<p>I’m thinking that one day I may become an admissions counselor just to read some of the tripe that kids churn out.</p>
<p>I was thinking the same thing…except doing it while in school since most places use current students to help out.</p>
<p>I’ve heard AP exams are particularly frustrating/amusing to grade.</p>
<p>Example: one student in the batch my AP Euro teacher read wrote a brilliant analysis of Adolescenza Mutante Ninja Tartarughe by an obscure Italian artist for an FRQ. The teachers thought it was magnificent and would have given him a 9, except they looked up the title and it turned out to be “Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles.”</p>
<p>My US History teacher said the teachers for that test actually put up a HUGE wall of butcher paper, and each time a reader comes across something really stupid they write it down. At break everyone goes around and laughs at what these poor students wrote.</p>
<p>I believe the scientific term is b.s. As a master in the art of b.s. I can say that if you save it for the proper time, it can be quite useful. Still, a college essay is not the place to use it.</p>
<p>Lol I love when people do that. My teacher had one where the student wrote “I don’t know. Hooby hooby hooby…(for the entire space)”</p>
<p>well, having perused some of the various forums here (the ive league ones are of course the most entertaining), it seems that kids are choosing - unintentionally or not- are choosing to bs their essays.</p>
<br>
<br>
<p>You want to do that for a living in order to read bad essays? That’s crazy talk. I can’t imagine a better definition of Hell on Earth than having a job where you go into the office each day to face a stack of 5000 or so dreadful essays waiting to be read.</p>
<br>
<br>
<p>Trust me – it’s torture. And I only have to read twenty or so every year, and if they’re really bad, I get to do something about it (i.e. help the students fix them). It’s be a lot tougher with a pile of 500 and no way to tell the students that they’re shooting themselves in the feet.</p>
<p>The reason it’s torture is that virtually all of the bad essays fit into one of a few categories. So it’s like reading the same bad essay over and over and over and over and over again. If they were terrible in a million different ways (like, say, bad American Idol contestants), then it might be fun. They never are.</p>
<p>pabulum <a href=“09/24/03,%20scathing%20TV%20review,%20spelled%20incorrectly%20%22pablum%22%20which%20would%20make%20it%20a%201940s%20baby%20cereal”>b</a>**
Pronunciation: 'pa-by&-l&m
Function: noun
Etymology: Latin, food, fodder; akin to Latin pascere to feed – more at FOOD
Date: 1733
1 : FOOD; especially : a suspension or solution of nutrients in a state suitable for absorption
2 : intellectual sustenance
3 : something (as writing or speech) that is insipid, simplistic, or bland</p>
<p>Which are the bad categories you say most essays fall into?</p>
<p>Let me take a shot:
- The ones full of platitudes
- The apologetic/excusatory ones
- The one where the author is trying to push himself/herself as being a) different b) a leader c) adversity overcomer by simply saying so and not letting the adcoms decide it for themselves
- The negative ones
- The badly written ones
- The ones signifying questionable personality</p>
<p>What kinds of things are platitudes though?</p>
<p>Platitudes:</p>
<p>1) How being part of a team changed me
2) How working with kids changed me
3) How working with seniors changed me
4) How hard work in general changed me</p>
<p>Other tragically excruciating essays:
- Look at me, I’m funny!
- I was the leader of this, and I did this, and I won this, and…
- My life is difficult; emo tear.</p>
<p>Now, all of these could fly if they’re well-written, but the temptation to fall into the pattern is too great for most to resist.</p>
<p>then what the hell is a good eassy if basically everything is crap or cliche?</p>
<p>I haven’t read any essays from people who got into harvard, but i have read some of the stanford and yale ones, and honestly, they bore me. They were absolutely ordinary and even-toned. I didn’t see passion, I didn’t see uniqueness, hell I didn’t even see eloquence. However, they didn’t fit in any of the categories above.
I don’t know who is looking for what anymore and I think that it is better this way so i could sit down and write whatever comes from within. I completed all my harvard application in two nights, the two nights before the deadline.</p>
<p>That sounds pretty true. YOu know what, I think the admissions committees like essays about nothing (kind of like Seinfeld, and wasn’t that a hit?) For example at Duke or Wake, one of the two, a dean of admissions was going on about some essay about the lack of use for male nipples, watching jeopardy with one’s family, cheese, etc.</p>
<p>So, go totally out there.
For me, I wrote about being a militant vegan in middle school and how I never got anywhere in life with it. So I changed strategies.</p>
<p>O yea, and I got a likely from the big H.</p>
<p>Talking about grandma’s cookies or how traveling taught me that people look different but are all the same on the inside… THOSE are major platitudes which I’d avoid.</p>
<p>Eloquence can’t hurt, but passion is key.</p>
<p>In my follow up, I wrote about how I thought Heaven was a bureaucracy. That was interesting. Now, I’m thinking of expanding it into a short story, hehe.</p>
<p>as bobbobbob said… “then what the hell is a good essay if basically everything is crap or cliche?” </p>
<p>-_- hehe</p>
<p>good short story if anyone’s interested, maybe you runningncircles: Allan Gurganus’ “Toward A More Precise Identification of the Newer Angels”</p>
<p>It’s hard to BS an essay. even the most talented actors can’t (convincingly) fake passion on paper.</p>