how can i help my classmates essay

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Supporting Classmates

Scenario #1.

I could see that John was really under a lot of stress. He’s been studying really hard this week, camping out in the classroom till after 3am. He always seems to have a cup of coffee in his hand.

We’re all worried about finals . Jane said he’s been sleeping in the men’s room because he’s been too tired to go home. He missed most of the lectures this week, including the review session before next week’s exam because he said he couldn’t wake up in the morning. I know he’s worried because he doesn’t have any lecture notes. I wonder if I should do something.

Scenario #2

I talked to Christina when I saw her crying in the bathroom. She said she was “OK” and had to do a history and physical examination on her patient tonight before scrubbing in on the surgery tomorrow morning. This rotation has been tough. Christina has been late for morning rounds and the residents have been on her for not seeing her patients before they did. In rounds , it seems like she’s not even there. She said she didn’t know if it was worth it anymore. She hasn’t been eating and it looks like she’s losing weight. But her last words to me got me frightened. She said, “What should I do? Should I speak to someone about it? I don’t know what I’m going to do. Maybe it’s better to end it all.”

Introduction

It’s been said, “No one gets through vet school alone.” Friends and colleagues in Vet school the program know first-hand what the experience is like and are often major sources of support. As you begin school, you will meet classmates who will become lifelong friends. Make a commitment to help each other along the way. Take a personal interest in the well-being of your friends and colleagues.

• Use the Buddy System . Promise to always be there and support a friend and ask their support of you. When people ask for help (or you sense they need help) act immediately.
• Include people in your study groups. When exams approach, stress levels rise and students who feel they have no one to study with may feel left out or frightened. Reach out to those who seem alone.
• Share lecture notes, lab notes, and due date calendars with each other.
• Make a Performance Pact with each other. For example, if six students are assigned to a rotation at a hospital, they might promise each other to make it the best learning experience possible. “Let’s be the best group of students they ever had here. Let’s help each other out. If someone has lots of patients to take care of or is really tired, let’s help ease their load. If anyone has a great patient or learns something really exciting, share it with others.”
• Recognize distress in others. If someone looks anxious or worried, speak to him or her. If you feel s/he need help, suggest faculty or counseling help to her or him, or share your concerns with resources listed below.
• Embrace differences. Most people we meet during vet school experience will not talk and think exactly as we do. Appreciate these differences, and see the opportunities in reflection when others see the world differently.
• Listen. One way to really help classmates when they’re under stress is to simply listen. Let your friend tell his/her story without interruption. Be aware of body language, such as nodding your head and leaning forward, to emphasize that you are listening and you care.

Make it okay.org  – how to talk about mental health and stories to help allies understand

Reducing stigma – top 10 steps

People to Talk to- it doesn’t matter which you start with. Just start!

• Crisis hot line (for yourself or someone else): (612) 301-4673
• Text “UMN” to 61222
• Student counseling services: (612) 624-3323
• Boynton Mental health clinic: (612) 624-1444
• Behavioral Consultation Team: (612) 626-3030
• Dr. Erin Malone: (612) 625-4762, [email protected]
• Anyone in Academic and Student Affairs
• GOALe mentor(s)
• Any faculty you feel you can approach
• Classmates, friends, and family

Final thoughts

——————-

“ Go out with other friends from vet school and get Margaritas on Tuesdays from La Casita! Or even just a drink or ice cream at a restaurant of your choice. Especially after a hard test or a surgery lab that didn’t go as planned, it feels good to take a couple hours and vent to other friends who are going through the same issues as you. Makes you feel like you’re not the only one feeling the way you do, and get to have some laughs and relaxation time at the same time. ”

UMN CVM Student, Class of 2019

“ If you find that you are struggling with time, funds, stress, depression, or anything else, there is always another student in the class who is feeling something similar. Find that other person! Take that first step. Open yourself up to your classmates and they will open up to you. We’re a team. ”

UMN CVM Student, Class of 2021

“ Remember that what most people need is for someone to listen to them and understand. You don’t have to be able to solve all their problems, but just taking the time for your day to support them will go a long way. And if they want specific advice, they will ask for it. ”

UMN CVM Student, Class of 2020

“ There is a lot of material. Group studying is a very useful tool. Try it. Even if it’s not your typical learning style. You’ll find it very helpfu l!”

“The way to survive [med] School is to support your classmates and feel supported yourself. Forget about competition. I found that the more I was open to helping, teaching, spending time with friends from school, the better I felt and did.”

JABSOM Student, Class of 2004

“Making some time during study group for us to vent our frustrations and voice our concerns with each other was invaluable in helping all of us maintain our sanity.”

ABSOM Student, Class of 2006

Well-being Handbook Copyright © 2019 by Erin Malone is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0 International License , except where otherwise noted.

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Learning from each other: Our classmates, our friends

By tuhina chakrabarti, executive mba metro ny ’18.

Group 7: A photo to celebrate the success of a great Business Strategy presentation

Even after reading all of the information packets and fact sheets about the Executive MBA Metro NY program, it’s impossible to understand the education you will receive from your classmates and friends. The journey from being strangers to becoming allies has been an incredible one. If I wrote about what I’ve learned from each and every one of my classmates, you’d be reading for an incredibly long time, so I’ll break it down into a few lessons learned from these brilliant people.

Cue the song: “We are a Family!”

For some, walking into a room filled with strangers is a fun challenge, and for others, it is absolutely terrifying. If you are afraid of getting to know strangers, the Executive MBA Metro NY program makes it easier. Whether you’re being introduced to one another in groups for class, or having a meal with the kind and compassionate personalities that will never let another eat alone, this community of students tries their best to make sure no one feels isolated. I remember being on Cornell’s ropes challenge course for team building on day one while I was still trying to keep names straight, but my classmate Tukunbo treated me like I was his pal for years. I soon learned that this was the attitude of many. Once you start warming up, getting close to classmates, and getting to know people outside of your comfort zone, you will find some phenomenal new friendships and even future colleagues at work.

What has brought us together the most? Positive attitudes! Positivity just attracts the same kind of energy. It’s what allows us to keep going and continue supporting one another when life is stressful. It is easy to get caught up in a negative moment at school or at work, or in your personal life, so having positive attitudes around you not only lifts you up but can give perspective. When we have a moment together to unwind we are able to fit in laughs, hugs, stories, and encouragement. When we look back on this program a decade later, we might be able to remember who was brilliant in one of our courses, but we will definitely remember those positive personalities that helped us through and shared some laughs.

It’s hard to believe that after one year, we have bonded and built trust in many of our relationships within this program. While some classmates may offer trust right at the beginning, and others prefer it to be earned, if you take the time to get to know the people around you and build relationships, trust comes pretty easily afterwards. Whether it’s trusting a partner on a project or trusting someone as they hold your beautiful baby, it’s a great feeling to have trust established and it makes the executive MBA journey a lot smoother. To be able to confide in and have others confide in me is one of the greatest gifts this program has given me. I don’t take it for granted, and I know others don’t either.

Family Values

To get to know the people in your class well, it’s important to know who else is a priority in their lives. So many of the students in our class have spouses, partners, children, and parents that mean the world to them. On my first day at Cornell University , I met a classmate named Eleonore who was a mother of a newborn. I was in awe of how she was able to balance her busy life as a new mom with her career and a challenging MBA program. But she’s handling it all with no complaints, and as I’ve gotten to know many of the other parents in my program, they are getting things done while keeping their families a priority. Seeing photos, hearing stories, and watching these classmates flourish at home and in the classroom is an inspiring thing. In addition, knowing the families of my classmates are supporting them through this journey and sacrificing time with that family member gives me admiration to the loving people that surround them on their journeys. I have enjoyed meeting the loved ones of my classmates, as they are an important part of our executive MBA family, too. We have tried to have gatherings that include the families of our classmates and that just makes us all so much closer.

These are just a few of many lessons learned in getting to know the wonderful and brilliant people that surround me in the Executive MBA Metro NY program. The time we spend together every other weekend is intense but makes us grow closer as colleagues and friends. My classmates have shared not only their industry knowledge and career advice, but also their dreams and life stories. Being able to pick up the phone at this very moment and ring someone from class just to vent or share some good news is a reality. I could have never imagined this being the case on our first day when we were just a room of strangers sharing formal introductions…but it is.

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• Knowledge Base
• College essay
• How to Write a Diversity Essay | Tips & Examples

How to Write a Diversity Essay | Tips & Examples

Published on November 1, 2021 by Kirsten Courault . Revised on May 31, 2023.

Table of contents

What is a diversity essay, identify how you will enrich the campus community, share stories about your lived experience, explain how your background or identity has affected your life, other interesting articles, frequently asked questions about college application essays.

Diversity essays ask students to highlight an important aspect of their identity, background, culture, experience, viewpoints, beliefs, skills, passions, goals, etc.

Diversity essays can come in many forms. Some scholarships are offered specifically for students who come from an underrepresented background or identity in higher education. At highly competitive schools, supplemental diversity essays require students to address how they will enhance the student body with a unique perspective, identity, or background.

In the Common Application and applications for several other colleges, some main essay prompts ask about how your background, identity, or experience has affected you.

Why schools want a diversity essay

Many universities believe a student body representing different perspectives, beliefs, identities, and backgrounds will enhance the campus learning and community experience.

Admissions officers are interested in hearing about how your unique background, identity, beliefs, culture, or characteristics will enrich the campus community.

Through the diversity essay, admissions officers want students to articulate the following:

• What makes them different from other applicants
• Stories related to their background, identity, or experience
• How their unique lived experience has affected their outlook, activities, and goals

Prevent plagiarism. Run a free check.

Think about what aspects of your identity or background make you unique, and choose one that has significantly impacted your life.

For some students, it may be easy to identify what sets them apart from their peers. But if you’re having trouble identifying what makes you different from other applicants, consider your life from an outsider’s perspective. Don’t presume your lived experiences are normal or boring just because you’re used to them.

Some examples of identities or experiences that you might write about include the following:

• Race/ethnicity
• Gender identity
• Sexual orientation
• Nationality
• Socioeconomic status
• Immigration background
• Religion/belief system
• Place of residence
• Family circumstances
• Extracurricular activities related to diversity

Include vulnerable, authentic stories about your lived experiences. Maintain focus on your experience rather than going into too much detail comparing yourself to others or describing their experiences.

Keep the focus on you

Tell a story about how your background, identity, or experience has impacted you. While you can briefly mention another person’s experience to provide context, be sure to keep the essay focused on you. Admissions officers are mostly interested in learning about your lived experience, not anyone else’s.

When I was a baby, my grandmother took me in, even though that meant postponing her retirement and continuing to work full-time at the local hairdresser. Even working every shift she could, she never missed a single school play or soccer game.

She and I had a really special bond, even creating our own special language to leave each other secret notes and messages. She always pushed me to succeed in school, and celebrated every academic achievement like it was worthy of a Nobel Prize. Every month, any leftover tip money she received at work went to a special 509 savings plan for my college education.

When I was in the 10th grade, my grandmother was diagnosed with ALS. We didn’t have health insurance, and what began with quitting soccer eventually led to dropping out of school as her condition worsened. In between her doctor’s appointments, keeping the house tidy, and keeping her comfortable, I took advantage of those few free moments to study for the GED.

In school pictures at Raleigh Elementary School, you could immediately spot me as “that Asian girl.” At lunch, I used to bring leftover fun see noodles, but after my classmates remarked how they smelled disgusting, I begged my mom to make a “regular” lunch of sliced bread, mayonnaise, and deli meat.

Although born and raised in North Carolina, I felt a cultural obligation to learn my “mother tongue” and reconnect with my “homeland.” After two years of all-day Saturday Chinese school, I finally visited Beijing for the first time, expecting I would finally belong. While my face initially assured locals of my Chinese identity, the moment I spoke, my cover was blown. My Chinese was littered with tonal errors, and I was instantly labeled as an “ABC,” American-born Chinese.

I felt culturally homeless.

Speak from your own experience

Highlight your actions, difficulties, and feelings rather than comparing yourself to others. While it may be tempting to write about how you have been more or less fortunate than those around you, keep the focus on you and your unique experiences, as shown below.

I began to despair when the FAFSA website once again filled with red error messages.

I had been at the local library for hours and hadn’t even been able to finish the form, much less the other to-do items for my application.

I am the first person in my family to even consider going to college. My parents work two jobs each, but even then, it’s sometimes very hard to make ends meet. Rather than playing soccer or competing in speech and debate, I help my family by taking care of my younger siblings after school and on the weekends.

“We only speak one language here. Speak proper English!” roared a store owner when I had attempted to buy bread and accidentally used the wrong preposition.

In middle school, I had relentlessly studied English grammar textbooks and received the highest marks.

Leaving Seoul was hard, but living in West Orange, New Jersey was much harder一especially navigating everyday communication with Americans.

After sharing relevant personal stories, make sure to provide insight into how your lived experience has influenced your perspective, activities, and goals. You should also explain how your background led you to apply to this university and why you’re a good fit.

Include your outlook, actions, and goals

Conclude your essay with an insight about how your background or identity has affected your outlook, actions, and goals. You should include specific actions and activities that you have done as a result of your insight.

One night, before the midnight premiere of Avengers: Endgame , I stopped by my best friend Maria’s house. Her mother prepared tamales, churros, and Mexican hot chocolate, packing them all neatly in an Igloo lunch box. As we sat in the line snaking around the AMC theater, I thought back to when Maria and I took salsa classes together and when we belted out Selena’s “Bidi Bidi Bom Bom” at karaoke. In that moment, as I munched on a chicken tamale, I realized how much I admired the beauty, complexity, and joy in Maria’s culture but had suppressed and devalued my own.

The following semester, I joined Model UN. Since then, I have learned how to proudly represent other countries and have gained cultural perspectives other than my own. I now understand that all cultures, including my own, are equal. I still struggle with small triggers, like when I go through airport security and feel a suspicious glance toward me, or when I feel self-conscious for bringing kabsa to school lunch. But in the future, I hope to study and work in international relations to continue learning about other cultures and impart a positive impression of Saudi culture to the world.

The smell of the early morning dew and the welcoming whinnies of my family’s horses are some of my most treasured childhood memories. To this day, our farm remains so rural that we do not have broadband access, and we’re too far away from the closest town for the postal service to reach us.

Going to school regularly was always a struggle: between the unceasing demands of the farm and our lack of connectivity, it was hard to keep up with my studies. Despite being a voracious reader, avid amateur chemist, and active participant in the classroom, emergencies and unforeseen events at the farm meant that I had a lot of unexcused absences.

Although it had challenges, my upbringing taught me resilience, the value of hard work, and the importance of family. Staying up all night to watch a foal being born, successfully saving the animals from a minor fire, and finding ways to soothe a nervous mare afraid of thunder have led to an unbreakable family bond.

Our farm is my family’s birthright and our livelihood, and I am eager to learn how to ensure the farm’s financial and technological success for future generations. In college, I am looking forward to joining a chapter of Future Farmers of America and studying agricultural business to carry my family’s legacy forward.

Tailor your answer to the university

After explaining how your identity or background will enrich the university’s existing student body, you can mention the university organizations, groups, or courses in which you’re interested.

Maybe a larger public school setting will allow you to broaden your community, or a small liberal arts college has a specialized program that will give you space to discover your voice and identity. Perhaps this particular university has an active affinity group you’d like to join.

Demonstrating how a university’s specific programs or clubs are relevant to you can show that you’ve done your research and would be a great addition to the university.

At the University of Michigan Engineering, I want to study engineering not only to emulate my mother’s achievements and strength, but also to forge my own path as an engineer with disabilities. I appreciate the University of Michigan’s long-standing dedication to supporting students with disabilities in ways ranging from accessible housing to assistive technology. At the University of Michigan Engineering, I want to receive a top-notch education and use it to inspire others to strive for their best, regardless of their circumstances.

If you want to know more about academic writing , effective communication , or parts of speech , make sure to check out some of our other articles with explanations and examples.

Academic writing

• Writing process
• Transition words
• Passive voice
• Paraphrasing

 Communication

• How to end an email
• Ms, mrs, miss
• How to start an email
• I hope this email finds you well
• Hope you are doing well

 Parts of speech

• Personal pronouns
• Conjunctions

In addition to your main college essay , some schools and scholarships may ask for a supplementary essay focused on an aspect of your identity or background. This is sometimes called a diversity essay .

Many universities believe a student body composed of different perspectives, beliefs, identities, and backgrounds will enhance the campus learning and community experience.

Admissions officers are interested in hearing about how your unique background, identity, beliefs, culture, or characteristics will enrich the campus community, which is why they assign a diversity essay .

To write an effective diversity essay , include vulnerable, authentic stories about your unique identity, background, or perspective. Provide insight into how your lived experience has influenced your outlook, activities, and goals. If relevant, you should also mention how your background has led you to apply for this university and why you’re a good fit.

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Trending Post : 12 Powerful Discussion Strategies to Engage Students

How to Respond to Student Writing: 10 Ways to Give Feedback that Sticks

Have you ever had the experience of a student crying, arguing, or yelling after handing back a graded essay? Have you personally ever felt wronged by a teacher or college professor whose feedback on an essay left you feeling one inch tall? Responding to writing is challenging because…writing is vulnerable. People have an emotional connection to the words they put on paper. If you’re wondering how to give feedback on student writing in an effective manner, this post is for you.

The way teachers provide feedback on students’ writing directly impacts their internal dialogue and self-perceptions. None of us approach grading essays with the intention of making a student feel bad, but we always know when it has inadvertently happened.

The problem comes in when English teachers have 150 papers to grade at a time. It can be easy to fall into the trap of commenting quickly to get through the massive stack faster – understandable on many levels. What that means, though, is that we might not be putting the amount of thought into our feedback that we need to in terms of being sensitive to how students will perceive it.

So, what can we do? If you’ve landed on this post because you’re wondering how to give feedback on student writing, here are ten tips that could provide some fresh insight.

HOW TO GIVE FEEDBACK ON STUDENT WRITING

1. narrow the focus.

When responding to writing, we need to think about what we  really  want our students to know. We can’t comment on everything because students won’t learn #allthethings like we hope they will. Instead, we can provide fewer comments that are meaningful suggestions worded in a way that are sensitive to students’ perceptions.

For example, if a student’s essay is full of spelling errors, it’s not necessary to circle every word (although it may be tempting to do so). Why not just write, “Please check spelling throughout the essay” or “Please ask a parent help you spell check”?  These comments are more positive and seem like less of a Sisyphean task.

2. ASK QUESTIONS INSTEAD OF MAKING STATEMENTS

Research shows that asking questions is more beneficial to learning than making statements. Questions push people to figure out answers on their own. In terms of wanting to influence students’ self talk in a positive way, consider the following.

Maybe you notice a student’s essay is wrought with run-ons. Would it be more beneficial to…

• State: “There are run-ons in every paragraph. Proofread more carefully.”    OR….
• Ask: “ Where might you insert end marks to help the audience follow your line of thinking more easily? Please review the notes on sentence errors and then make some revisions.”

3. CONFER WITH STUDENTS

It’s a lot easier to word suggestions in a positive manner if you are speaking with the student. In writing, it’s more difficult to infer tone, and it’s easier to write something that is brash than it is to speak it. Talking with students is one way to get to know them better as writers and as people.

Students need to feel a genuine relationship with their teacher in order to really be vulnerable and accept suggestions for improvement. Plus, conferring with students means we spend less time grading a mountain of papers. During conferring, we can word suggestions kindly to build students’ optimistic self-talk.

Not sure how to get organized? These writing conference forms can help.

4. USE A ONE-TO-ONE RATIO

Students will be more receptive to constructive feedback when it’s balanced with praise. Point out students’ strengths. Tell them what they did well. If you can’t find enough strengths in their writing, it’s probably a good idea just to help them develop one goal to work on for improvement. Anything else would be overwhelming…and it might make them feel incapable.

Plus, how many things can a student work on improving at the same time and truly master? A one-to-one ratio is a good goal to begin with if you’re not used to balancing feedback. Begin with the positive.

5. KEEP FEEDBACK TIMELY

When talking about how to give feedback on student writing, the answer is often in the timing. It can be difficult to provide feedback quickly after students submit an essay. However, when we allow too much time to pass, the feedback is no longer relevant to students. That’s a problem when we want our feedback to build confidence while also encouraging students to want to grow.

Helping students develop their writing skills requires a trusting relationship between teacher and pupil. If a student can’t depend on the teacher to return an essay within a reasonable amount of time, why would they trust us when we offer suggestions for improvement? What are we really saying when we don’t hand back feedback for two months after students submit an essay? What message does that convey?

6. JUST READ

The answer to the question of how to respond to student writing may be much more simple than it seems. The first time you look at a student’s essay, just read it. Take time to reflect on what you read before making any comments. This strategy will help you to write only the things that matter most and reduce time nit-picking every error.

Sometimes when responding to writing, our impulse is to point out every imperfection, but that doesn’t help the student or us as teachers. Just put away the pen for the first reading, and then balance positive and constructive feedback as you note the most important goals for each student.

7. ASK STUDENTS TO REFLECT

One important step in helping students improve their internal dialogue is allowing them to find their own mistakes. It’s true, students won’t find everything you will. But, when we provide them with a rubric we have carefully explained and referenced in advance, they should be able to pinpoint areas where they can grow.

Understanding how students view their writing will help us in two ways:

• We will be aware of what students think their strengths and weaknesses are. In this way, if they think their ideas are excellent, we know that we need to have a conversation with them about how content can be improved rather than writing feedback in the margins and giving them an “unsatisfactory” rating for that component.
• It prepares students to accept help. If they know their writing isn’t perfect, they will be less likely to negatively internalize suggestions for improvement.

8. BE SPECIFIC

It’s easy to rush through grading papers and leave vague comments like “awkward” or “confusing.” Yet, those comments don’t help students, and they typically are not internalized positively. A more helpful approach would be to leave kind, specific suggestions. For example, “Can you clarify this argument? I’m not sure what you mean here” or “Is the hotdog driving the car? Try rewording the sentence to clarify.”

Even when we are leaving good feedback, it helps to be specific. Rather than, “good” or “love this!” try writing, “This sentence really emphasizes the importance of the research” or “This transition is so helpful for readers to follow your line of thinking.”

9. CLARIFY THE AUDIENCE’S VIEW

Instead of pointing out what the writer did wrong, focus on what might confuse readers. For instance, will the audience be confused about how the hook relates to the thesis? You could ask, “What is the connection between the hook and the thesis? Can you help readers understand how they relate in the bridge?”

Another example might be if a student only cites direct quotes in the essay and does not paraphrase research. You could write, “How many of the sentences in this paragraph are in your own wording? How might you revise so that the audience will be able to hear  your voice coming through?”

Focusing on what the readers  need instead of what the writer  did wrong is another way we can be sensitive to students’ internal dialogue.

10. HELP STUDENTS UNDERSTAND THEMSELVES

What we stress in our feedback shapes how students view their writing abilities. It’s important that our feedback leads students to a point where they can see their own strengths and weaknesses. Pointing out patterns can be useful because students are not usually able to observe these patterns about themselves.

To illustrate, maybe a student is a talented writer, but he or she is consistently verbose. We can show students these areas for growth through our feedback.

I love how you take time to select words that are meaningful and precise. I can tell you put a lot of time and effort into writing sentences that are mature. I’m proud of you! Here is one area for growth I’d like you to consider: How can you maintain your personal style and your impressive word choice while also being more concise so that readers are can follow along easier?

Alternatively, give students your feedback, but don’t attach it to a grade. Allow them to let the feedback (using the tips above) sink in and reflect on their own areas for growth according to the rubric.

Responding to writing in a way that improves students’ internal dialogue and respects their readiness levels is hard. The best approach is for us to put ourselves in our students’ shoes. What would we want or not want a teacher to tell us?

Still pondering how to give feedback on student writing? Lauralee from Language Arts Classroom has some ideas to share.

5 Sentence Fluency Minilessons

Teaching elaboration in writing, how to model writing for students, related resource:.

Make feedback as meaningful as possible by conferring with student writers. Writing conferences help us to build confidence, establish relationships, and differentiate writing goals for all students. Use these writing forms to get started!

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Classroom Q&A

With larry ferlazzo.

In this EdWeek blog, an experiment in knowledge-gathering, Ferlazzo will address readers’ questions on classroom management, ELL instruction, lesson planning, and other issues facing teachers. Send your questions to [email protected]. Read more from this blog.

Response: Effective Ways Students Can Teach Their Classmates

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(This is the first post in a four-part series)

The new question-of-the-week is:

What are effective strategies for having students teach their classmates and other peers?

We educators have big jobs when we’re teaching 35 students at one time. One way to make it a bit easier, and more effective, can be to create situations where students can also teach their own classmates.

This three-part series will explore what this can look like practically in the classroom. Today’s contributors are Bobson Wong, Adeyemi Stembridge, Jennifer Davis Bowman, Starr Sackstein, Kathy Dyer and Rachelle Dene Poth. You can listen to a 10-minute conversation I had with Jennifer, Bobson, Adeyemi and Starr on my BAM! Radio Show . You can also find a list of, and links to, previous shows here.

I’m a big fan of leveraging the assets of students by encouraging them to be teachers. Whether it is by first having students brainstorm ways they can help through an Everyone Is a Teacher strategy, or by having intermediate English-language learners in my U.S. History class teach content knowledge to ELL newcomers, or through using the “jigsaw” technique in all of my courses, this belief in a team-approach permeates my practice.

You can read about lots of other similar strategies, as well as research that supports their use, at The Best Posts on Helping Students Teach Their Classmates—Help Me Find More .

Response From Bobson Wong

Bobson Wong (@bobsonwong) has taught high school math in New York City public schools since 2005. He is a three-time recipient of the Math for America Master Teacher fellowship, a recipient of the New York State Master Teacher Fellowship, and a member of the advisory board for the National Museum of Mathematics. As an Educational Specialist for New York State, he writes and edits questions for state high school tests:

Getting students to learn from each other takes a lot of work. If teachers don’t create the proper classroom environment, then any cooperative learning venture will fall flat. Here are some steps that I’ve found will create the right environment for students to teach each other:

First, identify the strengths and weaknesses of each student so that you can determine which students to group together. See who feels comfortable talking to their classmates and who may need additional encouragement. Some groups may form naturally, as when stronger students befriend weaker students. As you identify student groups, you can adjust classroom seating one group at a time to see how each potential group works together.

Second, work gradually and start small. Students need time to develop relationships with you and each other. At first, I allow students to work in groups of two or three to ensure that each person contributes. These brief opportunities need not be large-scale or highly structured. For example, I often use turn-and-talk opportunities, in which students turn to their neighbors in class to discuss a question for a few minutes. I also use dry-erase boards in class as a way for students to answer questions. Students work in groups to answer a question shown on the projector board. Each group then writes its answer on a dry-erase board and shows its board to the rest of the class simultaneously. As students get more comfortable working together, you can give them such as a group exit ticket or group assessment.

Modeling conversations in class teaches students how to speak appropriately and professionally to each other. For example, encourage students to say more with open-ended prompts like, “What do you mean by that?” or “What else can we consider?” Using these as prompts for turn-and-talk opportunities in class or making a list of prompts also helps students learn what questions they can ask each other. Students should also have clearly defined roles when working together (e.g., timekeeper, scribe, skeptic). These roles should require different skills to enable all students to participate.

After developing these strategies in class, students should feel more comfortable working with and learning from each other. You can then introduce more elaborate activities to your class. I’m particularly fond of jigsaws, which work especially well with struggling learners when planned properly. By first working in groups with their peers to learn, students receive additional support that they would not receive in a teacher-centered lesson. Furthermore, by being solely responsible for teaching that task to another group, students take responsibility for their learning.

In short, cooperative learning requires persistence and flexibility. Not every lesson can be turned into a full-fledged activity like a jigsaw, so using a variety of strategies such as the ones I’ve outlined above can help your students teach each other effectively.

Response From Adeyemi Stembridge

Adeyemi Stembridge, PhD provides technical assistance for school improvement with a specific focus on equity. He works with districts around the country to identify root causes of achievement gaps and formulate pedagogy- and policy-based efforts to redress the underperformance of vulnerable student populations. Follow him on Twitter at @DrYemiS:

The richest learning environments are animated by dynamic, multi-directional teaching and learning. In fact, one of the coolest things about being a teacher is that we are much more in tune with current pop culture than some of our non-teacher friends because being in the classroom naturally allows for opportunities for kiddos to teach us about the latest youth trends, lexicon, and topics of interests. Students can often explain understandings to each other in ways that don’t always occur to teachers. Because their synapses are more recently established, students literally are better able to remember than teachers what it feels like to not understand.

Student-to-student learning is most powerful not when students are delivering information as it were, but rather when they are re-enacting their emerging understandings. Every time students teach their classmates, they are helping their peers to find their own authentic pathways to understanding. As a result of that discovery process, the student who is teaching is deepening their own learning by reconstructing what they know. In this way, when we effectively leverage students’ talents for sharing their emerging understandings with other students, it not only enhances the quality of instruction but it also contributes to a sense of community that is essential in facilitating the engagement and responsible risk-taking necessary for meaningful learning experiences.

I most like to see students using each other’s thinking as texts to support their own emerging understandings. Students thinking, if captured effectively and shared in meaningful ways, can be an outstanding first-draft for further composition. I like encouraging conferencing models in which students assume the role of co-teachers so that they can consult directly with their peers to think through key aspects of the skills and understandings targeted in the learning. The point of the conference is to explore in close and personal terms not merely the “what” of learning but also the “how” and “why.” Conferencing is used in many language arts classrooms, but it can be applied to any learning experience in which students are asked to develop some product as evidence of their understanding of some aspect of a big idea. Conferencing is a strategy best employed in learning that is adaptive in nature and not technical. (If your goal is for students to memorize a list of facts, conferencing isn’t going to work well.) Conferencing isn’t a tool to be used to address specific errors as much as it is an opportunity to clarify conceptual understandings and how those may be applied in a task.

In their conferencing, students should use questions like these to direct their discussion:

• Tell me more about [some specific element of the learning experience]?
• What’s the most important part of this? How can you build on it?
• What part of this do you have questions about?
• What other way did you consider [some specific element of the learning experience]?
• Are there any questions we should be asking that are not covered here? Should we be emphasizing any of the questions that are here?

Another strategy is to have students consider pivotal elements of the enduring understandings through the incorporation of video reflections into the co-teaching model. Ask students to respond to questions like, “What problems did you encounter in learning ---? or “In what ways do you think you need to improve? or “What would you do differently knowing what you know now?” I like to use video so that students can share their thinking on a screen—which is often less stifling for students than trying to capture their initial thinking in writing. I’ve had some exciting success using video to capture students’ reflections during and after lessons. The videos that students make to capture their thinking are texts that can be used to frame the conferencing between students.

In order for any co-teaching strategy to work well, your student co-teachers should be clear on what specifically it is that their peers need to understand and/or be able to do so that they are best able to support their classmates through their thinking. In preparing with your co-teachers, you will need to set aside time to clarify for and with them the big ideas that matter most relative to the learning target. This would be an awesome time to review McTighe and Wiggins’ Six Facets of Understanding (Understanding by Design, 1998) to explore some of the different ways in which students might be able to show what they are coming to know. The more that students have the opportunity to teach and learn with their peers in ways that deepen their relationship to the big ideas, the more likely that students together will be able to both reinforce their own understandings and also confirm classroom spaces as ecosystems in which kiddos are able to give and receive support through multiple relational channels.

References:

Wiggins, G. P., McTighe, J., Kiernan, L. J., Frost, F., & Association for Supervision and Curriculum Development. (1998). Understanding by design . Alexandria, Va: Association for Supervision and Curriculum Development.

Adeyemi Stembridge, PhD

Response From Starr Sackstein

Starr Sackstein started her teaching career at Far Rockaway High School more than 14 years ago. She spent nine years as a high school English and journalism teacher at World Journalism Preparatory School in Flushing, N.Y., where her students ran the multimedia news outlet WJPSnews.com. She is a certified Master Journalism Educator through the Journalism Education Association (JEA) and serves at the New York State Director to JEA to help advisers in New York better grow journalism programs. Sackstein is the author of several books, including Peer Feedback in the Classroom: Empowering Students to Be the Experts (ASCD 2017) and Teaching Students to Self-Assess: How Do I Help Students Grow as Learners? (ASCD Arias, 2015):

Teaching is the highest form of learning and when we can provide opportunities for students to teach their peers we offer a learning experience that benefits both the teacher-student and the peer. As educators, we have a duty to put structures in place as we offer these kinds of experiences to our students to ensure success and promote autonomy and mastery of their skills.

One way to put students in the driver’s seat is to ask them to develop tutorial videos where they work in small groups to research a topic and then develop a short video that teaches students the skill or content that needs to be learned. By allowing students to become the experts of the content and then figure out a way to teach it to their peers, we ensure the depth of their understanding.

In one of my English classes, I had students develop grammar tutorials and/or poetry tutorials. In these videos, students researched in a small group a manageable topic like meter and then had to teach it in a 4-6 minute video. They had to come up with a clever hook, build content, and develop a review sheet that would support the learning in the tutorial. Additionally, they presented their learning in class and students could ask questions and later review the tutorial video that was housed in a class library.

To ensure learning for all students of all content and/or skill areas, not just the one they presented, students had to apply the learning in an independent writing project that asked them to use the skills they learned. As they went through this process, we employed a peer review process that allowed them to give feedback to each other before the final draft was due. As the teacher in the room, I conferred with students as they worked to address individual needs.

The best learning happens when we allow students to be the drivers of it. So teachers should continue to provide opportunities that promote student experts at all ages.

Response From Jennifer Davis Bowman

Jennifer Davis Bowman envisions classrooms filled with thinking caps—because uniforms are uninspiring—as well as students with plastic utensils—because every student deserves a seat at the learning table. As an educator with a terminal degree in special education and a license in school counseling, she’s written about her classroom and higher education experiences in Edutopia, Teaching Tolerance, ASCD, and Teach Thought. For education research and resources follow her on Twitter: @DrJDavisBowman:

Peer Collaboration: Yes, I’m Including You (Whether You Want to Be Included or Not)

Few things in life are less efficient than a group of people trying to write a sentence. The advantage of this method is that you end up with something for which you will not be personally blamed.

—Scott Adams, creator of Dilbert

We are often reminded of the advantages of collaboration and how it is a gift to students. Less often, do we inquire about the downside and look a gift horse in the mouth. Interestingly, the quote listed above, is able to do just that. It sheds light on the potential troublesome nature of collaboration (in terms of both efficiency and accountability). In order to stay mindful of collaboration challenges in the classroom, I offer three considerations:

• The need for identifying the necessity of collaboration

Just because collaboration has benefits, does not mean it is the best strategy to use. There should be a clear purpose behind asking students to collaborate on a project. Before implementing a group project, the Center for Teaching Excellence at the University of Waterloo suggests teachers answer the following questions:

• How will the assignment’s objective be furthered by asking students to work in groups?
• Is the activity challenging or complex enough that it requires group work?
• Is there any reason why the assignment should not be collaborative?

To revisit the quote at the introduction, it is important to ask, would implementing a collaborative activity be the most efficient use of class time?

• Yes, I’m including you (whether you want to be included or not)

Remember, it is human nature to show resistance if you feel forced to do something. One issue when mandating group work, is that students feel pressured and may be unable to join the group whole-heartedly. A second issue is understanding your role in student resistance. Clifton Mitchell, a professor cautions, “If you feel your student is resisting you, you also must be resisting your student.” A final issue is when the student is placed at a disadvantage in lieu of the collaborative experience. Even when you are proactive in managing typical group struggles, there are personal, under-the-surface issues that can make group work painful for students who have experienced trauma, students with language barriers, or students who have social anxiety .

• Students ought to see collaboration

The value of modeling as an effective classroom strategy is not new. When asking students to practice sentence structure and sentence vocabulary, teachers may model this with a mentor sentence. When working a math problem, teachers may have a high-achieving student model the procedure and “show the work.” Just as instructional methods are modeled, teacher-to-teacher collaboration must be demonstrated as well. Many educators interact on social media or in professional learning communities, but there are few scheduled opportunities for teacher-teacher collaboration in front of students . Maybe if this occurred more often, students could see what it would look like to disagree, negotiate, and problem solve in the classroom.

To revisit the quote at the introduction for a final time, how can we help schools be more accountable in modeling collaboration for students?

Response From Kathy Dyer

Kathy Dyer is Manager of Innovation and Learning, Professional Learning at NWEA. Kathy has more than 25 years in education, many spent designing and facilitating learning opportunities for educators. Coaching teachers and school leadership on getting better at what they do is her passion. Follow Kathy on Twitter at @kdyer13 or read her blogs on Teach. Grow. Learn:

How many different strategies do you use to teach others what you know? At work? At home? At play? How many of these strategies do you teach your students so they can support their peers in learning more? If we consider how students already teach each other non-academic stuff, how might we tap into what they do related to life and fun and apply it to academics?

Kids learn from other kids all the time. Now that your juices are flowing, you can see that the list of potential strategies to accomplish this task—empowering students to be instructional resources for one another—is pretty long. Let’s see if we can link some non-academic strategies to academics. Let’s start with something simple like learning to open a locker. The more experienced student sees the newbie struggling a bit. They walk over and offer to demonstrate. Then they stand there and watch as the newbie does it. They may offer suggestions about going a little beyond or being right on the mark (feedback). Success may take a couple of tries, but it happens. Strategies = modeling and focused peer feedback.

Or what about learning a new swing in baseball? This lesson might start with some feedback from a peer about stance and bat position. Ideas are offered about what to look for when the ball is thrown and how to move the head and arms. The batter swings, and more feedback is provided about what worked and where to adjust. Modeling by the peer might even follow. Strategies = instruction, peer assessment, peer feedback, and modeling.

Have you ever participated in a jigsaw activity to process multiple pieces of information? Imagine doing the same with students. Divvy up the content needed to be learned and let small groups become experts on one piece of content (expert jigsaw strategy). These experts then go teach their peers this information. Any of these three jigsaw strategies provide opportunities for learners to teach peers.

Expert Jigsaw: Form multiple groups of five or six learners. Count off one to five, or however many learners are in the group. The “ones” from each group form an expert group to work through a scenario or complete research. They then return to their original groups to share what they learned. Think about distributing tasks that will take a similar amount of time to complete, even though the readings may differ in topic and length.

Pieces-Make-the-Whole Jigsaw: Split a reading into multiple pieces with each learner in a small group taking a part to read individually. When learners complete their reading, they share their parts with the whole group. In this way, each part is essential for the entire group to understand the whole picture of the text.

Building Jigsaw: Distribute different readings connected in some way to the topic to each small group of learners. When each learner has finished reading individually, the small group shares and uses each reading to find connections and build deeper knowledge.

How can you establish a classroom environment where students learn with, from, and for each other?

Response From Rachelle Dene Poth

Rachelle Dene Poth is a French, Spanish, and STEAM Teacher and attorney from Pittsburgh, Pa. She is the President of the ISTE Teacher Education Network and Communications Chair for the Mobile Learning Network. She was named one of “20 to watch” by the NSBA, the PAECT Outstanding Teacher of the Year for 2017 and is a Future Ready Instructional Coach Thought Leader:

Students sometimes have a little bit of fear when asked to present in front of their classmates. I did not fully understand this until a few years ago when I observed two 7th grade students presenting to a room full of teachers at a professional-development session. These students were doing something that I would not feel comfortable doing, and yet I had been asking my own students to present to their peers, not understanding their hesitation to do so. From that day on, I decided to find ways to help students to become more comfortable not only interacting with their peers in the classroom within groups, but also by taking the lead and presenting both in and out of our classroom.

Step 1: Start off by having students work with one of their classmates and become comfortable engaging in different activities. For example, I had students become the “teacher “and create a lesson to teach one of their classmates. The next step was to have the other student teach a lesson the very next day. While the lessons were being taught, it gave me an opportunity to learn from the students and also to have conversations with each group. It gave students an opportunity to move from learners to leaders, which helps to build their confidence progressively.

Step 2: Once students develop some comfort and build confidence through the paired activity, combine two groups and have each student share what they learned from their teachers. Adding a few more classmates together will continue the relationship building process and also provide students with more authentic ways to learn. Encourage students to provide feedback to one another as well, and do so by modeling how to give feedback so that students have a good understanding of how to provide effective feedback.

• Step 3: The next step that I have taken is asking for the small groups to share their new knowledge with the rest of the class. Depending on how the students are feeling at this point, the “sharing” could come in the form of a gallery walk, where each small group can engage in a small discussion, or invite each group to present to the entire class. Students will continue to become more comfortable by having peers with them as they build more confidence.

In smaller classes, you may not need these individual steps you may just need the right topic that students are passionate about sharing with others. For example with project-based learning, the students are excited to share what they have learned on their own exploration. Even though they may still be a little bit nervous about presenting, they are comfortable in sharing something that is more meaningful to them. I have the benefit of having some students in my class each year as the only Spanish teacher in my school. By creating these small or opportunities it has led to bigger opportunities for students to not only present and feel comfortable doing so in front of their classmates, but for them to step out and present at technology conferences in front of other students, educators, and the public.

Creating these ways for students to teach not only gives them an opportunity to build confidence and become leaders, but it opens up different ways for them to learn as well. The benefit for teachers is that it creates more time for us to become the facilitators of learning and to develop a better understanding of how students learn as well. There are many ways to provide instruction, and if we limit the role of the teacher to ourselves, we will miss out on developing a clearer understanding of how students learn best. It just comes down to finding a way to build a comfortable and meaningful connection between students within a class and having a time to work with them to build their confidence.

Thanks to Bobson, Adeyemi, Jennifer, Starr, Kathy and Rachelle for their contributions.

Please feel free to leave a comment with your reactions to the topic or directly to anything that has been said in this post.

Consider contributing a question to be answered in a future post. You can send one to me at [email protected] . When you send it in, let me know if I can use your real name if it’s selected or if you’d prefer remaining anonymous and have a pseudonym in mind.

You can also contact me on Twitter at @Larryferlazzo .

Education Week has published a collection of posts from this blog, along with new material, in an e-book form. It’s titled Classroom Management Q&As: Expert Strategies for Teaching .

Just a reminder—you can subscribe and receive updates from this blog via email or RSS Reader. And, if you missed any of the highlights from the first seven years of this blog, you can see a categorized list below. The list doesn’t include ones from this current year, but you can find those by clicking on the “answers” category found in the sidebar.

This Year’s Most Popular Q&A Posts

Race & Gender Challenges

Classroom Management Advice

Best Ways to Begin The School Year

Best Ways to End The School Year

Implementing the Common Core

Student Motivation & Social-Emotional Learning

Teaching Social Studies

Project-Based Learning

Using Tech in the Classroom

Parent Engagement in Schools

Teaching English-Language Learners

Reading Instruction

Writing Instruction

Education Policy Issues

Student Assessment

Differentiating Instruction

Math Instruction

Science Instruction

Advice for New Teachers

Author Interviews

Entering the Teaching Profession

The Inclusive Classroom

Learning & the Brain

Administrator Leadership

Teacher Leadership

Relationships in Schools

Professional Development

Instructional Strategies

Best of Classroom Q&A

I am also creating a Twitter list including all contributers to this column .

Look for Part Two in a few days.

The opinions expressed in Classroom Q&A With Larry Ferlazzo are strictly those of the author(s) and do not reflect the opinions or endorsement of Editorial Projects in Education, or any of its publications.

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7 ways to help your students make friends

By Geri Coleman Tucker

Expert reviewed by Virginia Gryta, MS

Positive relationships help students feel a sense of belonging at school. But some students have trouble making friends. They may misinterpret social cues — or miss them altogether. 

Here are seven ways you can help your students build relationships with each other.  

1. Get to know your students. 

When you know your students and their interests, you’ll be better able to make connections between students. 

Try using student and family questionnaires to learn more about your students’ strengths, interests, and challenges. 

2. Create a strong classroom culture.

You likely set up rules early in the school year for how the classroom should function and how students should treat each other. That’s an important part of building a classroom culture.

Setting protocols for when things don’t go as planned for the group or between individuals is just as important. It will provide a common language for students to hold one another accountable and support each other.

3. Pair students strategically.

Use partner and group work as a chance to help foster friendships. Try pairing students who have similar interests (rather than pairing them by academic skills).

You can also make study groups and buddy systems for activities. When you pair up students, think about how they can both use their strengths and support each other’s challenges.

Learn about how to use flexible grouping in the classroom . 

4. Give students responsibilities.

When students have leadership roles in the classroom, they get more chances to interact with their classmates. It also shows that you trust students with important responsibilities.

Try having students help with tasks beyond passing out materials, like setting up an activity or leading a lesson. 

5. Use sharing activities.

Give students opportunities to talk about their interests and opinions during lessons. For example, “Turn and tell your neighbor whether you’d like to be friends with the main character of this book — and why.”

Read how one teacher uses a daily warm-up question to strengthen student relationships. 

6. Find out about social skills groups.

Many school counselors are trained in social skills. They may lead “lunch bunches” or other lunchtime chats with a small group of students. The sessions can help students practice responding when they are feeling isolated during an activity or being bullied.

Learn more about social skills groups . If you have a school counselor, talk with them to find out if these groups exist at your school.

7. Praise the positive.

Effective praise can encourage positive behaviors that help students thrive socially. Plus, when you establish that meaningful praise is a social norm in your class, you can teach students how to appreciate and praise each other. 

Learn more about how to use praise effectively . 

Looking to learn more about supporting your students’ social skills?

Read about what causes trouble with social skills and how to help.

Learn why some kids have trouble making friends .

Understand the possible connections between dyslexia and social skills .

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Getting College Essay Help: Important Do's and Don’ts

College Essays

If you grow up to be a professional writer, everything you write will first go through an editor before being published. This is because the process of writing is really a process of re-writing —of rethinking and reexamining your work, usually with the help of someone else. So what does this mean for your student writing? And in particular, what does it mean for very important, but nonprofessional writing like your college essay? Should you ask your parents to look at your essay? Pay for an essay service?

If you are wondering what kind of help you can, and should, get with your personal statement, you've come to the right place! In this article, I'll talk about what kind of writing help is useful, ethical, and even expected for your college admission essay . I'll also point out who would make a good editor, what the differences between editing and proofreading are, what to expect from a good editor, and how to spot and stay away from a bad one.

Table of Contents

What Kind of Help for Your Essay Can You Get?

What's Good Editing?

What should an editor do for you, what kind of editing should you avoid, proofreading, what's good proofreading, what kind of proofreading should you avoid.

What Do Colleges Think Of You Getting Help With Your Essay?

Who Can/Should Help You?

Advice for editors.

Should You Pay Money For Essay Editing?

The Bottom Line

What's next, what kind of help with your essay can you get.

Rather than talking in general terms about "help," let's first clarify the two different ways that someone else can improve your writing . There is editing, which is the more intensive kind of assistance that you can use throughout the whole process. And then there's proofreading, which is the last step of really polishing your final product.

Let me go into some more detail about editing and proofreading, and then explain how good editors and proofreaders can help you."

Editing is helping the author (in this case, you) go from a rough draft to a finished work . Editing is the process of asking questions about what you're saying, how you're saying it, and how you're organizing your ideas. But not all editing is good editing . In fact, it's very easy for an editor to cross the line from supportive to overbearing and over-involved.

Ability to clarify assignments. A good editor is usually a good writer, and certainly has to be a good reader. For example, in this case, a good editor should make sure you understand the actual essay prompt you're supposed to be answering.

Open-endedness. Good editing is all about asking questions about your ideas and work, but without providing answers. It's about letting you stick to your story and message, and doesn't alter your point of view.

Think of an editor as a great travel guide. It can show you the many different places your trip could take you. It should explain any parts of the trip that could derail your trip or confuse the traveler. But it never dictates your path, never forces you to go somewhere you don't want to go, and never ignores your interests so that the trip no longer seems like it's your own. So what should good editors do?

Help Brainstorm Topics

Sometimes it's easier to bounce thoughts off of someone else. This doesn't mean that your editor gets to come up with ideas, but they can certainly respond to the various topic options you've come up with. This way, you're less likely to write about the most boring of your ideas, or to write about something that isn't actually important to you.

If you're wondering how to come up with options for your editor to consider, check out our guide to brainstorming topics for your college essay .

Help Revise Your Drafts

Here, your editor can't upset the delicate balance of not intervening too much or too little. It's tricky, but a great way to think about it is to remember: editing is about asking questions, not giving answers .

Revision questions should point out:

• Places where more detail or more description would help the reader connect with your essay
• Places where structure and logic don't flow, losing the reader's attention
• Places where there aren't transitions between paragraphs, confusing the reader
• Moments where your narrative or the arguments you're making are unclear

But pointing to potential problems is not the same as actually rewriting—editors let authors fix the problems themselves.

Bad editing is usually very heavy-handed editing. Instead of helping you find your best voice and ideas, a bad editor changes your writing into their own vision.

You may be dealing with a bad editor if they:

• Add material (examples, descriptions) that doesn't come from you
• Use a thesaurus to make your college essay sound "more mature"
• Add meaning or insight to the essay that doesn't come from you
• Tell you what to say and how to say it
• Write sentences, phrases, and paragraphs for you
• Change your voice in the essay so it no longer sounds like it was written by a teenager

Colleges can tell the difference between a 17-year-old's writing and a 50-year-old's writing. Not only that, they have access to your SAT or ACT Writing section, so they can compare your essay to something else you wrote. Writing that's a little more polished is great and expected. But a totally different voice and style will raise questions.

Where's the Line Between Helpful Editing and Unethical Over-Editing?

Sometimes it's hard to tell whether your college essay editor is doing the right thing. Here are some guidelines for staying on the ethical side of the line.

• An editor should say that the opening paragraph is kind of boring, and explain what exactly is making it drag. But it's overstepping for an editor to tell you exactly how to change it.
• An editor should point out where your prose is unclear or vague. But it's completely inappropriate for the editor to rewrite that section of your essay.
• An editor should let you know that a section is light on detail or description. But giving you similes and metaphors to beef up that description is a no-go.

Proofreading (also called copy-editing) is checking for errors in the last draft of a written work. It happens at the end of the process and is meant as the final polishing touch. Proofreading is meticulous and detail-oriented, focusing on small corrections. It sands off all the surface rough spots that could alienate the reader.

Because proofreading is usually concerned with making fixes on the word or sentence level, this is the only process where someone else can actually add to or take away things from your essay . This is because what they are adding or taking away tends to be one or two misplaced letters.

Laser focus. Proofreading is all about the tiny details, so the ability to really concentrate on finding small slip-ups is a must.

Excellent grammar and spelling skills. Proofreaders need to dot every "i" and cross every "t." Good proofreaders should correct spelling, punctuation, capitalization, and grammar. They should put foreign words in italics and surround quotations with quotation marks. They should check that you used the correct college's name, and that you adhered to any formatting requirements (name and date at the top of the page, uniform font and size, uniform spacing).

Limited interference. A proofreader needs to make sure that you followed any word limits. But if cuts need to be made to shorten the essay, that's your job and not the proofreader's.

A bad proofreader either tries to turn into an editor, or just lacks the skills and knowledge necessary to do the job.

Some signs that you're working with a bad proofreader are:

• If they suggest making major changes to the final draft of your essay. Proofreading happens when editing is already finished.
• If they aren't particularly good at spelling, or don't know grammar, or aren't detail-oriented enough to find someone else's small mistakes.
• If they start swapping out your words for fancier-sounding synonyms, or changing the voice and sound of your essay in other ways. A proofreader is there to check for errors, not to take the 17-year-old out of your writing.

What Do Colleges Think of Your Getting Help With Your Essay?

Admissions officers agree: light editing and proofreading are good—even required ! But they also want to make sure you're the one doing the work on your essay. They want essays with stories, voice, and themes that come from you. They want to see work that reflects your actual writing ability, and that focuses on what you find important.

On the Importance of Editing

Get feedback. Have a fresh pair of eyes give you some feedback. Don't allow someone else to rewrite your essay, but do take advantage of others' edits and opinions when they seem helpful. ( Bates College )

Read your essay aloud to someone. Reading the essay out loud offers a chance to hear how your essay sounds outside your head. This exercise reveals flaws in the essay's flow, highlights grammatical errors and helps you ensure that you are communicating the exact message you intended. ( Dickinson College )

On the Value of Proofreading

Share your essays with at least one or two people who know you well—such as a parent, teacher, counselor, or friend—and ask for feedback. Remember that you ultimately have control over your essays, and your essays should retain your own voice, but others may be able to catch mistakes that you missed and help suggest areas to cut if you are over the word limit. ( Yale University )

Proofread and then ask someone else to proofread for you. Although we want substance, we also want to be able to see that you can write a paper for our professors and avoid careless mistakes that would drive them crazy. ( Oberlin College )

On Watching Out for Too Much Outside Influence

Limit the number of people who review your essay. Too much input usually means your voice is lost in the writing style. ( Carleton College )

Ask for input (but not too much). Your parents, friends, guidance counselors, coaches, and teachers are great people to bounce ideas off of for your essay. They know how unique and spectacular you are, and they can help you decide how to articulate it. Keep in mind, however, that a 45-year-old lawyer writes quite differently from an 18-year-old student, so if your dad ends up writing the bulk of your essay, we're probably going to notice. ( Vanderbilt University )

Now let's talk about some potential people to approach for your college essay editing and proofreading needs. It's best to start close to home and slowly expand outward. Not only are your family and friends more invested in your success than strangers, but they also have a better handle on your interests and personality. This knowledge is key for judging whether your essay is expressing your true self.

Parents or Close Relatives

Your family may be full of potentially excellent editors! Parents are deeply committed to your well-being, and family members know you and your life well enough to offer details or incidents that can be included in your essay. On the other hand, the rewriting process necessarily involves criticism, which is sometimes hard to hear from someone very close to you.

A parent or close family member is a great choice for an editor if you can answer "yes" to the following questions. Is your parent or close relative a good writer or reader? Do you have a relationship where editing your essay won't create conflict? Are you able to constructively listen to criticism and suggestion from the parent?

One suggestion for defusing face-to-face discussions is to try working on the essay over email. Send your parent a draft, have them write you back some comments, and then you can pick which of their suggestions you want to use and which to discard.

Teachers or Tutors

A humanities teacher that you have a good relationship with is a great choice. I am purposefully saying humanities, and not just English, because teachers of Philosophy, History, Anthropology, and any other classes where you do a lot of writing, are all used to reviewing student work.

Moreover, any teacher or tutor that has been working with you for some time, knows you very well and can vet the essay to make sure it "sounds like you."

If your teacher or tutor has some experience with what college essays are supposed to be like, ask them to be your editor. If not, then ask whether they have time to proofread your final draft.

Guidance or College Counselor at Your School

The best thing about asking your counselor to edit your work is that this is their job. This means that they have a very good sense of what colleges are looking for in an application essay.

At the same time, school counselors tend to have relationships with admissions officers in many colleges, which again gives them insight into what works and which college is focused on what aspect of the application.

Unfortunately, in many schools the guidance counselor tends to be way overextended. If your ratio is 300 students to 1 college counselor, you're unlikely to get that person's undivided attention and focus. It is still useful to ask them for general advice about your potential topics, but don't expect them to be able to stay with your essay from first draft to final version.

Friends, Siblings, or Classmates

Although they most likely don't have much experience with what colleges are hoping to see, your peers are excellent sources for checking that your essay is you .

Friends and siblings are perfect for the read-aloud edit. Read your essay to them so they can listen for words and phrases that are stilted, pompous, or phrases that just don't sound like you.

You can even trade essays and give helpful advice on each other's work.

If your editor hasn't worked with college admissions essays very much, no worries! Any astute and attentive reader can still greatly help with your process. But, as in all things, beginners do better with some preparation.

First, your editor should read our advice about how to write a college essay introduction , how to spot and fix a bad college essay , and get a sense of what other students have written by going through some admissions essays that worked .

Then, as they read your essay, they can work through the following series of questions that will help them to guide you.

Introduction Questions

• Is the first sentence a killer opening line? Why or why not?
• Does the introduction hook the reader? Does it have a colorful, detailed, and interesting narrative? Or does it propose a compelling or surprising idea?
• Can you feel the author's voice in the introduction, or is the tone dry, dull, or overly formal? Show the places where the voice comes through.

Essay Body Questions

• Does the essay have a through-line? Is it built around a central argument, thought, idea, or focus? Can you put this idea into your own words?
• How is the essay organized? By logical progression? Chronologically? Do you feel order when you read it, or are there moments where you are confused or lose the thread of the essay?
• Does the essay have both narratives about the author's life and explanations and insight into what these stories reveal about the author's character, personality, goals, or dreams? If not, which is missing?
• Does the essay flow? Are there smooth transitions/clever links between paragraphs? Between the narrative and moments of insight?

Reader Response Questions

• Does the writer's personality come through? Do we know what the speaker cares about? Do we get a sense of "who he or she is"?
• Where did you feel most connected to the essay? Which parts of the essay gave you a "you are there" sensation by invoking your senses? What moments could you picture in your head well?
• Where are the details and examples vague and not specific enough?
• Did you get an "a-ha!" feeling anywhere in the essay? Is there a moment of insight that connected all the dots for you? Is there a good reveal or "twist" anywhere in the essay?
• What are the strengths of this essay? What needs the most improvement?

Should You Pay Money for Essay Editing?

One alternative to asking someone you know to help you with your college essay is the paid editor route. There are two different ways to pay for essay help: a private essay coach or a less personal editing service , like the many proliferating on the internet.

My advice is to think of these options as a last resort rather than your go-to first choice. I'll first go through the reasons why. Then, if you do decide to go with a paid editor, I'll help you decide between a coach and a service.

When to Consider a Paid Editor

In general, I think hiring someone to work on your essay makes a lot of sense if none of the people I discussed above are a possibility for you.

If you can't ask your parents. For example, if your parents aren't good writers, or if English isn't their first language. Or if you think getting your parents to help is going create unnecessary extra conflict in your relationship with them (applying to college is stressful as it is!)

If you can't ask your teacher or tutor. Maybe you don't have a trusted teacher or tutor that has time to look over your essay with focus. Or, for instance, your favorite humanities teacher has very limited experience with college essays and so won't know what admissions officers want to see.

If you can't ask your guidance counselor. This could be because your guidance counselor is way overwhelmed with other students.

If you can't share your essay with those who know you. It might be that your essay is on a very personal topic that you're unwilling to share with parents, teachers, or peers. Just make sure it doesn't fall into one of the bad-idea topics in our article on bad college essays .

If the cost isn't a consideration. Many of these services are quite expensive, and private coaches even more so. If you have finite resources, I'd say that hiring an SAT or ACT tutor (whether it's PrepScholar or someone else) is better way to spend your money . This is because there's no guarantee that a slightly better essay will sufficiently elevate the rest of your application, but a significantly higher SAT score will definitely raise your applicant profile much more.

Should You Hire an Essay Coach?

On the plus side, essay coaches have read dozens or even hundreds of college essays, so they have experience with the format. Also, because you'll be working closely with a specific person, it's more personal than sending your essay to a service, which will know even less about you.

But, on the minus side, you'll still be bouncing ideas off of someone who doesn't know that much about you . In general, if you can adequately get the help from someone you know, there is no advantage to paying someone to help you.

If you do decide to hire a coach, ask your school counselor, or older students that have used the service for recommendations. If you can't afford the coach's fees, ask whether they can work on a sliding scale —many do. And finally, beware those who guarantee admission to your school of choice—essay coaches don't have any special magic that can back up those promises.

Should You Send Your Essay to a Service?

On the plus side, essay editing services provide a similar product to essay coaches, and they cost significantly less . If you have some assurance that you'll be working with a good editor, the lack of face-to-face interaction won't prevent great results.

On the minus side, however, it can be difficult to gauge the quality of the service before working with them . If they are churning through many application essays without getting to know the students they are helping, you could end up with an over-edited essay that sounds just like everyone else's. In the worst case scenario, an unscrupulous service could send you back a plagiarized essay.

Getting recommendations from friends or a school counselor for reputable services is key to avoiding heavy-handed editing that writes essays for you or does too much to change your essay. Including a badly-edited essay like this in your application could cause problems if there are inconsistencies. For example, in interviews it might be clear you didn't write the essay, or the skill of the essay might not be reflected in your schoolwork and test scores.

Should You Buy an Essay Written by Someone Else?

Let me elaborate. There are super sketchy places on the internet where you can simply buy a pre-written essay. Don't do this!

For one thing, you'll be lying on an official, signed document. All college applications make you sign a statement saying something like this:

I certify that all information submitted in the admission process—including the application, the personal essay, any supplements, and any other supporting materials—is my own work, factually true, and honestly presented... I understand that I may be subject to a range of possible disciplinary actions, including admission revocation, expulsion, or revocation of course credit, grades, and degree, should the information I have certified be false. (From the Common Application )

For another thing, if your academic record doesn't match the essay's quality, the admissions officer will start thinking your whole application is riddled with lies.

Admission officers have full access to your writing portion of the SAT or ACT so that they can compare work that was done in proctored conditions with that done at home. They can tell if these were written by different people. Not only that, but there are now a number of search engines that faculty and admission officers can use to see if an essay contains strings of words that have appeared in other essays—you have no guarantee that the essay you bought wasn't also bought by 50 other students.

• You should get college essay help with both editing and proofreading
• A good editor will ask questions about your idea, logic, and structure, and will point out places where clarity is needed
• A good editor will absolutely not answer these questions, give you their own ideas, or write the essay or parts of the essay for you
• A good proofreader will find typos and check your formatting
• All of them agree that getting light editing and proofreading is necessary
• Parents, teachers, guidance or college counselor, and peers or siblings
• If you can't ask any of those, you can pay for college essay help, but watch out for services or coaches who over-edit you work
• Don't buy a pre-written essay! Colleges can tell, and it'll make your whole application sound false.

Ready to start working on your essay? Check out our explanation of the point of the personal essay and the role it plays on your applications and then explore our step-by-step guide to writing a great college essay .

Using the Common Application for your college applications? We have an excellent guide to the Common App essay prompts and useful advice on how to pick the Common App prompt that's right for you . Wondering how other people tackled these prompts? Then work through our roundup of over 130 real college essay examples published by colleges .

Stressed about whether to take the SAT again before submitting your application? Let us help you decide how many times to take this test . If you choose to go for it, we have the ultimate guide to studying for the SAT to give you the ins and outs of the best ways to study.

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Writing your personal statement may seem daunting; after all, it’s the one piece that will form the core of your presentation of your character and ambitions to admissions officers. However, fear not! The good news is that you likely have many people in your life to whom you can turn for help. 

So whom should you approach for help with your essay? There is no set rule on who can or can’t provide advice and assistance—as long as you are the one doing the actual writing, of course. (It’s important to remember that if you don’t write your own essay, the consequences can be severe .) 

Read on for a list of the type of people who might be able to help out, as well as the pros and cons of each.

Your English Teachers

Your English teachers are default choices not only because they are experts on the fundamentals of writing and grammar, but also because they are familiar with your writing style and strengths. You can ask your English teachers to proofread your essay—catch grammatical errors, spelling mistakes, typos, and awkward phrasing—as well as offer suggestions on structure and content.

Keep in mind that many of your classmates may be asking your teachers for help, too, so don’t take it personally if the teacher you ask is unable to help you within the time frame you need. Thus, during peak college applications period, it is crucial to give your teachers at least 3 weeks’ time to read and offer suggestions. 

You can also consider asking someone who taught you English in an earlier grade, since they are probably getting fewer requests. Or, think about asking someone who taught you a different subject, such as social studies or history. Writing is a skill required in a myriad of subjects, so it is probable that there are other teachers who are familiar with your writing and are willing to provide feedback on your essay.

Keep in mind that although they are authorities on the subject of writing, you shouldn’t accept every suggestion blindly. 

Think twice about edits that render your college essay overly “academic” in tone.  Also remember that what your teachers are used to looking for in a stand-out essay is likely different from what admissions officers look for. With any content suggestions, always remember your overall message, and reflect on whether these changes would accentuate or detract from your application theme . 

Peers and Classmates

Another good option is your peers and classmates. For the personal statement in particular, they are probably more likely than teachers to gauge whether your essay is a good reflection of you and your voice. It is called the personal statement for a reason, and your essay should definitely do its best to convey who you are to a reader. 

However, they are also students who haven’t been through the admissions process before, so take this fact into consideration. Contextualize their advice, and always consider whether their suggestions would change the core theme or tone of your essay. 

Your School Counselor

A bit part of the school counselor’s job is to guide students through the college application process. Ideally, they should have the keenest eye on what works or doesn’t work for a college essay, and what colleges generally want to see in personal statements.  

You can go to your counselor for help with interpreting a prompt if you are struggling with ideas, or for review of an essay you’ve already written. For school-specific essays, your guidance counselor may be able to provide input as to what specific admissions committees like to see. Do remember that your counselor is not an admissions officer, so exercise your own judgement with regards to suggestions. 

Family Members

If you have older siblings or other family members who have been through the college applications process within the past few years, they might also be a good resource for questions and other support, particularly if they applied to the same or similar colleges to the ones on your list. Since they went through the process recently, they understand what you’re going through. As family members, there’s probably going to more transparency; they are probably going to more direct with suggestions, and you can voice your own concerns more clearly. 

Family members who attended or were accepted to your target schools recently are the best audience. They will be able to tell you what particular qualities the school values, and what they think gave them the edge in their application. (See following section).

If they didn’t apply to the schools on your list, it may be best to just treat them as another casual reader, and use this chance to catch small technical errors. If they applied more than a few years ago, also keep in mind that the process may have changed, so also take their advice with a grain of salt.

College X Alumni/Alumnae and Current Students

Graduates and current students of a particular college on your list could be one of your best resources, since they can provide the most specialized help for the school in question. These people know the culture of the college and have the best sense of what the admissions committee is looking for in a candidate. Current students may have even responded to the same prompt, and can provide advice unique to that specific essay.

If you know an alum of or current student at a college to which you are applying, it may be a good idea to reach out and ask if they can read your essay and offer any school-specific advice. If you don’t know anyone affiliated with the college, consider the various networks you have at your disposal. Perhaps an alum of your high school attended that college and could offer advice. Even if you don’t know these people personally, a shared connection might make them more willing to offer support. You could also check with school counselor to see if they might be able to connect you with alumni from a specific college.

Wrapping it Up

Feel free to ask multiple people to read your essay ­– it’s smart to get different perspectives on your work. Regardless of whom you ask, be sure to always reflect on whether their advice changes the tone or message of your essay. You want to be sure you’re preserving your unique voice and that your essays reflect who you are.

Last but not least, thank your readers! Reading your essay and giving comments takes time. A thank you note is always a nice touch as well.

How CollegeVine can help with your essays 

CollegeVine offers many resources for students at any stage of the college applications process. If you’re looking for tips on mastering the essays for the particular colleges to which you are applying, check out our school-by-school essay breakdowns .

Related CollegeVine Blog Posts

13 low-stress ways to talk with classmates and make friends

Growing up, I moved to four different schools and had to rebuild my friendships each time. Here’s what I learned…

Written by: Ian Chew, MHFA

Published on: 12/09/2022

Table of Content

School can often be the best place to make friends. Why?

That’s when you have few commitments and lots of time to hang out. When you have a job and family, prioritizing friends becomes a lot harder. 

Growing up, I moved to four different schools, as a) my dad changed jobs b) I really didn’t get along with a teacher in one of the schools. (I will spare you the drama on the latter). 

While rebuilding friendships wasn’t fun — especially when my name kept getting mispronounced — I learned to be friendly and proactive when approaching new classmates.

In my article, I’ll share 13 easy ways that you can start conversations with your classmates (whether you’re in high school, college, undergrad, or postgrad studies). 

And, to make the article more comprehensive, I asked my friend Laura Aronoff — who’s currently attending med school — for her tips on making friends.  

🛑 Note: if you have social anxiety like me, I’d recommend reading this article of mine first: Why do I get anxious before socializing?  

Just say hi! 

“Hi, I am… what’s your name?”

Being friendly — smiling and saying hi — might seem like kindergarten-level advice, but that’s often all you need to do to get someone’s attention. Here’s what Laura had to say: 

“It often happens when we’re standing around during orientation or things like that and just start by saying hi and introducing myself. Other times, sitting beside someone and starting to talk to them.” 

This leads to my next point…

Ask if you could sit beside them

This makes it much easier to start conversations — well, there wouldn’t be a need to shout “HEY YOU OVER THERE”.  

And more importantly, you benefit from the proximity effect : people who are physically close to each other are more likely to develop relationships. 

If possible, sit beside the same person every single time during the semester/year, so that you max out the power of the proximity effect. 

See if they’ve taken classes with the same teacher/prof

• “Have you taken classes with the same teacher?”
• “Have you taken any other [subject] classes?”

Since this is a quick yes/no question, you get to understand their academic history without being intrusive. Even if they haven’t taken similar classes, you can follow up by asking something like…

• “Oh, so what other classes are you taking?” 
• “What classes do you have this week?”
• “Any classes after this?” 

Discover why they decided to take this class

There can be many reasons why someone takes a class. It could be because it’s a prerequisite, or it’s simply a subject that they are fascinated about. 

If it’s the latter, you get the opportunity to delve into their personal interests. 

Find out what they’re majoring/minoring in 

If both of you happen to be doing the same major/minor, you are bound to bump into each other, which further increases the likelihood of you becoming friends. 

Here are some questions you could ask: 

• What’s your major/minor? 
• What made you decide to major/minor in…?
• Who influenced you to major/minor in…? 

If their response seems lukewarm, you could take a different angle by asking, “If you could choose your major/minor all over again, what would you choose?”

Request to borrow their notes 

Asking for help might seem like an unusual way to spark a friendship, but it’s a proven strategy, as per the Benjamin Franklin effect . When people help you out, they rationalize their willingness to help as them liking you. To make it easy for your classmate to say yes, make your ask small. For example, you could ask if they’re willing to borrow their notes for an afternoon.

And, give them a reason why to make your request more convincing. Here’s what you could say: 

“Can I borrow your notes for a day? I’m horrible at taking notes…”

Trade studying advice 

A strong friendship is a reciprocal one , where you help and encourage each other.

If they seem like the studious or overachiever kind, get them to teach you their studying strategies! Here are a few questions that I’d ask: 

• How do you plan to study for this class? 
• What’s your favorite studying strategy/tip? (you could get specific by asking about a specific part of studying, for instance memorization) 
• How do you stay focused when studying? 
• Where’s your favorite studying spot? 

If you’re familiar with the class subject, you could also suggest additional books or resources to help them ace the class.   

Gossip about the teacher/prof 

Gossip might get a bad rep, but research shows that it’s how we socialize and share valuable information, especially when it comes to relationships and social norms. 

To stay on the positive side, you could talk about what I call “teacher trivia”. For example: 

• Their background/qualifications 
• Their teaching/marking style  
• Any notable stories about them 

Discuss on-campus/off-campus life 

All school no life makes a boring conversation! I certainly got fed up with  academic talk by my second year. 

So, ask them about where they currently stay and how they’re finding on-campus/off-campus life. Here are a few questions to try:

• Do you stay on-campus or off-campus? 
• Which residence are you at?
• Where do you stay? (if they’re off campus) 
• When do you think you will move off campus? 
• Where will you live off campus? 

And as they open up to you personally, here’s what you can talk about… 

Learn about their non-academic interests 

By discussing your respective interests, you find out what activities you could potentially do together. Questions you could ask include: 

• What do you do when you’re not studying? / What do you do after classes? 
• What do you read besides textbooks?  
• What clubs have you joined? 
• What clubs are you thinking about joining?  
• How do you spend your school/college/university holidays?*

*If a long weekend is coming up, here’s a list of questions to consider: 11 long weekend conversation starters for deeper connection  

Share your respective aspirations 

There are plenty of ambitious students, and even if they have no idea what they will do after graduation, you bet they are actively thinking about it. You could ask questions like: 

• What are your plans after graduation? 
• What would be your dream job after graduation?
• Would you want to work right after graduation, or take some time off?

Here are more general questions to learn about their ambitions: 

• 54 goals conversation starters to spark deep conversations
• 47 dreams conversation starters for adults and kids

Invite them to an event

If you’ve built up some rapport, nurture the new friendship by extending an event invitation. 

It doesn’t really matter if it’s a formal event or a social gathering — the key is changing the relationship dynamics from “we are classmates” to “we are classmates and friends”.

The key is being direct and specific. For example:  

• “I heard that there’s a party next Friday… wanna go together?”
• “Hey, since you’re interested in entrepreneurship, would you like to go to this startup talk with me?” 

Reference a past event 

If you know of any popular events that happened recently, you could use that as a conversation topic. It helps you learn more about their interests, and paves the way towards future event invitations. 

Here’s what you could ask: 

• “Have you heard about [event name]…”
• “Did you attend [event name]…”
• “I didn’t go to [event name]… did you?”

How to keep the conversation going 

Alright, you started the conversation with your classmate… Now what? Here are some articles to help you chat away:

• 25 useful phrases to keep a conversation going (and avoid awkward silence)  
• Conversation starters with new friends, or people you just met  

Now, my advice doesn’t eliminate the chance of conversations dying — and that’s especially true at an age when folks are still discovering who they are/aren’t. Most of us have so much on our minds — so much anxiety, so many insecurities — that it can be challenging to talk with others! 

If the conversation feels one-sided, you can gracefully end the conversation. Here’s how: 

12 simple phrases to end a conversation politely  

How to start a conversation with a classmate online 

Initiating social interactions online can be less intimidating, and might be a good first step in building your social courage.

The conversation starters I mentioned above will work online too. Here are a few additional tips: 

• Introduce yourself , if you just got their number. “Hi, I’m so and so and we’re taking the same class…”
• Keep it short and sweet , which makes it much easier to respond to. A quick question or point is often enough to keep the conversation going. I’m not saying that you should NEVER write at length — I’m a passionate texter and I do get rambly — but in the first few moments of building a connection, keeping the exchanges brief can help you feel less stressed about what to say.
• Accept that they might not respond as quickly or enthusiastically as you like. Or they might not even respond at all — and it’s not your fault! It’s easy to take too much responsibility in a social interaction i.e. it’s because you said/didn’t say something, when there are so many other factors outside your control.

(If you do find yourself ruminating, check out this article of mine: Overthinking after social events? It’s normal. Here’s what to do. )   

How to start a conversation with an old classmate  

So, you took a class with someone years back, and you’re wondering… “Gee, do they still remember me? How do I say hi without making it awkward?”

Based on my experience reconnecting with old classmates, here’s what I’ve found that works best: 

Conversation starters to reconnect with an old friend 

Related articles 

• 7 easy ways to talk to strangers on campus (without being awkward)   
• 10 ways to start a conversation with a girl (without being awkward or creepy)  
• 7 ways to start a conversation with a guy (without being awkward)  

About Ian Chew, MHFA

7 ways to start a conversation with a guy (without being awkward)

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PRINCIPLES OF RESPONDING TO STUDENT WRITING

Your comments on student writing should clearly reflect the hierarchy of your concerns about the paper. Major issues should be treated more prominently and at greater length; minor issues should be treated briefly or not at all. If you comment extensively on grammatical or mechanical issues, you should expect students to infer that such issues are among your main concerns with the paper. It is after all not unreasonable for students to assume that the amount of ink you spill on an issue bears some relationship to the issue’s importance.

It is often more helpful to comment explicitly, substantively, and in detail about two or three important matters than it is to comment superficially about many issues. Many veteran readers find the experience of responding to student writing to be one of constantly deciding not to comment on less important issues. Such restraint allows you to focus your energies on just a few important points and also tends to yield a cleaner and more easily intelligible message for students.

Some suggestions for writing comments follow.

READING THE PAPER

You may want to skim through four or five papers to get a sense of the pile before reading and grading any single paper. Many instructors read each paper once through to grasp the overall argument before making any marks. Whether skimming on a first time through or reading carefully, you might keep the following categories in mind, which will help you assess the paper’s strengths and weaknesses:

• Thesis: Is there one main argument in the paper? Does it fulfill the assignment? Is the thesis clearly stated near the beginning of the paper? Is it interesting, complex? Is it argued throughout?
• Structure: Is the paper clearly organized? Is it easy to understand the main point of each paragraph? Does the order of the overall argument make sense, and is it easy to follow?
• Evidence and Analysis: Does the paper offer supporting evidence for each of its points?Does the evidence suggest the writer’s knowledge of the subject matter? Has the paper overlooked any obvious or important pieces of evidence? Is there enough analysis of evidence? Is the evidence properly attributed, and is the bibliographical information correct?
• Sources: If appropriate or required, are sources used besides the main text(s) under consideration? Are they introduced in an understandable way? Is their purpose in the argument clear? Do they do more than affirm the writer’s viewpoint or represent a “straw person” for knocking down? Are responsible inferences drawn from them? Are they properly attributed, and is the bibliographical information correct?
• Style: Is the style appropriate for its audience? Is the paper concise and to the point? Are sentences clear and grammatically correct? Are there spelling or proofreading errors?

WRITING A FINAL COMMENT

Y our final comment is your chance not only to critique the paper at hand but also to communicate your expectations about writing and to teach students how to write more effective papers in the future.

The following simple structure will help you present your comments in an organized way:

• Reflect back the paper’s main point. By reflecting back your understanding of the argument, you let the student see that you took the paper seriously. A restatement in your own words will also help you ground your comment. If the paper lacks a thesis, restate the subject area.
• Discuss the essay’s strengths. Even very good writers need to know what they’re doing well so that they can do it again in the future. Remember to give specific examples.
• Discuss the paper’s weaknesses, focusing on large problems first. You don’t have to comment on every little thing that went wrong in a paper. Instead, choose two or three of the most important areas in which the student needs to improve, and present these in order of descending importance. You may find it useful to key these weaknesses to such essay elements as Thesis, Structure, Evidence, and Style. Give specific examples to show the student what you’re seeing. If possible, suggest practical solutions so that the student writer can correct the problems in the next paper.
• Type your final comments if possible. If you handwrite them, write in a straight line (not on an angle or up the side of a page), and avoid writing on the reverse side; instead, append extra sheets as needed. The more readable your comments are, the more seriously your students are likely to take them.

MARGINAL COMMENTS

While carefully reading a paper, you’ll want to make comments in the margins. These comments have two main purposes: to show students that you attentively read the paper and to help students understand the connection between the paper and your final comments. If you tell a student in the final comment that he or she needs more analysis, for example, the student should be able to locate one or more specific sites in the text that you think are lacking.

SOME PRINCIPLES FOR MAKING MARGINAL COMMENTS

• Make some positive comments. “Good point” and “great move here” mean a lot to students, as do fuller indications of your engagement with their writing. Students need to know what works in their writing if they’re to repeat successful strategies and make them a permanent part of their repertoire as writers. They’re also more likely to work hard to improve when given some positive feedback.
• Comment primarily on patterns—representative strengths and weaknesses. Noting patterns (and marking these only once or twice) helps instructors strike a balance between making students wonder whether anyone actually read their essay and overwhelming them with ink. The “pattern” principle applies to grammar and other sentence-level problems, too.
• Write in complete, detailed sentences. Cryptic comments—e.g., “weak thesis,” “more analysis needed,” and “evidence?”—will be incompletely understood by most students, who will wonder, What makes the thesis weak? What does my teacher mean by “analysis”? What about my evidence? Symbols and abbreviations—e.g., “awk” and “?”—are likewise confusing. The more specific and concrete your comments, the more helpful they’ll be to student writers.
• Ask questions. Asking questions in the margins promotes a useful analytical technique while helping students anticipate future readers’ queries.
• Use a respectful tone. Even in the face of fatigue and frustration, it’s important to address students respectfully, as the junior colleagues they are.
• Write legibly (in any ink but red). If students have to struggle to decipher a comment, they probably won’t bother. Red ink will make them feel as if their essay is being corrected rather than responded to.

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Transfer and Postings

My Classmate Essay: Getting To Know My Classmate

My Classmate Essay: Getting to know our classmates is an important part of our school experience. We spend a significant amount of time with them in class, during group projects, and at school events. However, we often only scratch the surface of our interactions, and we may not truly know our classmates beyond their name or appearance. In this essay, I will explore my experience of getting to know one of my classmates and what I learned from them. I will also discuss the importance of having diverse classmates and how we can encourage inclusivity in the classroom.

Table of Contents

My Classmate Essay

In this blog My Classmate Essay, we include About My Classmate Essay, in 100, 200, 250, and 300 words. Also cover My Classmate Essay for classes 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, and up to the 12th class and also for kids, children, and students. You can read more  Essay Writing in 10 lines about sports, events, occasions, festivals, etc… My Classmate Essay is also available in different languages. In this, My Classmate Essay, the following features are explained in the given manner.

Who Is My Classmate

The classmate I got to know is named Sarah. She is a sophomore like me, and we had a class together last semester. At first, I only knew her by name and that she was a transfer student from another state. One day, we were assigned to work on a project together, and that’s when I got to know her better. She was shy at first, but as we worked together, we found common ground and shared interests. I learned that she was a talented artist and had a passion for photography. She also enjoyed reading and writing and was interested in studying journalism in college.

What Did I Learn From My Classmate

Working with Sarah taught me several things. Firstly, I learned that people are more than just what meets the eye. Sarah seemed reserved at first, but once we started talking, I found out she was a complex and interesting person. She had a unique perspective on the world, and I enjoyed hearing her ideas and thoughts. Secondly, I learned that everyone has their own strengths and weaknesses. While I was good at organizing our project, Sarah was great at creating eye-catching visuals. Our project turned out better than I could have ever imagined, thanks to our collaboration.

Why Is It Important To Have Diverse Classmates

Having diverse classmates is important because it exposes us to different perspectives, backgrounds, and cultures. In a classroom setting, diversity can enhance learning by providing a variety of viewpoints and experiences.

For example, in a history class, having classmates from different countries or regions can provide insight into how events were perceived in different parts of the world. In a literature class, having classmates with different ethnic or cultural backgrounds can offer new interpretations of texts. Additionally, having diverse classmates can help us develop empathy and understanding towards people who may be different from us.

How Can We Encourage Inclusivity In The Classroom

One way to encourage inclusivity in the classroom is by creating a safe and welcoming environment. Teachers can set the tone for inclusivity by making sure everyone feels valued and respected. This can be done by using inclusive language, acknowledging and addressing any incidents of discrimination or prejudice, and promoting positive social interactions.

Additionally, teachers can incorporate diverse perspectives into the curriculum by including texts, media, and activities that represent different cultures and identities. Students can also contribute to inclusivity by being open-minded and respectful towards their classmates, and by actively participating in discussions and activities.

Getting to know our classmates is a crucial part of our school experience, and it can have a profound impact on our personal and academic growth. By getting to know my classmate Sarah, I learned the value of collaboration, empathy, and diversity. Having diverse classmates enriches our learning experiences and prepares us for a diverse and interconnected world. By promoting inclusivity in the classroom, we can create a more welcoming and supportive environment for all students.

Read More: My Childhood Memories Paragraph

FAQs On My Classmate Essay

Question 1. How can I write about my classmate?

Answer: To write about your classmate, start by introducing who they are and how you got to know them. Share some basic background information, such as their name and grade level. Describe their personality and interests, and what you learned from them. Finally, reflect on the importance of getting to know your classmates and the benefits of having diverse classmates.

Question 2. What is the description of a classmate?

Answer: A classmate is a fellow student in the same grade level or course as you. They are someone you interact with regularly during school hours and may work with on group projects or assignments. Classmates may come from different backgrounds and have diverse interests and personalities. Getting to know your classmates can enhance your academic and personal growth.

Question 3. What is a simple sentence about classmates?

Answer: Classmates are fellow students you share a class with, who may have different backgrounds, interests, and personalities. They offer an opportunity to collaborate, learn from each other, and develop social skills. Getting to know your classmates can lead to long-lasting friendships and positive school experiences. Interacting with classmates can also broaden your perspective and help you appreciate diversity.

Question 4. Why are classmates important?

Answer: Classmates are important because they provide a social and academic support system during school. They offer the opportunity to collaborate on projects, share knowledge and skills, and learn from diverse perspectives. Interacting with classmates can also improve communication and social skills and lead to long-lasting friendships.

Question 5. What makes a good classmate?

A good classmate is someone who is respectful, responsible, and collaborative. They show up on time, participate in group projects, and support their peers. A good classmate also communicates effectively and listens to other’s perspectives, which can contribute to a positive learning environment.

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University of Notre Dame

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Tips from Counselors

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Tackling the Personal Essay: Tips from a Notre Dame Admissions Counselor

Published: August 30, 2024

Author: Zach Klonsinski

If you ask almost any admissions professional which part of reading applications is their favorite, it’s likely their answer will be a resounding, “The essays!” Essays are where we get to engage with students’ hopes, fears, dreams, life experiences (and more) in their authentic voice. We are humbled every year getting to “meet” all the incredible young people who are applying to Notre Dame through their essays!

Yet, writing an essay introducing yourself can be really hard. Maybe you’ve never done so before, or you haven’t for a really long time, and often it will seem really awkward. That’s OK!

It feels hard because it is–or at least it can be.

Don’t worry, though! I love sharing tips with applicants about the personal essay that will hopefully help you see it as an opportunity to learn more about yourself and then share that discernment with the colleges who will be fortunate enough to receive your application!

Getting started

The easiest way to get started is by simply brainstorming! I love using pen and paper (I’m anti-pencil, though I realize that may be a divisive opinion). The physical materials help me feel less constrained by technology, though you may find the technology comforting.

Use bulleted lists or short phrases to capture ideas, life experiences, values, and more. Every day, set aside five minutes to write about yourself or your college discernment process without stopping to think. Where does your mind lead you when you get out of your own way?

Ask your friends and family to help you identify values that are important to you or things that make you.. well… you! Often it’s easier to highlight and say nice things about someone else than it is ourselves, so lean on those who know you well!

Group these collective nuggets to see if any patterns or stories emerge. Do you see any prompts on your application that align with your brainstorming? The Common Application, for example, has seven to choose from, including a make your own prompt! Start writing on one that makes you pause, as that means you might have something to say! Don’t be afraid to go longer than your word count or to use an atypical form of writing.

While that specific level of chaos may not work for you, I always recommend staying away from sentences and avoiding constraining yourself while writing because…

Editing is more than spelling and grammar!

When we want to “edit” something, it can be tempting to start–and just as quickly end–with spell check. (Yes, your essay should have proper spelling and grammar, but please know we are not reading your essay with a red pen “grading” every single comma.)

What is far more important–though also far more intimidating–is your essay’s content.

What really improved my writing actually had nothing to do with me–rather, it was finding trusted editors to give me honest and constructive feedback. While it’s tempting to have your best friend or family member read your essay, I’ve found my best editors possess a strong rhetorical mind, ask thoughtful questions, and are not afraid to tell me when something isn’t working the way I think it is.

This may describe someone close to you, but maybe not. Maybe there’s a classmate or teacher who you have always admired, even if you don’t know them that well. Editing is an incredibly vulnerable process; don’t be afraid to lean into that vulnerability! I promise that a strong editor who works with your voice and style–rather than rewriting your essay how they would have–will help bring forth an authentic essay you didn’t even realize you could write!

Speaking of, authenticity will lead to your best essay

The best application essay is the one that helps us get to know you. Period. Full stop. Any topic can be a good topic, any topic can be a bad topic. At the end of the day, the topic you choose to write about is only a gateway to help us get to know you!

Let’s think of it another way. Say you printed out your essay at your school, without your name or other identifying information on it, and someone who knows you picked it up and read it. If they said, “I bet this is (your name)’s essay,” I can already tell you’re on the right track. There’s something truly you about it!

Where can I find more about writing application essays?

I’m so glad you asked! On our On-Demand Sessions webpage , you can find a number of helpful recorded sessions from our College Application Workshop series. One of them, co-presented by yours truly, is called “Crafting the Perfect College Essay”. My colleague Maria Finan and I present our own tips and tricks for about 20 minutes and then take questions from a virtual audience for the remainder of the 45 minute session. I invite you to check it out, as well as the other sessions we have recorded!

Ready to Write Your App Essays? Advice from an Admissions Counselor on the Notre Dame Supplement

Zach Klonsinski is a senior assistant director with the Office of Undergraduate Admissions.

He is the regional counselor for Minnesota, Missouri (Kansas City), Wisconsin, Rwanda, Kenya, France, Portugal, Spain, Andorra, Monaco, and China - Beijing

• Read Zach's profile.

• Tech & Innovation
• Artificial Intelligence

Can AI Help a Student Get Into Stanford or Yale?

Two entrepreneurial Stanford students fed hundreds of essays—both high and low quality—into an AI model to train it on what top-tier colleges look for in admissions essays.  

By  Lauren Coffey

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Two Stanford students have created an AI-focused company that helps students with their college admissions essays.

Photo illustration by Justin Morrison/Inside Higher Ed | Getty Images | Rawpixel

Scott Lee was scrolling through LinkedIn in June when he came across a post touting exactly what he was looking for: an AI machine called Esslo that provides feedback on college essays, based on those that have helped students gain admission to top-tier universities like Harvard and Stanford.

Lee, a student at Sacramento City College looking to transfer to the University of California system, had been using ChatGPT to review his admissions essays in the absence of friends and mentors on campus during summer break. But while ChatGPT “said what you wanted to hear” and failed to provide concrete fixes, Lee said Esslo met his drafts with “brutal honesty.” His essay had a “strong opening,” it told him, but didn’t capitalize on its full potential. And while his extracurricular activities were impressive, he hadn’t delved into the personal growth he gained from them or the challenges he faced.

“That is something I can implement, versus ChatGPT, which is very broad,” Lee said. He said he used Esslo “mainly for my early drafts, where it gave a lot more feedback so I’m not handing off something super underdeveloped to my friends and mentors,” who will help with the final version.

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Lee is among hundreds of students trying out Esslo—whose name is a mashup of the words “essay” and “Elo,” a ranking system used in chess and esports. The program is the brainchild of two Stanford University students looking to tackle what they believe is one of the most stressful parts of college applications: the admissions essay. 

How It Works 

When budding entrepreneurs Hadassah Betapudi and Elijah Kim began looking for a potential start-up project in the education-technology world, they started by asking friends and peers about some of the biggest gripes they had when it came to applying to colleges.

The normal topics cropped up—the steps involved in the application process, for one, and finding time to tackle the tasks involved. But the Stanford students soon realized the crux of the issue wasn’t about finding time: It was the daunting task of creating a good-enough essay to gain entry into top-tier schools.

“What we heard super consistently with college applications was that students had never written an essay like that before,” Kim said. “It was big and intimidating and it sets the trajectory for the rest of your life, so we heard a lot of stress over that—and we thought we could build something to help.”

Kim, now a graduate student at Stanford studying machine learning, compiled a data set of essays from students who’d gained admission to top-tier universities, including Harvard, the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and Stanford, and trained artificial intelligence models on those roughly 500 essays. He also included essays that were cited as “bad” examples from various college websites and admissions consultants.

Any student can now plug in their own essay, which brings up a list of suggestions such as avoiding clichés, using imagery effectively or getting more granular with details. Esslo also gives a score for writing, detail, voice and character. There is a free version and a paid version—the former of which gives students a round of line-by-line edits for one draft, the latter of which gives unlimited line-by-line edits. For every paid version Esslo sells, the creators promise that a student at a Title I–designated high school—which typically has fewer resources—will receive the paid version for free.

Both Kim and Betapudi were quick to say the technology will not write an essay for a student, or even serve as a brainstorming tool. But they think it can help fine-tune an essay—providing feedback that’s similar to the advice you might get from a parent, college counselor or paid college consultant.

“We want to train students to be better writers and train them on what colleges are looking for, versus doing it for them,” Kim said. “It’s no different than showing it to an English teacher and asking for feedback.”

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Another Admissions Counselor?

Rick Clark, executive director of enrollment management at the Georgia Institute of Technology, sees AI as the equivalent of using an admissions consultant—except that it’s more affordable for those who cannot pay for the often-pricey consultants.

“Using ChatGPT and copy and pasting it will create a horrible essay because it’s not specific and detailed, but using [this] to get feedback? In that regard, I’m all for it,” Clark said. “It’s democratizing resources, advice and consults, and it’s available 24-7, where sometimes adults are sleeping or working a second job.”

Few universities have policies on using technology for admissions essays. Most of those that address AI at all issue a blanket statement banning the use of the technology in the admissions process entirely.

David Hawkins, the chief education and policy officer for the National Association for College Admission Counseling, said NACAC has steered clear of creating any policy on supplementary generative AI use thus far, as the organization is still in the “information-gathering stage.” He echoed Clark’s notion that it could be seen as similar to using admissions consultants but added that the “most important human” intervention comes from the students themselves.

“They have an authentic story to tell, and the authenticity is what admissions officers are looking for,” he said. “Whether an institution allows AI or whether they don’t—both are looking for some expression of authenticity in essays. It certainly is still down to the student as to the quality and the depth of what they submit.”

Arnold Langat, a senior at Stanford applying for medical school, said he was encouraged by Esslo to replace “a few clichéd phrases with more personal reflections to better showcase my unique perspective.” Faced with writing more than 50 unique essays, he used ChatGPT for brainstorming and, similarly to Lee, used Esslo to fine-tune a first draft before passing it along to mentors, friends and family for further review.

Kim and Betapudi say they hope Esslo will close some socioeconomic gaps.

“Any student with an internet connection can find a standard high school or college prep course, but there’s still a huge gap in terms of access to quality guidance,” Kim said. “And we feel technology has caught up to where we can meaningfully close that gap.”

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Guest Essay

I’m a College President, and I Hope My Campus Is Even More Political This Year

By Michael S. Roth

Mr. Roth is the president of Wesleyan University.

Last year was a tough one on college campuses, so over the summer a lot of people asked me if I was hoping things would be less political this fall. Actually, I’m hoping they will be more political.

That’s not to say that I yearn for entrenched conflict or to once again hear chants telling me that I “can’t hide from genocide,” much less anything that might devolve into antisemitic or Islamophobic harassment or violence. But since at least the 1800s, colleges and universities in the United States have sought to help students develop character traits that would make them better citizens. That civic mission is only more relevant today. The last thing any university president should want is an apolitical campus.

College students have long played an important, even heroic role in American politics. Having defended the voting franchise during the civil rights movement and helped to end the Vietnam War, they have continued to work for change across a range of social issues. If you went to college in the past 50 years, there’s a good chance the mission statement of your school included language that emphasized the institution’s contribution to society. Like many others, my university’s founding documents speak of contributing to the good of the individual and the good of the world. Higher-education institutions have never been neutral .

The issue that matters most to many activists right now is the war in Gaza, and protesters will undoubtedly continue to make their voices heard. Last spring at Wesleyan, students built an encampment of up to about 100 tents to protest the war and to call for the university to divest from companies thought to be supporting it. Since the protest was nonviolent and the students in the encampment were careful not to disrupt normal university operations, we allowed it to continue because their right to nonviolent protest was more important than their modest violations of the rules.

I walked through the protest area daily, as did many faculty members, students and staff members. I also met with pro-Israel students, mostly Jewish, some of whom felt beleaguered by what their classmates were saying. I made clear that if any of them felt harassed, I would intervene. I also said that I could ensure their ability to pursue their education but that I could not protect them from being offended.

I disagreed with the protesters ’ tactics and some of their aims — and I was often the target of their anger — but I respected their strong desire to bear witness to the tragedy unfolding in Gaza. Before commencement, we reached an agreement with the students that they would clear the encampment and in turn be able to make their case to the board of trustees. They will do so this fall, as will pro-Israel students. I trust the experience will be a valuable lesson in how to communicate with people who may not share your views.

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