A good college application essay sets its author apart from thousands of other applicants. Here are some steps you can take to make your essay stand out.

STEP 1: Start early. Give yourself enough time to think about your essay and revise it as needed.
STEP 2: Write about something you’re familiar with.
STEP 3: Be yourself. The admissions team is interested in who you are – not someone you think they want you to be.
STEP 4: Be original. Though many college applications will have standardized essay questions, try to put an original, creative spin on your response. Make the essay your own.
STEP 5: Write an essay that shows how you’re unique. For example, one student who wrote about her distinctive laugh got accepted on early decision to Columbia University. Include any experiences or jobs that might set you apart from other applicants.
STEP 6: Be authentic. There’s no need to embellish your experiences. STEP 7: Use a relaxed, comfortable tone of voice but avoid being too familiar, sarcastic or comic.
STEP 8: Check to make sure your essay answers the questions asked. Avoid wandering too far from your subject matter.
STEP 9: Proofread your essay for spelling, punctuation and grammar. STEP 10: Mail your application early to avoid any postal mishaps. Tips & Warnings

Keep in mind that your audience will probably be a group of people very much like your high school teachers, but with slightly higher standards. Try not to be overly safe when writing your essay. You want to write an essay that is memorable.

Ehow.com

People who enjoy spectacular success often explain their secret of success by saying, “I just happened to be in the right place at the right time.”.
Here’s how you can copy them.
In my previous career I was involved in real estate. This brought me into contact with rich and poor alike, in a wide range of circumstances and in different types of housing. This proved to be a valuable masterclass in success creation.
In the areas with low income housing — both owner-occupier and rental — I was viewed with great suspicion, as I strolled around, looking for suitable real estate. Quite possibly I was thought to be a repro man, as I was rarely even looked in the eye by the locals, let alone smiled at, or spoken to.
Contrast that with my experiences in a different area, just a few miles away, which mainly consisted of high-end real estate: stunning mansions set in beautifully manicured grounds, tended by an army of gardeners. Bearing in mind my earlier experience, I expected to be viewed with even deeper suspicion, in case I was planning a spot of larceny to relieve the owners of these magnificent mansions of their valuables.
But no! When I chanced to pass a resident of this area, they invariably looked at me and smiled. Quite often they greeted me in a friendly manner.
This creates quite an interesting “chicken and egg” conundrum: are the residents of these magnificent houses more cheerful than their poorer counterparts, because they have “made it” — or is there something more fundamental at work here?
Having researched this in greater depth for my recent book, I am firmly convinced people who are more open, more receptive to new ideas and probably more sociable, place themselves in a far better position to be presented with more opportunities for success.
Of course, it’s then down to the individual to take advantage of these opportunities, but it means they are “in the right place at the right time”.
So, if you want more success, resolve to be more friendly to strangers, more open to new ideas and more sociable. There’s a great river of opportunity passing by your door and the more open you are, the wider the river becomes. So make it as wide as the Mississippi and then dip your net in and pull out success!

Paul Hooper-Kelly owns www.HowToMakeYourOwnLuck.com and uses his sixty years of business and life success to help ordinary people create extraordinary lives.
Get your copy of his popular course “Seventeen Secrets To Success” right now, whilst it’s still free Seventeen_Secrets_Of_Success

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