Writing a college essay: Things to avoid

Get Help with Writing a College Essay

An essay is one of the common assignments given to students. This task is a great instrument for assessing the student’s knowledge of the topic, as well as evaluating their writing skills. When writing academic essays, students often commit mistakes from the list mentioned in our article. If you want to get good grades for your papers, you should do your best to avoid these mistakes or order essay. Now, let us discuss these mistakes in detail:

1. Choosing a topic you are not interested in. A good topic is particularly important for writing an interesting essay. Many students choose the first subject they think about and work with it. Later, they experience a lack of ideas or sources, which leads to writer’s block. You should understand that if you are not passionate about your topic, you will find it very difficult to make your essay interesting for your readers. A good topic should be thought-provoking, relevant, and multi-layered. Also, it should be broad enough to allow you to discuss different perspectives. To choose an appropriate topic, you will need to think about your area of interest. Most probably, you will need to carry out preliminary research that will help you find out what subject can be discussed in your essay;
2. Using inappropriate sources. Nowadays, students look for information for their papers on the web. Although this method facilitates the writing process, the chances are high that the sources they choose are inappropriate. In accordance with the latest standards and conventions of academic writing, students should work with relevant, credible, and peer-reviewed academic sources. For example, Wikipedia cannot be considered a good source for an academic paper. In other words, you need to know how to determine facts from opinions;
3. Being careless with formatting. The formatting of your paper is very important because it impacts how well your paper can be read. If you check the grading rubric, you will see that formatting is its significant part. If you fail to choose an appropriate font, size, or spacing, your reader will find it too difficult to follow the flow of your ideas. In academic writing, there are several formatting styles, and each of them has specific peculiarities. Thus, we strongly recommend you read the instructions thoroughly to figure out what formatting style should be followed in your paper;
4. Being offensive. Please, note that your reader does not want to be offended or lectured at. If you make your arguments sound too offensive, you will fail to communicate with your reader successfully, which will affect your work. Here is what we suggest:

• Try to avoid religious, political, and racial topics;
• Make sure to avoid one-sided arguments when you are writing about the death penalty, abortions, guns, immigration, and other problems;
• Try to avoid being biased and subjective.

5. Concentrating on the achievements of other people. This mistake is often committed in personal writing. When you are supposed to submit an admission essay telling about your achievements and experiences, it means that your audience wants to learn more about you instead of reading about other people. Thus, you need to write your essay in such a way to reveal your personality and familiarize your reader about your strengths, experiences, and motivation;
6. Failing to structure your paper right. To bring you a good grade, your essay should be written not only well but also properly structured. According to academic writing standards, your essay will include an introduction, the main body, and a conclusion. If your paper contains up to two pages, it should be structured in the following way:

• Introduction (one paragraph);
• Main body (three paragraphs);
• Conclusion (one paragraph).

If you are working on a more extensive paper, the structure mentioned above will be supported with additional sections such as a literature review, methods, findings, discussion, etc.

7. Skipping the important information. When you are investigating a specific topic, it is essential to discuss it from different perspectives. It is particularly important to collect as many important facts related to the topic as possible, working with peer-reviewed and authoritative sources. Please, note that when you include some facts to support your arguments, you need to cite them carefully to avoid plagiarism accusations.
8. Assuming that your essay is flawless. The process of writing a good essay consists of several stages, and proper revision is one of them. When your paper is ready, you need to look it through to check if it is free from grammatical, spelling, and punctuation flaws. If you fail to edit your paper, your professor will not assess it with a high mark because of a number of mistakes committed because of your carelessness. Although revision may take much time, we strongly recommend you not to omit this process as it will help you get a good grade;
9. Failure to include your own ideas. Remember that your essay should not be a compilation of facts, but you need to link them together with the help of analytical thinking. No matter what kind of academic essay you are writing, it should contain solid arguments and appropriate evidence supporting these arguments. When revising your paper, you will need to make sure it is free from logical flaws and inconsistencies.
10. In all colleges and universities, plagiarism is strictly punished as it is academic dishonesty. If you want to succeed in writing academic papers, you need to avoid plagiarism by any means. First, you need to cite all sources you have used in your paper in accordance with the requirements of the citation style indicated by your teacher. Second, you need to use the available plagiarism-detection checkers to make sure your work is totally authentic. To bring you a good grade, your paper should demonstrate your hard work, original ideas, and awareness of the topic.

All in all, writing an academic essay is not an easy task to do, though you can succeed in it by following our suggestions. Our tips will help you turn the quality of your paper from good to brilliant.

Story by Oliver Reid