What should I write my College Essay about: The Best Topics
Before you begin to write your college essay, it is sensible to know what the admission offers want. Such include strong writing, an authentic voice, and a unique perspective.
You should avoid debatable topics since they do not make great college essays. One should tell the story honestly and authentically.
What Should I Write My College Essay About?
Before you write your college essay, it is vital to know which area you want to discuss. It should be something of your own life experiences.
For example, you can choose something to do with a memorable meal. Here, you can capture most of the important conversations as you sit down and munch.
You can also recount a story where you experienced failure. Explain to the audience how that incident affected you and the type of lessons you drew from such an experience. You should showcase your ability to reflect and learn from the same experiences.
Even better, you can write about your commitment to making a difference in the world. Colleges are not after absorbing perfect people.
They want people who will make a difference in communities, classrooms, and dorms. You should therefore come up with stories that reveal your input to the world.
How to Choose a Topic for Your Essay
1. Understand the Purpose
Every essay should have a purpose that relates to the main subject.
Before you begin to write the college essay, ask yourself hard questions regarding the intention of the essay.
If you are unable to write your college essay, feel free to ask for our assistance. However, read our guide on choosing topics below. More importantly, the essay should serve four things as captured below:
- Informing
- Explaining
- Persuading
- Entertaining
2. Be Consistent
Before selecting a suitable topic, ensure it is relevant to the college essay for this case. For that reason, you should follow the strict structure of that given essay type.
If you are explaining a specific point, ensure you offer an explanation of a specific event or a situation. As such, the audience will determine your position on the same matter easily.
3. Brainstorm
By brainstorming, we mean coming up with fresh ideas concerning that particular topic. You should understand the issues that relate to the topic and the keywords that you should use within your discussions.
The best method of brainstorming is to create a mind map to come up with a visual representation of ideas and thoughts.
When you use mind maps, you will harmonize your ideas concerning your past experience over the same topic. You should write down every idea that strikes your mind before organizing them into useful forms.
4. Select an Interesting Topic
You should list down the thoughts and circle the ones that will sound interesting to you. Once you find the interesting one, then you can offer more details about it. The topic will become more engaging to your audience if you remain enthusiastic about your writing.
In case the topic is boring, the same will reflect your audience. However, the same topic should expose the true-life experience that touched you to change your perspective concerning your encounter.
5. Analyze the Merits of Your Topic
Before settling for a specific topic for your college essay, ensure you have reliable materials to discuss it. It can be hard to settle for a topic that is narrow, where you fail to back it up with relevant materials.
The author should review every topic and reflect on all aspects. It will be reasonable to settle for a particular topic so that you can provide more information and necessary details to make it catchy. Also, suppose the topic is too wide; you can opt to narrow it down and remain consistent and relevant.
6. Change the Topic If Necessary
Suppose the topic does not work out well; you are at liberty to settle for a different one; suppose the circumstances allow you to do so. It can be tempting to begin to write your college essay on a certain topic and later realize that it cannot produce a solid essay.
Besides, one should not get obsessed with topic selection. You should dedicate your time to work on your essay at hand. The essay should flow well as per the given instructions instead of writing a poor one based on an interesting one.
Factors to Consider When Choosing an Essay Topic
1. Interest
If you select an essay topic in your area of interest, it will be easier to get more dedicated and committed to it.
Sometimes, you need perseverance and determination to produce a convincing essay on a given topic.
You can avoid boredom or frustration in your writing by selecting an area that you are passionate about.
Also, select a topic that increases the value of your intentions. It should be a topic that you can offer an interesting encounter that exposes your personality without sounding too academic.
2. Time
As a rule of thumb, many colleges will give you a timeframe as to which you should submit your essay. The given time will affect how you will explore a given subject area. You should narrow the topic to fit into your program without sacrificing the quality aspect.
3. Availability of Sources
The author should have the right sources to back up the selected topic. It becomes hard if you choose a topic that you have few facts to talk about it.
In this case, it should be a topic that you are familiar with concerning the real-life experience. You can offer to narrate a true account concerning your life experience and remain consistent.
4. Avoid Over-exhausted Topics
It can be great if you avoid popular topics that many people have been writing about. Notably, some of the popular topics may fail to catch the attention of the audience.
It becomes monotonous and boring to duplicate topics that other authors have been writing about over the years. You can break the norm by settling on something unique and catchy.
Advantages of Selecting Interesting Topics
1. Develops Remarkable Skills
An interesting topic will convince your audience to approximate your writing and creative skills concerning your life experience.
The writer will develop professional skills to help one become the best in every field one chooses.
Furthermore, it sheds light on the life issues that one will resolve once one encounters them.
2. Expansion of Knowledge
Knowledge has to do with giving insightful findings on situations or problems.
In this case, it involves giving details of that situation and explaining the type of lesson you got out of it.
Generally, it is always a joy when you discover something interesting out of a unique life encounter. As such, you should perform an in-depth surgery of the story and drag out the most significant information that can be useful to humanity.
3. Opens up Career Opportunities
When you write an interesting topic, it exposes you to massive career opportunities. You can earn a scholarship, secure a job, get a grant, or a fellowship. Also, it can secure you a chance for admission to the college of your interest.
4. Society Advancement
When you give true details of an interesting topic, you will make the world a better place to live. You will be exposing some of the important lessons to emulate and come out with the right approach to handle similar situations.
Disadvantages of Selecting Interesting Topics
The most outstanding weakness of choosing an interesting topic is that it comes with monotony. People tend to discuss almost similar versions of life encounters, hence making the topic boring to the audience.
The situation will compromise creativity among the writers, hence promoting boredom. It can be sensible to settle for a unique topic that creates curiosity among the readers.
Josh Jasen or JJ as we fondly call him, is a senior academic editor at Grade Bees in charge of the writing department. When not managing complex essays and academic writing tasks, Josh is busy advising students on how to pass assignments. In his spare time, he loves playing football or walking with his dog around the park.