um, hopefully, um, hopefully that I was a good listener, for example, and that I was like able to calm someone down.

Katie: Um, but also that, um. I was able to communicate a little bit about like the kind of direct interests I had. I talked later on a different essay about child abuse, which is something that I encountered on the suicide hotline. Um, I was able to talk a little bit also about my interest in language and how when you are listening to someone and I’m very much listening deeply to someone, there’s a lot in the way they deliver their words [00:31:00] and what they say and also what they don’t say that is really incredibly meaningful and in this case, actually really important for triaging crisis.

Katie: Um, and so I was able to communicate all of that by, through this essay and. Then because it was, like I said, it’s kinda the core of my, of, of, of all the essays and my other essays. For example, in my essay where I talked about my interest in cognitive science linguistics, I was able to reference back to this and say, oh, I’m actually really interested in how language develops in in young people.

Katie: Like as they’re growing up. How might abuse or how might different life circumstances and trauma impact how we learn about language? And also from a societal standpoint, how does language, I like how does language change and like how does it kind of like has a society like grows in every generation changes like language changes with it too.

Katie: And so that was a little bit of what my why major essay was about. Um, for my Y school essay, I was able to point out a particular class at Brown called [00:32:00] Culture and Health, which I actually ended up taking, um, which is in medical anthropology. And I was talking about how there was like this particular disease, which is a pion disease that’s related specifically to a cultural practice found in a particular indigenous population.

Katie: And how, what really interested me was this intersection of culture and of medicine. Um, and that was again, a huge, going back again to the medical humanities, right? I kept circling back to that over and over and over again. Um, so those were kind of my first set of essays. And then I also had essays that were a little bit more about me.

Katie: So I had an essay, well, okay, this one’s not, I said that and that wasn’t a good example. I had an essay that was about how I failed as a leader of my science oly, or how I felt like. How I felt like I really had failed my team and how I grew from that experience. Um, I also had essays about, uh, one of my favorite essays that I wrote was about what home meant to me.

Katie: And I was able to talk a little bit about my upbringing and my family and my childhood and what it meant to me to be living in [00:33:00] this house that I grew up in Los Angeles after, um, quite a bit of moving around in my childhood. Um, and so these were things that I hope, like, I hope I’m illustrating well, kind of paint a picture of who I am, paint a picture of my intellectual interest, and I will say what ultimately at the end of the day, what I hope to get across is.

Katie: That all of these essays need to have require a lot of introspection. If there’s one word that you can take outta this entire webinar, I hope that that word is introspection because a lot of this requires digging deep and getting to know a little bit more about your own interests and really trying to follow that and explore what it is about those interests intrigues you and getting a sense of who you are.

Katie: I think there’s nothing that can be a better like recommendation that I can give to like any young person in the world than introspection. And so I said all those things and told you about all those things, and I tell you that today I am. A psychiatry resident, so that that interest in language is still very much true to me.

Katie: I majored in medical anthropology. Like I [00:34:00] said, I took those classes. I said, so there was some part of me in high school that despite the fact that I had never heard of the word anthropology, like I never mentioned the word anthropology in any of my essays because I didn’t know that was a thing at the time.

Katie: Um, but that I had some sort of presence of, of mind or some sort of introspection. Some something existed within 18-year-old me to know what intrigued me and that I could follow that line of thought through to this day and still be someone who’s like, interested in psychiatry, interested in words, interested in children.

Katie: Um, so that’s again my, my pull for, for introspection. And I will also say, again, as someone who’s read a lot, a lot of essays, I think that the digger, the, sorry, the deeper you dig and. Really try to be thoughtful and spend time with it. I spent a lot of times when I was doing like a, I was taking a bus for an hour each way that particular summer during my for a summer program.

Katie: Um, and I would spend that entire hour like listening to music, basically having like my like main story protagonist [00:35:00] moment staring out the window, but like really thinking deeply about what it is I wanted to, to pursue in my future, what I wanted to look like, and also what I wanted to write about. Um, and more time spent thinking is always worthwhile.

Katie: Okay. So how can you stand out in your supplemental essays? Um. I’ve sort of alluded to this already, but the first big point that I ho I wish to make to most of you is this idea of risk stratification. So now that I’m a little older, I learned a little bit about finances and I understand that finances are very similar in the sense that, right, you have some things that you put your money in, which are safer and some things that you put your money in that are more risky when it comes to making money.

Katie: A portfolio, I’m sure a lot of, I feel like these days, everyone like understands stock portfolios and crypto more than I do. Anyways, the point is it’s a portfolio of essays because that’s what it is. You have the personal statement, but I promise you, you will have many other essays. I think at the end of this process, I’d probably written like 30 essays, 30 [00:36:00] different essays.

Katie: And so when you think of it that way, you can think of how you are taking more risk or more of that surprise element I was talking about earlier. You might take more risk or more surprise in some of your essays, and then other ones are much more straightforward. Um. Excuse me. Examples of ones that may be more straightforward by default are like the why school or the why major essays.

Katie: Those honestly end up tending to be, to end up coming out a little bit more safe because at the end of the day, what you were writing about is you’re writing about the school and why you wanna go there, and there’s no, not a lot of need for like really crazy structure or like acrostic poem or anything like that.

Katie: Um, and then you might take bigger risks in other parts of your essay. So I gave you the autopsy report, for example. I would say that exam, that story about me feeling as a leader, um, that was also a risk that I was taking, but then my personal statement was a lot safer. It was was about an extracurricular and it was clearly something that was like meaningful to me and was a kind of, one could argue like an obvious like thing that I would definitely wanna write an essay [00:37:00] about, if that makes sense.

Katie: Um, and so that’s where you can kind of play with different risks, whether it’s in structure, whether it’s in, um, format and, and like what you choose to talk about. Um, but that’s where you can kind of like. That’s where the brainstorming comes in, where you can brainstorm so many different things and it’s like not a single one of those things could, could be wasted.

Katie: Um, even things that you throw away, like all of these things, you writing so many essays that you will need the maximum amount of brainstorming of topics that could possibly occur these next couple of months. Um, okay. My second thing is to really comb through each and every word. Um, a good, I think a good.

Katie: Application writer even more so than like a book writer, is precise in their words. You really want to choose words that mean what they, what you want them to mean and communicate the full like breadth of what you hope that they communicate because you really don’t have a lot of work. I know six 50 words, some of you may sound like quite a bit of words, but when it comes to like telling your life [00:38:00] story, it actually you’ll find that you’ll end up being like, I need, need to cut out word count and I don’t know where to cut it out.

Katie: And so really every sentence, hopefully both advances the story, but also is getting, is getting closer and should be communicating something about you to us as the readers. Um, as you’re workshopping this and as you’re working through, like finding those words, feel free to find your own style and tone. I would say, for example, like telling a joke in your essay, um, a, a, a joke that fits in with your humor and is like an appropriate joke, for example, is not wasted words that’s telling us something about you.

Katie: It’s telling something about your humor, for example. Um, so. Really spending time. And again, I just wrote like a personal statement esque essay. I spent so much time after coming up with a topic, going through word by word, sentence by sentence, making sure that everything is exactly how I want it to sound and that the flow was exactly the way I want it to flow.

Katie: Okay. Can you reuse essays? I’ll [00:39:00] keep this answer short because the answer is absolutely yes. Um, I will caveat by saying that for those of you who might be applying to, um, well, no, this is just true across the board. For those of you who are applying to schools that, like the ucs, they all have one big, like essay portal.

Katie: But if you’re applying to schools like the Ivys, for example. Northeastern, or I’m just thinking of schools that I grew up in, Poona, the liberal arts schools, each of those schools actually does have a different vibe. Um, and that can be a, like a later conversation slash like other webinars, we’ll talk a little bit about that.

Katie: Like how is Brown different from Dartmouth, for example. Um, and so when you’re writing that why school essay, you wanna make sure the essay is actually being tailored for each individual school. Um, you want to be thinking about like what is the vibe and the fit that the students are looking for because when you’re applying, you want to try and think about how you can best make an argument that you fit that vibe for getting in.

Katie: Um, things that can be reused include, I think like a good crux of a lot of these, [00:40:00] like, um, about me. Supplemental essays can often be reused. Um. As long as you just make sure, you always double check that. If you’re referencing a school in your essays, make sure that you change the school name. Um, I rarely ever did except for my Y’s school essays.

Katie: And so I kept those all very separate. Like I kept all of my supplemental essays separate from my Y’s school and my major essays because I was very careful that these latter two essays were always full of things that were specific to the school. Okay. Oh goodness. I’m running outta time. I’ll go fast.

Katie: Okay. A good timeline for writing. Um, make sure I’ve said this multiple times now. Introspection. Brainstorm a ton. Brainstorm more than you draft. I know that sounds wild. ’cause most people out there are like, Hey, you need to write the first sentence to get writing. That’s absolutely true. But also if you’re writing multiple drafts, you might just burn out emotionally or writing paper, like writing things.

Katie: And so what I’d rather you do is spend a lot of time just like writing out little blurbs ideas that come to your mind. Your notes app on your phone is gonna be your best friend. I still have literally my notes app from my junior, [00:41:00] like that junior summer of me jotting down things. Um. And that can be the starting place for you, brainstorming and talking through with someone about what might make into a good essay.

Katie: Um, a lot of times students will come to me and o oftentimes I feel really awful, but the first draft, I’m almost always tearing apart. And so I, I hate when, um, I, I feel that I hate, I feel really bad when students come to me with like multiple drafts in a row and I’m like, I have to tear all of these apart and you can’t use any of these.

Katie: I’d rather you come to me with a bunch of different ideas. We talk through the idea, flush it out, and then we plan out how you’re gonna write the actual essay when it comes to it. Okay. Um, summer after junior year’s, a great time to start jotting down things. Um, even earlier is totally fine. And the first deadline is November 1st.

Katie: So for those of you who are, um, seniors out there, if you’re looking at early start getting to write, otherwise, I would say that for me at least, my Thanksgiving break was a pretty good time, but also like Thanksgiving’s only one day for my family. So I spent that time writing. And then I also [00:42:00] spent a lot of winter break writing.

Katie: I’ll be totally honest. Um, but the earlier the better you can get it done. And you never wanna wait till the last minute because that website, it will crash. If it can crash, it will crash. Okay. Common mistakes that I’ve seen in essays. First one being think like spending time writing. I think a lot of times we read like really beautiful literary novels that are full of flowery language and we think, Hey, this is good writing.

Katie: This is what application essays want to, like application admission officers want to see. And the truth is, good writing for a fiction book is not necessarily good writing for admissions essay, right? Like you can spend. 150 words describing to me the Jew drops on the, on the grass, uh, the, the morning before your race and how beautiful the weather was and how like all these things were occurring.

Katie: And I will have gotten nowhere in those 150 words. Like, I will have not learned a single more thing about you, and this has not done anything for me as a reader. And so there you are wasting word count that really should be used to tell me more about yourself or tell me more about the [00:43:00] story or event you’re trying or build up tension or do something for me.

Katie: Um, if you’re wasting too much time on flowery language, like write, write well and, you know, write the details that need to be written to kind of paint a, like flesh out a beautiful picture. But I don’t need like two or three adjectives per now. Um, that is a waste of word count. Okay. Second thing I would often say is asking too many editors for feedback.

Katie: Now I am and was someone actually as a high schooler who had a pretty strong sense of. Writing style and tone even at that time. And so I remember actually I asked a couple of editors and there were a couple of people where I just simply did not agree with their edits. It just did not jive with how I wrote or thought about what I wanna do.

Katie: And I also had editors who were really like, who, like their edits made sense to me. And like, I feel like I was constantly moving forward and there were people that I also, I could even brainstorm with and talk through ideas with. Those are the people you wanna go through. I would say three is about a decent amount.

Katie: And for my parents out there, if you [00:44:00] can help your kid write amazing and if they don’t come to you with your essays, also don’t feel hurt. Um, I never went to my, my, in fairness for my parents, English was not their first language, but still at the same time, they were not people that I. I wanted additional comments.

Katie: Um, they had, they, you know, they’re my parents. I have enough comments too about who I am from them. Um, and these essays, I needed them to be from a third person, third eye source, third eye, second eye source, whatever, you know what I meant? Um. Another source and I needed them to be the ones to comment. And so you find like really three editors who you really trust.

Katie: That could be your English teacher, that could be someone you hired. I definitely hired someone, although at the time CollegeAdvisor did not exist. Um, but I definitely needed that additional person to help me work through and just sit there and like grind through my essays. Um, so too many cooks. Is it too many cooks in the kitchen is also not a good idea.

Katie: ’cause then you get pulled in many directions and you’re like, ah, I don’t know what’s going on. Um, that can also cause you to be more stressed. All right. [00:45:00] Final piece of advice, um, for standing out, avoiding the generic. Um, hopefully I’ve given you enough examples of ways in which you can avoid the generic, um, ways that you could implement surprise and, and different things, whether it’s in structure or in topic that you can do.

Katie: Um, but it’s always hard because everyone’s worst fear, I feel like these days is being too generic. And so my advice is read a couple of really great essays. I love the John Hopkins essays that worked. I think that hopefully the website still exists ’cause that’s one of my favorite ones that I always recommend.

Katie: I would read a couple of great essays and then I would stop. Don’t read a ton of essays because the more essays you read, honestly, the more you’re gonna feel like there’s nothing new that I could possibly say about myself. I definitely remember having that feeling. Um, and oftentimes also the, like the essays that you can like purchase online, you don’t know if it’s the essays that caught them in or if they were there, like they got ’em for other reasons, if that makes sense.

Katie: Like, you know, like the, like they may have had like an exemplary extracurricular that got them in their essay. Um, anyways, the point is read a couple of really, really great [00:46:00] essays. Um, and then from there. Dive right into the pool and just start brainstorming. The rule of shoot show not tell really is true.

Katie: Again, going back to that flowery metaphorical language. Um, and then I think an often mistake that I, I also will see a lot of is like a lot of like starting out sentences. Like I, blah, blah, blah, I blah, blah. Make sure that you are varying up your sentence structure. And my last thing is, and this is my first time adding this to the webinar, but I realize that.

Katie: Chat. GBT is much more prominent now, and I’m also using it in my, in my day to day. And what I will say is I have not yet read a chat GPT essay that has stood out to me. It’s always falls into the grammar generic. So if you ever wanna read a generic essay, you could always ask chat, GBT to write an essay about your life.

Katie: I see what they give you, and I promise you it’ll fit under that first bullet point, and I promise you also that I’ll be able to tell. Okay, last one. Um, don’t feel like you need to directly answer the prompts. I feel like I already touched upon this, but, um, write [00:47:00] the essay you want to write and I, and it will fit into the prompts.

Katie: Um, you, you, you can mesh it around to make it fit. Um, what’s more important is that you’re writing the essay about this, about yourself and the story that you have to tell. Use the prompt as a jumping off point. Okay, that was me talking very fast. Finally, we have gotten two questions and answers. 

Lydia: Yeah. So that is the end of the presentation portion, like you said, Katie, we’re gonna jump into the q and a.

Lydia: I encourage those of you who are joining us tonight to feel free to continue asking questions in that q and a tab. Uh, just click on it. If you’re not able to, uh, access it, just try joining using that custom link in your email. Um, rather than joining through the landing page. If you come back in, it should probably be there.

Lydia: But let’s go ahead and dive in with the questions. So the first question that we have, and you touched on this a little bit about like AI and, you know, you haven’t read an essay written by AI that really, [00:48:00] you know, met the smell test. But are there ways that you can use AI that can actually be helpful, or should you avoid it in general in every process, part of the process of writing your.

Katie: Hmm, that’s a good question. And Lydia, I’m sure you have also thoughts on this that you can weigh in on. And I was actually like listening to a, a talk about like the ethics of this. Um, actually the other day, when it comes to like fiction novel writing, I would say that I think that AI is perfectly appropriate to, um, sometimes when you’re thinking about how to rephrase a sentence, um, sometimes also when you’re thinking of, to be honest, like journaling prompts, like prompts to help you brainstorm.

Katie: Like what are, like, ask me some questions that will help me get started or get those juices flowing. Um, that can be another way, really helpful way to use ai. Um, but I think in general that. It, it can’t, it can’t, like AI can’t because it’s summarizing. It’s like gathering information from all of the voices out there.

Katie: Including [00:49:00] like, right, like business voices. Like literature. Like there’s, there’s no, like college admissions, ai, um, um, I don’t know if there would be, that’d be kind of odd, but it’s hard to, you can’t capture like your pers your personality and your tone and your humor in, and, and like that kind of like rhythm that only like a, a good, a good writer who’s also 18 years old can, can mimic, um, or, and can, can write in.

Katie: And so that’s where I think like, don’t ask it to generate, um, sentences from nothing for you. Like don’t give it ideas and ask to generate sentences because that is where it be falls into that like, not so good category.

Katie: Lydia, you’re muted. 

Lydia: Thank you. Uh, I agree. Like, um, I, I think that AI can be great for, um. If you don’t have someone that can read your essay, I think sometimes taking it with a grain of salt, it can be good as a reviewer. And I think it can be good when trying [00:50:00] to, uh, bounce ideas around for the initial outlining process.

Lydia: But the actual writing itself should always be you. No one can tell your story the way that you can. Um, and even if you ask chat GBT to come up with an idea for an answer to one of the common app prompts, if it doesn’t know anything about you, it’s really not gonna be able to tell the story. So I think you already kind of having an idea of what you wanna say and then using it to refine it is really the key rather than using it to do the majority of the work.

Lydia: Um, another question that we have, um, you talked about how with the school specific essay is you kind of wanna know what the vibe of the school is and what they’re looking for in the student. One student asked, how do you know what the vibe of the school is and how to align yourself with that? 

Katie: That’s a very good question.

Katie: That was something that I also, I would say there wasn’t a lot of webinars like this when I [00:51:00] was growing up in high school, so I, I wish I had known a little bit more. So a couple of things. First of all, like sometimes like, I think I sometimes every year do like a brown talk, for example, where I’ll talk a little bit about the vibe at Brown.

Katie: Um, you could ask someone who’s an alumni from your high school, um, who’s there at the school now, oftentimes, like they will know the vibe of their school, but also of like other schools that are like local or like competitors schools, like I would say amongst, um, like, you know, like I think most, like for example, like now that I’m in New York, I’m realizing like new the New York, the New Yorkers have their own sense of like what the vibes of the different schools here are like too.

Katie: Um, and so just asking alumni, asking students is a great way. Another thing that I will do, just like separately that I. Um, when I’m researching about a school that I wish I had known about before was to go on their, like Eventbrite or go on their Facebook and then go into like the event section, like literally set my zip code to the school zip code and you kind of get to see like what the events are at the school, including, like, I, like [00:52:00] Brown for example, does a lot of theater and musical theater, but we also do like cultural part.

Katie: We do all these different things and you kind of get a sense of like, hey, like what are the students up to? Like what are they, like, what are the popular clubs on campus? Like that kind of stuff also kinda gives you a sense of vibe. Um, and of course touring the school. Um, if you can, if you have the means to.

Katie: I will certainly say I did not tour a single East Coast school before I got into them. Um, and so it’s, it’s definitely not a must. Um, but when you, when maybe once you get in also that cannot be a helpful way of deciding if that’s a school’s right for you. 

Lydia: Yeah. Um, another question that we have is. How do I find a topic that clicks when I’m trying to identify what to write about?

Lydia: Oh, that’s a really 

Katie: good question. A topic that clicks. Um, I, well, I’ll start with saying, I think that going back to like, I know I’ve read this so often, but like the brainstorming, sometimes what I would find when I was [00:53:00] brainstorming was I would like get this like jolt of like, Ooh, I could talk about this thing.

Katie: And then I would, like, literally I’m using, I’m using my phone, so I’m, I’m using my thumbs and I type it out. Like on this bus that I’m sitting, I’m typing out like the thoughts. And then at some point I find that my thoughts Peter out and I’m like, oh, maybe that was like a good little burst of inspiration, but it didn’t really have a place that it could go in a essay.

Katie: So an example of this, like I don’t, I don’t know why I thought this was a good essay. I like had this jot of inspiration. I was like, what if I talk about like how my mind worked when I was little and I got lost in a supermarket? What I was thinking and I was like, talk, I was like, oh, this is gonna be a great s idea.

Katie: Or I had enough of one when I was like talking about why, I was gonna talk about why I hated biology as a way to, to talk about what, but I loved about biology. I don’t know some, somehow in my mind that was also, that was also edgy. Um, and so I wrote up those things and then I found that I petered out.

Katie: And that’s how I knew that to be honest. Like, I couldn’t make a whole essay out of it. [00:54:00] It just, it couldn’t come and gel together. Um, when you find a topic that clicks, I think what happens is that you’ll be really excited about, uh, about the start of it, especially like you’ll have, and then as you write, you might like, oh, I thought of a really good, for example, like starting sentence that would really like jolt someone’s curiosity.

Katie: And then usually what happens is as you write the essay, there’s like, there is when someone can ask you questions about it and like grills you on it, which I often did ask friend, friends and editors and people to do was like, what is. What ultimate, like why are you talking about this? Like what is the, like are you just telling a funny story or a story that like your family loves to tell about you, like you falling over as a kid or something like something funny?

Katie: Or is there something that you’re ultimately trying to communicate with the story that you’re, that you’re trying to tell? Um, and if you could answer like, kind of that last question, that usually points you the direction of an essay that where it ends up clicking a little better.

Lydia: So before I ask the last few set of questions, I’m [00:55:00] gonna do our, uh, just a reminder about CollegeAdvisor and who we are. So CollegeAdvisor’s team of over 300 former admissions officers and admissions experts is ready to help you and your family navigate the college admissions process in one-on-one advising

Lydia: advising sessions. We’ve already helped over 6,000 clients in their college journeys, and we found that CollegeAdvisor students are two to four times more likely to get into colleges like Stanford, Vanderbilt, and Harvard. So increase your odds and take the next step in your college admissions journey by signing up for a free 45 to 60-minute strategy session with an admissions specialist on our team using the QR code

Lydia: on the screen. During this meeting, you’ll receive a preliminary assessment of your academic profile along with some initial recommendations, and in the end you’ll also learn more about the premium packages we offer that pair you with an expert who can support you in building your college list, editing your essays, and much more.

Lydia: All right, so Katie, if it’s okay with you, because we have so many questions, [00:56:00] uh, we might do a speed round with some these. Yes. Let’s do it. Okay, so quick example, what is the difference between show and show and tell? Like can you kind of show us what the difference 

Katie: is? Yes. Um, so for example, instead of saying I am a really good listener, like I’m a thoughtful person, when it comes to me talking about, like my work on the suicide hotline, I told them a specific story about this kid who wanted to jump off of the roof of his barn.

Katie: And this was someone who was living in like rural camp, like rural somewhere, and was very different from me living in LA City, girl life. And so I was able to illustrate how, like, how listening was important. And also like that I could relate and understand differences of like, of culture and people and or backgrounds without having to be like, hello, like I am.

Katie: I appreciate diversity of opinions and experiences. 

Lydia: [00:57:00] Definitely, uh, another one we’ve got is how do you stand out if you haven’t had any significant challenges in your life? 

Katie: Yeah, that’s another one. The good question that I often get. I think what often what we realize is that we do a lot of comparing of traumas, especially with like social media and like just the world in general.

Katie: Um, and everyone has their things that they struggle with. And, and so, um, thinking about what those things might be for you, instead of trying to think about like what, what are the biggest like, life traumas I could possibly talk about? Um, like I said, in one of my essays, I talked about moving around a lot as a child was like part of a very minor part of my essay, but I was able to hint at it by talking about the importance of the house that I lived in and sort of my family struggle with getting me to that house.

Katie: And that wasn’t like a, like I, there wasn’t a particularly big trauma or life hardship. Uh, it just was a part of my life and I was able to talk about it without being like, oh my God, like. I dunno, does it need to be like, it? Not every, like, not every essay has to be a [00:58:00] trauma porn essay, if that makes sense.

Lydia: Yeah. Uh, and I would say that honestly some of the best essays that I’ve had, but not that, um, colleges aren’t looking for the people who have had the hardest lives and the people who have, you know, had the saddest experiences. Um, yes, having a difficult moment and overcoming it can speak to who you are as a person, which is why I think a lot of college application essays do sometimes talk about difficult moments because they are really good at illustrating sometimes who you are as a person and then your character.

Lydia: But that doesn’t mean that, that they’re necessary. That’s not what colleges are actually looking for. They’re just looking for you to tell a story that really captures who you are and how you’ve learned. Some great essays that I’ve read have been about, you know, someone being really self-aware about the fact that they haven’t really gone through much and maybe they hadn’t experience that forced them to realize the, you know.

Lydia: Privilege or the blessing that it is that they haven’t had to go through certain things, [00:59:00] um, in their life and how that inspired them to do X, Y, Z and how they learn from that. Um, another question that we have is, and I’ll just answer this one quickly, is should you write different essays for every college you’re applying to?

Lydia: So, um, when it comes to the personal statement, you’re doing a common app that gets sent to all of your colleges and then, like Katie was talking about earlier, a lot of colleges, especially more selective ones, will have those supplemental essays and those are ones that you’re writing for that specific school.

Lydia: It just goes to them. Um, but like she was saying, you can repurpose general ideas. Like a lot of colleges may ask, why are you pursuing this major? What you write for MIT may be somewhat similar to what you write for Caltech or something like that. But obviously you’re gonna tweak it a bit because those are different schools.

Lydia: But you may be trying to major in the same thing and they may have. You know, similar appeal. Um, and then I’ll finish with [01:00:00] our last, this last question. Does our essay have to relate back to our desired major? 

Katie: No, absolutely not. Especially not your personal statement. I would say one of the biggest mistakes you can do is talk about your intended major in every single one of your essays.

Katie: That makes for the driest application, because again, I’m reading all of these applications, I, I know you’re writing different ones, but I read all of them at once. And so if you’re reading the same thing over and over again, I’m like, Hey, I got the point already. Um, the personal statement, um, there should be like one essay, the Why major essay that’s really about your interest and your desired major.

Katie: But really the rest of them, I wanna to know who you are and who you are gonna be as a student as part of this college, not just as you know who, what you’re gonna study. 

Lydia: Yeah, and I would say that, you know, uh, this is something that I feel like pre-med students or students that are related, interested in that realm.

Lydia: Tends to be particularly guilty of because Yes, absolutely. You know, you’ve been thinking about for, for a lot and um, for a lot of time. And a [01:01:00] lot of the time you may have a lot of extracurriculars that are aligned with that. But again, like an interesting pre-med student is someone who also has other things that they’re interested in and has varying reasons that they’re interested in pursuing medicine.

Lydia: So like there are dozens and dozens and dozens of students that are applying to do pre-med or you know, the other popular majors. And a lot of them will say, oh, I’m doing it ’cause I wanna help people and here’s like all the volunteering that I’ve done. But if that’s what you say for all of your essays, it just starts to.

Lydia: Feel like you’re like everybody else. So don’t be afraid to expose or share those like quirkier sides of yourself. And I would say that’s general feedback or, you know, advice for everyone. Um, I think sometimes people think that personal statements are either share the biggest sob story of your life or talk about how great you are.

Lydia: And you have to list all your accomplishments. And it doesn’t have to be either of those things. Like think of it almost like you’re [01:02:00] going on a date. Um, and like you get like 30 minutes to give this person an idea of who you are and what it would be like to spend the next four years with you. Um, so like, give them a slice of your life that you feel really captures who you are as a person.

Lydia: And maybe that’s an extracurricular that you were a part of and like a really stressful day that you had with your robotics team and how you had to work together and kind of. Lead them through a difficult challenge that you faced. Or maybe it’s a tradition that you have with your family and it’s cooking pasta with your grandmother and you know how that taught you patience or something like that.

Lydia: But all of those things give a picture of who you are outside of the cookie cutter things that they can see on your resume, in your transcript. And that’s really what they’re trying to get to the part two part of when they’re reading those things. So before we finish, Katie, is there like a final word piece of advice warning that you would wanna give to our students before we finish?

Lydia: [01:03:00] Um. 

Katie: I guess it’s that for all of my seniors out there who you have a couple months left, don’t be afraid to write about like those, like, like those kind of sillier parts of mys of yourself. Some of my favorite essays that I’ve read of, like my friends who have told me like they wrote about their love of puns or like the fact that they hate writing introduction paragraphs as they’re writing the introduction paragraph to their personal statement, right?

Katie: There’s like ways that you can have fun and play with it, and um, at the same time also reveal something about yourself. So keep those, keep those little bits of yourself in mind still. 

Lydia: Yep. Okay. Well thank you so much Katie, for imparting your wisdom on us. Um, and I know that there were plenty of ans questions that we had tonight.

Lydia: Hopefully you all found the information that we were able to share in the q and a useful. And again, this session’s being recorded. Um, I think a lot of the things that Katie was talking about earlier applied to a lot of [01:04:00] the other questions that we didn’t necessarily get a chance to get to. Um, and hopefully we can see you all again for our next webinar.

Lydia: Thank you for joining us and have a great night. Bye.