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Now that you have
seen the complex themes with which you
must engage and have begun thinking
about the personal details you will use,
it is time to begin the daunting task of
structuring your essay.
Your first concern should be clarity.
If your essay is haphazardly structured,
the reader simply will not be able to
follow your ideas, and your whole
purpose will be lost.
Your second concern is focus. An
essay could be clear on the sentence or
paragraph level, but still lack overall
coherence. Perhaps you have written
three paragraphs, each clearly devoted
to one topic, but you have not shown how
each topic contributes to a larger
point. The basic focus of every
admissions essay is why you should be
admitted to the school, but a more
specific theme can be helpful. You want
your reader to take away a clear point
after he or she puts down your essay.
Your third concern is impact.
Even a clear and coherent essay can fail
to achieve the optimal structure that
would maximize its overall impact. For
example, the overarching theme of an
essay might be your desire to help
others. After outlining this clear focus
in your first paragraph, you go on to
write three clear paragraphs, each
independently offering evidence of your
desire to help people. What is lacking
is a sense of progression: the reader
sees repetition, not growth. To maximize
impact, your structure must allow each
point to build upon previous points,
thereby improving not only your essay's
flow but also the overall force of your
argument.
The purpose of this section is not to
delineate one structural approach that
will work for everyone's individual
essays, but rather to discuss principles
of organization that should guide you in
constructing your argument. Here your
task grows even more challenging,
because some of the principles can be
mutually exclusive, and you may have to
decide between them to determine which
approach best suits your material. |
