Episode 5 — The Biggest College Essay Mistake

Summer is upon us, and many rising seniors—if they haven’t already—are turning their attention to college applications. Among the most important components they will be tackling is the Common Application “Personal Essay”, often simply called “the college essay.” For almost all students, this will be the most important essay colleges read, and for some, it may even be the only one they read.But there’s just one problem: almost every student writes the wrong type of essay.In this episode, we break down why the title “Personal Essay” is itself misleading and fails to tap into what many top colleges seek: students not merely with personality but those with a purpose.Students who show promise as future scholars and leaders capable of impacting their college—and ultimately, the world—in some singular, hyper-specific way.Merging both the “personal” and “intellectual” qualities colleges seek, we discuss how students should go about tackling this essay, illustrate with examples, and argue the much more strategic, proactive approach we introduce must be adopted across all application components.Finally, for students earlier in the college process, we motivate the importance of building the kinds of candidacies—and reference experiences—from which stand-out essays will ultimately be formed and without which many essays will fall short regardless of how well they are crafted.——“The Game” is hosted by Sam Hassell and brought to you by Great Minds Advising.Great Minds Advising’s unique, hands-on mentorship program and its deep strategic insight into the application review process have earned the company a nation-leading track record of excellence, with 100% of its students gaining admission to a top-choice school in the 2025–26 application cycle.Its students have recently gained admission to Stanford, Princeton, Yale, Columbia, Penn, Brown, Dartmouth, Cornell, Duke, Georgetown, Vanderbilt, Johns Hopkins, Rice, Northwestern, UC-Berkeley, and WashU (among many others) and are admitted to the Ivy League at a rate 14x the national average (90% when applying early).Web: greatmindsadvising.comContact: greatmindsadvising.com/#contactNewsletter: greatmindsadvising.com/#newsletterEmail: [email protected]: facebook.com/GreatMindsAdvising/IG: instagram.com/greatmindsadvising