High School to College

For the College Application project I opted to help consult one of my friends from home who is a senior this year. She recently began looking at schools and once she had chosen a few she began writing her college essays. The first time I consulted her she was writing to an in state school and the prompt wanted prospective students to write an essay describing a time in their life that had a significant impact on their life and what was the lasting affect of the moment. Since this was not necessarily a formal essay she was a little apprehensive on how to begin her paper. Also she wanted to choose a topic that was meaningful and original without the cliché after affects that most application essays had. She really wanted to wow the review board and standout. Since we were starting from scratch and the first stage of the writing process, I advised her first list all the significant moments in her life even if they did not seem that important. It’s better to start with a lot of material so that we would be able to sift through it all and have options rather than have meager pickings and have to improvise. After some intense brainstorming she finally decided on and event. Once that was done I told her to think of the impact it had on her and all the emotions and feelings attached to that memory. I wanted her to be able to delineate exactly what she had felt. I told her that she wanted to be able to paint a picture for her audience and through her words give the essay life. Having read excerpts from the Bedford Guide about voice, audience, etc, I told her now that she had a basis for getting started on her essay she now needed to focus on her audience, voice, organization, and content. Now that she finally has a foundation for her paper focusing on the major areas will help guide her in the right direction.