Find help for writing your four required essays for The University of California application. There are eight prompts, which are called Personal Insight Questions, to choose from. Each of your four essays must be under 350 words.
Read more about the Personal Insight Questions for both incoming freshman and transfer students on the UC Admissions web site.
If you need more help, learn more about my tutoring and other services.
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UC Personal Insight Question 1
Describe an example of your leadership experience in which you have positively influenced others, helped resolve disputes, or contributed to group efforts over time.
UC Personal Insight Question 5
Describe the most significant challenge you have faced and the steps you have taken to overcome this challenge. How has this challenge affected your academic achievement?
UC Personal Insight Question 2
Every person has a creative side, and it can be expressed in many ways: problem solving,
original and innovative thinking, and artistically, … Describe how you express your creative side.
UC Personal Insight Question 6
Think about an academic subject that inspires you.
Describe how you have furthered this interest inside and/or outside of the classroom.
UC Personal Insight Question 3
What would you say is your greatest talent or skill?
How have you developed and demonstrated that talent over time?
UC Personal Insight Question 7
What have you done to make your school or your community a better place?
UC Personal Insight Question 4
Describe how you have taken advantage of a significant educational opportunity or worked to overcome an educational barrier you have faced.
UC Personal Insight Question 8
Beyond what has already been shared in your application,
what do you believe makes you stand out as a strong candidate for admissions to the University of California?
A Peek into the Many Worlds of Prompt 1 of the UC Essays
UPDATE: The University of California announced NEW essay prompts for 2016-17. Read about how to answer them HERE.
The following content in this post is no longer relevant and is outdated!
About three years ago, I wrote a post to try to help students applying to the University of California find topics to answer Prompt 1 for their college application essay: Describe the World You Come From. Since I shared my advice in my Describe the World You Come From post, I have received more than a 100 comments from students. Most have specific questions, mainly trying to see if their idea of a “world” would make a great essay.
Since then, I tried to answer most of their questions. This year, I am so swamped with tutoring students, however, that I’m not able to answer all the questions right now. But I have noticed that many cover the same ground—even though the topics range from someone’s world of books, to playing tennis, to making cookies, to an ill family member, etc. So I pulled some of the questions that I thought are more common, along with my answers, in hopes they might answer questions still lingering out there. See below. read more…
Personal Quality, Talent, Accomplishment…UC Prompt #2
UPDATE: as of March 23, 2016 The University of California announced NEW essay prompts for 2016-17. Read about how to answer them HERE.
This post is now outdated. The information is no longer relevant!!
College Admissions Essay:
How to Nail Prompt #2 for UC Essays
If you want to be a freshman or transfer student at one of the University of California schools, you will need to answer this question to write one of their two required personal statement essays, also known as Prompt #2:
“Tell us about a personal quality, talent, accomplishment, contribution or experience that is important to you. What about this quality or accomplishment makes you proud and how does it relate to the person you are?”
In essence, they want you to write a personal statement.
A personal statement is an essay that shows the reader what makes you tick, what you care about, what sets you apart from the crowd.
Yes, it’s pretty wide open. Almost any topic can work—it’s all about what you have to say about it.
This entire blog has advice on how to write these.
But I’m going to map out a specific plan that should help you target this exact prompt. read more…
Brainstorm the World You Come
UPDATE: as of March 23, 2016 The University of California announced NEW essay prompts for 2016-17. Read about how to answer them HERE.
This post is now outdated. The information is no longer relevant!!
College Admissions Essay Help
The University of California Application Essay Prompt #1
So you want to go to UCLA. Or Cal, aka Berkeley. Or UC Irvine. Or Santa Barbara. Maybe Santa Cruz. Perhaps San Diego. Could be Davis! They are all such amazing schools–and you should do your best to write killer college admissions essays to get in.
If you are trying to write a college essay for the University of California’s Prompt #1, you should drop everything and read this super helpful post on how to answer it. Make sure to read the comments under that post, since students have asked questions about possible topics and I gave them specific advice and tips–which you might find helpful, too.
Jumpstart Your Personal Statement! All You Need is a Juicy Problem!
College Admissions Essays:
How to Start Your Core College Application Essay
If you are writing a college admissions essay that responds to a prompt that asks you to tell about yourself, or about “a time,” or describe a quality, background, interest, identity, talent, characteristic, experience or accomplishment (such as The Common App prompts or Prompt #2 for the UC app.), then your essay is also known as a personal statement.
The most effective personal statements are written as narrative essays, meaning they relate an experience using a story-telling style.
To share an incident or moment from your past, you only need two components to make a story: a character and a conflict.
So one magic way to create a personal narrative is to search your recent past for a conflict. (You are the “character.”)
Thinking back to English class, remember that conflicts can come from many different places—from within yourself (internal: you have a personal issue or hang-up that caused you pain or trouble) to outside yourself (external: something happened to you.)
To put it simply, a conflict is a problem.
Problems come in all shapes and sizes.
They do not need to be traumas or a crises, although those can work, too.
(HINT: Basic, everyday problems work best! Check out this post about “mundane” topics.)
Here are other words for a conflict or problem: challenge, failure, obstacle, mistake, hang-up, issue, a change, dilemma, fears, obsessions, etc.
Examples of conflicts or problems: you are shy, competitive, stubborn, were bullied, are obsessed with Twilight, didn’t make the team, got injured, have big feet, frizzy red hair, smile too much, someone quit at your work, don’t have own car, can’t spell, adhd, ocd, don’t eat meat, perfectionist, slob, lazy, drunk driving, have a mean grandparent, no money, etc…
Man, there are a lot of problems out there! But for the purposes of writing these dreaded essays, that’s a good thing for once!
Once you remember a juicy problem, follow these steps:
1. Describe the time you had a problem or describe a strong example of your problem.
(Include what happened and how it made you feel. Try to start at the moment it hit, or happened for the best impact! Include the 5Ws—who, what, when, where and why! Stick to one or two paragraphs.)
These mini-stories are also called anecdotes, and you can learn more by reading my post on how to write an anecdote.
RELATED: My Video Tutorial on How to Write an Anecdote: Part One
Describe the World You Come From…
UPDATE: The University of California announced NEW essay prompts for 2016-17. Read about how to answer them HERE.
This post is now outdated. The information is no longer relevant!!
College Admissions Essays
How to Answer Prompt #1 for the College Application Essay
for the University of California:
“Describe the World You Come From”
Only read this if you are applying to a UC (University of California school, such as UCLA, Berkeley, Santa Barbara, San Diego, Irvine, Santa Cruz, etc.).
There are two college essay prompts for their required personal statements for incoming freshmen.
Here is some advice regarding the first one:
Prompt #1 (freshman applicants)
Describe the world you come from — for example, your family, community or school — and tell us how your world has shaped your dreams and aspirations.
Read this closely. Note that it asks you to describe one thing and then tell about another–so there are two points you need to address in your essay.
When you describe the world you come from, think of this in a figurative sense.
Do not just write about your hometown.
Instead of the word “world,” try substituting it for the word “community” or “background.”
As a “community,” almost anything can be your world (a mini-community of shared activities, people, passions or places), from your yoga class to your bedroom to your job washing dishes to your grandmother’s kitchen making tortilla soup to your two moms.
It’s wide open. Just pick a topic.
Also, the examples they give, “family, community or school” are just that, examples.
Do not write a little about each of these.
And do not just write about “my family” or “my school.” Way too broad.
Write about your uncle’s magic shop in an underprivileged neighborhood, or the Scrabble club you started at your school even though you are the world’s worst speller, or the old movie theater in your town where you first fell in love with cinema and the power of a visual story.
(Check out the link at bottom of this post to my Tumbler blog with images and quotes to spark ideas for what makes your world.)
Quickie World-As-A-Community-Finder: What do you like/love to do? Where do you do it? Who do you do it with? Bingo! You have just landed on one of your worlds!
Another way to think about your world would be to show how your background has been challenging on some level–and how that has shaped and defined who you are.
In a way, your world is your life with its unique set of issues, obstacles or challenges.
Think of the saying: “Welcome to my world.”
If you have one piece of your life that shapes your “world” in a major way—something from your personal, cultural, educational, etc. background—and that colleges would understand you better if they knew what that was like, consider writing about it.
Examples:
The world of living with two gay dads.
The world of living with an autistic sister.
The world of living with a bi-polar mom.
The world of living with immigrant grandparents.
The world of living on food stamps.
The world of living with perfectionists/slobs/religious nuts/alcoholics/seven siblings/foster home/military parents/home-schooling/white parents and you are asian/constant moving/famous mom, etc.
To write this type of “world” essay, pick a real-life example of a “time” in your life/world when that issue affected you, start your essay describing that specific incident or moment, then go into how dealing with that reality has affected you.
You might be surprised what comes out of you–and how it makes you feel.
I have had students who have written about almost all of these “life” issues.
Their essays have been intense and often soul-searching, but also memorable and meaningful.
Although I think the bulk of your college application essay should focus on this world, and how it has affected you, also address the second part about your dreams and aspirations.
This has the potential to be general and boring, so make sure to talk specifically about how you will apply the lessons (values, skills, ideas, insights, etc.) you have learned in your world to your future.
(Hint: It wouldn’t hurt if you can show how these dreams and aspirations link to your specific college goals. For example, if your “world” is hanging out in your parent’s garage fixing an old truck, mention how the problem-solving skills you learned there will help your aspirations to be some type of engineer one day.)
If you are one of those A-type overachievers (hey, it’s OK, these UCs are insanely competitive!) who still feels insecure about understanding the UC prompts, check out this 50-minute video of a counselor guru spelling it all out at a convention for college admissions folks.
Just don’t let her freak you out too much. Definitely good info here, but I say overkill.
It’s also from 2007, though prompts are the same. Your choice: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6zo6NI4wHf4&feature=related
Here are some more helpful posts for answering UC Prompt #1:
- Best thing to help you with your Describe the World You Come From essay is to read SAMPLE UC PROMPT 1 ESSAYS!
- Make sure that you SHOW the World You Come From by describing the setting.
- MY MOST RECENT WORLD POST! Check out some of the comments from other students trying to figure out a “world” to write about in their UC essay in A Peek into the Many World of Prompt 1, where I share some of the questions students asked me to see if their world was interesting, or would make a great essay. Reading through these comments is a GREAT WAY TO FIND YOUR OWN WORLD TO WRITE ABOUT! (Yes, I was shouting at you!)
- Need help for UC application essay Prompt #2: “Tell about a personal quality, talent, accomplishment, …”
- This post can help you write your 650-word essay for the new Common Application.
- Need help getting started? Here’s my sure-fire brainstorm guide: Jumpstart Your College Essay.
- Still need a memorable topic for your college admissions essay? Here are some great posts to help you brainstorm: Twilight as a Topic? and Five Hot Topic Tips.
- Need help writing a “grabber” introduction for your college admission essay? Read this post, How to Write an Anecdote.
- Best for last: You must check out this super helpful Tumbler blog that uses images to help you find your “world” for your college application essay!***
- Here is a post by another essay “expert,” Allen Grove, who shares his ideas in Tips for Writing about UC Personal Statement Prompt 1 for About.com.
- The various UCs all seem to have slight variations on exactly what they look for in these personal statements. This personal statement guide is from UCLA’s admissions department; this personal statement guide is from UC Davis; this personal statement guide is from Berkeley.
See if this video from the UC Admissions Department helps.
I think it might give you an idea of what they want from the two personal statements, but not a lot on how to deliver it. That part is left up to you, as far as I can tell.
(Tips from video: “Be thoughtful, clear, succinct and provide depth.” “Just be honest.” “Focus on a strength.” “Write about what makes you different.” “I wrote from my heart.” All great stuff—the only thing missing is any direction, instruction or support for students on how to do all this in 500 words.)
*Also, if you are still looking for a “world” to write about, there are lots of ideas in the comments. Definitely worth scrolling through to see what others are thinking of writing about. Thanks for sharing all your ideas!
I believe you can write these UC essays on your own. But if you feel like you would like my personal help with them or other college application essays, find details on my Services page.
Best of luck! Janine Robinson
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