College 101

College 101 What are the two or three things you, personally, MOST need from a college? This, by the way, is ALSO the reason nobody can do this work for you. Ultimately, you’re the one who really knows your priorities and the things you most need in order to grow. Okay, maybe I’m overreacting â€" but I cannot for the life of me understand that award. That’s the case at St. John’s College, which has campuses in Maryland and New Mexico, says Benjamin Baum, vice president of enrollment for the St. John’s system. Patrick O’Connor’s new college guide, College is Yours 2.0, offers a better way to apply to college. It’s available now through Amazon.com, and discounts are available for school group purchases. Now, set a timer for seven minutes and don’t stop typing until the alarm goes off. Once you have your first draft, you can move on to the revision process. Unsettled, I turn to my ever-present book for comfort. Today it is The Things They Carried by Tim O’Brien, already worn and slightly crumpled. They say the best books tell you what you already know, resonating with your own thoughts and emotions. As I read, it is as if the tempest of my thoughts is spelled out on paper. “Most Original” always let me down, and as a result, I hated to be original in any context. In my hometown of New Haven, Connecticut, where normality was…well, the norm, I tried to be a typical student â€" absolutely, perfectly normal. I blended into crowds, the definition of typical. I became a person who refused to surprise people. The overflowing sense of hyper-reality in Tim O’Brien’s words of warfare spills into my world. His words somehow become my words, his memories become my memories. Despite the high speed of the bullet train, my mind is perfectly still â€" trapped between the narrative of the book and the narrative of my own life. The essay is the place to make a great first impression on the reader. They’ll be looking at that before the test scores. And you might fool your parents, or even a peer reviewer or two. But you won’t fool the experts, who have to read literally THOUSANDS of these things. Sometimes we get so wrapped up in the mindset ofthis-must-be-donethat we forget the primary reason for the presence of a personal essay. These papers, which usually clock in around 700 words, are designed to add some color to your transcript, which is pretty much all numbers and facts. Another element in my desire to devote my life to service to humanity was my parents’ divorce. Because I believe that this is valuable preparation for college and, beyond, life. They know their own programs, and if you think you can generalize your way around campus â€" sorry, no. Every early draft of a why school essay shares the same pernicious flaw â€" blanket statements made without evidence or context . Watch the following bland comment transform into a great point â€" through action. Instead, make a few well chosen points and back them up. You don’t want to address your weaknesses, unless it’s a challenge you’ve overcome that reveals something powerful about your character. The diversity of Washington’s schools and its communities is profoundly interesting â€" but use it as a backdrop to write about you. Richardson says that the appeal of an essay on an atypical topic such as origami showed that the writer was willing to take risks. In some cases though, the school may emphasize the supplemental essay as a top priority. At college, for instance, one is liable to find yourself living in a situation in which people don’t get along, especially in bathrooms. Bathrooms are in that sense a microcosm of the macrocosm. Bathrooms also can be a truly dramatic crucible, as the playright Arthur Miller has demonstrated in his dramaturgical magnum opus by that title.