bws college essay and applications

How do we set up Essay and Application Review sessions?

Please use our secure registration form to sign up for tutoring. (If you are registering using a mobile device, review the tutoring options on our FAQs page.) We will place you with the best tutor for your unique needs, location, and schedule. In addition to meeting students face-to-face, we can help students anywhere in the world online. Please click here for extensive details about our online college essay and application tutoring.

How much is your Essay and Application Review service?

Essay help and application review are offered at an hourly rate of $90 with one of our associate tutors, and $180 per hour with company President Brian Stewart.

What college application, college admission essay, and interview services do you provide?

We provide tutoring, brainstorming, review, editing, and proofreading for the following types of essays and application components:

  • College and University Application Essays
  • Graduate School Application
  • Common Application
  • Personal Statement
  • Resume and Curriculum Vitae
  • Scholarship Essays
  • Letters of Recommendation
  • College Interview Preparation

Who provides the application and essay services?

Please read our Instructor Biographies. Our instructors are experienced educational professionals who will empower you to make your resume, essay, interview or application the very best it can be. We have helped students earn admission to top colleges, including Harvard, Yale, Princeton, Cornell, Brown, Duke, Vanderbilt, Northwestern, Columbia, NYU, Dartmouth, Johns Hopkins, Notre Dame, Emory, and the University of Pennsylvania.

Where can we meet for our sessions?

Our tutors are available to meet students at a variety of locations throughout the Columbus, Ohio area. You and your tutor will determine the best place to meet, such as a coffee shop or a library. Tutors have worked on a regular basis with students from Bexley, Westerville, Grandview Heights, Upper Arlington, Hilliard, Worthington, Dublin, New Albany, Powell, Granville, and Columbus, Ohio. We can conduct all of our sessions virtually via our Socrates online learning platform for students who live in cities like New York, Washington, Los Angeles, Philadelphia, Houston, San Francisco, and Chicago, or for students in Ohio who want a more convenient in-home tutoring option.

How does our college essay program work?

Our program has three components:

  • Brainstorming Sessions—we have an in-depth discussion of how you can highlight your best attributes in your essay
  • Editing—after you have written a first draft, we evaluate the structure, tone, and content of the essay
  • Proofreading—we check for any grammar and spelling errors, ensuring that your essay is spotless

Most students find that between 4-6 hours of an essay editing program will fit their needs.

How does our college interview prep program work?

  • We review your resume and application to see what an interviewer will likely ask, and what you should try to highlight about your qualifications
  • We help you formulate questions for the interviewer so that you can demonstrate genuine interest in the school
  • We conduct a mock interview, asking you the most likely and most difficult questions you might face
  • We evaluate your mock interview performance, brainstorming ways that you can best answer challenging questions

Students typically find that about 4-6 hours of interview prep gives them the confidence they need to do their best.

Why is essay editing and application review important?

According to Malcolm Gladwell’s recent book Outliers, in 2008, Harvard rejected 2,500 applicants who had perfect Critical Reading SAT test scores, and 3,300 students who had perfect Math SAT scores. Put another way, Harvard could have doubled its class size and filled it with perfect-score rejected students. So how do Ivy League and other elite universities decide who earns admission when they have thousands of academically qualified applicants? A major factor is the essay. The essay will help colleges determine if you are an interesting person who will contribute to the vibrancy of campus life. Don’t procrastinate and turn in a shabby essay—excellent grades and test scores won’t be enough to overcome a sub-par personal statement. Devote the same attention to this component of the college application as you do to your grades and test scores.

What is the Common Application?

The Common Application allows you to apply to multiple universities using the same core application. In years past, you would have to fill out a separate application for every college—this is no longer the case. Given that you can use the same 650 word Common Application essay response for most, if not all, of the colleges to which you apply, it is of the utmost importance to have an exceptional product. The current common application prompts are as follows:

  • Some students have a background or story that is so central to their identity that they believe their application would be incomplete without it. If this sounds like you, then please share your story.
  • The lessons we take from obstacles we encounter can be fundamental to later success. Recount a time when you faced a challenge, setback, or failure. How did it affect you, and what did you learn from the experience?
  • Reflect on a time when you questioned or challenged a belief or idea. What prompted your thinking? What was the outcome?
  • Describe a problem you’ve solved or a problem you’d like to solve. It can be an intellectual challenge, a research query, an ethical dilemma – anything that is of personal importance, no matter the scale. Explain its significance to you and what steps you took or could be taken to identify a solution.
  • Discuss an accomplishment, event, or realization that sparked a period of personal growth and a new understanding of yourself or others.
  • Describe a topic, idea, or concept you find so engaging that it makes you lose all track of time. Why does it captivate you? What or who do you turn to when you want to learn more?
  • Share an essay on any topic of your choice. It can be one you’ve already written, one that responds to a different prompt, or one of your own design.

(Source: https://appsupport.commonapp.org/applicantsupport/s/article/What-are-the-2020-2021-Common-Application-essay-prompts)

You need only respond to one of these prompts. More selective schools tend to have more “supplementals” on the common application, where they ask you a variety of additional questions. We can help you with both the core common application essay and your supplemental essays.

Where can one find free college application resources?

We have created the greatest free college essay resource: a collection of over 1,500 real, successful college application essays. The essays are organized by school—chances are, if you are applying to a school, we have a sample application essay for that school you can check out. You can find it on our sister site, FreeTestPrep.com: http://www.freetestprep.com/blog/college-essay-collection.