CRUSH the College Essay

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Do they even read these things?

5 minute interview:

"Personal narrative"?

Top 5

Do/Don't/Quotables

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Untitled Slide

Brainstorm

Common App Q&A

Sketch the Skeleton

Rough Outline: Opening

• What's your opening shot (image, moment, scene, conflict)?
• Consider: in medias res

Rough Outline: Body

• What happens next? What other moments, experiences, or scenes do you need to tell this story?
• How to structure? Look to your prompt's question(s)
• What else needs telling? (can always cut later)

Other Body Structures

• Want to show one story via a series of scenes? Past, present, future structure?
• Want to show a series of different anecdotes linked by a common "through line" or theme?
• Want to show attempts at the problem, then eventual solution?
• Other ideas?

Rough Outline: Closing

• What's your closing shot (image, moment, scene)?
• Will you connect back to opening?
• Will you project forward?
• Will you use a cliffhanger to leave the reader wanting more?
• Something else?

Rough Outline: Example

Prep two 60 second Elevator Pitches

From "Essays That Will Get You Into College"

I enjoyed my bondage with the family and especially with their mule, Jake.

Filled with Victorian furniture and beautiful antique fixtures, even at that age I was amazed.

In the spring, people were literally exploding outside.

I am proud to be able to say that I have sustained from the use of drugs, alcohol and tobacco products.

Take Wordsworth, for example; every one of his words is worth a hundred words.

Opening Lines: Hook 'Em

• First words matter: ace the 10 second test
• Follow-through matters: ace the 60 second test
• What's your "through line"?

Hook #1: In Medias Res Action

• Use action, imagery, or dialogue to open in medias res
• "Sitting cross-legged on the floor of a Bhimanagar slum dwelling in Bangalore, I ran my fingers across a fresh cut on my forehead."
• "On a hot hollywood evening, I sat on a bike, sweltering in a winter coat and furry boots."

Hook #2: Surprising Statement

• Ignite curiosity with a surprising statement, or tease, but don't reveal
• "I almost didn't live through September 11th, 2001."
• "Cancer tried to defeat me, and it failed."
• "I am not drunk...but the doctor who delivered me was."
• "I change my name each time I place an order at Starbucks."

Hook #3: Contrast

• Set up a contrast or juxtaposition
• "Unlike many mathematicians, I live in an irrational world; I feel that my life is defined by a certain amount of irrationalities that bloom too frequently, such as my brief foray in front of 400 people without my pants."

Hook #3: Contrast

• Set up a contrast or juxtaposition
• As a child, being outgoing and athletic were characteristics far from my comfort zone. I would find an excuse to get out of any situation that seemed even remotely uncomfortable. You can understand my surprise then when I found myself up to bat in a foreign game, with foreign kids, speaking a foreign language in a foreign country: India.

Hook #4: Object/Image

• Focus on a compelling object or image
• Stones never forget. Their rough surfaces and cracks act as barriers, letting memories in and holding them in place, as if frozen in time.
• I never thought I could find so much joy in getting a new broom. When you work in a dirty, greasy, hectic kitchen you start to realize the importance of keeping your workspace clean.

Showing vs. Telling

DoNow: Turn this "Tell" into a "Show"

• I remember the game: it was a cold October evening.

Stage 1: Tell

• "I remember the game: it was a cold October evening."
• basic info; nothing memorable to hang onto; vague for reader

Stage 2: Expand & Describe

• Expand and describe imagery of the scene; more precise; more sensory
• "It was 30 bone-chilling degrees in late October when I stood across from the largest man I’d ever seen."

Stage 3: Recreate the Experience

• Provide background; take reader into the memory; make us participants; think like a camera and "show" us what you see

Stage 3: Recreate the Experience

• "On a bone-chilling night in late October, I stood across from a hulking brute who planned to put me on a stretcher before the night was over. I sucked the cold air into my lungs and blew it back out. Icy frost escaped as fragments of football memories flashed through my mind:

Stage 3: Recreate the Experience

• Pee-Wee practices wearing helmets too big for our heads. The mud, blood, and sweat I’d spilled with the other young men who stood beside me on this field. Tonight, in this moment, we were brothers. By the night's end, we’d be bitter enemies."

Final Tips

• "Tell" or summarize details that don’t need elaboration to fast forward.
• "Show" or zoom in on details that are most important or interesting to your story
• Add snippets of dialogue if they reveal characters or story (but capture speech)
• Go beyond visual images when it would add intrigue (hear? feel?)

Turn this tell into a show:
"Tearing my ACL was one of the worst moments of my life."

Find a "Tell" in your essay and turn it into a "Show"

See Links:
"Creative Writing 101: Show vs Tell"
and "Should You Show Or Tell?"

Closer #1: Full Circle

• Return to your opener, but with new insight
• Model #1
• Model #3
• Model #4

Closer #2: Project to the Future

• Proclaim commitment to using what you've learned (and explain how you'll use it in the future)
• Model #1
• Model #2
• Model #7

Closer #3: Poetic Inspiration

• End with a poetic and heartfelt emotional appeal
• Model #3
• Model #5
• Model #6

Closer #4: Cliffhanger

• Leave your reader wanting more with a "what happens next?"
• Model #4

Bonus Resources