<p>Does anyone have any tips or know of any good web-sites on brainstorming to produce college essay topics? Besides the paying and the waiting, this must be the most painful part of the process for the student (and prodding parent).</p>
<p>[Past</a> Essays Tufts University Admissions Department](<a href=“http://admissions.tufts.edu/apply/essay-questions/past-essays/]Past”>Past Essays | Tufts Admissions)</p>
<p>[Purdue</a> OWL: Writing the Personal Statement](<a href=“Purdue OWL® - Purdue OWL® - Purdue University”>Purdue OWL® - Purdue OWL® - Purdue University)</p>
<p>^those are really good resources, griffen. I’m saving them for S’14.</p>
<p>I think of the essay as a mini-memoir (if you’re doing the topic “describe a significant experience and its impact on you”). You’re not detailing everything that happened to you since birth – you’re selecting one moment that stands out, you’re saying why it was meaningful and more importantly, pointing out elements in your personal or academic life that shows the impact – then you’re wrapping it up to present day (HS senior applying to colleges) and tying it into where you see your life going (and implicitly, how getting into XYZ school will help continue this process).</p>
<p>So D’s essay focused on this significant experience: trick or treating, Hallowe’en, 2004. A budding Democrat, she dressed up as John Kerry and her best friend was Teresa Heinz Kerry. Some people in our very Republican town wouldn’t give her candy! She used this experience as the “that’s when I realized people sometimes make political decisions on a very superficial basis”. And she mentioned how she’d joined the Young Democrats which she ultimately headed; joined Model UN; supported ObamaCare, and how she now was choosing colleges based on their politics departments.</p>
<p>Thanks for your feedback. 2015, your D’s essay sounds great!</p>