{"id":9706,"date":"2012-08-13T08:48:44","date_gmt":"2012-08-13T14:48:44","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.mbamission.com\/blog\/?p=9706"},"modified":"2022-02-07T14:15:48","modified_gmt":"2022-02-07T19:15:48","slug":"monday-morning-essay-tip-false-claims-of-uniqueness","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.mbamission.com\/blog\/monday-morning-essay-tip-false-claims-of-uniqueness\/","title":{"rendered":"Monday Morning Essay Tip: False Claims of Uniqueness"},"content":{"rendered":"

\u201cThe semester I spent in France during high school was a unique experience.\u201d<\/em><\/p>\n

\u201cI want to attend Columbia Business School because of its unique Entrepreneurial Club.\u201d<\/em><\/p>\n

\u201cThe opportunity to do hands-on consulting at Ross is unique.\u201d<\/em><\/p>\n

\u201cMy finance background and strong interpersonal skills will allow me to make a unique contribution to Cornell\u2019s Investment Management Club.\u201d<\/em><\/p>\n

<\/em>One of mbaMission\u2019s consultants recently counted\u00a0five\u00a0uses of the word \u201cunique\u201d in a single 600-word essay.\u00a0 What is more, not one of the uses actually fulfilled the term\u2019s correct definition: \u201cexisting as the only one or as the sole example.\u201d Applicants tend to use the word \u201cunique\u201d as a way of trying to make themselves stand out to the admissions committee. However, because they use the word imprecisely\u2014and often too frequently\u2014it instead has the opposite effect of making the essay lose its distinctiveness and believability. Another danger of using the term too casually is that you risk exposing your lack of research about the school if you claim something is unique to the school when it really is not.<\/p>\n

Here are the same four statements written without the generic \u201cunique.\u201d In each case, the sentence is far more descriptive and therefore much less likely to appear in any other applicant\u2019s essay!<\/p>\n

\u201cThe semester I spent in France during high school was eye-opening, from the frogs\u2019 legs I was served at dinner to the concept of shopping daily for my food.\u201d<\/em><\/p>\n

\u201cI want to attend Columbia Business School because its Entrepreneurial Club offers an incredible range of activities that will prepare me to better run my own company.\u201d<\/em><\/p>\n

\u201cThe opportunity to do hands-on consulting at Ross will complement the theoretical background I will gain by taking classes on consulting.\u201d<\/em><\/p>\n

\u201cMy finance background and strong interpersonal skills will ensure that I will effectively coach and mentor classmates new to finance through Cornell\u2019s Investment Management Club\u2019s mentorship program.\u201d<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

\u201cThe semester I spent in France during high school was a unique experience.\u201d \u201cI want to attend Columbia Business School because of its unique Entrepreneurial Club.\u201d \u201cThe opportunity to do hands-on consulting at Ross is unique.\u201d \u201cMy finance background and strong interpersonal skills will allow me to make a unique contribution to Cornell\u2019s Investment Management … Read More  <\/i><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[118],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-9706","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-application-tips"],"acf":[],"yoast_head":"\nMonday Morning Essay Tip: False Claims of Uniqueness | mbaMission - MBA Admissions Consulting<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.mbamission.com\/blog\/monday-morning-essay-tip-false-claims-of-uniqueness\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Monday Morning Essay Tip: False Claims of Uniqueness | mbaMission - MBA Admissions Consulting\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"\u201cThe semester I spent in France during high school was a unique experience.\u201d \u201cI want to attend Columbia Business School because of its unique Entrepreneurial Club.\u201d \u201cThe opportunity to do hands-on consulting at Ross is unique.\u201d \u201cMy finance background and strong interpersonal skills will allow me to make a unique contribution to Cornell\u2019s Investment Management … Read More  \" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/www.mbamission.com\/blog\/monday-morning-essay-tip-false-claims-of-uniqueness\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"mbaMission - MBA Admissions Consulting\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:published_time\" content=\"2012-08-13T14:48:44+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:modified_time\" content=\"2022-02-07T19:15:48+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:image\" content=\"https:\/\/www.mbamission.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/03\/mbam-yoast-fallback-image.png\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:width\" content=\"1200\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:height\" content=\"675\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:type\" content=\"image\/png\" \/>\n<meta name=\"author\" content=\"Jeremy Shinewald\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary_large_image\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:label1\" content=\"Written by\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data1\" content=\"Jeremy Shinewald\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:label2\" content=\"Est. reading time\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data2\" content=\"2 minutes\" \/>\n<!-- \/ Yoast SEO plugin. -->","yoast_head_json":{"title":"Monday Morning Essay Tip: False Claims of Uniqueness | mbaMission - 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