There is a really easy way to inject some elixir into a research or term paper you’ve had to write for school in a way that will provide you with a good backup answer for those vexing occasions when an application asks for two long essays. Here’s how:

1. Rummage around in that pile of papers on your desk (or under your bed) and pull out the graded paper you’re most proud of. Even if you elect not to convert it into this essay, make enough copies (complete with teacher comments and the grade you got) to submit with each application. Whether Admissions officially asks to see such an example of your academic writing, you may earn major brownie points for sending it. For some reason, colleges want to see your intellect at work.

2. To convert this academic piece of writing into a dramatically insightful personal essay, do this:

• Reread the paper critically.
• Brainstorm about why you originally picked the topic.
  
• Brainstorm whether your approach, interpretation and conclusion about your subject would still be the same were you to write the paper today. Why? Why not?
  
• Provide a personal anecdote or a scene from your own life to dramatically illustrate what has either emphasized or altered this point of view.
  
• Brainstorm a thoughtful conclusion about what specifically you have learned about yourself since your wrote the paper, and specifically how you learned it.
  
• Rewrite for meaning; rewrite for structure; then fine-tune your dental draft. By now you’re such a veteran with Uniquely U.’s 5 Steps©, doing this should be a piece of cake.