Show, Don’t Tell ：Keystone Alumni on Writing Application Essays
Genghis Khan with an F1 racecar. George Washington with a SuperSoaker. Emperor Nero with a toaster. Leonardo da Vinci with a Furby. If you could give any historical figure any piece of technology, who and what would it be, and why do you think they’d work so well together?**
“Was it a cat I saw?” “Yo-no-na-ka, ho-ka-ho-ka na-no-yo” (Japanese, “the world is a warm place”). Mo?e jutro ta dama da tortu je?om (Polish, “maybe tomorrow that lady will give a cake to the hedgehogs”). Share a palindrome in any language, and give it a backstory.**
How would you answer these questions if you were an applicant for a college or university? And how did you feel upon seeing these prompts?
During the college application season, essay writing is probably the biggest headache for every high school senior. Their GPA and standardized grades are quantifiable, while their activities and awards can easily be described in a resume. But how can they express their “soft power” as students? This is where essays come in. Writing them allows students to explore themselves deeply. Rather than treating essays as a mere requirement, applicants should look at these articles as professional assignments for writers or journalists. When students do so, they can dig deep and sort through their past experiences to find moments that best represent themselves.
But what exactly do colleges want to know about their applicants? Delsie Phillips, former Director of Admissions at Haverford College, said in Admission Matters:
No matter which question, we are asking what is really important to you, who you are, and how you arrived where you are. The whole college application process is really a self-exploration, and the essay is a way to put your personal adventure into words.
Still, how can an average high school student make themselves heard in a sea of applicants from around the world? In this edition of Keystone Roundtable, we invited Keystone Director of College Counseling Percy Jiang and five alumni to share insights into writing application essays and strategies for managing challenges.
Keystone Roundtable Guests
How different are essays for US colleges and personal statements for UK universities?
Percy Jiang (PJ): The subject matters and aims are different. Essays for US colleges are more of narrative prose, divided into common application essays and supplemental essays.
Common application essays have six questions about applicants’ life experiences and achievements and are not necessarily have to be related to the student’s intended major. They also have another open-ended question where they can write about a topic of their choosing. In supplemental essays, students will answer prompts about their choice of school or major. However, some American institutions offer students creative prompts since they want to see candidates beyond their grades. This is why essay writing for American colleges is so personalized without any standard template or formula to follow.
Meanwhile, UK universities require applicants to determine their majors when applying. As its name implies, a personal statement for UK universities is an expression of applicants about their chosen professional field, and their experiences and passions for it. For example, if you prefer natural sciences, you will have to state why you are interested in it, what you have done in this field, what achievements you have made, and what professional issues you want to explore.
Jack He (JH): In general, supplemental essays will answer the why in your application: Why did you choose the college? Why are you a good fit for this school? I feel it is important for applicants to write about the school's unique qualities. Unlike common application essays, supplemental essays require researching the school thoroughly. Students must write about what attracted them to the school and the major.
Kevin Zhang (KZ): Essay reviewers differ in British and American institutions. In the US, it’s mostly college admissions officers who review essays, while in the UK, it’s the professors in the applicants’ target major. Take the University of Oxford as an example: the professors give one-on-two or one-on-three lectures and will read personal statements. They also decide on your admission. British universities like Oxford and Cambridge are committed to recruiting the best students and training the top talents in their fields. Therefore, when you write, you can ask yourself questions like: If I were a professor in the mathematics department, what would I expect to see in the applicant? Do they have a genuine professional interest? Are they at a higher knowledge level than average high school students?
How should parents help children during the essay-writing process?
PJ: Some parents interfere excessively with the essay writing process, sometimes deciding what their children should write about to appeal to admissions officers. Some even write for their children. I suggest that parents respect their children’s ideas and not replace their opinion with an adult’s. Allow children to express themselves first on their own levels of language and thinking, and after the essays are finished, parents can give feedback or help edit or proofread the pieces. When we return the right of expression to children, we will be surprised by how good they are. Adults’ way of thinking will limit children’s expression.
Can you give some ideas on how to write the supplemental essay?
Symonne Liu (SL): You will need some technical skills for supplemental essays because most prompts are about why you are choosing a specific college and major. Although there are no correct answers to supplemental essays, the school and admissions officers want to use them to select students who match the colleges’ environment.
In my case, I answered a supplemental essay question given by a University of Chicago Class of 2020 student. I first analyzed it because I believed it required me to reconstruct a way of composing any picture or graphic with a deeper meaning. There was a lot of room to play with, so it was interesting. Since I was applying for the Biological Sciences Division, I decided to reconstruct the yin-yang diagram using slime molds on a petri dish. I placed two bacteria on the two points of the yin-yang diagram. Then, as the bacteria moved to find something to eat, their positions would change.
I analyzed the results of my experiment and found many similarities between these pictures. Just as in the yin-yang diagram, the bacteria did not move in a straight line. I related my findings to the capitalist principle of efficiency. If you ask a capitalist to draw a yin-yang diagram, what they draw to separate the two will not be a curve but a straight line, which is the shortest path between two points since it is the easiest and most cost-effective way. I found it interesting because life forms do not appear in straight lines; instead, curves and bends are also ways of life. In my essay conclusion, I wrote:
“This Yin-Yang diagram of slime manifests the natural pattern of life. Blue whales, grasshoppers, amoeba—every organism has its own trajectory. We, Homo sapiens, can decide our journey from birth to death. Yet do we really want it to be a straight line between the two destinations? We should, perhaps, stretch our minds and challenge the existing linear pathway; what’s wrong with a squiggly curve?”
College application essays make me feel that schools and reviewers ask you to do one thing but what they really want is another. So, even though the question was about a graphic, it aimed at something else: it wanted you to articulate a perspective and stance behind a visual and your interpretation of things. Of course, such open-ended questions never have a fixed correct answer. It’s all about how you interpret them.
How can an applicant present their individuality through essays and personal statements?
Yutong Wen (YW): Write about your thinking, not just experiences. Colleges value traits such as self-reflection. It is important to start writing with materials that capture your most authentic aspect and best match your experiences. If you are worried that your experiences might be similar to others, you can reflect more on your thinking about the experiences rather than talking too much about the experiences themselves. This way, you will use your insights to demonstrate your perspective instead of just telling readers what you have been through.
SL: It is more important to express your love and dedication to a particular field than simply showing that you are good at it. Colleges value more that you love the major you’re applying for than how good you are at a subject or field. How and why you will use what you have learned and will learn in the future truly matter. In your essays, you must dig into the real reason that drives you forward, not just the one on the surface.
Andrew Li (AL): I believe it is more important to write your own story than something that might look good to all. You need to imagine yourself as a photographer or screenwriter to organize your story. Essay writing doesn’t mean you have to write a great essay in an hour. Time management and story structure are more important than writing skills. For science students who feel their writing skills are inadequate, you should understand that your perspective differs from that of the admissions officers. For example, you need to write your inquiry into physics as a story that will interest the admissions officers because they may not have the background knowledge of the major you are applying for.
KZ: When I applied for Oxford, I thought I should demonstrate my knowledge of mathematics and reflect its beauty, elegance, and symmetry in my personal statement. Looking back now, however, no matter how deep you believe your thoughts are, you are still a high school student presenting some shallow opinions from the perspective of a college professor. So, what you should consider when writing your personal statements for British universities is the expertise you have that distinguishes you from others. Moreover, be humble yet conscious in your personal statements. Remember, professors who will read them are way better than you in this field.
What challenges did you face when you wrote your essays?
JH: The biggest challenge comes from knowing yourself. First, it is important to give yourself enough time to think. When writing my essays, I kept asking myself whether they showed who I was. I got some significant scores and participated in activities, but the essays were different. How could I show that I was a real and emotional person? How would I know what kind of person I really was? These were questions I thought about the most during writing.
SL: The most obvious challenge is that in analytical writing, which I am familiar with, the conclusion comes first. In college essays, the conclusion closes your piece. The principle of essay writing is “Show, don’t tell”. I needed to lead readers naturally to the argument I wanted to make with a compelling example and let them draw their conclusions. To be honest, narrative writing was what I found most difficult.
YW: Mine was communicating efficiently in English. When I wrote my first draft, I easily exceeded the word limit because I thought I would have to explain some content in the essays to make my point. The key to overcoming this challenge is to see the logic and relationships between sentences. In this way, I was able better know the role of each sentence in my essay and write them more purposefully, thus making the essay more concise
What advice can you give to applicants?
SL: Looking back, one of the big reasons I was admitted to UChicago was that I knew what kind of students it was looking for. Visit colleges’ websites because you will learn what kind of students your dream schools want. Then you will need to match the schools’ expectations, which will significantly increase your chances of getting admitted.
JH: Don’t just think. Try to start writing and do it early. People are always thinking while writing, so ideas might pop up one after another once you start. It will produce unexpected connections. I also began writing my common application essay in Grade 11, which took me a few months, if not almost a year, to finish. It went through many revisions, and I went back and forth on it many times. Starting early gives you enough time to reflect on your experiences and growth, which is helpful for essay writing and the entire college application process.
Andrew Li: During the application season, there will always be unexpected situations like changes in the application schedule, lags or shutdowns on application platforms, and other things that will stress you out even more. So, to add to what Jack has said, make sure you finish all essays or personal statements at least one to two weeks before the deadline so you can have more time to troubleshoot or edit.
In addition, make good use of resources in the school and on the Internet. The Keystone Office of College Counseling holds various seminars and lectures for Grade 11 and Grade 12 students, including regular weekly sessions on college admissions. I recommend that students listen carefully because our college counselors know the requirements for essays and personal statements very well and they have counseled many students. Their experience helps you avoid detours on your ways forward. In addition, many online forums share topics about applicants’ experiences of success and failure.
College application is never easy, but as Symonne Liu said in an online session for students held by the Keystone Office of College Counseling:
Applying for college was not fun. You’ll feel tons of pressure, gain 20 kilos of anxiety, and receive 50 grams of self-doubt. But live with it, honey. You’ll be fine. Just bear in mind that you only need to do this once in your entire life, so you should definitely try your best to produce the most brilliant piece of writing to make you a strong candidate.
** Supplemental essay prompts from the University of Chicago application, academic year 2022-2023.
Translation: Allen Zhu
Editing: Andy Pe?afuerte III
