Tips to Get Accepted Into the College of Your Choice

A student must begin working on his or her college application about a year in advance to gain insights into themselves and their desire for a college education. The advice and counsel of parents, teachers and mentors are always useful.

Colleges are interested in young people with a vision. Enterprising individuals, who are always looking for a challenge and can motivate themselves so as to work towards improving the world. Keeping this in mind, you need to make sure that your essay tells the reader about YOU as a person. For multiple essays, ensure they each reveal another aspect of who you are, while not contradicting each other. This is a story about you, so keep it interesting.

• While writing about a mentor or someone who has impacted your life in a significant way can show the reader you are a gracious person that appreciates what people do for you, you should avoid discussing this person/people at length so as to keep the focus on you. This also applies to people who have inspired you.
• Never use profanity and avoid slang.
• Do not include your GPA or other information that would be available in your application.
• While humor is often a great way to break the ice and establish a connection with another person, this may not be the best time to use it. As you don’t know who is going to be analyzing your application, you have no way of knowing how your humor will be received.
• Discussing your lifestyle is unnecessary and unlikely to add any value to your application.

Some of the biggest application mistakes students make on their applications include lying, submitting the college application on the deadline date, writing less than the minimum number of words on the essay, skipping the optional essay, and forgetting to proofread.