The college essay wrongly encourages students to cast themselves as victims, to exaggerate the adversity they’ve faced, and to turn genuinely upsetting experiences into the focal point of their self-understanding. The college essay, dear reader, should be banned and banished and burned to the ground.
Gonna hard disagree that the purpose is useless, the problem is the advice we give kids. I work at a scholarship competition that has an essay requirement. We’re p vague with what we ask for in the essay, the prompt just asks student’s to share a meaningful story about themselves or someone who has inspired them. Thousands of kids every year write in with their “oh woe is me, I faced such adversity” essays, and pretty much all of them get ignored because they all look the same. I’m still young enough to remember high school, so I know that they’re getting coached to write this drivel, because I remember getting coached the same way.
The kids who end up receiving scholarships are always the ones who use the essay for it’s actual purpose; to give us an insight into who they are. Usually they write about something they’re passionate about, like the research they’re doing. Some students write a beautiful work of metaphorical prose. Once, we received a poem, and I wish we got more like those. These students ended up having far more unique and interesting essays, essays that ended up earning them scholarships, and they completely broke the “rules” of a good essay.
It seems that what the author of this article really has a problem with is the image that American high schools teach of what a “good college essay” ought to be, rather than the essay’s purpose as a tool that ultimately allows students an opportunity to define themselves outside of the standardized methods of measuring intelligence we employ. I agree that it’s an issue and schools should probably focus more on telling kids to highlight what they’ve done rather than lament their circumstances, but it’s also not even in the top 25 greatest issues with American high schools.
It would be nice if you could put a warning in the instructions that you’re not looking for a sob story (unless, of course, you like having “misled by a shitty guidance counselor” as a weed-out criterion).
The goal of the instructions is to be vague so students feel like they can write about really anything without being penalized. We could have very specific criteria that would likely produce better essays on average, but the goal isn’t for us to receive good essays; again, it’s just to get an idea of who the student is. Otherwise in addition to “no sob stories,” we’d need “no sports essays, no writing about your parents, no religious trauma etc.” We don’t want to be dictating what students write.
It’s also not to say that every student writing about the circumstances they’ve gone through is a bad essay. I read an excellent one this year from a student who immigrated from the Dominican Republic and faced a lot of racism. They linked their experience to the broader cultural decay that America is experiencing though, and the real topic of the essay was the hypocrisy present throughout the messaging of the American hegemony; how we often preach diversity while actually hating it. They didn’t try to focus the essay on themselves and their circumstances, they just related what they experienced to a larger topic they were clearly passionate about.
If we had a big warning that said “No sob stories,” we might not have received that essay, and that student might not have received an award.
This is an insanely long walk to a pretty weak point.
There’s lots of problems with America. This isn’t even one of them.
I mean, it is a problem… It’s literally filtering higher education by main character syndrome.
If you force someone to victimize their self history, that doesn’t just go away - it’s recontextualizing your life. That’s not something people generally do outside therapy or psychedelic trips. It’s deep introspection, it’s something the average person only does a few times in their life
If privileged people think of themselves as victims, that instills a lack of empathy. They look at those less fortunate, and think they had it harder, because they don’t know the details of their lives but their narrative is as a victim
They’re fucking disappearing people in my county, and there’s no problem that measures up to that… But it is a real problem
What in the fuck are you even describing right now?
If you force someone to victimize their self history
??? Has English completely left your brain? This sentence makes no sense, but maybe I’m in the wrong here. I’d love for you to break it down into a digestive format that myself and everyone can understand, because otherwise, this sentence is absolute bullshit and nonsense.
Please allow me to respond to your comment first in the context of the article so we’re on the same page:
- Your assertion is that college-aged kids are being FORCED into an essay. K
- These college-aged kids are both privileged AND victims somehow? Cool
- Because they don’t know what these “college.aged.”“kids”" are saying, that something must be wrong.
And then in the last single sentence you get to the heart of the matter.
Seriously fuck off with this nonsense. Personal essays have been a mode of education for hundreds of years. Now you take issue with their subjective nature? My fucking LAWD.
They aren’t agreeing with you dumbshittery. It doesn’t mean they are wrong.
If they start spouting stats and facts that are fucking DEMONSTRABLY wrong, then come on back and have this argument.
All you’re espousing right now is they don’t agree with your stupid bullshit. Fuck right off.
These college-aged kids are both privileged AND victims somehow? Cool
This is the heart of it. I don’t know what else you’re going on about, but but yes - this is the problem
You can be both. You can go through abusive experiences and decide they’re normal - and vice versa. You can be both a victim and a predator… To insist otherwise is fucking brain dead
There are many issues with education in the US. Addressing other larger issues would probably lead to stuff like this changing just by nature.
Wow… For real?
“College essay is the worst thing in America because you could be perfect in all the tests, but then straight up just be an unlikeable asshat that nobody wants anything to do with.”
🙄
