Mistakes That Students Make in Their Admission Essays

Writing an effective college admission essay can be a challenging task for students. If you’re writing the essay yourself, regardless of whether you’re a high school or college student, then you need to understand that admissions officers are looking for more than just good grades. They’re looking for strong, confident writers with the right attitude and perspective. By focusing on the right approach and understanding what mistakes students to tend to make, writing your essay can become much easier. So, this article will help you avoid the most common mistakes made in admission essays so that the college knows that they have made a good decision in accepting you.

Common Admission Essay Mistakes

Writing about yourself instead of about your achievements

One of the biggest mistakes that students make in their college admission essays is that they write about themselves instead of what they actually want to say: why they want to attend that particular college or university. This can be easily fixed by simply avoiding using “I” or any other personal pronouns in your essay. Instead, use verbs like “am”, “was”, and “have been”. For example: “I am a hard worker” should be changed into “I work hard”, so that it does not sound like bragging or self-promotion but rather as if you were talking about someone else who has these qualities.

Failing to address the main issue:

One mistake that many students make in their college admission essays is failing to address the main question that has been put forward to them by the admission committee. It can be anything like why students want admission to this particular institute or regarding their future plans or even about how they can enjoy a good career by seeking admission to this college. Failure to answer the question can cost students their college admission. E.g., If you are seeking admission to a music school and want to give an admissions officer a good picture of who you are and why are you choosing the institute, don’t just say that you love music or art — tell them exactly which sports or instruments or artists interest you and why they interest you.

Spelling and Grammatical mistakes

Another worst mistake that students make when writing their admission essays is leaving too many spelling and grammatical mistakes that are not acceptable at all. An essay is bound to reject when every other sentence has a typing error, some spelling mistake, or grammatical errors that make no sense to the readers at all and make reading the essay a pain. These teachers are scholars and qualified people, and they will not tolerate such mistakes and outright reject the essay. In order to ensure that the admission committee is impressed by their essay, students must edit it really well and make sure that there are so much silly mistakes in the paper.

Final thoughts:

As you can see, some of these mistakes are avoidable, while others cannot. Once you understand what not to do, the only thing holding you back will be your own creativity and hard work!