“The College Essay Guidebook”: A Look into Dr. Mandler’s Latest Book

English teacher Dr. David Mandler’s latest book, “The College Essay Guidebook,” was released on September 25. The book includes 30 activities that help guide the reader to writing effective responses to the Common Application questions. It also includes a grammar section and essay draft progressions from former Stuyvesant seniors.

Dr. Mandler has published another book, a nonfiction work titled “Arminius Vambéry and the British Empire: Between East and West,” as well as a short story, and numerous articles in the Budapest Times.

He wrote his latest book to help his students, as well as others across the country, produce an effective story about themselves. “I had to do something to guide people. It’s really in the spirit of alleviating much of the stress that students feel in creating an essay that I wanted to do this book,” Dr. Mandler said.

The new book also includes student reflections from seniors who have gone through the college process. “I find that this book is very relevant, especially to Stuyvesant students, because the advice in the book comes straight from last year’s seniors,” Dr. Mandler said. “They allowed me to integrate some of their essays, using their names and college affiliations. But the book is open enough to allow for any other high school senior to understand.”

He also chose to create a publishing press for this book, the “Ergo Sum Press.” The name is derived from Descartes’s “I think, therefore I am.” “The major negative [of] looking for a publisher is the time period,” Dr. Mandler said. “[It takes] at least a year or two for a book to run the course of selection. I wanted to retain control over what the book looked like. When you go with a publisher, you give up a lot of control of what goes into the book.”

Dr. Mandler is also in the process of writing two more texts: a novel and a book of poetry.