duh

[paperclippy]

So I was looking on line for examples of what kinds of things people write for their statement of purpose for grad schools, as I was thinking I should write mine like, now.

http://www.accepted.com/grad/sampEssay02.aspx

This has to be one of the poorest sample essays I have ever seen. Not only are the sentences hopelessly choppy and uninteresting, but the content is so ridiculous that nobody could possible write an essay like this! Check out these couple sentences:


Knowing that the professor, Mr. John Doe, was a tough teacher, I asked him for the textbook so I could study and get ready for the class over the summer. Just arrived from Belize, I was determined to succeed. In class we learned about forces on simple members and then we put the members together to form a simple truss.

I mean, come on. Not only was this student so motivated that s/he got the book over the summer, but s/he was also a recent immigrant from Belize! Obviously this means that s/he must be hardworking and intelligent to have made it to the US! I mean, really. This was their sample essay for "the engineering student." How am I supposed to write something good if all the examples are crap like this?

That said, I still need to ask profs for recommendations, and I'm feeling less confident since I've been slacking off in research. I really do have other things I've been doing instead, it's not like I've spent hours and hours putzing around. I still feel bad about it. Maybe I'll go down to the lab tomorrow night and make sure I get working all the stuff I was supposed to do for this week but I haven't started on yet.

I mean, if all else fails, I can get two recs from my summer research and only one from Mudd. I feel like I should have two from Mudd though. I'm still waffling on who to ask. I want someone to tell me "you should ask so-and-so, but not so-and-so." Maybe I should go talk to Prof. Kuenning about it -- he's been really helpful with helping me find which schools/programs to apply to.

Comments

[2gouda4u.livejournal.com]

Kuenning might be good - he was very enthusiastic when I asked him if he would be willing to write a recommendation for me, and when I got rejected by the research program in question, they told me something like I couldn't have had a more complimentary/positive recommendation. As long as you don't catch him on one of the off-days he seems to have...