Thread: College Admission Essay: Input wanted

Kind of an aside, but if you're applying for college, do you need to apply to the CIS department now? Most of your classes the first year or two are likely to be general ed with a tilt toward math & science (at least that's how it worked when I went to college). The core courses, at least the degree ones, were generally reserved for juniors and seniors. Maybe it's different where you're applying. I went through about nine or ten majors.
As for your revised essay, it's a lot better, but again, be specific and concrete. Not a resume, but not too generic either, and avoid excessive superlative & hyperbole. It rarely works.
Have you thought about just asking the CIS department what they're looking for? It could help you tailor your letter and give you an idea if their focus is what you're looking for. Your letter might also depend on who will be reading it - someone from the department who knows CIS or someone in admissions who calls MIS to minimize their windows, or both?

Ride-or-Die

This is much better! It does not sound like a resume.

Also, taylor your answers, like salvelinus, said - it make you look like you did your homework about them.

<I am fluent in the way each element of a computer system works, and why it works. The technology I have worked with varies all the way from older to the newest types.>

Yo ROD, dont say stuff you cant back up! I am not saying you cant, but there is more to a CPU than meets the eye. Other hardware aside, what if they asked you about logic,transistors blah blah..CPU is a NICE thing-if you know how it works. Dont oversell you self-you want IN, not a medal!

heres an approach. In essays, emotion is the critical point that needs to be moved. the goal in a good essay, and more so in a personal one, is to not only prove a point, but make someone believe it. It has to appeal to their senses emotionaly. if it is a fact, that doesn't mean they want to believe it, or care for it


What you know isn't very important to them, they want to know why you want to go to that university. They want to know why your special.

Be specific, mabe write of a certain instance that happened while you were working on "technology". don't be wordy, yet don't be broad. keep the sentence style varried.

The most important part of the whole essay is the first sentence, there it'll either stand out or be just another essay. be creative, see what you can come up with.

Ex.

Grabber: my hands flew across the keyboard spewing letters across the screan. Another day in class, and yet another problem solved. Time in its greatest essence stopped so that I could finish, stopped in a way that allowed my mind to race. there was no idea what to do in the last hour or so, but then My mind wasn't time in that past. Now I had all the time I needed. Another problem solved, the Algorithm was complete. Computers had, once again, swept me away, leaving me a feeling of completion. Once again giving me the need and love for technology .



Then explain: Why are you obsessed with technology, what makes it so different to you than anything else, why did you choose ot over another field

Ps. Sorry if there are any mistakes in the intro I wrote, it took me all of 2 min.

Remeber this is only one aproach

I agree completely, it's like I was saying before, they are going to be reading thousands of these, you have to make them remember yours. There are two great ways to make them do that...the most important is the openning sentance, you have to make them wakeup from the dreamstate they've slumped into reading essays and apps for two weeks straight and pay attention to you. Then, number two, you have to keep thier attention, and emotion is a great way to do that.

Your opening sentance should say "Hey! Read me! I'm intresting!!!"


Here are my 2:

I was sitting on the cool steel on a warm October morning, looking down on the field as 7th and 8th grade boys crashed into each other as hard as they could.

She looked more like the kind of old woman you’d see in the local supermarket, not in the depths of hell.

Now given I messed up and they don't say "Hey! Read me! I'm intresting!!!" you get the idea.

(Oh I should also note that they arn't programming related, but the question had nothing to do with computers)