Four Strategies to Help You Write a Persuasive Essay for Your Dream College

When applying to practically any college, you’ll be required to complete an essay for the application, which gives you the opportunity to display more about yourself that can’t be readily included in the other areas of the application. The most important guideline to follow when attempting to write a persuasive essay is to start early, which ensures that you don’t need to rush to meet a deadline. This article takes a look at four strategies you can use to write a persuasive and effective essay for your college application.

Make Sure That You Choose the Right Topic

An essay for a college application isn’t meant solely to reiterate the other information that has been included in your application. You shouldn’t write about the college itself or the number of activities you took part in during your high school years. Instead, it’s important that you use your creative talents when writing this essay. Write about your personal story and some of the thoughts you have about going to college. You can also include information that you were unable to place in the rest of the application, which could include details about some of your records from high school.

Use the Correct Voice

When attempting to write a persuasive essay, it’s important that you write in your own voice to more effectively get your point across. You should try to avoid using phrases that are commonplace and are likely being used by other individuals who are applying for college. Stay away from words and phrases that are unnecessary or overtly formal. When writing in your own voice, consider writing about an experience that you went through and how it was a formative one. It’s also essential that you edit your essay without any outside help. If you get someone else to edit your essay, admission officers will likely be able to identify any changes in voice.

Keep the Focus of the Essay Personal

It’s important that you don’t write a broad and impersonal essay that covers too many topics, which only serves to make the essay read more like a resume that you’re sending to a prospective employer. Your writing should focus on yourself and the qualities that you have. Every reader should be able to understand the primary idea of your article from the first paragraph to the conclusion.

Ask Someone to Proofread

While you shouldn’t get someone else to edit your essay, it’s highly recommended that you ask a parent or teacher to proofread the article for any grammatical errors. Even though a standard spell-check feature is able to detect misspelled words, it’s not comprehensive and won’t catch every error in your essay. If you ask a teacher to proofread your essay, you should be confident about their findings and any errors they point out.

To write a persuasive essay, you need to be yourself. The essays that are written for college applications aren’t the same as ones that you’ll be tasked with writing throughout your college education. These essays are designed to provide prospective students with the ability to show admission officials who they are and why they want to attend the college in question. With these aforementioned strategies, it should be easier for you to write a persuasive essay.