What is holding you back from writing a productive college entrance essay or scholarship application?

Question

Many students face challenges when writing college entrance essays or scholarship applications. Share your thoughts and experiences below:

1. Procrastination: Struggling to start or stay focused?
2. Confidence: Doubt your writing abilities or story?
3. Topic Selection: Having trouble choosing a topic?
4. Clarity and Structure: Difficulty organizing your thoughts?
5. Feedback: Uncertain about where to get useful feedback?
6. Time Management: Juggling multiple responsibilities?
7. Motivation: Lacking motivation or feeling overwhelmed?

Discuss these challenges and offer support, tips, and strategies to help each other succeed.

Answer 1

Writing applications is vulnerable and can be nerve-wracking.

Think about it -- you are putting yourself out there and often to an unknown audience. Who is going to read this? What are they going to think? What are they looking for and what do they care about? Will they like me? Will they reject me? You're not in the room with them when they are evaluating your application; you don't get to read their body language or make any additional explanations. This lack of control is scary!

If you're like me, those questions above can get in my way before I even begin brainstorming ideas to write about. But once I identify those nagging questions, I can put them aside (well, mostly put them aside!), take a deep breath, and get to work.

It's also very helpful to get support. Support could be having a tutor or a friend be a sounding board when brainstorming or having a compassionate reader give you feedback. Inviting other people to help you can make you feel less alone, more in control and more confident about how others might read your application.

Answer 2

None of the above. It's skill. Let's face it. A college application essay--or resume, or cover letter, etc.--is basically a sales pitch for you. College essay questions are often disguised versions of "why should we allow you to come here for school?" I was never great at selling myself, and I suspect many college prospects today are not great at it either. While other tutors may disagree with me on this, I believe this is an innate, not an acquired, skill. Either the student is comfortable selling themselves or they are not, and, if not, that puts them at a distinct disadvantage.