Crafting the College Essay with Dean Christina Lopez
It’s hard to believe how much the world has changed in these last few months. As restrictions start to lift all over the country, I am excited for some sunshine and outdoor activities as we roll into summer. Although your college search will be different from years past, my advice about how to utilize your summer prior to your senior year shall always remain the same - get started on those college essays! Summer is a great time to get a jump start on all the writing pieces of your application so you are prepared for the fall. As I like to say - if you stay ready, you won’t have to get ready!
I love reading college essays! Many people assume the college evaluation process is purely quantitative — a simple, quick review of your GPA and test scores. For highly selective colleges, such as Barnard, this could not be further from the truth. Through the application process, we are trying to get a sense of you — who you are, your accomplishments and how you could contribute to our community. The college process is truly a human one and the college essay is the heart of it.
The essay provides a window into the world of the applicant. It’s the only place in the application where I get to hear your voice and hear your story. Who else is more equipped to tell your story than you? In this time in our society, it is so important for everyone to own their stories and their truth. In my opinion, this makes the essay the most empowering piece of the application.
I’m often asked how a student can stand out in an applicant pool of thousands upon thousands. The essay is one of the few places where you can do this. No one has your exact perspective. Two people can be watching the same event, but your lens is what makes it unique to you. How you think about and process the world around you is unique to your perspective. The essay allows you to highlight this to us in your own way.
My advice is to figure out how to show the admissions committee the lens you use to view the world. Your lens is an amalgamation of all that you are— your ancestry, your experiences, your intersecting identities, where you grew up, your upbringing, your culture, etc. It is how you process and make sense of the world around you. The college essay provides a rare opportunity to show us how you reflect on your experiences— how they have shaped the way you see yourself and the world around you.
I often feel the hardest part of writing the essay is getting out of your own way. There are so many things that can impede this creative process, but they all center around the same issue: your own self-doubt. This is what can push a student to pepper their application with big SAT words they don’t use. They think the way they write (or talk) doesn’t sound smart enough. This misconception is also what leads students to write essays about things they don’t care about. They think their life experiences aren’t interesting enough. When I give talks about writing the college essay, my workshops center around the idea that you are enough. Your experiences and your way of seeing the world is enough. A personal statement is really hard to write when you aren’t comfortable with yourself. So my first piece of advice is to tell yourself, “I am enough!”
Next, just start writing. I love this quote by Louis L’amour, “Start writing, no matter what. The water doesn’t flow until the faucet is turned on.” For me, I have always felt that a blank page is the first major hurdle. Sometimes just putting some words on a page makes me feel better. Even for this blog post, I typed up a few random thoughts and then walked away from it for several days. When I came back, I re-read some of my paragraphs. Some thoughts made it into the final draft others did not--that’s the process. When you are learning to run, you have to be okay with walking! Writing is a process, and you have to embrace it.
Which leads me to my next suggestion: give yourself time! The prompts for the Common App Personal Statement are posted on May 1st. This means you have alllllllllll summer to work on your essay. Time to start and stop. Time to write something and toss it. Time to change your mind! The best thing you can do for yourself is to produce a solid working draft of your essay in September when you go back to school. Senior year will come at you fast! It’s your most challenging curriculum, you’ve reached some leadership positions at school, you’re involved with family responsibilities (like many of you, I had to watch my younger siblings, too) and you have all the highs and lows of your last year of high school. Trust me, one day it will be the first day of school, you’ll blink and it’ll be time to turn in your applications! Having a solid draft will definitely help you get organized.
Lastly, don’t strive for perfection. It doesn’t exist. Of course edit your essay (please edit your essay), but don’t feel you need to have someone edit your voice out of it. Remember, your voice is enough! Your story is enough! Don’t give your power away by having someone edit your ideas and voice out of your writing. Of course, get guidance and suggestions, but be careful that you aren’t letting someone re-write your story for you. I suggest you have two trusted people be your editors – someone who knows you really well, and someone who knows grammar really well!
It’s an honor to hear your stories. Remember, we are crafting a class of students from a variety of backgrounds, experiences and viewpoints. Barnard’s identity-rich community is a beautiful tapestry of fearless women who want to invest four years into their academic, professional and personal growth. The essay gives me a window into how you will fit into that community. It’s a taste of your intellectual curiosity, how you see the world, how you see yourself and others, and how you make meaning of everything.
What will you write about? I can’t wait to read all about it!