Here Are the Right Strategies

Applying to enter college as a freshman is now very much like launching an advertising and promotions campaign. The number of high school students who want to get the university degree that would make them competitive in the labor market has grown tremendously over the years. High school graduates have to exert all efforts to stand out to earn the admission officers’ nod. This is the stage when GPA or SAT scores and class grades have already been pretty well set, akin to product attributes that student applicants’ cannot improve on anymore. The only option to further bolster the chances of an enrolment is through the college admission essays which are tantamount to an ad copy encapsulating the product intangibles of an individual.

In these personal statements that are prerequisites to most college applications, the first idea that usually comes to the minds of the aspiring freshmen is to make themselves unique from the rest of the pack. This approach is good and workable. However, in this endeavor to present each individual’s unique selling proposition, equal attention must be paid to the specific desires of the institution to which the proposal is addressed. In other words, student applicants should make their aspirations tailor-fit to the goals of the school they are seeking admission to.

It is therefore essential for those writing college admission essays to first have a thorough research on the educational institution that they are eying for enrolment. What are its vision and mission? What are its norms and values? All of these are often expressed in the websites of colleges and universities, and are thus easily accessible. Another tactic that would help in gathering background information on a school is to consult some of its students, faculty members or even some of its admission staff. A student applicant’s network of friends and relatives should be able to contribute some key contacts in this kind of a background research.

With the keen competition for freshmen slots in major colleges and universities, high school students now often send several applications to several schools. In this scenario of multiple applications, it would be wise to craft a different essay for each application. Simply put, the college admission essays that a student applicant sends to different schools should not be a one-size-fits-all paper. If a shotgun approach for writing is adopted, it would be rather difficult or nearly impossible to highlight personal aspirations aligned with those of several educational institutions.

A personal essay in this case would be so full of clichés and motherhood statements that it is unlikely to stand out. Instead, it is likely to be dismissed as a mediocre piece by an author unworthy of consideration. It must be borne in mind that the academic goals of colleges and universities could vary widely. For instance, centers of learning with religious affiliations will have markedly different academic principles than the secular schools. Student applicants submitting college admission essays which adapt to the specific standards and values of these distinct institutions will have the better chances of making it to the freshmen’s roster of these schools.