After successfully completing this week's Learning Module, you should:

• Know more about scholarship and transfer application questions and application processes

• Decide on one of the two possible organization strategies for your own personal statement

• Be able to explain the basic storytelling techniques needed for successful narratives and personal essays

• Begin building a complete draft for Essay #1

This week you'll review a few key details about the first essay assignment, make a decision about how to organize the story you tell, and work to complete a full draft for peer review next week. Though this might seem like a lot to do in one week, storytelling shouldn't be as slow and painful as a typical college essay--especially if you made a plan and got feedback in the Week 1 Email Assignment. The goal in getting as far as we can writing this week is to make sure we have enough material generated in order to discuss the problems that inevitably come up, things like ending up too long/short, needing to combine more than one story, or realizing that a story needs more focus to be effective given your audience.           

If you get confused or lost at any point in this process I want to push you to contact your professor for clarification. Like I've mentioned before, it doesn't make you look bad and it doesn't bother your professor; in fact, it's my job to help you succeed in this class, and I take that seriously.        

I also want to remind you that the Roxbury Community College Learning Center is a really important resource, especially for scholarship and application essays. And this semester, tutors are available on campus and online. If you don't connect with the Learning Center to improve your own grade on Essay #1 or because you can use this statement to apply for a scholarship/transfer application in the future, do it because you get +1% extra credit added to your course grade each time you get help (max of 5%). To get the extra credit make sure you provide me with evidence, like an email from the Learning Center, to show that you worked with a tutor.

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You can see a video walkthrough of this week's assignments and where to submit them here.

Essay #1: Personal Story with Required Information  

Just a quick reminder: you can't just turn in 500-650 words that directly answer the Jack Kent Cooke Scholarship or Common Application for Transfer prompt as though someone had asked you in person. This assignment requires you to follow the best practice explained by the Purdue OWL and tell a story in addition to answering the questions provided in the essay prompt you choose. 

One helpful way to think about this is to compare the process to how you apply for a job. For a job you complete an application that provides all the information an employer requests (like your education and work history), but that's usually not enough to hire you. In addition to that information, you're almost always required to interview. In the interview, the employer doesn't just ask you to repeat the information from your application; instead, they try to get you to show who you are beyond the basic application facts. They also try to get to know your personality and judge whether you're a good fit for their needs and culture. 

Following this approach, answering the scholarship or transfer application questions is like your resume. Telling a story for the narrative part of your personal statement is like the interview. As you might expect, both parts are essential if you're going to be successful.  

That's because they can trick you into focusing too much on yourself and what you gain rather than on what they want to hear. For example, when an open-ended question asks why you want to transfer you might be inclined to say something like "because I want _________ degree" or "I want _________ job." While that might be honest, it's not what the committee wants to hear. They want to hear why you're awesome. For example, it might be better to say "I want to achieve _________ goal" and then suggest that the scholarship or college experience is how you'll get there. The part of you that's awesome is your goal (which is why it has to be a little bigger than a degree or a job), and the role the college or scholarship plays is to make it a reality. See that difference between saying only what your personal goals are and saying why accepting you makes something important happen?

Here's a quick break down of how that might look for both of your options for this assignment:

Option 1: Jack Kent Cooke Scholarship 

This statement should provide information not elicited elsewhere in the application, such as leadership roles, family, educational, philosophical, or other life experiences that have influenced your achievements and career decision. Also include professional and civic activities that you consider important. The narrative should be concise, emphasizing those areas most important to your intellectual development.

This prompt can be tricky, especially if you read it and think it wants you to give all of these things rather than just encouraging you to think about these different aspects of your life. For example, if you've had a leadership role (maybe as a volunteer, member of the Student Government Association on campus, or at work) and that role says something positive about you, then tell a story about it. If something in your family speaks to strengths (pursuing your academic goals with care responsibilities at home or supporting a family member with a medical issue or disability) then make sure it's part of your story. If there's something unique in your education experience that you want to talk about (attending an exam school, being the first in your family to attend college, earning a GED as an adult) then talk about it. Just remember, the final two options--philosophical or "other life experiences"--are wildcards and should be used with some caution since they involve risks not present with the more straightforward choices. As long as you know it's a risk, and you've decided it's worth it, then you're good to go. 

Also, keep in mind that whichever of these options you pick (and you really should focus on one only) you'll want to address the part of the prompt that's less obvious: "that have influenced your achievements and career decision." The key is to remember that you'll want to talk about how leadership, family, education, philosophy, or "other life experiences" have helped you accomplish things and helped you decide what your career will be. 

Finally, if you have a professional activity (an internship or a job training program) or a civic activity (see examples here) make sure it finds its way into your story. Just try to emphasize why you think it's important, both for your development but also for some larger sense of positive impact for the people providing the scholarship. 

Option 2: Common Application for Transfer

While as recently as last year the Common Application for Transfer had a single prompt asked you to simply explain your reasons for transferring and what you hope to achieve, it now uses the same six prompts as the traditional Common Application essay for first-time college students. 

**Just a quick note: if you wrote a Common Application essay in high school, don't use it for this assignment. You've got a chance to take a risk on something new, get feedback from someone with lots of experience, and spend a few weeks making a new/second essay that is very likely to be better than anything you've done before**

To help you see the shift from what you gain to what the admissions committee gains, let's take a look at the first prompt:

Some students have a background, identity, interest, or talent so meaningful they believe their application would be incomplete without it. If this sounds like you, please share your story.

This prompt might seem less challenging, but it can actually be harder since it's so wide open. Here they want to see just two things: 1) what is the background/identity/interest/talent that defines your identity as well as 2) why is your application incomplete if we don't know this information. These may seem like they overlap, but the truth is that it's at least two different stages in the process--who you are and what this brings to the college

These two very different options for writing a personal statement can feel like a lot to think about, I know. And it's really common to either freeze up making the plan or push ahead with something that doesn't fit the prompt. But if you do your best to answer every question from the prompt you choose completely, if you make sure you focus on telling a story, and if you work on showing yourself beyond your resume to the committee in a positive way, then you'll be on the right track. 

How Do I Combine My Story with the Requested Information?

Okay, back to the Essay #1 assignment. The next question most people have is about how to combine the requested application information with a personal story. 

One option, the one I think is easiest, is to add a paragraph after the story that covers the requested information. You can see what that looks like for a different application in this student sample: "My Struggle as a First Generation College Student"

The other option would be to include this information along the way, mixed in with the story. This is hard because 1) we have to make sure we don't miss anything and 2) it can mess with how the story has "flow" or feels cohesive since you'd be jumping around a bit from one part of a story to a different part that answers the application prompt. Still, it's not a bad idea to look for places where this might make sense--and you might just have a story where this fits naturally. 

Again, the bottom line is that readers should be able to spot all requested information from the prompt clearly. When we do peer review next week, and when you work to read and revise your early work, ask whether or not those things are clear. If they're not, consider using some of the same wording from the question or placing all requested information in a single paragraph outside the story so the connection is obvious. The risk of readers not seeing what they need is that they could think your statement isn't complete, and that could hurt your chances of being accepted.

Optional: If I Decide to Apply, How Do I Do That?

Remember, you are not required to apply for a scholarship or transfer application to complete this assignment. But if you want to use your personal statement, which is a good idea since you'll have your professor's input and the input from peers (something people pay a lot to get), here's what else you'll need in order to apply for the Jack Kent Cooke Scholarship. 

Check Your Eligibility

The first step is to make sure you qualify. Because the Jack Kent Cooke is such a prestigious scholarship and offers a lot of financial and academic support, they want applicants to meet the following criteria:

• Be a current student at an accredited U.S. community college or two-year institution with sophomore status as of January 1, 2025, or a recent graduate (since spring 2020)

• Plan to enroll in a full-time baccalaureate program at an accredited college or university in the fall of 2025

• Have a cumulative undergraduate grade point average of 3.5 or better on a 4.0 scale (or the equivalent)

• Demonstrate unmet financial need. We will consider applicants with family income up to $95,000.

• No previous enrollment or attendance at a four-year institution. Students who have attended a four-year institution in the past are not eligible for this scholarship.

Get a Common Application Account

Jack Kent Cooke requires that you begin a Common Application for Transfer and add Jack Kent Cooke Foundation in the “Add Program.” Then they want you to complete the application (including finances, recommendations, contacts, family, activities and honors, and college plans) in addition to the Cooke Foundation supplements including the writing section. 

Additional Writing Requirements

In addition to the essay you're working on for our class, Jack Kent Cooke requires a little short answer writing, including the following:

•Résumé Circumstances 

(Tell us about any special circumstances you would like the committee to consider when reviewing your résumé. Also explain any periods on your resume where you were neither employed nor a student.) 

•Please explain how you selected the four-year colleges/universities listed (3 total) 

•Discuss your reasons for pursuing the major(s) and minor(s) you selected. 

•What are your future career plans? If you are undecided, please explore one of your interests.

Letters of Recommendation

The application recommends getting two letters of recommendation, though if you can't get these it might still be okay to submit the application (it is free after all). Requesting a letter of recommendation is something you should definitely take seriously. In your request, you should include the following:

• Who you are and how this person knows you

• What you need--in this case a short (less than one page) letter and some short answers that will go through an email sent by Common Application once you select your reviewers

• What you are hoping the recommendation will mention (maybe some really cool work you did or some aspect about you--like your willingness to help others)

• Most importantly: When you need this by

Who you ask for a letter of recommendation can matter, so try to pick a professor or teacher who knows you and your work. If you pick someone who isn't a professor, shoot for a person with a good knowledge of you and who has good perceived credibility (maybe a former boss or church leader rather than just a neighbor). Keep in mind, you'll need this person's email and the recommendation has to be completed online. 

Official Transcript

Common Application (both for transfer and the Jack Kent Cooke Scholarship) require an official transcript from every college you've attended. The good news is that you only have to get the transcript(s) to Common Application one time, and there's a process inside the application. You can learn more here or talk to someone in the Enrollment Center on campus. 

While there is a lot of hassle involved in this step, I want to remind you that having bad grades or not knowing a professor well enough to ask for a recommendation are not good reasons not to apply. Instead, you might think of using the statement to explain what external factors affected you and how you've changed so that you're on track for better grades now. This is more helpful with the Common Application for transfer, but it's not impossible for Jack Kent Cooke either. 

Deadline and Options for Additional Guidance

As you can see in these FAQs, the Jack Kent Cooke Scholarship deadline is in November, but the prompt doesn't change and you could also use this statement to apply in November of 2025.

If you decide to apply think about connecting with Evan Desatnick, the RCC transfer coordinator for additional advice: edesatnick@rcc.mass.edu 

If you plan to use your personal statement to apply for admission (but not the Jack Kent Cooke Scholarship) using the Common Application for Transfer to a college who accepts Common Application then you'll just need to follow the advice above about adding a program (the college you're applying to) as well as all the other details about letters of recommendation and transcripts. Deadlines will depend on the college where you're applying (check for colleges here), but you can begin the process of getting more information on the Common Application website. 

Review: Important Storytelling Techniques

We went over this a bit in last week's module, but now before you begin developing a full draft of the narrative I wanted to give you a chance to review the most important techniques for effective storytelling.

In addition to having one of the two structures we talked about (starting with setup or starting in the middle of the action), narratives are also very focused on providing details that make the story feel alive. That's because a good story is expected to help the reader "experience" what happened, not just hear it. Details are how we do that.

Details

Narrative essays are all about detail. That's because you're sharing a story with someone who doesn't know you and because you want to make sure your story connects with their experience so it's relatable. We typically do this by focusing on two different kinds of detail.

Essential details are the place, setting, time, and anything else that could make us feel lost without your help. Vivid details are those that paint a picture and often make the narrative more entertaining (something you should always pay attention to); they include things like how you felt, what the scene looked like, and what sounds you heard--especially dialogue. Of course, it's important to be careful: if you give too much detail (painting overly detailed visual scenes, quoting every word said in an hour long conversation, or trying to cover all five senses at every moment) you can overwhelm the reader, drag down the pace to an uncomfortable level, and distract from the information that you know is most important. 

One final aspect of detail in narratives is that our stories are rarely problem-free moments of once-and-for-all victory. That is, a sophisticated narrative will try to be as honest as possible, including the details that don't make us look perfect. It will try to make all of the struggle clear. It will value failures as much as it values triumphs. Keep this in mind as we get started on our essay. 

The Role of Conflict in Narrative

One thing to remember as you choose a story about your identity to tell is that the central part any good narrative is conflict (just think of how reality television has become so popular and addicting). That's because conflict helps develop a reader's interest in your story as they want to hear how things work out. Believe it or not, if you present yourself as a good person in your narrative readers will even become invested in seeing you succeed and overcome whatever stands in your way. That's something we want to make sure we capitalize upon as we write.

Keep in mind, this conflict doesn't have to be big. It's really just a challenge, confrontation, or struggle you encountered. For this essay that might mean a time someone bullied you, did or said something offensive, or just didn't take you seriously because of who they thought you were. As you'll see in the sample essays, we often start in the introduction by setting things up (place, age, and any other essential details) and end the introduction by establishing our conflict. The thesis--which in a narrative goes at the start of the conclusion (also called the moral or main point)--then shows some resolution to the conflict which helps readers feel there is at least a small amount of closure.

The bottom line: make sure the identity marker that you decide to focus on (the thing you want to emphasize about yourself to the scholarship committee) has a story or several small related stories, make sure the story has a conflict, and be sure you plan ahead for a moral/main point at the start of a conclusion. 

What If I Have More than One Story?

We've mentioned before that this is totally fine. Maybe instead of having one big story about a struggle getting your parents to understand your desire to be a teacher you have one short story about telling a friend, another short story when you told your counselor, and then the story from when you told your parents. 

One trick here is to make sure you're not giving us too detailed of a timeline. That means making sure your essay doesn't say "In 1st grade I... and then in 2nd grade I...and then in 3rd grade I..." As the writer you chose what we focus on and what we can ignore. That means picking the best stuff to show and not worrying if every single thing has been covered. 

The other trick is to make sure you're not losing us as you move from one story to the next. That's work you need to do with your topic sentences. Those, remember, are the first sentence of any body paragraph. They're responsible for showing the transition (addition, contrast, example) and helping us see where we are in the timeline and setting. If you don't do this readers could get lost. If you have more than one story there's even more pressure on the topic sentence to keep us on track. That might mean saying something like "Another time I experienced frustration was when I was in my 8th grade art class." The good news is that with narratives, because we're pretty experienced storytellers in our daily lives, topic sentences focused on setting/timeline and transitions should come naturally. 

While all this pressure on a topic sentence can be intimidating, trust that outside readers (like peer review, your instructor, and the Writing Center) are how we know if this is working. 

Activity: Begin Building a First Draft

Your job at this point is to begin telling the story and combining the required application information. I don't have much to say here to get you going, but I can offer some advice based on my own experience writing. 

1) Get started. Like, don't try to write the essay all at once; just start telling the story, whether that's on your phone or in a notebook or someplace else. Once you get something going--even one incident in the larger story--it's not too hard to come back to and keep adding. This advice, I think, is especially useful for procrastinators (i.e. most of us). 

2) Keep going. Tell everything. Try to have so much that you have to cut rather than add. It's always easier to be a tough editor making something better than a desperate writer with a word count and deadline.

3) Make an outline if it helps. Narratives, of course, can be notoriously hard to plan in advance since stories can sometimes take unexpected turns. But you can always have a rough idea what you'll do in the introduction (set some things up, end with a conflict) and what you'll do in the conclusion (make a clear main point and include the required application information). Or consider making a timeline for your story, which also gives you a chance to move things around or decide what might not be important if you have to cut later. Another option is to break the story into episodes, like episode 1 to set things up with conflict, episode 2 to take us to the past, episode 3 to show us the present, and episode 4 to wrap things up and show a main point that's a clear look at something positive about you a college would want to see.  

Most importantly, don't sweat the small details until the first draft is done. This can be really hard, especially if you're a little bit of a perfectionist like I am. But if you can push that back just until you have the first draft done you'll be in a good position to finish on time. 

What Is Writer's Block and How Do I Beat It?

I want to take a few minutes this week to talk about writer's block--that feeling of anxiety that can stand between your best intentions and abilities and the finished assignment. To start, here's a helpful definition from the UNC Writing Center:

“Writing anxiety” and “writer’s block” are informal terms for a wide variety of apprehensive and pessimistic feelings about writing. These feelings may not be pervasive in a person’s writing life. For example, you might feel perfectly fine writing a biology lab report but apprehensive about writing a paper on a novel. You may confidently tackle a paper about the sociology of gender but delete and start over twenty times when composing an email to a cute classmate to suggest a coffee date. In other words, writing anxiety and writers’ block are situational (Hjortshoj 7). These terms do NOT describe psychological attributes. People aren’t born anxious writers; rather, they become anxious or blocked through negative or difficult experiences with writing.

Perhaps as important as understanding that writer's block can depend upon the situation in which you are writing and your past experience is understanding that it's not an always or never kind of thing. That means while it could be pretty easy for you to get to a full first draft most of the time, there are times when it's surprisingly harder than others. 

No matter what situation you might find yourself in, there are a few common causes of writer's block and some good ways to get past them. Consider this list of "symptoms" and "cures" from the Purdue OWL:

Symptom

You have attempted to begin a paper without doing any preliminary work such as brainstorming or outlining...

Possible Cures

• Use invention strategies suggested by a tutor or teacher

• Write down all the primary ideas you'd like to express and then fill in each with the smaller ideas that make up each primary idea. This can easily be converted into an outline

Symptom

You have chosen or been assigned a topic which bores you....

Possible Cures

• Choose a particular aspect of the topic you are interested in (if the writing situation will allow it...i.e. if the goal of your writing can be adjusted and is not given to you specifically, or if the teacher or project coordinator will allow it)

• Talk to a tutor about how you can personalize a topic to make it more interesting

Symptom

You don't want to spend time writing or don't understand the assignment...

Possible Cures

• Resign yourself to the fact that you have to write

• Find out what is expected of you (consult a teacher, textbook, student, tutor, or project coordinator)

• Look at some of the strategies for writing anxiety listed below

Symptom

You are anxious about writing the paper...

Possible Cures

• Focus your energy by rehearsing the task in your head.

• Consciously stop the non-productive comments running through your head by replacing them with productive ones.

• If you have some "rituals" for writing success (chewing gum, listening to jazz etc.), use them.

Symptom

You are so stressed out you can't seem to put a word on the page...

Possible Cures

• Stretch! If you can't stand up, stretch as many muscle groups as possible while staying seated.

• Try tensing and releasing various muscle groups. Starting from your toes, tense up for perhaps five to ten seconds and then let go. Relax and then go on to another muscle group.

• Breathe deeply. Close your eyes; then, fill your chest cavity slowly by taking four of five short deep breaths. Hold each breath until it hurts, and then let it out slowly.

• Use a calming word or mental image to focus on while relaxing. If you choose a word, be careful not to use an imperative. Don't command yourself to "Calm down!" or "Relax!"

Symptom

You're self-conscious about your writing, you may have trouble getting started. So, if you're preoccupied with the idea that you have to write about a subject and feel you probably won't express yourself well...

Possible Cures

• Talk over the subject with a friend or tutor.

• Assure yourself that the first draft doesn't have to be a work of genius, it is something to work with.

• Force yourself to write down something, however poorly worded, that approximates your thought (you can revise this later) and go on with the next idea.

• Break the task up into steps. Meet the general purpose first, and then flesh out the more specific aspects later.

If that kind of small problem solving isn't what you need, consider these bigger solutions:

Begin in the Middle

Start writing at whatever point you like. If you want to begin in the middle, fine. Leave the introduction or first section until later. The reader will never know that you wrote the paper "backwards." Besides, some writers routinely save the introduction until later when they have a clearer idea of what the main idea and purpose of the piece will be.

Talk Out the Paper

Talking feels less artificial than writing to some people. Talk about what you want to write with someone—your teacher, a friend, a roommate, or a tutor. Just pick someone who's willing to give you fifteen to thirty minutes to talk about the topic and whose main aim is to help you start writing. Talking will be helpful because you'll probably be more natural and spontaneous in speech than in writing. Your listener can ask questions and guide you as you speak, and you'll be more likely to relax and say something unpredictable than if that you were sitting and forcing yourself to write.

Tape the Paper

Talk into a recording device (like the Voice Memos app in an iPhone), imagining your audience sitting in front of you. Then, transcribe the recorded material. You'll at least have some ideas written down to work with and move around. Note: Microsoft Word which comes with your RCC email actually lets you speak while it types; just know that it's a lot of work to go back and add paragraph breaks and fix the punctuation. 

 (Many of these ideas are from Peter Elbow's Writing with Power, [Ch. 8; 59-77] and Mack Skjei's Overcoming Writing Blocks.)

What If It's Actually Just Procrastination? 

Procrastination can often feel a lot like writer's block. The big difference is the feeling that you know what you need to do and how you want to do it, you just don't want to do it now. In technical terms then, procrastination is a kind of avoidance behavior rather than a feeling of apprehension or pessimism. 

If this isn't ringing a bell for you, think about the forms of procrastination described by the Brown University Counseling and Psychological Services office and see if they sound familiar:

1. Do you act as though if you ignore a task, it will go away? 

2. Do you underestimate the work involved in the task, or overestimate your abilities and resources in relationship to the task?

3. Do you deceive yourself into believing that a mediocre performance or lesser standards are acceptable? 

4. Do you deceive yourself by substituting one worthy activity for another? Suppose you clean the apartment instead of writing your term paper. 

5. Do you believe that repeated minor delays are harmless? An example is putting off writing your paper so you can watch five minutes of your favorite television program. If you don’t return to writing the paper after five minutes have elapsed, you may stay tuned to the television for the entire evening, with no work being done on the paper.

6. Do you dramatize a commitment to a task rather than actually doing it? An example is taking your books on vacation but never opening them, or perhaps even declining invitations for pleasurable events, but still not pursuing the work at hand nor getting needed relaxation. This way you stay in a constant state of unproductive readiness to work–without ever working.

7. Do you persevere on only one portion of the task? An example is writing and rewriting the introductory paragraph of the paper but not dealing with the body and the conclusion. The introductory paragraph is important, but not at the expense of the entire project.

8. Do you become paralyzed in deciding between alternative choices? 

The truth is, most people--even very busy people--procrastinate to a certain extent. What's important then is trying to find an approach that minimizes the impact. The same handout from Brown University suggests the following approaches: 

• Segment the task. The entire job may seem impossible, but smaller segments may seem more manageable. Divide the task into small steps.

• Distribute the small steps reasonably within the given time frame. “Reasonably” is the key word; you must allot sufficient time for each step. Do not fool yourself by believing you can do more than is humanly possible.

• Realize that humans periodically need variety and relaxation. Intersperse rewards, relaxation, and gratification for work completed. This will help you feel less resentful of the task and the work that still needs to be done.

• Monitor your progress on the small steps. Watch for the pitfalls discussed earlier. Assess problems when they arise and do something about them quickly. Keep track of the segments and how they fit together to form the whole picture. Reassess time commitments as necessary.

• Be reasonable in your expectations of yourself. Perfectionistic or extremely strict expectations may cause you to rebel or may sabotage your progress.

The bottom line: you've got to get started on Essay #1 now. Do what you have to do to unleash the "panic monster" and defeat distraction or a lack of motivation. I know you can do it, and I'm here to help if you get stuck or need a push.  

Key Takeaways

• It's helpful to think of our process writing this essay like applying for a job: you have to provide a resume (the requested application information) and do an interview (the story you tell in your personal statement) so the person making a decision can get to know you; you'll want to make a deliberate decision about how you organize the essay to manage both of these elements without repeating yourself.

• It's important not to let the application questions trick you into missing something required. Each one has more than one thing it's looking for. Make sure you cover all of it. 

• Writer's block is a kind of apprehension or pessimism that can keep you from getting started on an essay; it's helpful to understand that it depends on the situation and can sometimes slow your progress unexpectedly. It's also helpful to remember that most of us know what it feels like. 

• Procrastination is a very common and manageable avoidance behavior that can undermine your ability and intention to do well in a class; learning how to manage procrastination can both help improve the quality of your work and your quality of life as a student. But again, it's not always easy to manage. The key is to plan realistically and trust that you know yourself. 

• There are strategies for overcoming both writer's block and procrastination, most of which involve breaking projects into smaller tasks, tricking ourselves into using panic as a motivation to work, and getting support and encouragement from other people.  

• You're not required to submit a real scholarship or transfer application, but you'll have a solid statement plus my advice if you decide to give it a chance in the future. 

• The RCC Learning Center is a great resource for help with scholarship essays and with your personal statement for Essay #1; they can help even if you're not on campus; and working with the Writing Center gets you +1% for your overall course grade (5% max).

Reading to Review

Essay #1 Assignment Sheet

Essay #1 Scoring Rubric

For examples of successful college admissions essays:

"'When Normal Life Stopped’: College Essays Reflect a Turbulent Year" excerpts from The New York Times

"Chaos, Injustice, and Joy: The 2023 College Essays on Money" full essays from The New York Times

For Common Application essays:

"Essays that Worked" from Johns Hopkins University (acceptance rate = 12.8%)

"Essays that Worked" from Tufts University (acceptance rate: 14.6%)

"Essays that Worked!" from Connecticut College (Acceptance rate: 35.1%)

Note, there are not very many (if any) verified successful samples for the Jack Kent Cooke Scholarship essay; if you decided to follow a model you find online make sure you check that the source is a credible and reliable place for information. Keep in mind, the essay style and approach is not different than the Common Application, so those samples are still relevant. 

Process Portfolios Assignment Sheet

"Application Essays" from the University of North Carolina

Read more about the Jack Kent Cooke Undergraduate Transfer Scholarship

Read more about the Common Application for Transfer and see what schools accept Common App