rate my college essay gogogogogo

[joelav128]

It's only a draft but I'm looking for feedback positive or negative. If you like it, tell me, if you think I should start completely from scratch let me know that also. Give me your thoughts and let me know what you think I should take out, add in, or leave the same! Here it goes...


Life on the pine may be difficult for some, but I thrive upon it. Filling up water bottles to the perfect height, screaming with every shot that goes in and always being optimistic are things that I pride myself on. It takes a lot of hard work to be successful, but I have put in tons of effort in order to make myself the perfect benchwarmer, a challenge that not many people are eager to accept.
Thirty two minutes per game has allowed me more time than I prefer to consider my position on the team and ways of improving it. From “accidentally” falling on the point guard’s ankle during practice to learning how to hit half court shots, nearly everything has crossed my mind. After careful thought and much deliberation, I have come to one conclusion: basketball may not be the sport for me.
Rather than give up just like that, I was determined to have my status as cheerleader revoked. I hit the weight room hard three days a week after school, sprinted alone in dark gyms and took jump shot after jump shot in the off season until my arms wanted to fall off. Still, that was not enough. I sprinted with weighted shoes, dribbled tennis balls around my driveway and stopped eating McDonalds. Finally as the first game of the season approached I was excited to show off my new skills and actually become a contributing member of the team.
The first quarter came and went, then the second, the third, and the fourth. I had not played a single minute, even when we were up by forty with four minutes left in the last quarter. On the surface it appeared my hard work had been in vain, but that was not the truth.
Toiling away day after day in the gym had taught me something valuable. Working hard allowed me to be proud of myself, even if I was not successful in reaching my goal of playing in a game, if only so for a minute. However, I had achieved my goal of becoming a better basketball player. I can’t complain about not playing in the game, apparently others, mainly my coach, did not think I improved as much as I did. Hey, there’s always next year, right?
Lessons learned in basketball have allowed me to improve in other areas of my life. Not understanding the loop rule in physics? Study harder. Can’t get that girl in your English class? Stop stumbling over your words and saying stupid things to her. Now that I have the right mentality, I am ready to approach college with the same attitude that has led me to success, or lack thereof, in basketball. I’m waiting to get off the bench in the game of life that I have so far been sitting on and move on to the next “season” that awaits me.

[Keyser.]

Was there a specific question or statement you were supposed to address? Or was it just a "tell as about yourself" prompt? Just wondering because admissions councils like when your essay seems like it was written purely for their school, and not just a standard piece you'll send to the other 10 colleges to which you apply.

That said, I actually think the topic is pretty cool. It's definitely not what most people will write about.

There are quite a few sentence-level things that could be fixed but I'll just the resident writing teacher do that b/c his changes will be better than mine.

[Colombo]

there's a few syntactical mistakes, but I think the theme of your paper is very cool and interesting.

[joelav128]

thanks guys, its just a rough draft i literally just finished writing it so im gonna let it sit for a while before i revise it... regarding the topic there was no specific question i just wrote a free response for the common app

[pokerchap]

being a senior i can tell you this is way better than i write and mostly all my peers can write. good job sir.

[AE6]

"Filling up water bottles to the perfect height, screaming with every shot that goes in and always being optimistic are things that I pride myself on."

The structure here is kinda awkward, I think it would sound a lot better as "I pride myself on filling up water bottles, . . . . ." Also, there should be a comma after the word "in."

I like the theme a lot, but there's definitely a few more grammar/structure things like this that could use some work. Take it to your English teacher and ask him/her to have a look at it.

[pokergrader]

Its very funny because my college essay was also about me sucking at basketball, only mine was satire about lessons learned playing on the street courts in my suburban town.

It is a great starting point and as I have previously mentioned, love the theme. Your style here though needs a lot of work. One important aspect of writing is making sure the flow of your sentences matches the content.

And before I get into this, keep in mind I am a huge writing nit and other than multiple technical writing classes I have no real experience doing anything.

So nitty points:

Your introduction starts out really well "Life on the pine may be difficult for some ..snip.. always being optimistic" and then just finishes so poorly. Phrases like "are things" and "tons of effort" really should have no place in this essay. For this type of essay to work you have to not only prove you are creative, but that you are so good of a writer that you can do a crazy topic and still make it work. Use lots of diverse vocabulary.

2nd paragraph is great idea but needs to be re-written. Sentences are confusing and the ideas aren't expressed clearly enough.

3rd paragraph is goodish. I would not write things like "my arms wanted to fall off" and "stopped eating McDonald's" instead I would come up with other phrases that just sound "older" to me. However I am undecided whether that is a good idea for this paper. Maybe try out a few new things and see if can retain the smoothness but sound a little more mature.

Conclusion is just more of the same. Too many commas breaking up the flow, sentences like "I can’t complain about not playing in the game, apparently others, mainly my coach, did not think I improved as much as I did." are painful to read.

Just workshop it a little bit, idea is good, last sentence is hokey but works for the paper. Again I am not a professional writer, so don't take any of these comments to mean anything of importance.

[tshort]

Concept is interesting which is important. Your conclusion never seems to really break from the analogy that you "work hard, but fail." Transition better from how your hard work in basketball has and will result in success in other areas.

Convey some sense of confidence that you do (and will continue to) well in academic affairs.

[joelav128]

okay guys, thanks a lot for the feedback i appreciate it... i am going to revise it over the next couple days and see if i can fix some of the things you have mentioned... i am eagerly awaiting i_teach_writing to stop by. Would anybody be interested in reading the final product when it is ready?

[metamath]

not bad