By Pragya Jhunjhunwala
College Essays; something most students have to battle once they reach 12th grade. While these are the best ways to tell colleges about yourself, the prompts are also such that it is, most of the time, not easy to think of an eye-catching topic immediately.
Before starting the essay writing process a student needs to know all the basics of the application, have a solid & final college list, and even have a few extracurriculars in hand.
Students usually have doubts regarding how they are going to start and/or approach their essays and are usually in need of some clarity and inspiration.
Tips for brainstorming
1. Read other essays that worked:
College essays are different than what student usually writes in school. The format and approach are very different in both and most students have never written a college essay. In order to get a basic sense of what a good college essay looks like, students can find example essays through the following sources:
a. Websites:
b. Books:
Accepted! 50 Successful college admission essays(https://amzn.to/2OraLcd)
100 Successful application essays(https://amzn.to/2KKpltn)
50 Successful Ivy League Application essays(https://amzn.to/2OTYFtc)
c. From people you know:
These are one’s peers, especially seniors, and school career counsellors. If a student has any connections with someone who has gotten into a good college or a college similar/same as your first choice, they should be sure to contact them. The school career counsellor can also help out in finding a few previous successful essays.
Do not plagiarize these sample essays! The purpose of looking at these essays is to get a sense of the template for the student’s essay and analyzing how it is different from a normal school essay. While reading these essays one should ask themselves- what strategies are being used by the writers? What kind of topics work? What is the overall structure of the essay?
2. Compile all the prompts:
Before starting, a student should combine all the prompts of all the schools that they are applying to into one document. Then, they should read all the prompts and brainstorm from there. Most of the time, a student starts off with the prompts one by one and this can actually make them feel intimidated as one prompt might be tricky and one which requires a challenging thinking process. In this case, they should actually check out other prompts that are easier to start with. This will also help the student feel less overwhelmed about the essay writing process.
Starting with the easier prompts might actually benefit the student and give him/her a kickstart on the writing and brainstorming process.
3. Write down your life story:
If the student is really stuck and unable to brainstorm anything, he/she should just sit down and write out their life story without having the pressure of writing related to the prompt. This will give the student some ideas as they are writing down all their experiences and beliefs, etc. This is not an exercise that is meant to be the essay itself. It is meant to put some things on the plate so that it gives the student more clarity regarding the topics they can write about.
4. Start a list about you:
It might be difficult to come up with an exact topic for an essay but it might be easier for the student to come up with a list about things that are awesome about them and what they would want colleges to know about them. This can be anything; for example: “I have a great sense of humour”, “I am creative”, “ My mom is my role model”, or even “I love physics”. These are all elements that make the student special and unique. They are things about them that set them apart.
They should make a list of these and compile them. Then, the student should start thinking about how they can tell a story that reveals these traits.
5. JUST WRITE!
All the above steps regarding making lists and discovering things about your self to write can be helpful but sometimes it gets a student nowhere. In this case, he/she should just look at the prompt and start writing with the first thing that comes to mind. Some students are afraid to start writing without a plan because they think the essay will not make any sense and will be all over the place; something many don’t know is that it’s okay to just keep writing even if it is all over the place because once they start writing, they are put in an engaged position to actually think of ideas. It is the process of writing itself that gets one to open up their minds and unless one starts to write, they cannot come up with their best thoughts.
So if you’re stuck, just write! Write about any prompt, write about multiple prompts, or even write about all the prompts that you can have curated but just write, write, write!
This entire process of college essays is giving the college a look into your personality and who you are. A student’s essay should be a reflection of them.
Happy writing :)
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