How To Answer UPenn's 2024/25 Supplemental Essays: Tips & Insights
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Part I: What Is a College Essay?
Part II: College Essay Formats
Choosing the Best Format
Part III: Structure
Part IV: Revising With a Rubric
Part V: Nuts & Bolts Formatting
This blog post provides a comprehensive guide to college essay formats and structures, covering the purpose of the essay in admissions, the differences between personal narratives and personal essays, and a variety of both common and creative essay structures. It also includes a concise rubric for evaluating essays and practical tips on formatting and submitting your final draft. Whether you’re just starting your essay or refining your final version, your essay is a crucial application component. The principles and insights in this post will position you to write the kind of essays submitted by top applicants.
Crafting a compelling college essay is a critical part of the admissions process, but it can also be one of the most daunting. Understanding the different formats and structures available can help you tell your story in a way that resonates with admissions officers.
Whether you're writing a personal narrative, personal essay, or a reflective essay, this guide will walk you through the key elements to consider, offering practical tips and creative strategies to help your essay stand out.
First, it's important to understand that the essays you write in high school differ from what you have to write in your college application essays. Whether you’re writing the Common App Essay, Supplemental Essays, or UCAS Personal Statement, it's crucial that you prepare ahead of time to do your absolute best. Read ahead for guidelines on how to format and structure a college application essay and what mistakes to avoid.
A college essay introduces you to your prospective college or university.
It’s common for these essays to have a prescribed length between 200 and 600 words.
The college essay is a pillar of most applications because it offers a glimpse into who you are as a person and helps admissions officers gauge your potential fit in a college community.
Your choice of format and structure will also be guided by the specific prompt you’re writing to and how you approach the prompt, based on your own unique personal circumstances and the college context.
Many students have little experience or formal teaching for this kind of writing format, and have had little opportunity to experiment with it and get feedback.
Shifting gears away from what many US students learn about writing a 5-Paragraph Essay or any similar form of expository essay, let's put the college essay writing format into a more familiar perspective.
Imagine you’ve decided to (or been asked to) write a brief memoir of your life.
Or, imagine you’re asked to develop and write a thoughtful personal reflection about a favorite activity, book, or influential event in your life.
Do these examples make writing a college essay feel a bit more approachable? I hope so!
We all have a story to tell that can help strangers know us better.
We all have a capacity for sharing our reflections on formative and memorable personal experiences or big life questions or concepts.
And when we do that, we’re sharing in much the same way we share in a college essay.
For some students, the prompt can be both helpful and intimidating:
Here is an example of an actual college essay prompt from Yale:
Reflect on your membership in a community to which you feel connected. Why is this community meaningful to you? You may define community however you like.
This kind of essay isn’t about information and facts, or your resume! You're going to need to write about yourself, through the lens of your own feelings, thoughts, perceptions, and experiences. This can involve some uncomfortable honesty, candor, and vulnerability, and a level of subjectivity that's foreign to most academic writing you're used to!
To drive this point home, note that the words you/your appear five times in the prompt from Yale!
Also, the prompt even tells you that “community” can be defined however you like. That's nice freedom... BUT, you're left with the challenge of making a coherent essay out of your thoughts and reflections.
While the general purpose of a college essay is to introduce yourself to admissions officers or help school leaders gauge your "fit" with their school, you’ll want to decode the essay prompt for more nuanced clarity on the purpose of your essay.
For most college essay prompts, “decoding” is very straightforward, but it’s still important:
Use the specific admissions context to guide decoding.
Using the example above, it’s clear Yale wants to get a sense of how you’ll thrive in a very social learning environment: from interactions with a study group, to collaborating in a school club, orchestra, or athletic team, or thriving in the the larger campus community…
One can go a step further, putting the prompt (and the essay you’ll write) into a larger context. Yale no doubt understands its role in preparing students for future leadership. High-level, innovative leadership requires a well-honed ability to navigate complex community and public/private interactions, collaborations, and even rivalries.
In the end, your essay will focus on what’s real and authentic for you personally, but decoding the prompt in its larger admissions context can help you decide what content is most relevant.
Good question!
In some contexts, or when used loosely, the two terms may periodically be used interchangeably.
But in most contexts, personal statements are different from college essays, even if both are used for admissions.
If you use the UCAS platform to apply to a UK school, you’ll be asked to write a clear and concise “personal statement” under 4,000 characters that includes the following type of personal information:
As you can see, a personal statement is autobiographical but in a more matter of fact way, making it less subjective and less intimate in terms of sharing about identity, nuanced thoughts, and formative personal experiences.
A personal statement requires time and effort, but the task is more straightforward, based on resume-type information, qualifications, and academic or professional goals.
A college essay has a prescribed focus, but it’s also asking you to share values, reflections, and ideas, and speak to your personality, attributes, and aspirations. This makes your approach more open-ended, and it’s a big departure from more practical forms of business communication or academic writing.
In this section will delve more deeply into the general format of a college essay, with a closer look at the two most relevant formats for this kind of writing task:
A college essay will typically have the overall format (structure, voice, and perspective) of a personal essay/reflective essay OR personal narrative.
A personal essay is a reflective piece of writing that explores a specific theme or topic from the author's life. Rather than following a story arc, a personal essay delves into events, influences, personality traits, or beliefs and reflections related to a larger personal theme.
Features of a Personal or Reflective Essay Format:
A reflective essay format is similar to a personal essay format, but making a distinction may be helpful.
Some college essay prompts will ask students to share their introspective views of a big idea or concept. This aligns with a reflective essay format, for most circumstances.
With less focus on life events and experiences than a personal essay, a reflective essay focuses on a writer's inner thoughts: this format is ideally suited for sharing thoughts and ideas, revealing how you make mental connections between influences, experiences, and thoughts, and spotlighting evolving ideas and perspectives that shape your identity or academic interests.
A personal narrative is a story about a specific experience or event from the author's life, focusing on a particular moment or series of events and the emotions and lessons associated with it.
Features of a Personal Narrative Format:
Depending on the prompt and the content and themes that you most want to recount and share, a college essay may use one of the formats above exclusively, but oftentimes a college essay will be made more effective by integrating features from one or more of these college essay formats.
There can always be creative exceptions to what’s most common…
One such example is using the third-person voice instead of the first-person voice.
While personal essays are typically written in the first person, some applicants choose to take an unconventional approach by writing about themselves from an external perspective.
This method involves observing oneself as if under a microscope, adopting a tone that is intentionally dispassionate, objective, and impersonal — even though the essay is deeply personal. In this style, the writer may even refer to themselves in the third person (using "he," "she," or sometimes their own name) instead of the usual first person ("I").
This approach can offer a unique angle and a distinctive narrative voice, though it requires some artistry to maintain clarity and a strong connection with the reader.
When choosing the best format for a college essay, you’ll want to start with brainstorming and ideation.
Your final choice of format and perspective will depend on the prompt in particular, and how you envision responding to the prompt.
What kind of information is the prompt asking you to share about yourself?
As you can see, both narrative features and analytical essay features can be effective for a college essay.
When deciding which formats are best for your essay, you’ll want to consider both the prompt itself and the kind of content you want to share based on your personal circumstances.
Whether you choose a narrative or essay format, the purpose of a college essay is to introduce yourself in a very personal way, including expressing some personal, intellectual, and emotional honesty, authenticity, and vulnerability, rather than just listing autobiographical data, as on a resume.
Doing this effectively can also make an essay more memorable, leaving a stronger impact on the reader (which is a challenge when top schools have so many applicants).
Showing, not telling is an effective strategy to create a stronger bond between writer and reader, and to cultivate empathy and intimacy.
Tips and Techniques for Showing, Not Telling
Do’s:
Don’ts:
We’ve done a deep dive into the format, perspective, and kinds of writing elements to use in a college essay. But when it comes time to put it together — to outline, compose, and organize — you’ll often find you really don’t have a lot of room in a college essay. this makes it imperative to work within a well defined structure that fits your prompt and the content you're sharing.
In Part III, below, you'll learn crucial tips for structuring an essay so it's memorable and makes its mark on readers. You'll also discover just how many kinds of creative structures you can choose from!
Top 5 Common App Personal Essay Red Flags
First, let’s take a look at how to structure the beginning, middle, and end of a college essay to make it as effective as possible.
You’ll want an effective hook to give your essay a strong start, and set the stage for making a bigger impact on your reader, helping your essay, and application, stand out!
A creative and imaginative hook is one that announces a larger, unifying theme and also creates some form of invitation or tension, drawing the reader in, so almost without realizing it, they need to read the next part and can't wait to find out more…
One caution here: don’t create a “hook” because you think it’s necessary to show you’re a “good writer.” That’s not really the point.
Create intrigue, suspense, or curiosity…
Since a hook can take so many forms and needs to be so integral to your essay, there’s no fixed recipe to offer.
That said, one way to gauge the power of a hook is by the measure of intrigue, emotion, and curiosity it sparks in the reader.
Here are examples for inspiration:
When I read Frederick Douglass’ account of learning how to read while enslaved, there was one detail that I couldn’t forget, one I’ve been thinking about in my own life over and over again…
My brother died when I was only thirteen and while I look whole on the outside, I sometimes think if people really could see me it would be like I was missing a leg or confined to a wheelchair, it’s just that it’s not physical, but the loss doesn't go away and makes me feel different. And it's become part of who I am.
My stepfather doesn’t believe college is worth it and doesn’t approve of my decision to go to college, let alone go to a really selective one. One week in my junior year the conflict took a turn for the worse, but what happened eventually helped me understand why my motivation to study political science is different from the interest others have in fixing laws and making the country better.
As you can see, each hook has most or all of these features:
With an effective hook your essay comes out of the gate like a racehorse, beginning with the very first sentence! Most likely your reader won’t put down your essay to go to the concession stand either. Instead, they'll keep reading and really start to care about your story and your educational aspirations and future!
The middle phase is all the stuff you need to share to add depth and conviction to your writing and core themes, while also maintaining the reader’s engagement. It will also help you personalize your essay, as you share inner thoughts or recount real personal experiences.
Here are some strategies you may find helpful as you develop your ideas for this section of your essay.
Note: you may need to ignore what's not relevant or less relevant based on the structure, content, or approach you're using.
There are actually many effective ways to conclude a college essay that are compact but also likely to help make your essay more memorable and give your central theme stronger resonance.
Whether you choose to focus on a resolution (or lack of resolution), or you want to craft a conclusion with a strong future-facing insight, it’s up to you. As author and editor-in-chief, you'll decide what kind of ending works best, but here are ideas to give you a head start:
Circle Back to the Introduction:
Revisit an image, theme, or idea from the opening of your essay. This creates a sense of cohesion and closure, giving the reader a feeling of completeness. For example, if you started with a specific memory or metaphor, bringing it back in the conclusion can effectively tie your story together.
Reflect on Growth or Change:
End with a reflection on how the experiences or ideas discussed in the essay have shaped you. Highlight the personal growth, lessons learned, or changes in perspective. This helps demonstrate self-awareness and the ability to learn from experiences—qualities valued by admissions committees.
Look Forward:
Use the conclusion to connect your past experiences or reflections to your future goals. This shows that you’ve not only learned from your experiences but are also motivated and focused on what comes next. For example, you can mention how the skills or insights gained will help you succeed in college or contribute to your chosen field.
Leave a Lasting Impression:
End with a strong, memorable statement or image that resonates with the reader. This could be a powerful sentence that encapsulates your main theme or a vivid image that leaves the reader thinking. Avoid clichés and aim for something unique to your experience.
Pose a Thoughtful Question:
Conclude by posing a question that invites the reader to think more deeply about the themes of your essay. This can be a rhetorical question that leaves the reader pondering your insights or the broader implications of your experiences.
End with a Call to Action (for Yourself):
Consider concluding with a personal resolution or commitment related to what you’ve discussed in your essay. This shows forward-thinking and a proactive attitude. For instance, you might write about how you plan to apply what you’ve learned in college or in your future endeavors.
Keep it Concise and Focused:
The conclusion should be succinct and avoid introducing new ideas or topics. Focus on reinforcing the main themes of your essay and leave the reader with a clear understanding of your message.
Use an Appropriate Tone:
Ensure that your conclusion matches the tone of the rest of the essay. If your essay is reflective and serious, the conclusion should maintain that tone. If your essay has a lighter, more optimistic tone, your conclusion should also reflect that.
While most college essays follow the dominant format of a personal narrative, personal essay, or reflective essay, there are many creative ways you can structure elements from each format.
These structures are not, most of them, used for academic writing, so it’s new territory for many young scholars. On the bright side, consider it an opportunity to use a creative structure to convey something fresh and unique about your personality.
Tip: Only use a structure when it aligns effectively with content you're presenting in your essay.
This structure focuses on the people, places, and transitions that shaped your upbringing.
This structure is effective when it ties together various aspects of your background to illustrate a cohesive narrative about your personal development.
This structure centers around a specific event or experience that was highly formative and memorable for you.
This structure is effective when the anecdote is not only memorable but also reveals significant personal growth and understanding.
This structure is all about overcoming adversity, often framed as a three-act drama:
Think of this structure like a nonlinear mix of short video clips or a photo montage. It mirrors the disjointedness of our memories, where seemingly unrelated moments, anecdotes, or events come together to form a cohesive theme in your life.
Each vignette stands alone, not connected by chronology or topic, but when combined, they create an impressionistic and layered narrative.
The key to this structure is ensuring that each vignette is tied to a common theme, allowing the separate pieces to coalesce into a meaningful whole. This structure may help a writer foreground attributes such as creativity and imagination.
This structure blends recounting past experiences or influences — such as an event, a book, or a trip — with reflections on their significance from a present-day perspective.
This structure is effective when you want to demonstrate how your past has influenced your present beliefs, showcasing your capacity for deep thought and introspection.
There are a whole host of creative structures that may appeal to your creative side or prove to be a good fit for a particular prompt and how you want to respond to it.
Circular Structure:
The essay begins and ends with a similar idea, image, or event, creating a sense of closure and emphasizing the cyclical nature of the experience or the lesson learned.
Braided Structure:
Multiple storylines or themes are interwoven throughout the essay, with each thread contributing to the overall message or insight. The threads may converge or contrast with each other by the end.
Parallel Narrative Structure:
Two or more narratives are told side by side, either contrasting or complementing each other. This structure is often used to highlight connections between different experiences or themes.
Question-and-Answer Structure:
The essay is framed around a central question or a series of questions that the author seeks to answer through their reflections and experiences. This structure often lends itself to a conversational tone.
Frame Story Structure:
The essay begins with an introductory narrative (the “frame”) that sets the stage for the main story or stories within it. The frame is revisited at the end to provide closure or reflection.
Fragmented Structure:
The narrative is broken into non-linear segments or fragments, jumping between different times or events. This structure often reflects the complexity or disjointed nature of memory and experience.
List Structure:
The essay is organized as a list, with each item on the list representing a different memory, thought, or aspect of the central theme. This structure allows for flexibility and creativity in presentation.
You can use these structures alone or combined, depending on your particular story and the specific prompt, purpose, and context for your essay!
Common App Essay Guide Part 2: Structure
The rubric below uses a 3-point scale to evaluate key components of a college admissions essay. Use to gauge your progress when you get into the work of revising your essay drafts.
The "Content and Ideas" category can also be used as a guide while developing content for the initial draft and outline.
3 (Excellent): The essay presents a compelling and original story or theme, offering deep insights into the applicant's personality, experiences, and values. It effectively addresses the prompt and demonstrates the applicant's readiness important aspects of college life and learning.
2 (Satisfactory): The essay provides a clear and relevant narrative or reflection with some insights, but may lack depth or originality in certain areas. It addresses the prompt adequately but may not fully showcase the applicant’s potential.
1 (Needs Improvement): The essay lacks focus or depth and may not clearly address the prompt. The content may feel generic, overly personal, or unsuitable for an admissions essay.
3 (Excellent): The essay is well-organized with a strong hook and a clear, logical flow. The structure complements the content and purpose, making the essay engaging and easy to follow.
2 (Satisfactory): The essay has a basic structure that is generally clear but may have some organizational issues. The flow is adequate, though it could be improved to enhance engagement.
1 (Needs Improvement): The essay lacks clear organization, making it difficult to follow. The structure may be disjointed, with a weak hook and unclear transitions between ideas.
3 (Excellent): The essay has a strong, authentic voice that reflects the applicant’s personality. The tone is consistent, engaging, and appropriate for the content, helping to create a connection with the reader.
2 (Satisfactory): The essay’s voice is clear but may lack some authenticity or consistency. The tone is generally appropriate but may not fully engage the reader or complement the content.
1 (Needs Improvement): The essay’s voice is weak or inconsistent, and the tone may feel detached or inappropriate. It does not effectively convey the applicant’s personality or engage the reader.
3 (Excellent): The essay is free from grammatical, punctuation, and spelling errors, demonstrating careful editing. The mechanics support the essay’s structure, voice, and tone.
2 (Satisfactory): The essay has a few minor errors but they do not significantly detract from the overall quality. The mechanics are generally sound but may need some polishing.
1 (Needs Improvement): The essay contains multiple errors that affect readability and clarity. The mechanics need significant improvement to support the essay effectively.
3 (Excellent): The essay adheres fully to length and formatting guidelines and is completely relevant to the prompt and purpose.
2 (Satisfactory): The essay meets most guidelines but may slightly exceed length or have minor formatting issues. It is generally relevant but may not fully align with the prompt.
1 (Needs Improvement): The essay fails to adhere to length or formatting guidelines and may not be fully relevant to the prompt or purpose.
The main focus of your college essay is the content. The format and structure should make the essay easy to read to maintain this focus.
A title to your college essay is generally not required and takes from your word count. It can also confine your essay to a single meaning, so if you decide to use titles, use them with care. Keep your font double-spaced with a line space between the paragraphs to keep the essay easy on the eyes.
When the word count is not given, staying around 600 words is a safe bet. While it’s important to share about yourself in your essay, oversharing could make you stand out from your competition — in the worst way possible!
If you are copying and pasting your essay into a text box, here are some necessary actions to take to ensure your essay will be received as intended.
When attaching a document, you’ll need to be more precise with your formatting, but here are a few rules of thumb to follow:
These are just general guidelines... Always review all explicit instructions and requirements for layout, submission, and length for each particular school and essay.
The college essay format can feel like uncharted territory for many young scholars, presenting unique challenges and often becoming a stumbling block in the application process. However, you should find this resource abundantly helpful as you navigate the writing process. By understanding the distinct elements of the college essay format and thoughtfully applying the tips and insights we've just shared, you can apply strategies used by top applicants to top schools. Remember, the college essay is an opportunity to showcase your authentic voice and personal experiences in a way that sets you apart.
If you’re looking for additional guidance, consider signing up for a free consultation with a Crimson admissions advisor. They can provide personalized feedback, connect you with essay writing mentors, and help you refine your essay to make a lasting impression.
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