College EssayAnswered
Hi, I'm a senior can anyone help Me? I'm having a really hard time coming up with an anecdote/memoir for my essay. I keep trying brainstorming exercises on YouTube, but nothing seems to be working. I just feel like there's nothing in my head I can descriptively describe that will make my college essay stand out to college admission officers. Also trying not to use cliché topics that people already use, I want mine to be truly unique and stand out.
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Fellow high school senior here who is also working on college essays right now :). Although I don't have as much experience as other people might, I've reached out to professors I know personally and other academic people for their advice on writing these kinds of essays and it has been a lot of help. The best thing I've been told is to write about something that I want to write about, that I feel passionate about the story I have to tell. Don't write about what you think the college admissions people want to read-- they read thousands of essays every year and chances are, "golden" topics are WAY overdone. If you want to move the reader you have to stay true to your own voice, your own story-- it isn't about the topic at all. The way that essays stand out is by making the reader feel something. The only way to do that is to be genuine. For life lessons and such, be genuine, too. What did you actually learn, especially in high school, about the world/ perspectives? If it's cliche, rephrase/ make it original, elaborate, etc. I hope this was helpful!
Hey! I'm currently writing my essay as well.
I would seriously recommend the College Essay Guy website, he's a great resource and has tons of articles/videos for coming up with ideas for your essay. He also has many examples of essays that worked and he explains why they worked.
Personally I could not figure out what I wanted to write about. I'm a huge Office fan so I wrote about that but my essay was terrible. So weeks later after a lot of thinking, I finally remembered a moment in fourth grade of me hiding in a trash can for hide and seek and am tying it into why I want to become an engineer. Sounds kinda crazy, but I'm glad I took the extra time to think about it. It was not really something amazing that happened to me or anything but I figured out how to make it work.
I would try to find something that would unexpectedly showcase who you are and what you want to do with your life. Don't be afraid to take your time or do multiple rough drafts. And if you haven't already, check out College Essay Guy's "Personal Statement Resources" for amazing college essay advice!!
personally I have written something about my role model influenced my mindset and ethics (how I applied and how it resulted in my work). I heard a few people that compared themselves to inanimate objects/sentences. maybe try that?
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@Claire_H, thank you so much love, will take your advice into consideration when writing my essay. Have a nice day!