Episode 5: Writing a Killer College Application Essay

Episode 5 Transcript

• Episode 5 Transcript

  [00:00:07] BW: Welcome to College Admissions Insider, the podcast where we talk to real college admissions counselors to bring you expert advice for your college search. I'm Bryan Wendell from Bucknell University.

  [00:00:16] BT: And I'm Brooke Thames, also from Bucknell University. Our goal is to cut through all the fluff to give you everything you need to start continue or complete your college search.

  [00:00:25] BW: Now, Brooke, as you know…Bucknell, we get about 10,000 applications each year. And with that many there's a decent chance that a few of these applicants are going to have similar grades, academic rigor, and extracurricular involvement.

  [00:00:39] BT: Right, right. That's very true, Bryan. But in all of that overlap there is one place where all applicants can stand out. There's one thing that's guaranteed to be singular on every single application.

  [00:00:51] BW: Yeah, yeah, that's right. And we're talking about the college essay, which is really an applicant's best opportunity to show colleges who they are. It's kind of a chance to color outside the lines a little and add your own personal touch to what otherwise might be a black and white application.

  [00:01:06] BT: Absolutely no pressure there. But, I mean, it doesn't have to be an intimidating process with a little bit of help and some useful advice, which is why we are here with our best tips on how you can put your individual and unique stamp on your application through that essay.

  [00:01:21] BW: Right, and we brought in an expert to help us out. We have Josh Wilkinson, who is the associate director of admissions for communications at Bucknell University. And importantly, he's also an application reader, meaning he gets to see hundreds of student essays every year. Hey, Josh, welcome to the podcast.

  [00:01:38] JW: Hi. Thanks so much Bryan and Brooke for having me. It's a pleasure.

  [00:01:41] BT: Yeah. We're so excited to have you here to chat with us about this because the essay is one of the biggest things students are going to have to tackle as they're doing their applications. And, I mean, high school students are pretty used to writing essays but may not be as experienced in terms of writing about themselves. And so yeah, what is the difference between writing, say, a five page analysis of the Great Gatsby or something like that for an English class and writing a 500 word essay about yourself for college?

  
  [00:02:08] JW: Yeah, absolutely. So I think the biggest difference and honestly a hangout for some people is that you get to pick the topic. So it is rather open-ended in that sense. There are several examples of questions for you to pick from, and some are relatively open-ended. And so, at the end of the day, the source material isn't something like the Great Gatsby. The American masterpiece that we're looking at is going to be you, right? The college applicant. You're the one who we want to know about, and that may seem kind of counterintuitive to a student who might have been trained to talk more academically and not so much about their own personal experience. But it's going to be your chance to tell us about yourself on the application. As Bryan put, kind of coloring outside the lines of the application a little bit.

  But another key difference is going to be I think the audience for your essay. You're not going to be writing for just one teacher, but a number of application reviewers. Sometimes your essay will be read by more than one person at one university. And, of course, every university that you're going to be applying to will be seeing it. And the audience that you're going to be writing for has very limited time, unfortunately, to read the essays. And sometimes I know for me, that might mean that I read 50 essays in a day. So you'll definitely be writing for an audience whose time is definitely precious. And so I think it's just something to consider, for sure, at that high level.

  [00:03:24] BW: Yeah. So that's a little bit about the who — who you're writing for…which you write completely different from a normal high school essay. But let's also talk about when. And I'm interested in the timing. So if a student is, let's say, applying for a school where the application is due by January 15, when should that student be starting on the essay process?

  [00:03:45] JW: Yeah, absolutely. I mean that's a tough question to answer because I think it could be different for a lot of people. But for me, ideally you'll have a few months to work on this. And that may seem like overkill for something that's only a page long, but you want to give yourself the time to iterate on the essay and to give your proofreader some time to give you feedback. And so a good proofreader would be your high school counselor. They tend to be very busy people sometimes, and they might not be able to turn around feedback within a week. And so you want to give them time to give you the feedback, but then also give yourself time to work on that feedback. And that might mean that you iterate on the same essay sometimes. If you end up getting frustrated or you get some good feedback that kind of gives you inspiration, you might even decide to write about something else that would be a good essay or a better essay than the one you had before.

  In fact, I'm kind of speaking from experience there. I actually had that happen to me where I wrote an essay and I worked on it for months and then something happened in my life within that span that was a much better topic for the essay. As I'm sure we all know now in 2020, a lot can happen to you in a few months. And so it kind of gives you some time and some leeway, and it's not something that you want to wait until the last minute and have to phone in, because for some colleges like Bucknell, we spend a lot of time reading those essays and paying special attention to it.

  [00:05:05] BT: Yeah, making sure you have enough time to get feedback. Yeah, that's especially good point — especially since, I mean, students could likely end up having multiple drafts or hopefully multiple drafts. You always want to kind of give it room to breathe and go back. But even, yeah, multiple iterations of the same essay. But before students can even get there to writing the essay, they have to pick a prompt, right? The Common App has seven different essay prompts and then the Coalition App has five. And so how do you suggest students go about selecting which prompt they'll write to? And do they have a better chance of being admitted by choosing one kind of prompt over another?

  [00:05:39] JW: Yeah, that's a great question. I guess what I would suggest is that you look at each question. You pick one or maybe a few that's personal to you that points you to a story of yourself that's inspiring or excites you to write about. Because I know me, and if I'm bored writing about it, then chances are the person reading it is going to be bored. And so you don't want to pick something that you think the colleges want to hear about. You want to pick something that you may be passionate about. Because you'll be surprised that when you write about a topic — or maybe you won't be surprised to hear this — but if you're passionate about it, that tends to come out in the writing. You tend to have an easier time writing those stories that you care about and that mean a lot to you. And ultimately us as reviewers, that's what we want to see come out of your essay, is what does matter to you. What makes you tick? And so that's very important, is finding something, some personal connection to the questions and not just picking something that you think is the right question. Pick something that's right for you.

  As far as your second part of the question, we don't tier the questions or prefer specific ones. The ones that we prefer students choose are the ones that you can answer effectively. And so don't pick one, as I mentioned before, that you think is just like, “Oh, this is the best thing.” I think the question about overcoming a hardship is a common example. You might think, “Oh, this is the one that everyone wants to hear about.” But you may not have a good answer to that question. You may not have a hardship that you've experienced or a hurdle that you've had to overcome. And so don't pick that one. That's totally fine to pick something that gives you a chance to tell us what's unique about you and not something that you kind of wish you could talk about.

  [00:07:19] BW: That's great advice. So once the questions have been narrowed down —maybe you haven't selected the exact prompt you w ant to use, but you've picked maybe two or three finalists, we could call them — then it's on to brainstorming. And really anybody who's ever written anything knows that's not something that you can always plan to fit in a tiny box where you just say, “Okay, today I'm going to figure out my college essay. Find the perfect antidote. Do all the brainstorming. Tomorrow I'm going to start writing.” So how do you suggest students start that process of collecting ideas for the essay?

  [00:07:51] JW: Yeah, that's a good question. So I think…And I mentioned it a little bit earlier that you might want to pick a few questions that might seem to be good options for you. So maybe you pick two or three questions that you could see yourself writing about or maybe that stand out to you and then compile a list for each one and say like, “Okay, what are different ways that I can answer this one question?” And list those out. I know that helps me instead of it just sitting in my brain and maybe picking the first thing comes to mind, think about different ways that you could be answering each question because the answer might surprise you. It might be something that's off the beaten trail a little bit, which is great, but it might not be a common story. And I think that's the other thing I would advise students is to avoid maybe the common stories or the ones that could be seen as being a cliché. Because again, think about your audience. We're reviewing many essays a day. And so if five or ten of them are very similar story…and this does happen. We'll get five different essays in one day that talk about, say, a sports injury or something like that — a very common thing that happens to people. It obviously could be an important thing that happens to you. But if five other people are writing about it out of 50, then that might be one that you want to avoid and you might want to pick something else on your list. And so if you have other things on that list that you come up with that aren't as common and maybe more unique to you, I think that might help you brainstorm kind of in the right direction.

  [00:09:13] BT: Yeah. So when it comes to you know choosing a good anecdote or story to infuse into the essay especially when, like you said, some of those stories across applications can be kind of the same. How can students, you know, really make their story stand out? And I mean you mentioned how difficult it can be sometimes to answer questions like “What's a hardship that you have gone through?” And if you haven't yet…how can students kind of pick stories and anecdotes to answer some of those difficult questions?

  [00:09:38] JW: I think the best advice I can think of — and it kind of makes me smile a little bit — is to unlimit yourself. Don't place arbitrary limits on yourself because the key is that it has a personal connection to you, and it may be something really mundane that you may not even think is important. So a few examples of this, I've read a great essay about the students relationship with their grandparents and having dinner with them every Friday. That may seem pretty mundane. That maybe is part of your daily, weekly life. But that student was able to flesh out that idea and build connections and like, “Okay, this is why this is important to me. This is why this is important to me. It's impacted me on all these different ways.” Just having Friday night dinner with your grandpa. And so that's an example. It may not seem like an exciting thing, but it obviously had a personal connection to the person who was writing it, and it obviously affected them in a deep level. And it was exciting for us to read because the student cared deeply enough about it and wrote effectively.

  So, as I mentioned, something dramatic isn't necessary. Hardships aren't necessary. We want to hear about you. And it sounds kind of like a cheesy cliché, but it's true. We want to know about you, what you care about, what makes you tick. And some of my favorite examples are sort of a little off the wall. I had an applicant who wrote an essay about her love of the keytar. And my first reaction was disbelief. This person is writing about what, in my mind, might be the lamest instrument there is. And then I was amazed because not only did she write about a keytar and her love of the keytar but she owned it. And she related the guitar to basically all aspects of her life. And her personality really shone in it, and I just could not wait to see her come to campus when I was done reading it. And it just seems like the most unobvious example. And I think if, again, I come back to the idea of replacing limitations because I think I would have put a limit on myself and like, “I can't write about this. This is silly.” But the student cared about it and she wrote about it and it was amazing. And so I think that's how you would, I guess, make that connection and what you want to write about.

  [00:11:47] BT: Yeah. It sounds like that note of what you said earlier, that as the passion comes through in writing, the personal also comes through in the writing. And being as personal and specific as possible, yeah, it's really effective.

  [00:11:57] BW: Yeah. So you can really choose any topic as long as it's got that connection and it speaks to you, whether it's a keytar or Friday night dinner. I also want to read another example that ties in perfectly to your point. So this is from a recent Bucknell applicant. I'll just read the first three sentences of an essay that, Josh, you and the admissions team were kind enough to share the anonymous essay. Anonymous to me I should say, not anonymous to you guys. All right, here it is: “One of the things I most enjoyed about my first three years of high school actually occurred each day before school. At 6:57 a.m., my mom and I embarked on our daily drive to the bus stop. We fine-tuned the logistics to a near science.” So that's just three sentences. That's the introduction though and, to me, just reading it, that really catches my eye from the start. So my question is how important is the beginning? And as an application reader, Josh, what makes a great essay beginning?

  [00:12:50] JW: Yeah. I mean, like other types of writing, the first sentence really should draw in the reader. And then the example that you read is a perfect example of that. It stokes my curiosity right away. The student is talking about a favorite thing of school, but what stokes my curiosity about it is that it didn't actually happen at school. It happened sort of before anything at school happened. And so it makes me curious to find out more about it. And so it's just good storytelling. And really at the end of the day, that's what you're doing, is telling a good story on the essay. And ultimately as well, the sentences are clear and concise, and I could easily follow them — because sometimes it's difficult to go from point A to point B on an essay. The last thing you want to have happen is the reader get about halfway down and think okay, “Who, are we talking about? When did this happen?” And sometimes events get out of order. This was easy to follow and drew me in.

  [00:13:44] BW: Or they go for death by thesaurus, right? Where you can tell that they thought a word wasn't fancy sounding enough, and so they just like right click on it and pick the first long word that's in the list there.

  [00:13:56] JW: Yeah. It's never a good day when I have to stop and define something in Google when I'm reading an essay, which it can happen if the topic is something scientific and absolutely makes sense. I wouldn't know what it was. But you're absolutely right. If you're just trying to pick the most complex words possible. Really, we want clarity over complexity.

  [00:14:15] BT: Yeah, yeah. It happens to the best of us though. I'm not going to say that I haven't been there before. But yeah, good advice not to overdo the thesaurus search. And so as students get down to writing, when it comes to doing that first draft, should they put it directly into the Common App or the Coalition App, or should they write something on Google Docs or Microsoft Word first, or pen and paper?

  [00:14:38] JW: That's a great question, and I would say it's personal preference. The one thing I will say is you don't want to write your first draft in the Common App or Coalition App. It's just a kind of a blank box. You want to use something with spellcheck at least at some point. Certainly, if writing something down on a piece of paper is best for your rough draft, I think that's absolutely fine. But once you get into a word processor of some kind, I think as long as you get to that point, then you'll be fine. Because the spellcheck and, for me especially, the grammar check sometimes helps. It helps you pick up things that you may not notice, but definitely don't rely too heavily on the spell check and grammar check because then that's where the proofreaders come in, because obviously it doesn't check out everything. It doesn't pick out every error. And then for me too, something that autosaves, which is most things now — but just making sure that you can just close it out and not lose progress is really helpful. Somehow, it still happens every once in a while where I may use something cloud-based where something happens. I didn't do exactly what I was supposed to do, and I lose what I wrote. And that's always the most, I think, demoralizing thing that could possibly happen to a writer. It makes you not want to try again. And so definitely make it something safe that you can use that autosaves with that spellcheck.

  And you also want to be careful pasting into the Common App. One thing that we see a lot is it'll just be a big block of text. And I think what happens sometimes is they had it beautifully formatted maybe in Word; they hit Control+C and then Control+V, or whatever it is you do; and pasted it right into the block, and it just ended up being a big hideous block of text, and it's hard to read. And so, if you do end up pasting in there, make sure you break up out the paragraphs because it really makes it a lot easier on us to be able to read it.

  [00:16:22] BT: Yeah. And curious, do you recommend that students, as they do multiple drafts, do they save each iteration of what they're doing? I know for me sometimes when I'm writing something it's helpful to have all these different drafts in case I decide I want to go back and change it back to what it was or kind of track some changes.

  [00:16:38] JW: That's a good question. So a lot of programs like Google Docs will track that automatically for you, so you can always backtrack. I would recommend doing that if you might take a left turn somewhere. And so say you're writing about something and then you get some feedback like, “Actually I want you to sound a little bit, I don't know, more playful about this.” You're like, “Okay. Well, this is kind of a tone change. Maybe I'll make a new version, see how it reads, and compare the two.” And so if you're making some kind of a big change like that, maybe it's useful to have different versions and then, like I said, vet it with other people. See how they read. And maybe end up picking one over the other, or maybe wanting to go back to how you originally did it. Yeah, that's a great question.

  [00:17:16] BW: I'm glad you mentioned pasting into the Common App and Coalition App because I know when I paste into any type of form, not only will it strip out the paragraphs but it might strip out italics. So if you've italicized a title or something, or if you've used bold. I don't know why you necessarily would, but it might strip out all that formatting. So you definitely want to go back and proofread that. Speaking of proofreading, you shouldn't be the only one who sees the essay before sending it off, right? So how do you recommend students find the perfect proofreader or proofreaders? And can you actually send it to too many people and make it death by committee?

  [00:17:55] JW: Oh, there could always be too many cooks in the kitchen, Bryan. Yeah, so I don't know what the magic number would be. But for me, a few trusted allies would be ideal. And so if that's two, or I think at least two or three, to me, would be ideal. At least your high school counselor — that person, obviously, that's their job. They're there to guide you — it’s why they're called guidance counselors — to a strong essay. And so they see many of them, and they can kind of tell you the perspective of what different colleges are looking for as well. I think somebody like an English teacher would be great, or if you have a strong relationship with a different teacher in a different subject that you know is a strong writer maybe in social studies, history, something like that. Somebody who you trust to be able to give you a good feedback. I would avoid people that can't be objective such as parents because they…I mean, theoretically, they like you, right? And so they're going to always give you different feedback, and also they might not be the best choice because they're not the experts in college writing lists or, say, an admissions counselor, or they work at a university. So they could be a good choice for you in some instances.

  But the other thing that I see sometimes is that the parent might be more influential. The last thing we want to do is read an essay that sounds like a 45-year-old lawyer and not the 16- [or] 17-year-old student. We can definitely tell when some input is almost like rewriting portions of the essay. So whoever you choose, you want to make sure that you're maintaining your voice and that you are writing as a 17-year-old college applicant and not an adult. Of course, everyone's voice is a little bit different, so some people write differently. But you definitely want to avoid whoever it is that's proofreading your piece to rewriting whole sections kind of wholesale, and you kind of just almost having your piece rewritten by that person.

  [00:19:44] BT: Yeah, maintaining voice, super important. I know that sometimes when I write things and I'll go to certain people for advice. Yeah, they'll kind of give me some advice. I definitely have to say I would never say it like that. And so talking about some of these essay prompts a little bit more, some prompts might inspire students to take a strong stance on a controversial topic or something that they feel very like passionate and fiery about. Is that an okay thing to do? Should students be concerned about sharing certain viewpoints that might be different from the person who was reading their essay?

  [00:20:18] JW: Yes, it’s a very tricky question to answer. But at the end of the day, these controversial topics are controversial partially because they're very personal to people, and that people care very deeply about them, as they should. But you definitely want to tread carefully. And so I would say you can write about controversial topics as long as you do it the right way. You don't want to make any assumptions about your audience about the reader, right? You want to be careful. You want to be respectful. Assume the audience that you're writing for doesn't necessarily agree with you. And make it personal to you and not just sort of saying, “Okay, I'm going to write about this certain ideology or perspective of the story.” Make it clear why it's important to you because, at the end of the day, even about these controversial topics, we want to see what it means to you and how it's a driving force in your life and not just read about something that's happening in the news.

  And to me, those are some of the most inspiring essays I've read, are the ones that are obviously the topic is sort of hot-button now, whatever it is. And so I can relate to it just because it's going on. But then I'm seeing this a student that might be inspired to act. And so if they're taking it to the next level and they're not just sort of, I don't know, complaining about something, but they're saying, “Because of this happened, or because I care so deeply about this issue, I've taken this to the next level. And I've decided to start this nonprofit, or I've decided to start this initiative to help the poor or whatever it might be.” Those are the most exciting essays to read sometimes because we're seeing young people making a big difference in a big way.

  And I know for schools like ours, like that's something that we really cherish in a student. And so, yeah, at the end of the day, don't shy away from those topics if they are important and personal to you. But be careful and respectful, and just assume that the person may or may not agree with you.

  [00:22:06] BW: So the hot button issues themselves aren't cause to just completely trash an idea, but are there things that applicants should avoid when writing an essay?

  [00:22:15] JW: Oh, yes. So there are a few things that…I mean, I think I noted something earlier when we were talking about using a thesaurus. And so anything that would trip up the reader. And so the last thing you want them to do is to stop and kind of have to think about it or reread it three times. And so complex sentence structures can do that. Bigger words than are necessary can do that. If you're writing it like it's an academic essay and it's not particularly engaging, that's something that you'll want to avoid. Because it's not an academic essay, it's a personal essay. And so you should write it as such.

  Another example of that are excessive use of quotations. I think a good quote every once in a while is okay. But one of the things that really trips me up right away is if the essay starts with a quote, and it starts with a quote that I've already heard from Martin Luther King Jr., or from Dwight Eisenhower, or Abraham Lincoln, or the big players. Gandhi is another very popular one. I hear a lot from Gandhi during the application season. These quotes are great, but it's not the most exciting way to start an application. It's not very personal to start out with a quote like that. So you just have to be careful around it. I have seen them used in good ways, but you just have to be careful when using them.

  And I kind of touched upon before, clichés. Things that are just not very unique and that are heard many, many times in college essays. And so, I mean, every college counselor you talk to will have a different list. For me, I already mentioned one, which is the sports injury. It's like, “Oh, I injured myself in a football game and this is what I learned.” Or, Bryan, you might relate to this one, but the boy scout trip to…Where is it they go? New Mexico. I already forgot.

  [00:24:00] BW: Yeah. Yeah there's a ranch in New Mexico, Philmont Scout Ranch.

  [00:24:03] JW: Yeah, so I've read about that many times. It's a very important trip for those people. And then any service trip as well where you do a service trip and, “Oh wow! I went down to this community and I thought I was going to make this big impact, and it end up impacting me as more than I expected.” That's a very common story. So just be careful that it's not something that is black and white. But you want to pick something that isn't that common, if that makes sense.

  [00:24:32] BT: Yeah, sounds like similar to going back to what you're saying about kind of those smaller personal moments and finding the stories that can be told there are some of the things you should lean towards as opposed to maybe some Gandhi quotes, or some other kind of common things that you'll come across. And speaking of those kind of personal experiences…COVID, everyone is kind of experiencing all of this at the same time. And so should students write about their experiences with COVID on their applications? Or is that something that you're expecting kind of everyone to be doing that, and then it’ll become kind of a cliché thing?

  [00:25:04] JW: Yeah, I wish they could see my face when you read that. I'm not sure. We'll see I guess is kind of where at. As soon as all the school closings were happening in the spring, what we started saying to each other was, “Wow! We're going to read a lot about this, aren't we?” And so I don't think it's something that you necessarily have to avoid. But again — and I apologize if I'm repeating myself a little bit — [but] if it's personal and impactful to you, then absolutely, you can write about it. But again, just go in with the understanding that we may be seeing a lot of these. And so it may not be a good option for you because we will be seeing a lot, I'm sure. How many? That's going to be left to be seen. But the example I think for my generation was 9/11, right? Everyone was writing about 9/11. It had a huge impact no matter who you were. And I think this is kind of the new version of that, where no matter who you are, no matter what walk of life you're in, this has impacted you in some way. And that's fine. But at the same time, you have to realize that everyone's in the same boat. And so it's sort of the low-hanging fruit. And so, I would just encourage you to find, if you do write about it, maybe some way that that's made it kind of a unique experience for you.

  So I know some students, they've just kind of taken their own passions to the next level. I was just hearing from somebody who really cares about food security, and this whole COVID pandemic has really taken that to the next level for her personally. And so she's done some research, extra research, on food security and food pantries, and a lot of community service because of COVID. So don't just kind of begin and end with the pandemic, but maybe begin with pandemic and end with how you've turned that into something positive, and how you've made that into something that a college would want to see in a student coming into their university.

  [00:26:43] BW: Yeah, that's a great point because every applicant had their high school experience interrupted in the same way, but it's what they did with it after that happened. That's great. So Josh, I have to think that in your role, it's kind of an honor to read these essays because these students are inviting you into their lives. And a lot of times, they're admitting their feelings about experiences in ways that are really vulnerable and that they might not even be comfortable talking to a friend about. So I have to think that's quite an honor. But I'd love to hear your take on what makes this so special — what your favorite thing about reading college essays really is.

  [00:27:20] JW: Well, Bryan, you use the right word, and that's honor. It really is an honor to read these essays because you're right, I mean, you're really getting something oftentimes that the student hasn't told family members. It'll be something sometimes that they're struggling deeply with or has impacted them in such a huge way that they don't want to talk about, but they're choosing to divulge that information on the college essay. And so it really is an honor and a privilege first and foremost to be a part of that process. And when I tell students about the college essay and what it means to us reviewing them, I always tell them that I'm trying to find the heartbeat of the applicant in the essay because everything else is sort of standardized. It's just a bunch of information kind of thrown together. It's important information, but the essay is really your chance to show who you are a little bit. And it breaks up the monotony of reading applications for us as well. So it's usually the highlight for us when we're reading applications because it's something different every time, hopefully. And not always, but hopefully it's something different every time, and we get to kind of peek behind the curtain a little bit to see what these students are about. And you really get a sense of people through these essays and through the stories that they tell.

  And there's many times that we've had to reach…In fact, the only time I keep tissues anywhere near me is when I'm reading essays, just to be honest, because you'll never know when. And you'll know right away sometimes when you're like, “Oh, it's going to be…Uh-oh, this might be a hard one.” Not necessarily for a bad reason, but just heartfelt. And so sometimes you get these heartfelt, heartrending stories, but you just appreciate them all the more because the student has chosen to share them with you.

  And so it becomes personal for us as well. We use that word a lot today: personal. But it really is the personal side of the application for us, for us to get invested in you. And for a school like Bucknell, we actually don't have an interview process. So this is kind of your chance to tell us a little bit about yourself that you won't have otherwise, and so definitely take advantage of that.

  [00:29:21] BT: Yeah, and I imagine getting to know some of the students who may possibly become part of the Bucknell community is especially special and exciting. Well, thank you so much for joining us. I think you've given students plenty of really awesome advice for tackling these college essays.

  [00:29:35] JW: Absolutely. Thank you.

  [00:29:37] BW: Yeah, this has been great. And if you enjoyed this episode, we invite you to subscribe, share it with your friends, family, counselors, and keep listening. We're going to be releasing new episodes of College Admissions Insider every other Monday. And each one is going to be just as much like this one as we can, where it's a really deep dive into an important element of the college admissions process.

  [00:29:57] BT: And if you have topics or ideas for future episodes, we would love to hear from you at our email address, podcast@bucknell.edu. Or if you're a college admissions officer interested in being a guest on a future episode, it us there too.

  [00:30:11] BW: And finally, if you want to learn more about applying to Bucknell, you can do that at bucknell.edu/apply. We've put that link in the show notes. That's where you'll also find a link to a transcript of this episode and a whole lot more resources, including a post on our admissions blog where — if 30 minutes of advice wasn't enough — we have even more advice for writing your college essay.

  [00:30:32] BT: But that's it for this episode. Thanks for listening to College Admissions Insider. And we'll see you next time.