Humor with Value: College Admission Essay Sample

Headlines like "Baghdad Residents Treated To Magnificent Light Show" and "Duraflame Introduces Slow-Burning American Flag" aren't typical of mainstream publications. But writing such leads has been a major interest of mine for the past year and a half.

While I've always had a flair for humor, it wasn't until high school that I began to put hand to keyboard and seriously write. I started reading satire as well: Jonathan Swift, Dave Barry, and Al Franken were among my idols. But it was the Onion, a straight-faced, satirical rag, that provided the inspiration for "Witty Tirade."

At the end of sophomore year, I started regularly writing pastiches of news articles and publishing them on a website I designed myself. From March on, I spent my entire Saturdays writing articles for the site's weekly updates.

Forty-four online editions of Witty Tirade were produced before I received the long-awaited opportunity to advance to another medium: print. Having spent a year on the school newspaper staff, I was invited to create an entire page on a regular basis. Thus was the current incarnation of "Witty Tirade" born.

Armed with PageMaker, a program I had never used before, I created an entire layout from scratch over the summer and spent the rest of the time writing and diligently refining the articles and layout up until my first deadline. While readership was low, I would continue to write, composing, not to persuade or even entertain, but solely for the opportunity to create humor with value.