As every collegebound senior knows, the essay portion of the application is a major stresser. It requires intelligence, originality, creativity, and, above all, it must make a good impression on the admissions counselor. Each essay is pored over by the respective senior. It is the reason for sleepless nights and relentless soul-searching. It is presented with a special ritual to a trusted adviser, who searches it for flaws and then submitted back to the student for another rigorous round of editing. In all, this essay takes a massive amount of time from the student (and others) to create and formulate. It takes admissions about four minutes to read. Four. Minutes.
All of that time spent for a four minute impression of a document. What a waste.
But that isn't all; the topics for these essays can become ridiculously broad. For example, the UC personal statement's first prompt (for incoming freshman) states: Describe the world you come from — for example, your family, community or school — and tell us how your world has shaped your dreams and aspirations.
They also enforce a word limit of 1,000 words for the two essays. Each should be between 250 and 750 words.
This is ridiculous - My world is bigger than 750 words. I can talk barely talk about today in 750 words, let alone yesterday, and the day before that, and every other day of my life. How am I supposed to explain my view of the world without subjecting myself to a labelling process that endorses the stereotypes associated with each brand that I fall under. Personal statements are silly - they are far to short to accurately display the whole of someone's being.
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