College Admission Essays: Different Types of Structure

Chronological order

Click here for an example of a chronological order essay

Click here for an example essay that uses survey and chronological order

When you write an admission essay, you naturally look back over your life and think about the events and people that shaped you. So chronological or time order is a good fit for lots of essays — especially for the ones that ask about events or people that shaped you. (Funny how these things go together!) This structure adapts itself to several different patterns:

• Relevant events: Thinking of an important aspect of your life — your passion for smelly cheese or your burning desire to climb Mount Everest — trace your involvement or the origin and development of your interest by describing several events very briefly.
• Single event: Focusing on one event in your life, perhaps the time you ran the Kentucky Derby on foot because your horse went on strike. (He wanted more oats and less hay.) Recount the event, hour by hour.           
• Typical day: For the “person who matters to you” question, describe one typical day (or hour or minute, depending on the essay) with him or her.

In each of these essays you should devote a paragraph or two to interpreting the event(s) you’re describing. As you write that paragraph, think of the reader. You’re asking him or her to accompany you through time, to experience an event or period with you. The reader’s logical question is “Why do you want me to be with you during this experience?” Make sure you answer that question!

Interrupted chronological order

Click here for an example of an interrrupted chronological order essay

All those movies about time machines reveal how fervently human beings would like to have the ability to interrupt the usual chronological order. You can’t do it in real life, but you sure can tinker with time in your essay. Interrupted chronological order is helpful for essays about an event that changed you or an issue you care about, particularly when you want to relate a past event to your present situation or attitude. Interrupted chronological order has a million variations. Here are two of the most useful:

• Flashback: You’ve seen this technique on television. The character, usually wearing tons of makeup in order to appear decades older than the actor’s real age, stares blankly into space. The music swells, the picture fades, and suddenly the young actor is on the screen. In a flashback essay, start with the present and cut to the past event. End with the present or with an interpretation of the flashback.
• Bookends: I call this structure “bookends” because you begin and end with two halves of the same event. The middle is usually the interpretation or background of the event. Suppose, for example, you’re writing about the time you won a student election. You describe one particular part of the election in detail — your big speech calling upon the administration to abolish grades. You begin the essay with the first sentence or two of the speech and a quick peek at your audience. Then cut to your decision to run, the challenges awaiting candidates, the goals of your candidacy, and so on. End with the last few lines of the speech.

Regardless of what you’re recounting in interrupted chronological order, you must still interpret the event for the reader. Here’s what happened, you’re saying, and this is why it mattered to me.

Survey

Click here for an example of a survey essay

Click here for an example essay that uses survey and chronological order

A survey resembles a mosaic, a picture created with tons of tiny, tinted tiles. (I was going to say “multicolored,” but I was having too much fun stringing “t” words together.) In writing, you can create a mosaic by briefly describing a number of objects, people, or events, giving equal weight to each. A survey essay, like a mosaic on the wall, should create a larger picture out of the smaller elements. So be sure that your survey essay has a main idea that you communicate clearly to the reader.

The survey structure is useful when you want to discuss something or someone you love passionately. (I am not suggesting that you write about your latest romantic partner, by the way. Bad idea. You’ll probably break up before graduation anyway.) Perhaps you’re nuts about toucans, those birds with the flashy orange beaks. You write an essay filled with lots of little toucan moments — the first meeting of the Toucans Lovers Society, which you founded; the way your pet Tookie used to sit on your lap while you watched cartoons; the Saturday morning walks in the park with Tookie; the time Tookie ate Grandma’s ear; and so forth. The main idea is your devotion to a misunderstood but loveable animal.

Description and interpretation

Click here for an example of a description and interpretation essay

What can you describe? Things, places, events, people, ideas . . . just about anything! And after you describe something, you can interpret its meaning by showing how it is relevant to your life. This sort of structure provides a strong base for essays about people or events that have influenced you, qualities that define your personality (describe the quality and then show how it plays out in your day-to-day life), values you cherish, and lots of other topics. This structure is very adaptable!

When writing an essay with a description-and-interpretation structure, take pains with the description. Tuck in lots of sensory details — the sights, sounds, smells, feel, and (if appropriate) taste. Don’t stint on the interpretation section either. Allow yourself to grow a bit philosophical, speculating on the meaning — to you and to the larger world — of what you’ve described.

Comparison and contrast

Less common than the other structures I discuss in this section, a comparison-and-contrast essay may be useful for the “discuss an issue you care about” question that appears on so many applications, including the common app. In this sort of essay you might discuss two possible solutions to a problem, explaining the advantages and disadvantages of each. You can organize this essay in several ways. The first paragraph may explain the problem, and the second discuss one solution. The third paragraph then reviews an alternate response to the situation. In the final paragraph you explain which solution you believe is best. Comparison-and-contrast structure also works when you’re writing about people. For example, you could compare and contrast the influence upon you of two relatives. I once read a great student essay comparing the writer’s grandmothers. One was very straight-laced and the other a loveable eccentric. After allowing the reader to experience their vastly different child-rearing styles in the first few paragraphs of the essay, the author devoted the last paragraph to his point: Both grandmothers showered him with unconditional love and shaped his personality.

Pro and con

Another structure that helps out occasionally on the “issue you care about” question is pro and con. Don’t use this structure if your mind is made up and you’re totally committed to one side or the other. But perhaps you’re on the fence, seeing some worthwhile elements in each position. You may want to explore the two points of view, showing the admissions committee how you’ve analyzed the situation and where your sympathies presently lie. The best pro-and-con essay I ever read concerned the abortion issue. The writer, clearly torn, saw some merit in both the pro-choice and the anti-abortion positions. Her essay was a truthful, thoughtful presentation of her views. In the first paragraph she explained why the issue mattered so much to her: A close friend became pregnant and asked her for help. The writer freely admitted that she was not sure how to respond. In the second paragraph the writer discussed the reasons why she supported her friend’s right to choose. The third paragraph portrayed the deep sense of anguish the writer experienced as she contemplated the termination of her friend’s — or anyone’s — pregnancy. In the final paragraph she honestly explained her continuing conflicted feelings and her decision to support her friend regardless of the option her friend selected.

Cause and effect

Cause-and-effect admission essays fall into two categories:

• Here’s what happened, and here’s what I did about it.
• Here’s what happened, and here’s what it did to me.

In each of these basic cause-and-effect scenarios, the “it” is a situation or event, also known as a cause. The effect is your reaction to that cause. You may build a fine cause-and-effect essay to answer several application questions, including “describe a person or event that influenced you” and “show how you faced a challenge or exercised leadership.” For example, suppose you want to write about your aristocratic aunt’s influence on you. You describe a visit in which Aunt Brunhilda terrorized the staff of your favorite restaurant and how you finally stood up to her and ordered her to apologize to the waiter she had hit over the head with the wonton plate. Or, you describe the visit and explain how Aunt Brunhilda’s behavior awoke your desire to become a labor lawyer specializing in cases concerning hazardous working conditions.

Structuring the Career Essay

Grad school applications often ask you to describe your career 10 or 15 years down the road. Many graduate schools also question why you want to enter a particular field. Here’s the lowdown on structure for these essays.

Future career

You’ve got a nice variety of choices for this type of essay:

• Chronological order: Take the admissions committee through the steps you see yourself climbing as you pursue your chosen field.
• Survey: Show the reader several aspects of your professional life as you envision it, giving equal weight to each.
• Description and interpretation: Describe a moment in your future practice and explain why that moment epitomizes your ideal career.

Why this field?

Here are some structures for this sort of essay:

• Chronological order: Review the events in your life that led you to see the field as a perfect fit for your personality and values.
• Survey: Explain all the factors that draw you to the career.
• Description and interpretation: Similar to the “how do you envision you future career” essay I discuss in the previous section, you might answer this question by imagining yourself as a professional in the field and then explain why that vision appeals to you.