Seniors who are taking one of their final steps towards college must first tackle their college essay. The college essay gives the college a snapshot of who you are outside the classroom. Getting into a college means not only having good grades but also making yourself stand out. The College Essay Workshops hosted in the high school Media Center are meant to help seniors improve their essays.
These workshops are organized by English Department supervisor, Elizabeth McKenna to help students take on their college essay.
“Students were applying to more and more colleges” and “[the] senior course for academic students only being a semester, teachers were having a hard time really devoting a lot of time in class to the college essay,” McKenna said.
Each senior is paired with an English teacher or a guidance counselor to have a fifteen-minute one-on-one meeting. The teacher helps the students by giving numerous suggestions on how to improve the essay. Students can bring anything from rough brainstorming to full drafts.
One of the most prevalent problems people come in with is, “students have really great openings, really great zooms, they have a really great story to tell but they really struggle with the ‘so what?’ How does this story make you attractive to colleges?” Mckenna said.
Whether people like to admit it or not, everyone needs a little help sometimes, especially with something as important as one’s college essay.
Senior, Morgan Wilson, decided to attend this night.
“I haven’t really looked at my college essay since being in Mr. Koetzner’s class at the end of junior year. I was kind of stuck and didn’t know how to improve it anymore,” Wilson said.
The night helps countless seniors make their essay better especially when they feel like they have hit a wall.
“My paper is now covered in a bunch of blue marks and we discussed how to reword a lot of [the essay] to make things shorter or longer and where to expand and help me focus my essay,” Wilson said.
Trying to make yourself stand out among thousands of other applicants can be hard. It can be even harder trying to make yourself look good in just one essay, but these workshops help seniors do exactly that.
Overall, the night was a huge success and when asked if she would recommend this to her peers she replied, “If I had someone else seeing a new pair of eyes on it and someone may not even know me that would be very helpful.”  Wilson said.
These nights have been a success to many seniors and aim to help more seniors in the years to come.
“Every year we send out surveys to the students who come and every year we get overwhelmingly positive feedback.” McKenna said.