Dear MBA Hopefuls,
Stanford's timeless essay- What matters most to you, and why?- is undoubtedly one of the most difficult essays to answer. Read the following tips and a sample essay to knock this essay out of the park :)
To assist us in our discussion, let's welcome Raj. Raj is a Round-3 applicant from India, who applied to Stanford class of 2016. Before we dive into his "What matters most to you, and why" essay, please read the disclaimer below:-
Disclaimer: Few MBA hopefuls, due to wide variety of reasons resort to plagiarism. Please remember that doing so is not only unethical, it can also prove detrimental to your MBA dreams. Business schools, all around the globe, have increasingly started using plagiarism detection softwares. I am obligated to advice MBA hopefuls not to indulge in such practices. The resources provided on this blog are meant to help you think about your own essays. Please resist the urge to copy-paste/copy re-word and paste/pick stories or ideas from the posts you see from this blog or any other blog.
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Okay, with the formalities out of the way, let's turn our attention to this sample essay:
Summary for Raj's essay: Since this is a long essay (close to 750 words). Let me give you a quick run down to what this essay holds.
Raj's essay in a nutshell: Raj is passionate about helping people, and this is what he writes about in his essay (in paragraph one). In paragraph two, he gives the evidence of helping others by sharing a story about a boy (Ajay), whom he mentored. In paragraph three, four and five, Raj talks about how his professional career as a promising sportsman ended, and how he found helping others as a coping mechanism (and why helping others is so important to him). Then in paragraph six and seven (which are not shared on this blog), Raj explicitly talks about the WHY part of this essay.
The writing style is staggered (the italics you see in paragraph 5). Such a writing style creates a background effect, and helps you portray two stories in parallel. The story proceeds in such fashion (which is not a part of this blog post) after paragraph five.
Actual Essay:
Question: What matters most to you, and why?
Question: What matters most to you, and why?
[Para 1]: Assisting others in creating their defining moments matters the most to me. Throughout my life, I have always encouraged and motivated people, helping them achieve things that they never thought could exist …After this there are three more sentences, outlining Raj's noble aim of helping others.
[Para 2]: Here is a story that Raj tells [Story 1]: As the founder of [some non profit organisation that teaches underprivileged students; this is a nonprofit that Raj started], I interacted with Ajay, one of the underprivileged students that our organisation taught. As his teacher, I used to interact with him on every weekend. ….Then there are multiple sentences about Raj’s interaction with Ajay, and how he influenced him.
[Para 3; introduction to Raj's second story]: Spending time with Ajay, I learnt that we all ought to take chances in life. [Start of story 2] As a young sportsmen, I was leading my team to the state semi-finals, but an ACL injury ended my professional career…..
[Para 5 and 6]:...My injury ended my career- I could not compete at the professional level. After spending a few months depressed in my dungeon, I decided it was time to take charge of my life. My coach assisted me in this regard: he helped me coach the little leaguers...then there seven sentences (which go on in the next paragraph as well) on Raj’s experience of coaching this team.
[Para 7 and 8]: Raj answers the WHY part of this essay.
Overall take on the essay: If you keep the writing style and grammar aside, and just look at the stories, you will realise that Raj has the following things to say in this essay:
1. He mentored a child.
2. He started a non profit
3. He was a professional sportsman
4. He has genuine reasons to help others. Since his coach inspired him, he wants to inspire others.
So, let’s see how we can improve this essay :)
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General tips: Please read Stanford's website CAREFULLY! Stanford tells you what EXACTLY they are looking for in a good essay. My first tip is quoted from there.
Tip#1: Tell a story. And, tell a story that only you can tell.
Tip#2: Talk about ONE thing in this essay. For example, If you say that surfing on high tides matters the most to you, then just talk this very point only! If you decide mid-way through your essay that you would also like to tell the Ad-Com about how important it is for you to build sand castles on the beach, then please resist this urge. Your essay needs to be extremely focused.
Tip#3: Balance is the key. There is no right approach to this essay. However, your essays needs to have these following qualities:-
a) Needs to be interesting (or at least it should not be boring; therefore, telling a story is the way to go!). Ad-Com consists of people, and people get bored. This is going to be a slightly longer essay-750 words or so- hence, make your essay interesting.
b) Should be insightful. It should give out a lot of information about your experiences in life and the way you have acted in testing circumstances.
c) Needs to be genuine and written from heart. For this essay to have an impact, after reading this essay, the person reading your essay should get that warm fuzzy feeling! :)
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Back to the sample essay :
[Para 1]: Assisting others in creating their defining moments matters the most to me. Throughout my life, I have always encouraged and motivated people, helping them achieve things that they never thought could exist …After this there are three more sentences, outlining Raj's noble aim of helping others.
Comments: The language is clear, and one can easily understand what Raj is trying to convey. It looks like he is already implementing tip#1 and tip#2 in this essay. However, there is a fundamental problem with this current version: this paragraph seems to be boring. There is no "hook", which would compel a reader to read this essay further.
Tip#4: Incorporate a creative "hook". There are multiple ways you can incorporate a hook. You can simply give out a vivid description (central to your story from the essay. In Raj's case it is about helping people, so the central hook should ideally incorporate this aspect. Other ways of creating a hook can be starting with with something uncanny, or asking a pertinent question at the beginning. The point here is not to be bland.
Take a look at the re-worked paragraph:
Though we are essentially saying the same thing as we are in the first paragraph, but this re-worked paragraph is more poetic. The "kodak moment" might look a bit fuzzy at the beginning. However this term has been stated a multiple times throughout the essay and its meaning becomes clearer.
[Para 2]: Here is a story that Raj tells [Story 1]: As the founder of [some non profit organisation that teaches underprivileged students; this is a nonprofit that Raj started], I interacted with Ajay, one of the underprivileged students that our organisation taught. As his teacher, I used to interact with him on every weekend. ….Then there are multiple sentences about Raj’s interaction with Ajay, and how he influenced him.
Paragraph 2 is too straightforward to be a successful Stanford’s essay. Since, this essay is long, you need to keep things interesting. See how we re-worked this paragraph:-
[Re worked Para 2]: [Story 1]: Ajay’s valedictorian speech drew huge cheers from the whole team of [some non profit organisation that teaches underprivileged students]. As Ajay’s teacher and founder of [this non profit organisation], I found Ajay to be disinterested in his class work. His life experiences, after being abandoned by his birth parents, resulted in an extremely negative outlook and made him under-confident and de-motivated. Then there are 7-8 sentences, which skilfully portray Raj's relationship with Ajay. Sentence such as As his ‘big brother’, I would often join him on the field ….. shows how invested Raj was in Ajay’s life. This story of how Raj had an impact on Ajay’s fits perfectly with the central theme of Raj's essay. Raj ends this paragraph by talking about how Ajay started dreaming big because of time and effort that Ajay and his team put in helping this child develop.
[Para 3; introduction to Raj's second story]: Spending time with Ajay, I learnt that we all ought to take chances in life. [Story 2] As a young sportsmen, I was leading my team to the state semi-finals, but an ACL injury ended my professional career…..Paragraph three looks extremely disjoined right now. There is no connect between stories 1 and 2.
Tip#5: Your essay should be interwoven (the more connected the paragraphs in your essays are, the stronger your essay appears). The third paragraph looks disjoint. Though, I understand that you cannot possibly connect every paragraph, but do not waste opportunities where you can actually do so; here is a better way of writing this paragraph:
[Re-worked para 3 and 4]: I realized that it wasn’t just Ajay and his 180 other classmates who were scared to take chances, at some level, we all were. (This is the missing “connect”)
[Now, we slide in story 2, which shows how Raj got motivated in the first place to help others] My life changed drastically: an ACL injury had dashed my hopes of leading [Some team], it ended my professional career as a [professional sportsmen] and also my prospects of getting a college scholarship. I was worried whether I would be able to make something of myself? but on a deeper level, I really doubted if I would be of any value again, the way I used to be for my team…
Side note: Stanford loves thoughtfulness! Through this paragraph Raj outlines a challenge, and in subsequent paragraphs he walks us through how he rose to the challenge.
[Reworked Para 5 and 6] …Coaching the little league team, I couldn’t be happier. I was elated to see these kids celebrate after they bowled an “outswinger” that I had taught them. My coach helped me realise that though my world had changed drastically, there was a lot I could still offer. With his help, I organised a little league cricket tournament, giving many of these kids a kodak moment of playing their first match. I was touched to see that after a match these kids would want to have me in their family pictures. These little gestures gave me the strength to rediscover myself. Our small celebrations made me realise that I do not have to be at the centre of things to make a difference- I can stand by the side-lines and contribute. My coach oriented me towards the goal of contributing to happiness of little-leaguers, giving me my first kodak moment.
[Paragraph 7 and 8] Paragraph 7 and 8 answer why helping other matters the most to Raj. As a Stanford Hopeful, make sure you answer this part explicitly. Through both the stories, Raj has subtly conveyed why helping others matter to him, but this essay solicits explicit response. Para 7 and 8 have been extremely well written and I won't share those paragraphs here. However, if you have been thoughtful in the WHAT part of this essay and have picked your stories carefully, then answering the WHY part is not going to difficult.
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If you wish to read this re-worked essay in one go:
[Re-worked Para 1]: A beautiful smile and happiness all around, how could you not love a kodak moment? Assisting others in creating their kodak moments matters most to me. For me it involves encouraging and motivating people and helping them live moments that they never thought could exist.
[Re-worked Para 2]: Ajay’s valedictorian speech drew huge cheers from the whole team of [some non profit organisation that teaches underprivileged students]. As Ajay’s teacher and founder of [this non profit organisation], I found Ajay to be disinterested in his class work. His life experiences, after being abandoned by his birth parents, resulted in an extremely negative outlook and made him under-confident and de-motivated. Then there are 7-8 sentences, which skilfully portray Raj's relationship with Ajay. Sentence such as As his ‘big brother’, I would often join him on the field ….. shows how invested Raj was in Ajay's life. This story of how Raj had an impact on Ajay's fits perfectly with the central theme of Raj's essay. Raj ends this paragraph by talking about how Ajay started dreaming big because of time and effort that Ajay and his team put in helping this child develop.
[Re-worked para 3 and 4]: I realized that it wasn’t just Ajay and his 180 other classmates who were scared to take chances, at some level, we all were. (This is the missing “connect”)
My life changed drastically: an ACL injury had dashed my hopes of leading [Some team], it ended my professional career as a [professional sportsmen] and also my prospects of getting a college scholarship. I was worried whether I would be able to make something of myself? but on a deeper level, I really doubted if I would be of any value again, the way I used to be for my team…
[Reworked Para 5 and 6] …Coaching the little league team, I couldn’t be happier. I was elated to see these kids celebrate after they bowled an “outswinger” that I had taught them. My coach helped me realise that though my world had changed drastically, there was a lot I could still offer. With his help, I organised a little league cricket tournament, giving many of these kids a kodak moment of playing their first match. I was touched to see that after a match these kids would want to have me in their family pictures. These little gestures gave me the strength to rediscover myself. Our small celebrations made me realise that I do not have to be at the centre of things to make a difference- I can stand by the side-lines and contribute. My coach oriented me towards the goal of contributing to happiness of little-leaguers, giving me my first kodak moment.
[Para 7 and 8]: Explicitly answer THE WHY part of the essay.
Question: How good was this essay?
Answer: Since we do not have Raj’s result yet, we cannot say how good the essay is. However, let us ask you, did you get a warm fuzzy feeling after reading about Raj’s story?
Regards,
Manager, mbaessaybank
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As an MBA Hopeful, if you want to avail any of the services mentioned below, please write to us at: mbaessaybank@gmail.com
1. Get your essay edited (for free). Your essay will be featured on this blog (without the meaty details), like the sample essay above. In return, we will send you (over e-mail) a detailed analysis of your essay along with the re-structured paragraphs.
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