Pre-2013 Common Application Personal Essay Tips

Important Note for 2019-20 Applicants: The Common Application essay options have changed twice since this article was written! Nevertheless, the tips and sample essays below will still provide useful guidance and essay samples for the current Common Application, and both the old and new applications include the topic of your choice option. That said, be sure to read the most up-to-date article on the 2019-20 Common Application Essay Prompts. ________________________________ Heres the original article: The first step to writing a stellar personal essay on your college application is to understand your options. Below is a discussion of the six essay options from the Common Application. Also be sure to check out these 5 Application Essay Tips. Option #1. Evaluate a significant experience, achievement, risk you have taken, or ethical dilemma you have faced and its impact on you. Note the key word here: evaluate. You arent just describing something; the best essays will explore the complexity of the issue. When you examine the impact on you, you need to show the depth of your critical thinking abilities. Introspection, self-awareness and self-analysis are all important here. And be careful with essays about the winning touchdown or tie-breaking goal. These sometimes have an off-putting look how great I am tone and very little self-evaluation. Read Drews essay, The Job I Should Have Quit, for an example of option #15 tips for essay option #1 Option #2. Discuss some issue of personal, local, national, or international concern and its importance to you. Be careful to keep the importance to you at the heart of your essay. Its easy to get off track with this essay topic and start ranting about global warming, Darfur, or abortion. The admissions folks want to discover your character, passions and abilities in the essay; they want more than a political lecture. Read Sophies essay, The Allegany County Youth Board, for an example of option #25 tips for essay option #2 Option #3. Indicate a person who has had a significant influence on you, and describe that influence. Im not a fan of this prompt because of the wording: describe that influence. A good essay on this topic does more than describe. Dig deep and analyze. And handle a hero essay with care. Your readers have probably seen a lot of essays talking about what a great role model Mom or Dad or Sis is. Also realize that the influence of this person doesnt need to be positive. Read Maxs essay, Student Teacher, for an example of option #3Read Jills essay, Buck Up, for another example of option #3Read Catherines essay, Diamond in the Rough, for yet another example of option #36 tips for essay option #3 Option #4. Describe a character in fiction, a historical figure, or a creative work (as in art, music, science, etc.) that has had an influence on you, and explain that influence. Here as in #3, be careful of that word describe. You should really be analyzing this character or creative work. What makes it so powerful and influential? Read Felicitys essay, Porkopolis, for an example of option #4Read Eileens essay, Wallflower, for another example of option #47 tips for essay option #4 Option #5. A range of academic interests, personal perspectives, and life experiences adds much to the educational mix. Given your personal background, describe an experience that illustrates what you would bring to the diversity in a college community, or an encounter that demonstrated the importance of diversity to you. Realize that this question defines diversity in broad terms. Its not specifically about race or ethnicity (although it can be). Ideally, the admissions folks want every student they admit to contribute to the richness and breadth of the campus community. How do you contribute? Read Carries essay, Give Goth a Chance, for an example of option #55 tips for essay option #5 Option #6. Topic of your choice. Sometimes you have a story to share that doesnt quite fit into any of the options above. However, the first five topics are broad with a lot of flexibility, so make sure your topic really cant be identified with one of them. Also, dont equate topic of your choice with a license to write a comedy routine or poem (you can submit such things via the Additional Info option). Essays written for this prompt still need to have substance and tell your reader something about you. Read Loras essay, Eating Eyeballs, for a sample of option #6

Disability As A Metaphor For Inferiority - 990 Words

Charlotte McCarthy 9.22.17 Prof. Rifkin Disability as a Metaphor for Inferiority While disability rights and awareness have advanced, disabled people have not been able to wrest total control of the discrimination placed upon them due to the way society uses the idea of disability as a metaphor signifying human incapacity. In Douglas C. Baynton’s, Disability and the Justification of inequality in American History, he analyzes the controlling metaphor of disability through race. Similarly, watching Donald Trump s infamous speech where he mocks a disabled reporter shows how the metaphor also relates to hierarchical ineqaulity. Throughout history, American culture has come to define disability as a social burden. Metaphors of disability†¦show more content†¦He shows this by saying, â€Å"It is this use of disability as a marker of hierarchical relations that historians of disability must demonstrate in order to bring disability into the mainstream of historical study† (Baynton 34). Subconscious associat ions surround disability in America; disability is linked with social burdens, differences with mental illness, and impairment with deterioration. Baynton employs the examples of women s suffrage and African American civil rights to display this metaphor of disability as inferiority. He explains that â€Å"the concept of disability has been used to justify discrimination against other groups by attributing disability to them†(Baynton 33). In a rejection of social equality, humanity understands women s perceived physical and physiological attributes to be disabling, solely because they are different from men’s attributes. These traits, including excess emotionality and physical weakness, are considered to be an impairment that makes life harder for women. Similarly, Baynton explains that disability arguments were common in justifying slavery in the nineteenth century. One argument stated that African Americans were not competent enough to function in society and therefo re were meant for captivity. American culture doesn t cope well with differences, which results in the societal antipathy surrounding disability. While Baynton uses the example of minority groupsShow MoreRelated Push and Invisible Man - Nobody Is Truly Invisible Essay682 Words   |  3 Pagesshow her lack of intelligence and only amplify her inferiority to the people around her. When you’re invisible, nobody treats you with respect; in the beginning of the book, everyone treats Precious like worthless trash. Though, later, she becomes visible again through the people she meets at the alternative school, and the birth of her second baby, Abdul. The two authors, the author of Push and the author of Invisible Man, both use the metaphor of invisibility to describe their main charactersRead MoreThe Layers Of Social Strata Within Disability1684 Words   |  7 Pagesperceptions of disability. Avenues in which we see public portrayals of intellectual, emotional, linguistic, age and physical impairments include television, radio, film, literature and various social media platforms. The utilization of media can either reinforce or challenge stereotypes that are widely accepted in western society. The layers of social strata within disability can be intersectional with gender, race, age and social class issues. This paper will examine attitudes about disability as a wholeRead MoreRoad to Mecca3242 Words   |  13 Pagesis a teacher. It is not stated here weather she had children, a husband, or any family relationships. Before meeting Helen was she lonely and alone? I can begin to see the attachment they would have for each othe r. One of the most outstanding metaphors that Helen describes is her fear of darkness, it appears that this fear was originally a child’s normal fear of being in the dark. In some way Helen has carried this fear all through her life. She relates it to her mother leaving her alone in theRead MoreTennessee Williams s The Glass Menagerie2066 Words   |  9 Pagesshe grew up she became painfully shy and largely withdrawn from the outside world. She devotes her life to her glass menagerie which like her is exquisitely fragile and should not be moved from the shelf. Tennessee Williams writing never lacked metaphors and like the main character Tom he had a poet s weakness. Tom is the narrator of the play and the play itself roots from his memory. Tom constantly breaks the fourth wall within the play demonstrating its stageability. Tom is an aspiring poet whoRead MoreGender And Gender Roles : The Black Boys2966 Words   |  12 Pagesnovel are products and not beings. They belong to men and are subordinate within society, utterly contrasting the matriarchal society Kesey builds. In contrast, Plath illustrates the subordination of women as a result of patriarchal oppression. ‘Metaphors’ describes her long winded pregnancy in metaphorical language, whilst exploring ambivalence. In 1959 when the poem was written, Plath was pregnant with her first child, Frieda, symbolising the connection of personal life and her poems. Plath declaresRead MoreEssay on Summary of I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings4065 Words   |  17 Pagesaround at the store. Chapter 2: Summary: Maya and her brother recite their times tables for their Uncle Willie, who was crippled as a child and whose left side of his body is shriveled and deformed. Maya and her brother are disturbed by his disability, though his mother, Mayas grandmother, blames God but accepts her son. Things are more difficult for him, since able-bodied men are hardly able to make a living and take their insecurities out on him, and because he too is ashamed of being crippledRead MoreMID TERM STUDY GUIDE Essay16611 Words   |  67 Pagesrefers to cognition analyzes: (37) a. The cognitive development of children b. The friendship capacity of children c. The way people make sense of information *** d. The computer model of development 10. In Erikson’s stage of industry versus inferiority, the child’s task is to: (37-38) a. Learn the range of skills needed in an adult world *** b. Develop a sense of initiative c. Gain a sense of self-control d. Develop a self-image 11. One type of insecure attachment is: (39) a. Disruptive Read MoreEffects Of Depression On Older Adults6297 Words   |  26 Pagesof the suicides in the United States (Van Orden Conwell, 2011). According to the American Association of Suicidology (2014), on average, one older adult kills themselves every hour. Along with these alarming statistics, common risk factors of disability, loss, and poor social support significantly impact the mental wellbeing of many older adults; yet, depression in older adults continues to be under-diagnosed and untreated (Cole Dendukuri, 2003). Katona (1996) suggests that perhaps this occursRead MoreDevelopmental Psychology Notes7715 Words   |  31 Pagescomprehension when information is fuzzy, or incomplete. Bilingualism – use of more than one language. Developing self (still middle childhood 6-12) Erikson states middle childhood is very much about competence 6-12 is the industry-versus-inferiority stage characterized by a focus on efforts to the meet the challenges presented by parents, peers, school and other complexities of the modern world. * Must do well at school as they are given a whole body of information, make a place for themselvesRead MoreDeveloping Management Skills404131 Words   |  1617 Pagesself-knowledge. They resist acquiring additional information in order to protect their selfesteem or self-respect. If they acquire new knowledge about themselves, there is always the possibility that it will be negative or that it will lead to feelings of inferiority, weakness, evilness, or shame. So they avoid new self-knowledge. As Maslow (1962, p. 57) notes: We tend to be afraid of any knowledge that would cause us to despise ourselves or to make us feel inferior, weak, worthless, evil, shameful. We protect

Media’s Negative Effect on Women Body Image Free Essays

I. Images in the media are having a negative impact on female body image and has given society a blurred meaning as to â€Å"beautiful† A. Models 1. We will write a custom essay sample on Media’s Negative Effect on Women Body Image or any similar topic only for you Order Now Models give an unrealistic view of the ideal woman; they give the idea that you cannot be beautiful unless you are thin. 2. â€Å"The average model is taller and weighs 23 per cent, or almost a quarter, less than the average woman who is 5’4†³ and weighs 148 lbs. † (Canadian Women’s Health) 3. Model’s bodies have been getting thinner by the years, and as the bodys keep slimming down women and girls in society are becoming more unhappy with their selves. B. Economic goals . â€Å"There are no official statistics for spending on diet products, but estimates vary from $40bn to $100bn in the US alone – more than the combined value of the government’s budget for health, education and welfare. † (Cummings) 2. By the media presenting an almost impossible ideal to get and maintain, the cosmetic and diet industry becomes profitable. 3. Ads are directed mostly to younger girls purposely. C. Health issues 1. Exposure to images of thin, youn g, air-brushed female bodies is linked to depression, loss of self-esteem and the development of unhealthy eating habits in women and girls. . The American research group Anorexia Nervosa Related Eating Disorders, Inc. says that one out of every four college-aged women uses unhealthy methods of weight control (bulimia, anorexia, excess exercising, laxatives, skipping meals. ) 3. This has even affected younger girls, as low as 5-6 years old. 4. Nearly half of all preadolescent girls wish to be thinner, and as a result have engaged in a diet or are aware of the concept of dieting. (Tiggeman) 5. Researchers generating a computer model of a woman with Barbie-doll proportions, for example, found that her back would be too weak to support the weight of her upper body, and her body would be too narrow to contain more than half a liver and a few centimeters of bowel. A  real woman built that way would suffer from chronic diarrhea and eventually die from malnutrition. II. Although the damage has been well done, by eliminating the fake women pictures and providing the society with a healthier view of themselves, women’s views about themselves would be a lot healthier and they would feel uch happier. A. Although these campaigns have just started with their healthy ideas, many companies have tried to help with this problem and have received much positive feedback. 1. In 2004, Dove launched the very successful Campaign for Real Beauty which features real women, not models, advertising Dove’s firming cream. (Dove) 2. Dove has also recently launched a new campaign, 3. In September 2006, a news and media furor erupted when Spain banned overly thin models from its fashion runways. 4. Dove produced this video in response to the negative comments of the changes of the company’s models called Evolution which shows the transformation from a regular women to a model and how unrealistic perceptions of beauty are. 5. In 2010, Dove ® set out a bold new vision for the brand with the Dove ® Movement for Self-Esteem. ( Dove) III. Not everyone agrees, however, that this is something wrong. A. The people that prosper from these ideas say 1. Women need to have more self control. a. It’s not like women can just avoid these ads, they are everywhere and have come to dominate our society. Depression and low self-esteem is not something that women want to have. Not everyone is born the same. 2. Obesity is a problem, thinner is healthier. a. Thinner can be healthier because obesity has become a growing issue but the media has taken it to their advantage. b. The thinness shown in magazines and models is not healthy, the models are always underweight which leads to fainting and serious health conditions including malnutrition. Works Cited â€Å"Beauty and Body Image in Media. † Media Awareness Network. N. p. , n. d. Web. 20 Nov 2011. http://www. edia-awareness. ca/english/issues/stereotyping/women_and_girls/women_beauty. cfm. Cummings, Laura. â€Å"The diet business: Banking on Failure. † BBC news. N. p. , 05/02/2003. Web. 20 Nov 2011. http://news. bbc. co. uk/2/hi/business/2725943. stm. â€Å"Body Image and the Media. † Canadian’s Women’s Health Network. N. p. , 2005. Web. 20 Nov 2011. http://www. cwhn. ca/node/40776. â€Å"The Dove Ca mpaign for Real Beauty. † Dove. Dove, n. d. Web. 20 Nov 2011. http://www. dove. us/Social-Mission/campaign-for-real-beauty. aspxgt;. How to cite Media’s Negative Effect on Women Body Image, Papers