How to Find Your Essay Voice
Many students have trouble finding their “voice” while writing college application essays. One of the biggest problems I see is that students want to sound smart and impressive, and they often lose their natural story-telling voice by forcing in big...How to Write Your Transfer Essay for the Common App
When my son wanted to transfer from his small liberal arts college in the Pacific Northwest into a larger university to pursue chemical engineering, I offered to help him with his college application transfer essay. I thought it would be a good opportunity to share my...
Essay Contest! Winners Will Be In My Book!
You Already Wrote It. Why Not Submit it? Enter Your College Application Essay in Essay Hell’s Heavenly Essays Contest! One of the first things I advise students to do when they start working on their college application essay is read sample essays. There’s...A Peek into the Many Worlds of Prompt 1 of the UC Essays
UPDATE: The University of California announced NEW essay prompts for 2016-17. Read about how to answer them HERE. The following content in this post is no longer relevant and is outdated! About three years ago, I wrote a post to try to help students applying to the...Admissions Officers From Select Colleges Confirm They Want Stories!
Tips for Writing Essays College Admissions Folks Want to Read While trying to think of topics for college essays, students often try to guess what the admissions officers are looking for, or what they want to read. It often feels like such a mystery. But in a...Read moreIf your essay starts by relating something that happened, the reader is going to dive right into it and not stop until they are satisfied–until they know what happened.
You Are Not Alone
I gave away 100 copies of my ebook guide last week. (If you missed the giveaway, I’m planning on doing another in October.) Even though I’ve always had visitors from all over the world, I was overwhelmed by the enthusiastic students from so many...Should You Humblebrag in Your Essay?
A smart dad sent me an email recently asking how college-bound students could work in related achievements and accomplishments into their personal, narrative-style essay, without sounding like they were blowing their own horn. It’s definitely a fine line....Insider Essay Advice from Tufts
When people visit my Essay Hell web site, I can see where they come from on my Google analytics page. (I know, kind of creepy, but that’s just how it works now.) I noticed a recent spike of visitors from a blog written by an English teacher in Southern...Click logo to visit Home Page!
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