When psychologist Dr. Tim Davis first taught a class on resilience at the University of Virginia, it was tiny.

18 students.
One credit.
Ungraded.

Today, it enrolls 150 students a semester with waitlists just as long.

Not because it teaches finance, coding, or AI.

Because it teaches something students quietly admit they don’t know how to do:

How to struggle without falling apart.

And right now, that skill might be more valuable than anything else universities teach.

Here’s the backstory—and why this class is spreading by word of mouth among students and parents.

👇

The College Class Students Can’t Stop Talking About

Every fall, millions of students arrive on college campuses carrying the same invisible thought:

Everyone else seems to know what they’re doing.

They assume their classmates are confident.

Prepared.

Sure of themselves.

But the truth is simpler—and more uncomfortable:

Most of them are just as unsure.

Psychologist Dr. Tim Davis spent 20 years watching this play out from the inside.

Before teaching at UVA, he worked as a clinical director for college counseling centers. His job was to help students who were overwhelmed by the pressures of college life.

And the numbers were clear.

Students today are more anxious than any generation measured before them.

More pressure.
More expectations.
More uncertainty.

But Davis noticed something else, too.

The way universities were trying to solve the problem didn’t scale.

Why Therapy Alone Can’t Solve Student Anxiety

Traditional mental health support follows what psychologists call the medical model.

Students struggle → they seek counseling → they receive treatment.

This works.

But it reaches only a small fraction of students.

Think about the logistics.

A counseling group might include 8 students.

It requires trained clinicians.
Administrative time.
Case documentation.

For those eight students, it can be life-changing.

But what about the thousands who never walk into the counseling center?

Davis started wondering:

What if resilience could be taught before students reached that point?

Not in therapy.

In a classroom.

The Experiment

At UVA, Davis tried something unconventional.

He launched a small seminar called “Resilience in Young Adulthood.”

The format was simple.

Students would:

• learn the science of resilience
• practice skills for managing stress
• talk openly about challenges most students hide

The class maxed out at 18 students.

Then something strange happened.

Students started talking about it.

The Class That Grew 10x in Three Years

Word spread.

Students told their friends.

Friends joined the waitlist.

Soon the class expanded.

18 → 35 → 75 → 105 → 120.

Now the course enrolls 150 students per semester—and still fills instantly.

After 15 years in student mental health, Dr. Davis says he had never heard feedback like this.

Students weren’t just saying the class was interesting.

They were saying something much bigger.

It was changing how they approached their lives.

The Assignment That Changes Students

At the center of the class is a project called the Resilience Experiment.

Each student must design a challenge with three rules:

It has to:

1️⃣ Scare you
2️⃣ Create real anxiety
3️⃣ Make you unsure you can succeed

Students propose the challenge, attempt it over the semester, and write about what happened.

Some start difficult conversations.

Some try leadership roles they’ve avoided.

Some confront fears they’ve been carrying for years.

The result?

Stories of growth that often surprise even the students themselves.

Because the real lesson of the class isn’t motivational.

It’s psychological.

The Most Powerful Lesson Students Hear

One idea from the course sticks with almost everyone.

It’s simple.

And almost no students have heard it clearly before.

Give yourself permission to struggle.

In high school, struggle often feels like failure.

You’re expected to get good grades.
Know the answers.
Perform.

But college—and adulthood—work differently.

Struggle is part of the process.

Sometimes, struggle is the signal that you’re doing something meaningful.

Why Parents Are the Real Audience

Here’s the surprising twist.

Davis believes the first audience for these ideas isn’t students.

It’s parents.

Graduating high school seniors rarely pick up a book about resilience on their own.

But parents—watching their kids step into adulthood—are searching for guidance.

The goal isn’t controlling their path.

It’s finding the balance between support and independence.

Davis describes it this way:

Hold on loosely, but don’t let go.

Enough support to know they’re not alone.

Enough space to let them grow.

The Bigger Question

The success of the resilience class raises a bigger question for universities everywhere.

What if we stopped assuming students already know how to navigate pressure?

What if we taught resilience the same way we teach economics or biology?

Not after students burn out.

Before.

Because one lesson students consistently say they wish they had learned earlier is this:

You’re not the only one who feels like you don’t belong.

Almost everyone does.

And learning to face that feeling—without letting it define you—may be one of the most important skills of adulthood.

Timothy L. Davis, PhD, is an Associate Professor of Leadership and Public Policy at the University of Virginia's Frank Batten School of Leadership and Public Policy. A clinical psychologist, he specializes in building resilience, team leadership, and emotional intelligence. He previously served as the Executive Director for Resilience & Leadership Development at UVA.

I first stumbled on Dr. Davis’s brilliance in a lecture hall in 2018. Years later, I was able to track him down and get his advice for students and parents on developing emotional resilience in college students. I’ve summarized his advice in the handouts below.

2026 Build Emotional Resilience Parent Handout

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2026 Resilience Checklist For Students

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At The Student Empowered, academic life coach Mya Anderson helps students and families navigate the transition from high school to college with clarity, confidence, and practical strategy. Because the truth is, college operates like a “second language” — and most students are expected to already speak it.

They don’t.

And when they don’t understand the hidden rules, systems, and expectations, they hesitate to ask questions. They make avoidable mistakes. They lose confidence. Sometimes, they fall behind before they even realize what went wrong.

The Student Empowered exists to change that.

College Is Not High School — And That’s the Point

In high school, success often looks like:

• Complete the assignment

• Check the box

• Follow the instructions

• Get the grade
  

In college, the message shifts dramatically:

• You should know what to do

• You should know when to ask

• You should know how to manage it

• You should figure it out
  

But no one actually teaches students how to “do college.”

Professors don’t explain how course numbers work. Advisors don’t always have time to catch every registration mistake. Syllabi are handed out, but rarely decoded. Campus services exist — but most are passive. If a student doesn’t initiate, no one intervenes until there’s already a problem.

Mya’s role is to step into that gap — proactively.

Starting Before Move-In Day

The Student Empowered ideally begins working with families in the summer before college starts.

Why? Because confidence and clarity don’t happen overnight.

Summer support includes:

Translating the “Language of Higher Education”

Students and parents learn what course codes mean, how academic calendars function, when to meet advisors (there’s actually a sweet spot), and how college systems really work behind the scenes.

Orientation Prep and Recap

Students retain surprisingly little from orientation. Mya meets before and after to create a practical “cheat sheet” so nothing important gets lost.

Family Communication Planning

How often will you talk? What happens when they come home for the first break? How do you support without interrogating? How do they ask for space without shutting you out?

This is not about creating distance. It’s about preserving connection.

Course and Priority Management Foundations

Instead of vague “time management” advice, students learn how to:

• Rank priorities

• Estimate task effort

• Break down syllabi

• Understand academic expectations

• Create realistic work plans
  

College doesn’t reward good intentions. It rewards systems.

First Semester: Real-Time Support

Once classes begin, the coaching becomes personalized.

Syllabus Mastery

Most students treat a syllabus as a list of dates. In reality, it functions more like a contract. Mya teaches students how to extract grading policies, professor expectations, participation rules, and hidden risk points — before they become problems.

Note-Taking and Learning Strategy

No one actually teaches students how to take notes in college.

Students learn:

• Why they’re taking notes

• How to match note-taking style to professor style

• How long they can truly focus (“sweet spot” reading time)

• How to build study stamina

• How to use graded feedback to improve
  

It’s not about working harder. It’s about working smarter.

Help-Seeking Confidence

Office hours can feel intimidating. Sending emails about grades can feel confrontational.

Instead of reacting with, “Can you change my grade?” students learn to ask:
“Can you help me understand what happened?”

That shift alone can change outcomes — and relationships.

Students practice scripts. They prepare for conversations. They walk in with a plan.

When Something Goes Wrong

Even with preparation, college includes bumps.

Maybe your student:

• Registers for the wrong level course

• Misreads expectations on a paper

• Struggles with a roommate

• Loses motivation mid-semester

• Faces a breakup that affects sleep and focus

• Comes home for break and something feels different
  

Mya helps students move from panic to plan.

Instead of spiraling, they ask:

• What happened?

• What are my options?

• What’s my next best move?
  

Families are also prepared for transition moments — like the first fall break, winter reset conversations, or the emotional turbulence that sometimes accompanies young adult relationships.

Everything is normalized. Nothing is shamed.

Why Families Choose The Student Empowered

Many families hire support for college admissions.

Few think about support for college completion.

But college is one of the largest financial investments most families make. Repeating a course can cost hundreds or thousands of dollars. Extending graduation by even one semester increases tuition, housing, and opportunity costs.

More importantly, confidence costs something too.

The Student Empowered protects both the financial investment and the emotional investment.

Parents often say:

• “I want to enjoy my child’s first year of college.”

• “I don’t want every conversation to feel like an interrogation.”

• “I want someone else to be the strategy voice.”
  

Mya becomes a neutral, knowledgeable partner — not replacing the parent, but preserving the parent-child relationship.

Students don’t see her as a disciplinarian.

Parents don’t feel like they’re hovering.

Everyone feels supported.

What Makes This Different

Mya brings more than 20 years of on-campus higher education experience. She understands advising loads, faculty expectations, campus systems, and institutional blind spots.

She knows where students slip — because she’s seen it happen.

She also knows how capable they truly are when given the right tools.

At its heart, The Student Empowered does one powerful thing:

It normalizes “I didn’t know.”

And then it turns that moment into learning, growth, and momentum.

The Goal

Not perfection.

Not control.

Not pressure.

The goal is this:

A student who knows how to:

• Advocate for themselves

• Recover from setbacks

• Understand academic systems

• Make thoughtful decisions

• Build confidence intentionally

• Stay on track toward graduation

Because getting into college is exciting.

Finishing strong — and growing through the process — is empowering.

^^^ These are “my why.”

My background is editorial. I’m both a writer and a certified professional photographer; my work has appeared in newspapers and magazines nationwide as both a staff member and a freelancer. My editors used to call me a “twofer” because they could send me as the writer and photog.

Storytelling is a rhetorical mode that not many students are familiar with. It’s not something we use much in high school.

When my two kids were going through the college application process, I was working both as a freelance feature writer and photographer for the New Orleans Advocate,

and I was also the Lead Faculty for Communications, teaching undergraduates in COMM and English.

My kids, my kids’ friends, and my friends’ kids were all bringing me their college application essays. They were all making the same mistakes. That’s how I got involved in this work.

In 2023, I published a book and won the Loudoun (Virginia) Chamber Small Business Award.

In 2024, I completed 16 graduate-level hours in college admissions and career planning at the University of California, Berkeley, and became a certified Maxwell DISC consultant and trainer.

The Student/Career Report assessment lists potential careers where a student’s strengths and interests might best serve them. I spend time talking with students about pursuing these interests before we start looking for strong colleges and universities that offer those programs.

Most academically qualified students come to me with one of two things: a list or an essay.

Students who come to me with an essay ask, “Will you edit this for me?” The problem with will you edit this for me, is that editing is the last step in the process. The college application essay is academic writing, and academic writing is a technical skill. While most students have mastered the five-point “hamburger” persuasive rhetorical mode in high school, they haven’t yet learned that the persuasive rhetorical mode is not the only rhetorical mode used in academic writing — and the catch-22 is that they likely will not learn this until they get to college, but first they have to get in!

I break down academic writing at the undergraduate level for high school students. I give them tools to make this work easier, so they never sit down to an essay assignment again and stare at a blank page.

Students who come to me with a list often use words like “safety school.” I explain why I use words like “likely target, reach, unlikely.”

I use software that aggregates more than 30 years’ worth of admissions data. The software shows students where they stand relative to the larger pool of applicants, especially in this era of grade inflation. This is how we balance and strategize their list of schools they’ll apply to.

Unlike a photograph, a feature story, or even a college application essay, the numbers tell the story in this process. In a holistic admissions process, no single factor determines admission. A 6 percent acceptance rate does not equal a 6 percent chance of admission. The math is not cumulative. Applying to more highly selective schools does not increase a student’s chances of admission at any of them.

The college application process is a part-time job for students; it quickly becomes a full-time summer job for those who aspire to apply to more than one highly selective college or university (admissions rates below 30 percent, for example), just in writing the essays alone.

For most families, purchasing a college education is the third-largest expense after buying a home and saving for retirement.

My goal is to turn an admissions officer into an advocate through a college application essay, because when all other things are equal on paper, the essay is the one thing students have complete control over and can set them apart from tens of thousands of other applicants.

How do I do this? By showing students what I call The Steps in the RIGHTING Process; we make students jump off the page.

A college degree only yields a return on investment if the student graduates. Yet in 2025, one in four college freshmen did not return for their sophomore year.

Questions? Please schedule a Parent/Student Discovery session here.

1. Starting (and Ending) with “Rough Draft”

Great essays are built by working through The Steps in the Writing RIGHTING Process. Many students skip important steps in the writing process and jump straight into “writing a rough draft.” Writing an effective essay is about thinking, reflecting, and planning.

Before you start writing, make sure to:

• Understand exactly what the prompt is asking.
  
  

• Choose a topic/story that reveals who you are and what you value. (Think: Soundbite)
  
  

• Plan your organization (outline) based on the correct rhetorical mode & organizational method.

• Freewrite. Freewriting is an essential part of the essay process, helping students to unlock ideas, find their voice, and overcome perfectionism early in drafting.

2. Focusing on Grammar Too Early

Worrying about commas and punctuation before your ideas are clear is like brushing your teeth before eating dessert. Use the 80/20 Rule of Writing RIGHTING: spend 80% of your time on content and organization, and only 20% on editing mechanics. Communicate. Navigate. Punctuate.©

Tip: Get your ideas and structure right first — then polish your grammar.

3. Writing a Testimonial Instead of a Personal Story

It’s natural to want to write about someone who inspired you — a coach, teacher, or parent — but the essay isn’t about them; it’s about you.

Don’t tell someone else’s story. You can include others, but only in the context of how their influence helped shape your actions, choices, or growth.

Ask yourself, does this essay teach the reader about me or about them?

Review “You Thank” and use what you’ve written to hand this person a heartfelt thank you note.

4. Ignoring the Prompt

It seems this would go without saying, but you’d be surprised. Answer. The. Question.

Every essay prompt is “prompting” you to discuss a specific idea or experience. Make sure your essay:

• Clearly responds to the question being asked.
  
  

• Keeps a clear, focused message throughout.
  
  

• Stays within the word count limit.
  
  

Rule of thumb: If you can’t answer the question the prompt is asking in a single sentence, out loud, it’s likely you won’t be able to write a compelling essay on that topic. Return to freewriting.

5. Submitting Inauthentic Work

Having someone else write your essay — or borrowing someone else’s ideas — might seem like a tempting shortcut, but it’s a major mistake. Admissions officers can easily detect essays that don’t sound like a teenager’s authentic voice — or worse, plagiarized.

Plagiarism checkers on the faculty side are far more robust than they are on the student side.

Parents: If you are writing your student’s college application essay, you are not “helping” your student; you are sending the message to your student that they are not capable of doing this work, robbing them of an opportunity to earn their acceptance letters.

The essay is a student’s chance to show who you are, not who someone else thinks you should be.

Colleges value honesty, self-awareness, and genuine reflection far more than perfection, and many have academic honor codes that you’ll agree to when submitting your application (whether or not you read the fine print.)

6. Telling Me Your Passion

The word “passion” is so overused in college application essays.

Show me. Don’t tell me. Your high school teachers have been telling you this for years.

“Don’t TELL ME the moon is shining; SHOW ME me the glint of light on broken glass.”

—Anton Chekhov

The word “passion” is a noun; use active verbs, not nouns and adjectives, to write your college application.

Replace “verbs of being” (is, are, was, were, am, be, been) with strong, active verbs. Be specific. Use concrete details, personal stories, unique examples only you could write.

Don’t tell UPenn about Upenn. Don’t tell Penn State about Penn State. (They already know.)

7. Telling The Wrong Story

• Desperation

• Hesitation

• Risqué

• Braggadocio

• Perspective

• Controversy

Choose your own Soundbite.

Protect your privacy (HIPAA, FERPA.)

Don’t use the word “you.” You can only speak for yourself in these essays. You have no idea who your audience will be, and you want to avoid alienating or offending your reader, so every statement needs to be in the first person, not the third.

8. Writing a résumé or autobiography

The Common App essay is not a list of all your accomplishments. It’s not “The Life and Times of Student Name.” It’s not a “Why Major?” essay.

Think of the Common App essay as a slice of pie — it’s a sliver of time, a small snippet of a story that tells a larger story about the flavor of your life.

9. Using literary devices

The Common App essay is not an application for an MFA in Creative Writing. It’s a job interview.

Admissions officers are busy people. Application essay readers read tens of thousands of essays. Connect the dots. Draw a line from A to B.

Avoid:

• Creating suspense

• building themes

• Metaphors

• Dialogue

• Alliteration

• foreshadowing

10. Repurposing

Every application deserves a fresh approach.

11. J101

The Catch-22 here is that students won’t be able to get the information they need from Journalism 101 to write their college application essay until after they are in college — but first, they have to get in!

Just because it happened to you doesn’t make it interesting. (I know. That’s way harsh, Tai.) The first time any student hears it, it stings.

Trust me on this. The older, more educated, more experienced you become, the more you will understand and appreciate being told this — you may even be grateful to have the heads-up to avoid making the mistake catastrophic.

Students tend to bury the lede, and some fatally overwork an essay.

“I know that one of the great arts that the writer develops is the art of saying, ‘No. No, I’m finished. Bye.’ And leaving it alone. I will not write it into the ground. I will not write the life out of it.” — Maya Angelou

12. Using Sarcasm

Sarcasm is a low-level form of anger. It’s literal definition is “the use of irony to mock or convey contempt” and there’s no college application essay that benefits from mockery or contempt. And that’s to say nothing of students who have yet to truly master the use of irony in writing.

There’s a difference between sarcasm and wit; witty people are funny. Sarcastic people are mean.

sar•casm noun the use of irony to mock or convey contempt

13. Skip the fairytale ending

Sometimes, things in life can’t be fixed; that’s okay. Growth and reflection matter more than happily-ever-after.

14. Don’t get emotionally attached

I encourage students not to write about topics they are emotionally attached to in their college application essays, but sometimes, it’s unavoidable.

When writing about an emotionally charged topic, the writer is especially vulnerable to criticism, making objective revisions and improvements extremely challenging and often accompanied by personal disappointment.

A student who is less attached to the topic is more open to feedback and can objectively evaluate the overall message, leading to stronger and more effective final drafts. (See “J101” above.)

As an IEC, I can only do what I can do. While I’ve read tens of thousands of these essays, most of my students have only written one; ultimately, it’s the student’s decision which version of the essay to copy and paste into the Common App.

15. First learn the rules

Then learn to break them.

🎓 Final Thought

The college application essay isn’t a writing exercise per se — it’s a thinking exercise. The more time you spend freewriting, reflecting, and organizing, the more your authentic voice will shine through.

The best essay isn’t the one that sounds perfect — it’s the one that sounds like you.

In 1990, Maya Angelou was interviewed on stage at the YMHA in Manhattan, New York, in front of an audience of mostly women. The interviewer, George Plimpton, asked Angelou how she began her workday. While writing, she describes trying to pull the language into shape, into sharpness, and taking a few weeks to describe what she’s seeing. Plimpton then asks how Angelou knows when the work is done, to which she says it’s done when it’s the best she can do. It may not be “the best,” but as Angelou’s quote above says, knowing when to let a piece of writing go is one of a writer’s best tools. This interview appeared in Issue 116 of The Paris Review.

2026 Common College Application Essay Mistakes

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Some colleges and universities quietly eliminated Early Action from their application options. Students must choose from Early Decision or Regular Decision as their only two options.

Some colleges and universities that retained Early Action moved their Early Action deadline to October 15th, and others moved their Early Decision to October 15, catching many students off guard and unprepared.

Many students who are faced with Early Decision or Regular Decision (if Early Action is eliminated) will be forced to apply Regular Decision to schools that are quite high on their list; but if colleges and universities fill the majority of their freshman class in ED, those students could miss out on acceptance and/or financial aid or both.

Not all state schools offer an Early Decision option, and many state schools are notorious for waitlisting applicants.

Strategically, students need to be conscious of the constant flux that is the college admissions process.

High school seniors: Submit your financial aid applications promptly, as the availability of resources and allocation of funds will likely be determined by the first application pool.

Don’t stop communicating with your admissions counselor if you’ve already started; if you haven’t started, do so. As soon as your midterm grades come out, write to your admissions counselor. Advocate for yourself. Continue the conversation.

High school juniors take note: Things change quickly in college admissions. The business of higher education is constantly changing. You’re now just one year away from college applications. College isn’t two years from now; the deadlines are inside 365 days, and the clock turns quickly.

Parents and students, if you have questions, concerns, or feedback, let us know.

Spark Notes: Financial Aid

1. start planning;

2. fill out FAFSA;

3. review aid offers;

4. receive aid;

5. repay loans

The FAFSA begins accepting applications on October 1, 2025. The sooner you complete it, the more likely you are to get the aid you need/& or qualify for.

UPDATE: The 2026-2027 FAFSA is now officially open for all students, ahead of the traditional October 1 …

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To-Do:

Finalize building your college list; carefully cull this list, keeping acceptance rates in mind; see book suggestion below for additional help

Fill in all the details of your Common App

Low-income students: request application or testing fee waivers via high school counselor

Compile a list of all supplemental essays; begin writing

Focus first on compl…

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• I promised to hand you 30 percent of your essay.

• “All roads lead to outline.” This is your outline for a narrative essay.

• Fifty percent of your work is done in the freewriting step.

• Don’t try to “write” a lede!

• Don’t try to “write” a rough draft.

We’re going to pull your “lede” out of your freewriting exercises, and usually this happens after many freewriting exercises in the process. Leave the lede blank for now and focus on your freewriting exercises. Trust me, that’s where all the magic happens. 😊

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Parents and students can find key data points to compare schools, assess admissions chances, and make informed college decisions by using the Common Data Set.

The Common Data Set (CDS) initiative is a collaborative effort among data providers in the…

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This is a video from a live workshop in 2022; we used the Virginia Tech prompts as examples; some of these prompts have since changed, but Virginia Tech’s motto remains “Ut Prosim.”

It’s paramount that students understand the mission of the school that they are applying to, especially when writing supplemental and/or “Why Us?” essays. Virginia Tech is a…

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The “Why Us?” essay is one of the most important college essays that you will write. Colleges accept a limited number of students every year, so they want to ensure that admitted students have a genuine interest in their school. Of course, the fact that you're filling out an application form and writing all of the admission essays tells them that you want to attend the school, but this essay is supposed to tell them why.

Many students apply to colleges due to name recognition, ranking lists, or peer pressure. Others are drawn to specific colleges because they are genuinely interested in particular programs or courses offered by the institution or because the school and the student share common values. The admissions committee wants to make sure that you fit into the latter category because it means that you are more likely to thrive socially and academically.

For your “Why Us?” essay to be strong, it needs to show the admissions board that you understand the school's values, culture, curriculum, and the opportunities or experiences that it has to offer. The person reading your essay should feel like you have already spent time picturing yourself on their campus or in the classroom, and they should feel that you are excited about that possibility.

Visit the campus when possible. Spend some time on the website. Do not limit yourself to the admissions and undergraduate programs page. Instead, take a look at the online catalog, social programs, and even the course schedule, if available.

The aim is to find out what sets this school apart from the others you’ve applied to. Your essay should discuss precise details about at least one of the following:

• Courses & Programs

• Campus Culture

• Events, Activities, & Clubs

• Latest News About College & Its Achievements

• Extracurriculars

• Internships & CoOps

• Mission Statement/Values

If you have questions about the programs or if you feel that the website has not provided you with enough information, you can reach out to the admissions office or a local representative.

DOs & DON’Ts:

• Show, don't tell.

• Connect the essay to YOU.

• Don't be generic or vague. Be specific.

• Don't focus on the school's location, reputation, or ranking.

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Students often come to me and say, “I’m not a very good writer.”

My answer to both is the same:

It doesn’t matter! It’s academic writing!

Academic writing is a technical skill.

As a technical skill, academic writing’s purpose is to present arguments, discuss research findings, and contribute to scholarly discourse in the form of research papers, theses, dissertations, journal articles, and essays.

The acquisition and development of technical skills generally follow a process, often described in stages or phases. In this case, we use the Steps in the Writing RIGHTING Process:

In addition to the steps, we use the alliteration of Communicate. Navigate. Punctuate.® to help students remember the three most important components of writing: content, organization, and mechanics.

Q: Why throw in the Pareto Principle?

A: In my experience, students will open a document and stare at the blank page for upwards of 10-30 minutes, unsure where to begin. College freshmen can expect to write an average of 92 pages of essays; even on the low end, that’s a lot of unpaid hours with no return on investment. The Pareto Principle, A.K.A. The 80/20 Rule, helps students to maximize their results with minimal effort.

Developing a technical skill is not a one-and-done exercise, but rather an ongoing pursuit of learning, practicing, receiving feedback, reflecting, and applying knowledge to solve problems. It’s not enough to watch the attached video and say, voilà, I got this; students (especially the students who are comfortable with writing) may feel pushed out of their comfort zone. Other students (especially those who don’t typically describe themselves as someone who writes things for fun) will be super relieved to be handed a formula.

We’re building a bridge between High School AP English Lit and Rhetoric 101, and we’re starting with the college application essay, because college! What if you get in? 😜

Coding, data analysis, and operating machinery are all examples of technical skills.

The people who deploy these technical skills aren’t born with these innate abilities.

Students rarely come to me and say, “I’m not a good pilot.” Either they’ve learned how to operate aircraft, or they haven’t, but they don’t consider themselves “bad at flying” if they haven’t even tried to learn it. Same with coding.

The thing about academic writing is that students don’t really do a deep-dive into speech, communications, and rhetoric until college — but first, they have to get in!

pilots study and train for years to move the flying public around the world in jumbo jets. Technical skills are learned.

, and photographers don’t wake up one morning with innate talents to expose images on manual mode with a 1948 Hasselblad 1600F.

Below are resources for students and parents. All ESSAY CURE students have access to extensive ArborBridge evaluation and tailored tutoring resources to help students achieve their best possible score.

Act : Sat Concordance

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Timelines For Preparing For The Sat Or Act

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Step 2: PREWRITING

Five Whys

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Start With Why

Prewriting is a tool to transfer ideas and abstract thoughts into words, phrases, and sentences on paper.

There are numerous prewriting techniques, including:

• Freewriting

• Outlining

• Brainstorming

• Idea mapping

• 5WH$ (who what where when why how + how much $)

In this workshop, we focus on “freewriting” because it’s the easiest, fast…

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But first. Let’s talk about the side of college that nobody in the halls of your high school is talking about:

Nobody’s coming.

As a college freshman, if you sleep through your …

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• Why YOU?
  This essay is about you and your fit with the college, NOT a list of the college’s great attributes.

• Show, Don't Tell:
  Use specific examples to illustrate your points.

• Be Genuine:
  Q: How do admissions officers spot insincerity in “Why Us?” essays?

  A: Because your competition has already shown them sincerity. There are students out there who want…

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"To break a mental model is harder than splitting the atom." —Albert Einstein

✅ Try anyway.

To break the mental model of “sitting down to write a rough draft,” we must first unlearn the muscle memory you’ve developed in high school. Those of you who enjoy writing and/or those of you who have been successful in pulling off writing assignments at the 11th h…

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July is the month when some rising high school seniors scramble to increase their ACT/SAT scores to include in their college applications.

Here are some images to help students get a sense of each exam and what’s expected:

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I come from _____.

Don’t worry about grammar, spelling, or punctuation. Just write.

Go!

I completed this exercise during a workshop for college counselors in San Diego last month.

Here’s what I wrote:

I come from: Swedish cinnamon rolls and homemade donuts; Colorado’s San Juan Mountains; a pa…

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