3 Tips for a Winning Scholarship (or college application) Essay: Part 1

Crafting a scholarship or college essay that stands out is no small feat, but what if you could transform your writing with a few actionable tips? Join me as I unlock the secrets to compelling essays with practical tips you can apply  to scholarship applications and to college admissions essays. Discover how staying on topic and adhering to word counts can enhance the impact of your essay, keeping you from being cut off mid-thought. From tackling the quirky Zombie Apocalypse Scholarship prompt to navigating open-ended questions on the Common App, I can guide you through essay writing.

These tips help you think strategically about your essays, aligning them with  values of the scholarships or institutions you're aiming for. Whether you're showcasing your community service for a Rotary scholarship or highlighting unique personal experiences, I emphasize the importance of resonating with your readers. In this episode, we focus on the foundational steps of crafting your essay, setting you up for success. Stay tuned for the next part, where we delve into personalizing your essay further and mastering the art of proofreading for an error-free final draft.

For more about me - my experience and my speaking, check out the links below.

You can reach me at jen@firstgenfm.com.

https://www.linkedin.com/in/jenschoen/
https://www.firstgenfm.com/speaker-high-school-educators-students-parents

Transcript

Speaker 1: 0:04

Hey there, welcome and welcome back to College TNT. I am here to share some more tips with you, but this time it's not about scholarships. It's how to write essays for the scholarship applications, and these tips can also be used if you're working out your common application and submitting them to colleges as well. A lot of the tips are the same things, because when we're reading scholarships, when we're reading application essays, we're looking for the same information something about you. Let's go ahead and get started with my tips Now. This is likely to be a two-parter as well, because I have a few different tips, so today I want to talk about directions. Staying on topic have a few different tips, so today I want to talk about directions, staying on topic and giving yourself time to write. Next time I'll talk about how to be specific in your essay, so it's really unique to you, which is something that you want, and how to proofread and edit, because those are very important. But let's go ahead and get started with follow the directions and I know I said this before when I talked about the student activities list and it seems like a no-brainer, but again, you would be surprised. So for this time, when you're looking at your essay. Before you sit down, sort of read through all the instructions and make sure you have a sense of what the word count is and you stay as close as possible to that word count. You want to make sure that when you're writing it it's not going to cut you off in the middle. So right when you're gonna say like and then the most amazing thing happened and it cuts you off and there's nothing left and it leaves me hanging when I'm reading your scholarship or your application essay. So be very aware of those word counts and how that works in the application that you're filling out, especially if you're doing it online and they may cut you off, like a lot of apps do.

Speaker 1: 1:54

The second thing is to stay on the topic. So sometimes you'll get a really specific question. I know I mentioned this before, but the zombie apocalypse scholarship Now, I know I mentioned this before, but the Zombie Apocalypse Scholarship asked very specifically what would you do if there was a zombie apocalypse? My hope is, many people say run, run fast, but if they don't, that's okay because it's unique to you, but that's a really specific question, right? What would you do in a zombie apocalypse? So you know exactly what you're going to write about. However, if you have a really broad question like, let me read you this one, that's one of the prompts from the common app and it's often the same year after year.

Speaker 1: 2:35

So whether you're a freshman, sophomore, junior or senior still applying to college, uh, you're going to see things like this share an essay on any topic of your choice. It can be one you've already written, one that responds to a different prompt, or one of your own design, and that is a very broad question. What that means is you need to sit down and start to think about what is it that I'm going to write about? What is going to share something that's meaningful to me, that fits in with either the type of scholarship or the institution, or what I haven't said before somewhere else in the application, and those are all things to consider. So let me give you an example.

Speaker 1: 3:17

If there is a scholarship and it's based on your community service right, it's an organization like, maybe, rotary, that is looking for students who have done significant community service. Well, probably you want your topic to be about your community service experience. Yes, you may have listed all your community service services, all your community service experience, somewhere in the application, but this is your opportunity in the essay to bring out a little bit more about what those experiences meant to you, and that's really what you want to get at, because you're reading this like you're this, you're thinking of the topic, to write as if you're the one reading it. So if I'm working for a community service organization giving out a scholarship to students who have done community service, like I want to know why that was important to you, what did was important to you, what did that mean to you, so that I know my money is going to go to somebody who is going to continue maybe that community service or really understands what it's like to give to something that is beyond themselves. So that is just one example that I have for you to kind of look at where you're applying whether that's a scholarship again, or a college, and then also look at what is meaningful to you that you can write about. That fits with that, all right. So, again, thinking like an admissions counselor, a scholarship, uh, selection committee, a little bit there, so all right. So that's two tips, right, the follow directions, the word count and all that.

Speaker 1: 4:53

And then, staying on the topic, the third tip I'm going to give you is to give yourself time to write. Now, I know that sometimes you might come up against an application. You just find it it's due tomorrow and you have to write pretty quickly. But when that's not the case, you definitely want to give yourself time to write. So here's what that means to me it means that you sit down and you take the pressure off yourself by not telling yourself I will now sit down and I will write the greatest scholarship application essay that humankind has ever seen, because that's a lot of pressure.

Speaker 1: 5:36

But I know a lot of students, a lot of people in general, when they sit down to write, think like I'm gonna write the best thing ever. Don't do that. Don't put that pressure on yourself. Sit down and say, okay, I'm gonna sit down and write a crappy first draft, and that's it. All of a sudden the pressure is gone, because you know it's not gonna be great, but you're going to sit down and write a crappy first draft, and that's it. All of a sudden the pressure's gone because you know it's not going to be great, but you're going to get your thoughts I was going to say on paper, but on the computer, so you don't have that blank sheet staring at you that cursor sort of blinking, going like neener, neener, like you have nothing. No, write a crappy first draft. Just start writing.

Speaker 1: 6:15

And that is going to be really helpful because once you start to fill up the page with words, you are going to say, okay, now I have something to work with. That is great. Maybe I can cut that out. Oh, I need to put a little more in there. Oh, that's a cliche. I need to be be write something a little more unique to me than that like overused cliche. So just sit down and write that draft and then go back, take some time away, go back and redraft. Maybe take some time away, redraft it again and put in specifics that speak to your uniqueness, as you're answering the question. So I'm gonna leave that there for now, because those are three tips I think I hope are helpful following directions regarding word count, staying on the topic and being choosing your own topic if you need to. That's meaningful and then giving yourself time to write.

Speaker 1: 7:11

In the next, I'm going to talk a little bit more about how to do that, how to put in specific experiences that are unique to you. So it's really your essay and only you could write it. And I also want to talk a little bit about proofreading and editing, which are two different things but I think are very, very important. When you're submitting something that says hey, this is my best self on paper because I want to get into this college, I want to win this scholarship, and so you want to take the time to do the proofreading and editing. Stay tuned for more tips next episode and please, if you wouldn't mind, following me on Facebook I know maybe for you parents who are listening, that's where you'll find me at college TNT. And for those of you who may not be on Facebook or may think like, oh my gosh, that's my parents do and you're a student, you can also follow me on Instagram at college underscore TNT, you can find me there. So thank you so much and I look forward to part two coming soon. Have a great day.