Check out all the blog posts in this series:
- Identifying the Ingredients of a Winning Essay
- Finding a Theme for Your Statement of Purpose
- Writing Your Career Goals Essay
- How to Start Your First Draft of an Application Essay
- Revise and Polish Your Application Essays
You’ve completed your first essay draft – this is a great milestone! But outstanding essays are the result of multiple drafts, so now it’s time to revise and edit. Here’s how to get the job done:
- Let your essay rest for a day or two, particularly after an intensive writing session. You’ll return to it with fresh eyes, and you might be amazed at how many ways you will find to strengthen it. It’s important to remember that one of the most common problems plaguing application essays is bland, forgettable prose. One reason for this is that while you know your backstory and the details of the experiences you are writing about, your reader does not. For that reason, as you look at your essay again, try your best to root out generic writing that lacks color and details, such as the following example:
“Although I have been responsible for a lot of exciting projects, I want to move into management, which might not happen on my current path.”
What kind of projects? What made them exciting? Why wouldn’t a management path be open to the writer? Has this been explained? Let’s wake up this sleepy prose by adding appropriate details:
“My role as a product manager for a midsized giftware business has allowed me to develop my creativity as well as my communication, market research, and social media skills. As exciting as it has been to have helped plan and release our innovative kitchen tabletop lines, I want to move into management, which seems unlikely at this family-owned and -managed company.”
Adding details takes more room, but those details make your essay come alive. When you are tight on space, rather than cutting back on detail, choose to write about fewer examples, and simply provide greater detail for each of them. This will serve you far better than offering a laundry list of vague accomplishments or character traits you feel you have. “Show, don’t tell” remains a cardinal rule in writing.
Also check to make sure that you have responded to the specific prompt and to every part of the prompt. Did you adhere to the word/character/page requirements? If you wrote multiple essays for the same program, did you avoid repeating yourself?
2. Ditch the passive voice. Using the active voice instead will liven up and tighten your writing. Consider the following passive-voice sentence:
“Client assessments were carried out by the clinical team and me.”
This passive construction is draggy. Remodel the sentence by moving the “doer” of the action to the beginning. Doing so in this case not only highlights the writer’s leadership role but also cuts three words:
“I conducted client assessments with the clinical team.”
3. Read your essay aloud. Hearing your essay allows you to catch any small mistakes you missed during the editing process and that can be easily overlooked when reading silently. When you read out loud, you will also be able to tell which sentences could benefit from some tightening, expanding, or other improvements. Avoid repeating words throughout your essay.
4. Assess your essay for overall quality control. Now that you have come back to your essay and reviewed it after setting it aside for a while, ask yourself whether the draft has achieved the goal you set for it. Do you sound like the focused, thoughtful, and energetic individual you hope to present yourself as? If not, continue tweaking your essay until you are confident that the voice you have created on the page reflects positively on you.
Summary Tips:
- Step away from your draft for a day or two so you can return to it with a fresh perspective.
- Respond to the specific prompt, and follow the length guidelines provided.
- Revise any bland writing and minimize the use of the passive voice by replacing both with specific, detailed, and active prose.
- Read your essay aloud so you can identify any weak spots and assess the overall voice you have created. Does your essay meet your goals? If not, keep revising.
Now that you’ve planned, drafted, and edited your application essay, consider investing in personalized advice tailored just for you to help get you to the finish line. Here’s how it works:
- Schedule a free consultation with an Accepted admissions expert.
- Team up with an admissions expert who will work with you directly to help you discover your competitive advantage and use it to get accepted to your dream school.
- Send us an email letting us know when you’ve been accepted. It makes our day!
By Alice Diamond, former associate dean for career and community service at Lesley University. Alice has a BA from Colgate University, an MA from Bryn Mawr College, and an MS from Cornell University. She has more than 35 years of experience in career and admissions advising for undergraduate and graduate candidates. Alice’s clients have been accepted to top programs in a wide range of fields. Want to work with Alice? Click here to get in touch!
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