How to write a great [Fulbright FLTA] application


The Fulbright FLTA competition is now open. As the program alumna, I’ve decided to put together some tips that can help you write a great application. I think the tips will work for many other programs and scholarships.

Participating in the program was a truly eye-opening and life-changing experience for me, which you can find out more about by reading my other Fulbright posts (see the links at the bottom of this one). Check the requirements on the official website and go for it if you are eligible.

My top tips on writing great application essays

#1
Don't Google how to write applications and don’t look at other people’s essays. Everything you find online will also be found by other potential participants who google and find the same thing. Just don't. Tap into your own inner resources. Make your application unique and memorable. The decision makers read hundreds of applications. It will play in your favor to stand out.

#2
Start brainstorming and writing your first draft very early. Writing a meaningful essay can take up to a month. If you write it in a one-day sprint, it will be a mess. Application essays are your foot in the door, so they should really make a good impression.

#3
Structure your essay clearly. All essays have the same structure: introduction, body paragraphs, conclusion. Organize your ideas logically. Don't turn them into a stream of consciousness. By organizing your ideas logically, you are helping the readers understand what you are trying to communicate. Keeping in mind that yours might be the 100th essay they read, isn't it in your own interests to make sure they can do it effortlessly?

#4
Address the topic directly. Unfortunately, most people see all essay topics as "write something." But essay topics always have specific instructions (usually including ‘why’ or ‘how’), which shouldn't be ignored. Answering the question clearly is your chance to demonstrate that you are a good fit for the program, which makes you more likely to be selected.

#5
Hook the reader. Don't write something bland like, "My name is Irina Lutsenko. I've been a teacher for 15 years. I love teaching. I love English. I would love to learn more about life in the USA.” Such things are true for the majority of applicants (which, by the way, is not a reason to panic). Just find a more exciting way to communicate them. Start with a quote. Write a personal story. Choose an unusual angle.

#6
Read up on your role and the program. Your role in the Fulbright FLTA program will be to teach Russian and be a cultural ambassador. Write what is relevant to that. Don’t write what’s relevant to you. Don't write about your CAE / CPE results. No one knows about these exams in the US. And they are not relevant to the program. They are only relevant to you.

#7
Don't lie. Don’t even bend the truth. Write what you genuinely believe or want to share. First, if your lies are spotted (which lies have a tendency to do), you can wave participating in the program goodbye. Second, if you write something that is not true and get selected based on that, you will end up in a program that isn’t a fit for you. You’ll be miserable. It's not worth it. Plus, I guarantee there is bound to be an institution that is a good fit for your interests as there are a lot of universities that participate in the program. There is really no reason to lie.


These are my top seven tips. If you want even more tips, check Maria Merziapova's post. A Fulbright FLTA alumna too, she wrote her tips completely independently from me, so you'll get a different perspective.  

Speaking of Maria and tips... We have also written a post with Fulbright interview tips. Make sure to read it because some tips work for writing essays too. And don't forget to scrutinize my other Fulbright posts. 

Even more of my Fulbright posts:


Image credit: Photo by Danielle MacInnes on Unsplash

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

How to tame your IELTS pie charts

Image
IELTS line graphs are easy to tame - you just go chronologically, so the description doesn't get out of hand. Information in pie charts, however, can be hard to organize because there are different directions you can go in. In this post, I want to share two IELTS pie chart answers I wrote for the same task. The task is from Cambridge IELTS 11 . The introduction and the overview are the same. As you read, pay attention to the organization and try to decide which description works better. ✼✼✼ Introduction  The pie charts compare the percentage of British students of one English university who knew foreign languages in 2000 and 2010. Main Body Version 1 The percentage of students in three groups grew. Speakers of Spanish formed the largest share in both years, rising by 5% from 30% to 35%. The increase was the same in the “Another language” and “Two other languages” groups. In 2010, the former amounted to 20%, while the latter comprised 15%, making up the second and third largest prop...
Read more

My Fulbright application or a teachable moment on essay writing

Image
I did it one day before the deadline. I submitted my Fulbright application on 30 May 2014. Now, 14 months later, I am going to the USA as a proud Fulbrighter! The program I am participating in is called Foreign Language Teaching Assistant or FLTA for short. As a participant of this program I will be teaching Russian and studying at an American university for an academic year. When my students heard the news, they asked, “What did it take to get this grant?” I replied, “Well, there were several stages. First, I had to write a lot of text. Then, I … .” And one student said, “I am curious to read what you wrote.” I suppose many are, so I am going to let you in on one of my application essays. One of the essays I wrote is called “Objectives and motivations.” What I wrote is too long to upload here (1274 words, no less!), so I am only going to share my introduction and conclusion . Oh, and I see a teachable moment here, which I just can’t help using. Introduction "Albe...
Read more

C2 Proficiency. Writing Task 2. Review (of a film I haven’t seen).

Image
I keep writing like crazy because I am preparing for the C2 Proficiency test (fka CPE). In my previous post, I shared my Writing Part 2 article . In this post, I want to share a review I wrote about a movie I haven't seen and give some insights into handling an unfortunate task. Task A film magazine has invited readers to submit reviews of films which are set in the future, but deal with themes relevant to today’s world, such as our relationship with technology or environmental problems. You decide to submit a review briefly describing such a film and explaining why its themes are relevant today. You should also consider how important it is for films set in the future to say something about contemporary society.   ( Cambridge English Proficiency 2 , Test 2, Question 4). This is a really unfortunate task for me because I watch very few movies, maybe 3 a year. But as I read it, I imagined myself sitting in the exam room not wanting to fail, so I had to come up with somethin...
Read more

Top 8 mistakes Russian learners of English actually make

Image
Due to the nature of my job, every once in a while I stumble upon an article about N most common mistakes that learners of English make. I look at them and go, “Who makes these mistakes? Russians certainly don’t.” (For example, Russians don’t confuse your and you’re .) In this post, I want to talk about 8 common mistakes Russian learners actually make. These mistakes persist on different levels, but are not usually addressed in EFL course books. The list is based on my personal teaching experience. The order is random. 1. I with I often ask students “What did you do at the weekend?” and what I hear is “ I with my friends went to the cinema. ” The right way to say something like this is “ My friends and I went to the cinema ,” or “ I went to the cinema with my friends .” In English, the word order is “subject+verb” and prepositional phrases can’t go in the middle. 2. How to say When students don’t know how to say something, they ask me or murmur to themselves “ How t...
Read more