Free writing samples
First drafts and revisions, side by side. Same student, same prompt, same word budget. School, faculty, and program names redacted.
Sample 1Why-school essay · 400 words
Prompt
What specific aspects of [the school]'s academic programs or community drew you to apply? (400 words)
First draft
As Professor of Urban Ecologies, [Professor M.] approaches cities as living, social spaces. He emphasizes how urban design, ecology, and community relate, treating cities as places where people live together creatively rather than just move through them.
[The school]'s Architecture Design program in particular stood out to me because of its focus on spatial relationships and context rather than treating design as decorative. In my ultimate goal in redesigning American parks, I found many resources helpful to me within [the school] in my exploration of the program.
[The school]'s three-dimensional design classes offer a glimpse into the practical applications of enclosure, scale, and transition. Its resources, such as physical models and digital 3D tools, can test how a path subtly slows movement or how seating placement encourages quiet coexistence. These tools would allow me to refine my ideas through structure and practical application, giving me an outlet to put my theories into practice.
[Professor M.]'s research in urban ecologies is supplemental to my interests in city and park planning. I noticed how [Professor M.] approaches cities as living, social spaces, evident from his essay series. I noticed his emphasis on how urban design, ecology, and community relate, treating cities as harmonious, functional places. This directly ties into my interest in urban park planning.
Finally, [the school] offers a studio-based structure from the architecture and design program that is one of the most important aspects of exploring public space. Parks must respond to different people and to fully fill those needs of emotions, which requires constant adjustments and reflections. Studio critiques at [the school] further encourage the process by allowing students to evolve their ideas.
Overall, [the school] offers the fundamentals of what architecture makes up the world that I hope one day to live in. I firmly believe [the school] will be the next step in my goal of revitalizing American parks, and to make every sight of all city parks serve as they were always intended to be. I hope to one day bring the opportunities I had to experience in Beijing Olympic Forest Park and to gracefully incorporate elements of it into American cities.
Revised
The path through the Beijing Olympic Forest Park follows a man-made wetland for about 1.4 kilometers. My grandmother and I used to walk it most summer mornings back when I was in fourth grade. Every few steps one of us would stop to point: a heron standing stock still in the reeds, a dragonfly skimming the water, a turtle that had somehow gotten onto the path.
Neither of us knew the wetland was engineered. It was built to filter runoff before it reached the Yongding River, but we loved it because of the herons.
Years later, after discovering what an architect was, I realized the wetland had been playing two roles at once. It was infrastructure, quietly cleaning water. It was also where a grandmother and grandson wanted to spend their mornings. The fact that a single landscape could achieve both has stuck with me ever since.
American parks are nice enough. They have lawns, benches, and the occasional captivating structure. But they were designed once and have been static for decades. They're sites to pass through instead of systems that engage with life in a city.
That is why I am applying to [the school].
When I read [Professor M.]'s work on civic terrain, I noticed that his writing treats ecology, infrastructure, and social life as parts of the same problem. It put into language what the wetland was doing in Beijing years earlier when I was too young to articulate it.
I am equally drawn to [the school]'s three-dimensional design sequence because it treats small spatial decisions as meaningful. I actually have a notebook of ideas about a derelict park in Queens that I want to bring into [named studio] for critique, including a sketch where I've moved the path two meters left so it crosses a creek instead of skirting it. More importantly, I want a roomful of people to argue with me about that two meters.
At the moment, most of my design thinking happens alone. [The school]'s studio culture would force those ideas into conversation with other people. My goal is not to leave [the school] with stronger designs. It is to leave having learned how to reconsider my own.
I eventually hope to create places like the wetland my grandmother and I walked years ago: landscapes that solve problems most visitors never notice, while giving them reasons to stop every few steps anyway.
What we changed in the revision4 notes
- The revision opens with the Beijing wetland and the writer's grandmother. The original opens by quoting a professor. One is the experience that earned the knowledge; the other is performing the knowledge.
- Cut generic enthusiasm: "I firmly believe," "I found many resources helpful," "I hope to one day." Replaced with specific actions the writer takes: a notebook of park ideas, a path moved two meters left across a creek.
- Added concrete details only this writer could name: 1.4 kilometers, fourth grade, the heron in the reeds, the dragonfly skimming the water, the turtle on the path, the Yongding River, the two-meter sketch in Queens. The opening uses a list of three specific images instead of abstract "beauty of the route."
- Closed the loop. The opening's "every few steps one of us would stop to point" returns in the closing's "giving them reasons to stop every few steps anyway." The closing also pulls together the dual-purpose thesis (infrastructure that also serves human life) without restating any single body paragraph. Endings that pay off the opening land harder than endings that gesture at future hopes.
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