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Greatest accomplishment essay example and topic ideas.

Developing a college essay on accomplishment may seem easy on the surface, but a hard nut on the inner. Why? Most students have not developed the necessary skills and tactics needed to give such an essay a perfect look it deserves. Nevertheless, we are here to help you develop that and make your essay one of the best achievements ever made. At the end of this post, you will be more proud that Isaac Newton, who saw a mango falling from a tree.

An accomplishment essay should have the following components :

• The challenge
• The outcome
• The significance

First things first, we will start with an accomplishment essay example, which will form the basis of our discussion. Let’s do this!

The Greatest Accomplishment Essay: How I Made it in Life “When I was growing up, I had one purpose in mind, to be my boss. Well, many may find it absurd that a young lad who barely knew all the letters of the alphabet would dream of such. As crazy as it may sound, that was my dream, and I had no intention of looking back. The same urge still burned in me ten years later. No doubt that my passion for leadership was in my DNA, and nothing could stop me from achieving it. What is success? One person defined it as the accomplishment of a purpose or an aim. We create success on our own, and this is how I made my success story. I grew up in a humble background, with my mother taking both parental roles. We lived from hand to mouth, and there are times when we would go for two or three fortnights without a meal. Being a single mother, she had to ensure that her two children were well fending for with the little that she could afford. She would take up any job position; a cleaner, a homemaker, a cook, and even one time, a garbage collector. All these were for the best of her children. Don’t think that I was blind to all these sufferings. There are times that she would take me on these jobs, and I had a first-hand experience of how difficult they were. That is where I started developing a longing for a better life. Not just for me, but my family and all the others who were going through the same ordeal. From the little pennies I collected, I began my little savings account. A bank wouldn’t accept my little coins, and so I had a metallic tin, which I dubbed, “my treasure box.” As time went by, my little treasure box began being heavy. One day I decided to open it when I counted the amount; it was kind enough to buy a few packets of sweets. I bought the first three packets, and lucky enough, all of them sold out. The urge to buy more packs of sweets developed, and within no time, I had a small kiosk. Through several ups and downs, I managed to open a small shop with not just sweets but also other essential commodities. The shop did well, and I moved to a mini-market where I would do wholesale and retail services. I eventually opened a supermarket, and that is where my fortune came. Due to the excellent progress of this supermarket, I opened another branch, and the business began expanding. From a sweet seller to the director of a supermarket with branches nationwide! That is how I became my boss by creating opportunities for people like me who did not have a source of income.”

A personal accomplishment essay is as simple as that. You do not have to hustle for the so-called “great” stories. Look for that one achievement in your life and give it your best shot.

Topic Ideas for Writing the Greatest Accomplishment Essay

Show the great strides you made in your education and the accolades you received for the same.

Describe how your interest in medicine drove you to become a doctor

How does one not achieving a specific goal contribute to his/her failure?

• The Importance of Accomplishment Discuss the privileges, results, and social impact of an accomplishment

Things to Avoid in an Accomplishment Essay

A good essay on accomplishment should not:

• Be of an ancient achievement
• Involve a friend, family, or marriage unless the story is genuinely distinctive and has a substantial impact.

To sum up, writing one of the most significant accomplishment essays bears a couple of requirements in mind. You should critically ask yourself specific questions and, after that, reflect on the experiences that answer those questions. If you have a problem on how to do this, we have experts with years of experience who can help you navigate through.

We also offer professional wring assistance with more essay samples for your inspiration. Contact us today.

Sample Common Application Essay for Option #5

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Jill writes about a person who had a significant influence on her. Her response works well for Common Application essay option #5: "Discuss an accomplishment, event, or realization that sparked a period of personal growth and a new understanding of yourself or others."

As you read the essay, note how it is about much more than the woman who influenced Jill. Jill uses her interactions with a strong-willed and difficult woman to reveal to the admissions folks an important moment in her own personal growth.

Sample Common Application Essay

"Buck Up"  by Jill

Susan Lewis is a woman that very few people would consider a role model for anything. A fifty-something high-school dropout, she has little more to her name than a beat-up truck, a Jack Russell Terrier and a ragtag herd of aging and/or neurotic horses with which she's run a largely unsuccessful riding lesson program for twenty years with no business plan to speak of and little hope of ever turning a profit. She curses like a sailor, is perpetually un-punctual, and has an erratic and often terrifying temper.

I've taken weekly riding lessons with Sue since middle school, often against my own better judgment. Because for all her seemingly unredeemable qualities, she inspires me - not necessarily as a person I'd strive to emulate, but simply for her unwavering perseverance. In the five years I've known her, I've never once seen her give up on anything. She would sooner go hungry (and sometimes does) than give up on her horses and her business. She sticks to her guns on every issue, from political views to hay prices to her (frankly terrible) business model. Sue has never once given up on herself or her horses or her business, and she never gives up on her students.

My dad lost his job not long after I started high school, and horseback riding quickly became a luxury we couldn't afford. So I called Sue to tell her that I wouldn't be riding for a while, at least until my father was back on his feet.

I hadn't expected an outpouring of sympathy (Sue, as you may have guessed, isn't an overwhelmingly sympathetic person), but I certainly wasn't expecting her to yell at me, either. Which was exactly what happened. She told me in no uncertain terms that I was ridiculous for thinking that money should stop me from doing something I loved, and she would see me bright and early Saturday morning regardless, and if she had to drive me to the barn herself that she would, and I'd better be wearing a good pair of boots because I'd be working off my lessons until further notice.

Her refusal to give up on me said more than I could ever put into words. It would have been easy for her to just let me leave. But Sue was never a person to take the easy way out, and she showed me how to do the same. I worked harder in Sue's barn that year than I'd ever worked before, earning every minute of my riding time, and I'd never felt more proud of myself. In her own stubborn way, Sue had shared with me an invaluable lesson in perseverance. She may not be much of a role model in any other respect, but Susan Lewis does not give up, and I strive every day to live by her example.

Analysis and Critique of Jill's Common Application Essay

What can you learn from how this essay was written? The essay is interesting and written in an engaging style, but how well does this work for the purpose of the Common Application essay?

The Essay's Title

The title is the first thing a reader sees. A  good title  can immediately pique your reader's curiosity and grab his or her attention. The title frames and focuses on the words that follow. A missing title is a lost opportunity, and a weak title is an immediate handicap. Unfortunately, coming up with a good title can be remarkably difficult.

Jill's title "Buck Up" is good in that it plays with the word "buck." On the one hand, the essay is about horses. On the other, it is using the phrase "buck up" to mean "showing some courage or backbone." This kind of playfulness can work well in a title.

"Buck Up," however, does have some shortcomings. Namely, it isn't entirely clear to the reader what the essay will be about. The admissions folks may end up appreciating the title, but only after they read the essay. A title that makes sense only in retrospect obviously isn't doing the best job preparing the reader for the essay.

The Essay's Focus

By focusing on Susan Lewis, someone who in many ways isn't even likable, the essay isn't typical, and it shows that the author can recognize the positive in a person who has a lot of negatives going for her. The college admission reader will be impressed that the author has shown she is a creative and open-minded thinker. The essay fully explains the influence Susan Lewis has on the author, leading her to appreciate hard work and perseverance. This was an important step into adulthood for the author.

Also, think about the broader implications of the essay. If a teenager is able to recognize the positive qualities of someone as unlikable as Susan Lewis, that student is also likely to do well in a residential college where different personalities are thrown together in close quarters.

The Essay's Tone

Striking the right tone can be a big challenge in a college application essay. When writing about someone who is rather unlikable, it would be easy to come across as mocking or condescending. The essay points out many of Susan Lewis's shortcomings, but it keeps a light an playful tone. The result is that the author comes across as loving and appreciative, not deprecating. However, it takes a skillful writer to provide just the right balance of levity and seriousness. This is a danger zone, and you will need to ensure you don't fall into a negative tone.

The Quality of the Writing

"Buck Up" is not a perfect essay, but the flaws are few. Try to avoid cliché or tired phrases such as "sticks to her guns" and "back on his feet." There are also a few minor grammatical mistakes.

Jill does well when it comes to the essay's style . The narrative has a pleasing variety of sentence types ranging from short and punchy to long and complex. The language is playful and engaging, and Jill has done an admirable job painting a rich portrait of Susan Lewis in a few short paragraphs.

Every sentence and paragraph adds important details to the essay, and the reader never gets the sense that Jill is wasting space with a bunch of unnecessary fluff. This is important: with the 650- word limit on Common Application essays, there's no room for wasted words. At 478 words, Jill is safely within the length limit.

The most admirable thing about the writing here is that Jill's personality comes through. We get a sense of her humor, her power of observation, and her generosity of spirit. A lot of applicants feel like they need to brag about their accomplishments in their application essay, yet Jill shows how those accomplishments can be conveyed in a pleasingly understated way.

Why Colleges Ask Applicants to Write Essays

It's always important to keep in mind why colleges ask applicants to write essays. On a simple level, they want to make sure you can write well, something that Jill has demonstrated effectively with "Buck Up." But more significantly, the admissions folks are indicating that they have holistic admissions and they want to get to know the students they are considering for admission.

Test scores and grades don't tell a college what type of person you are, other than one who works hard and tests well. What's your personality like? What do you truly care about? How do you communicate your ideas to others? And the big one: Are you the type of person we want to invite to become part of our campus community? The personal essay (along with the  interview  and  letters of recommendation ) is one of the few pieces of the application that helps the admissions folks get to know the person behind the grades and test scores.

Jill's essay, whether deliberately or not, answers these questions in ways that work in her favor. She shows that she is observant, caring, and funny. She demonstrates self-awareness as she narrates the ways in which she has grown as a person. She shows that she is generous and finds positive qualities in people who have a lot of negatives. And she reveals that she gets pleasure out of overcoming challenges and working hard to achieve her goals. In short, she comes across as the type of person who would enrich a campus community.

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• The 2021-22 Common Application Essay Prompts
• "Grandpa's Rubik's Cube"—Sample Common Application Essay, Option #4
• Sample Application Essay - Porkopolis
• Tips for the Pre-2013 Personal Essay Options on the Common Application
• Sample College Application Short Answer Essay
• Common Application Essay Option 2 Tips: Learning from Failure
• Tips for an Application Essay on a Significant Experience
• 2020-21 Common Application Essay Option 4—Solving a Problem
• Common Application Essay Option 3 Tips: Challenging a Belief
• Tips for an Admissions Essay on an Influential Person
• Common Application Essay on a Meaningful Place
• Sample Short Answer on Soccer
• Addressing Diversity in a College Application Essay
• Common Application Essay, Option 1: Share Your Story

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Common App Essay Prompt 5 About a Period of Personal Growth

Mark montgomery.

• June 30, 2023

Write a Great Common App Essay on Personal Growth

Common App Essay Prompt 5 asks you to “discuss an accomplishment, event, or realization that sparked a period of personal growth and a new understanding of yourself or others.” If you’re looking to highlight your transformative journey, consider crafting a Common App essay on personal growth.

The best Common Application essays show how you have grown as a person over time and how you reflect on that personal growth. Great news: Common App essay prompt 5 makes it easy for you to do just that!

On its surface, this prompt seems to be asking about a specific moment in your life, and telling a story about a specific time will definitely help your essay come together. But really, this prompt wants a before-and-after. Tell the reader about one way you’ve grown as a person, and demonstrate that you are aware of that period of personal growth and able to reflect on it in a mature way. If you can do all that, you’re well on your way to writing a strong Common App essay!

Defining “Event, Accomplishment, or Realization,” “Period of Personal Growth,” and Other Keywords from Prompt 5

Period of Personal Growth and Understanding 

As we grow older, we find that in some situations we feel—or are treated—as children, while in other situations we feel more like adults. Sometimes this transition is subtle, as in how other adults begin to treat you with greater seriousness in restaurants, at the post office, and in other public  places. Sometimes, however, this transition can seem more abrupt, as in the day you get your driver’s license or register to vote for the first time. Religion often marks this transition (first communions, bar mitzvahs), as do particular cultures (quinceañeras, debutante balls). This prompt asks you to examine more closely  your own transition from childhood to adulthood. Granted, for all of us, this transition is slow and gradual (and frankly, sometimes even we are not sure we have completely transitioned to adulthood!). But no matter our age, religion, or culture, this transition is  punctuated by some memorable stories—stories that you are being asked to share with your  readers.  

Accomplishment or Event 

The transition to adulthood is marked by both accomplishments and events. An accomplishment  is something that you achieved through hard work. An event, on the other hand, is a happening in which you may have been more passive, but nonetheless marks a very important milestone in your life. Some of these accomplishments and events are formal (e.g., learning Hebrew and reciting the Torah before your congregation in a ceremony before your friends and family). Some of these  accomplishments and events are informal (e.g., you finally looked old enough that when you entered a restaurant with your parents, the hostess no longer gave you the kiddie menu). College admissions folks do not care so much about the exact nature of these accomplishments or events;  rather they care about how you tell an interesting story about your transition to adulthood. 

Realization 

Unlike an accomplishment or event, a realization can have no outward manifestation that others can see or experience. You may, instead, experience some sort of internal “Aha!” moment. Your  understanding changes. You see yourself—or others—in a completely new light. Perhaps you shared this realization with others, or perhaps it is one that is intensely private. But the change or transition is real, because it leads to a new and different understanding of yourself and the world  around you. 

At first glance, this prompt doesn’t seem to have a story at the heart of it. However, the focus is on a transition, which implies a description of “before” and “after” this event, accomplishment, or  realization. So you should retell the story briefly to help your reader understand the transition. As with the other prompts, you should then go on to put this event, accomplishment, or realization into a larger context. You need to interpret this story for your reader through analysis and synthesis. By focusing your “discussion” of what happened after this event, accomplishment, or realization, you can give your reader a sense of your increasing maturity and your priorities, values, and personality.  

Examples of Essays That Worked for Common App Essay on Personal Growth

We have worked with hundreds of students over the years, and many of them have written excellent essays about experiences that sparked a period of personal growth. Here are just a couple examples of students who successfully wrote about accomplishments, events, or realizations that sparked periods of growth.

Example One:

→The writer is a volunteer tutor in a Saturday program for refugee students. One day, one of the younger students asks the writer why he is helping them, and the writer explains that he is part of the Refugee Outreach Club at his school (a club the writer founded). The younger student bristles, saying that he is not a refugee since he was born in the US. The writer realizes that the younger student doesn’t want to be seen as a refugee, and that by using that term, the writer is alienating the younger student. The writer then thinks about how people in the US often view refugees as poor people in need of charity, rather than as respected peers and neighbors. The writer acts on these thoughts and begins making changes to his club and his approach, including using the phrase ‘new Americans’ rather than ‘refugees’ and coordinating social events like playing basketball between his classmates and the new Americans in order to foster genuine relationships.

→The event the writer highlights is quite simple: a three-line conversation between himself and another student. What makes this essay so successful is that the writer shows that he can think deeply about the connections between his personal life and the wider social and political landscape around him. He understands that the relationship he has with the younger student he tutors is a tiny example of the broader patterns experienced by refugees in the United States. Not only is the student able to articulate this realization,   but he pushes himself to grow and change his thoughts and his behavior accordingly.

Example Two:

→ As a freshman in high school, the writer tries to pursue both volleyball and modeling, two activities that speak to her values and interests in different ways. Her volleyball coach tells her to gain fifteen pounds of muscle to be a better player, while her modeling agency tells her to lose fifteen pounds in order to conform to the look they want. The student realizes that she can’t possibly meet both of those expectations at the same time. She chooses to quit modeling and pursue volleyball. Her team is quite successful throughout her high school career. More importantly, volleyball helps her solidify values like hard work, collaboration, and teamwork.

→In this essay, the writer successfully recounts a fairly narrow event (being given opposing demands by different activities and subsequently choosing one activity over the other). The writer then articulates a couple realizations she experiences as a result of this event. For one, you can’t please everyone and fit into all molds. Sometimes tradeoffs are required to find success. Secondly, while some change is necessary to grow, not all change is good or healthy. People should be intentional about the types of change they want to pursue. The writer is able to show how she parlays her new understanding into a period of growth in which she becomes more focused on her chosen activity and finds success, all while strengthening her values and her connection to those around her.

Avoiding Traps: Topics That Don’t Tend to Work for Common App Essay on Personal Growth

Like many of the Common App prompts, this one is quite broad, so many topics could work well for it. However, there are some pitfalls to be aware of. 

Avoid Writing About Other People

For this topic, you might be tempted to write about an interaction you had with a significant person in your life, such as a parent, grandparent, or teacher. There is nothing wrong with writing about such an interaction. However, writing about a relative or other mentor figure can quickly verge into an essay about someone else. If you find yourself filling your reader in on all the details of someone else’s life, that’s a strong sign that you are not actually writing about yourself. Of course it is okay to mention other people in your essay. However, make sure that you and your journey are at the heart of the essay. 

Avoid Topics That Are Very Commonly Done – Unless You Have a Unique Spin

Certain growing experiences are common to many American teenagers. For example, we have seen countless essays about students who get their driver’s license and then experience a period of increased independence. This topic fits the prompt and could be meaningful to you personally. However, because this is such a common experience, it will be very challenging to write about it in a way that allows you as an applicant to stand out…unless there was something unusual about your experience! Perhaps, for example, you are a student with a physical disability, and you were only able to get your license after a significant amount of work and help from others. Or maybe you are an undocumented student, and your driver’s license is the first piece of government ID that anyone in your family has had access to. In a unique case like that, writing about getting your driver’s license might actually allow you to showcase what makes you unique.

A similar case could be made for topics such as an impactful conversation with a grandparent, getting your first job, or winning (or losing) a big sporting event. Nothing is strictly off limits, but make sure that if you are relating a common experience, you have a very unique spin on it.

Stop Reading and Start Writing Your Common App Essay on Personal Growth

Essay prompt 5 will work best if you can focus on one moment in your life and use it as a jumping-off point to explore some sort of before-and-after. Tell a story about how you grew as a person, and reflect on how you think about that growth now and how that growth has helped you navigate your life or think about your future. Now get writing!

Need More Help Writing Your Common App Essay?

At Great College Advice, we offer a wide range of services designed to help students with every aspect of the college application process, including writing and revising their Common App essay. Our team of experienced counselors and writing coaches can provide personalized feedback, guidance, and support to help you craft an essay that is compelling, authentic, and effective.

Whether you need help generating ideas, organizing your thoughts, or polishing your final draft, we are here to help. We offer a variety of service packages to fit your specific needs and budget, including comprehensive application counseling, essay coaching, and hourly consultations.

Great College Advice has helped hundreds of students just like you write their Common Application Essays and submit college applications that they’re proud of. Learn more about how we can help you with your essays . We can help with the rest of your application , too! 

Additional Resources for Common App Essay Prompt 5

• In this informative video, Dr. Mark Montgomery dives into Common Application essay prompt 5 which focuses on discussing an accomplishment, event, or realization. With his expertise in college admissions and essay writing, he provides expert guidance on how to effectively approach this prompt and craft a compelling essay.

For additional writing help, check out our Common App Essay Series for in-depth guidance on various topics. Our expert tips and insights will help you showcase your unique experiences and perspectives in a compelling way. Whether you’re just starting your essay or simply refining it, our series is designed to help you every step of the writing process. Make your Common App Essay stand out!

• Common Application Essays: What are they?
• Writing about Background Story
• Writing About Failure
• Writing about Questioning Beliefs and Ideas
• Writing about a Period of Personal Growth
• Supplemental Essays
• Why Our College? – Supplemental Essay Question

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Essay About Achievements: Top 5 Examples and 6 Prompts

Are you having problems writing your essay about achievements? Then, continue reading this article for samples and prompts to guide you in your writing.

Achievement influences our expectations and self-growth. It’s also often connected with an individual’s progress in life. It gives way for recognition in attaining a goal through standards. 

Achievement acknowledges successes, productiveness, and involvement. But sometimes, achieving doesn’t result in a feeling of satisfaction. Writing an achievement essay is usually based on experiences from yourself or others. You can explore different viewpoints, such as what they consider an “achievement,” how to overcome weaknesses, or why they want a specific achievement. Below are 5 examples and 6 writing prompts to assist you in your essay:

1. The Greatest Achievements In Life by Gerard Reese

2. greatest professional or academic achievement by james taylor , 3. essay on achievements from my professional life by bdoan, 4. my accomplishment by taylor wood, 5. when my weakness became my greatest accomplishment by jay merrill logan, 6 writing prompts on essay about achievements, 1. ways to achieve within different settings, 2. achievements in the small things, 3. how to build confidence, 4. the power of overcoming fear, 5. steps to be successful, 6. guide to building a strong character.

“Nobody succeeds on the first try, we take our mistakes and learn from them. Mistakes are the things that help us strive for greatness, which is why failure should not be viewed as something negative, but more as something we can use to attain [what] we want in life.”

Reese’s piece on achievement talks about learning from failure and trying again until you reach success. Time and failure are contributors to our achievements. He emphasizes that failure can be a steward and teacher to help us get where we want to be. He also provides lists of individuals who encountered crises in their lives until they reached their most successful phases. 

“My father always instilled in me the importance of education. He knew very well that in order for his children to be successful he needed to set them up for success and place them in a position where we would be afforded the opportunity to succeed.”

Family significantly impacts one’s interpretation of what achievements are about. Taylor’s essay highlights the idea of what his father taught him about education and success. He mentions how he embarked through life while keeping his father’s acknowledgment of his potential in the field he has chosen. His essay shows that family shapes one’s belief about what’s considered a successful life.

“I consider the experience in Japan as a big achievement and an important step in my career. The fact that I could master the complex situation gave me much self-confidence and showed that I could manage people successfully even in difficult situations. Today, this unique ability of handling teams attributed me as a strong leader for my people.”

Bdoan’s essay focuses on past experiences and how she handled cultural differences and beliefs, leading to her successful professional life. To achieve fulfillment in work, she breaks the barrier, communicates effectively, and embraces Japanese culture, which she set as a significant setting stone in her career life.

“Through the influence of my best friend, I have motivated myself to spend two hours during the night before I go to sleep to master the lessons the teacher has discussed in class. This helped me greatly since I would no longer have to cram and study everything for the exams later.”

Wood’s essay highlights the external factors that contributed to his achievements. External factors can lead a person to success or frustration. Through a piece of great advice, he changed his lifestyle by allowing himself to move forward and build a quality life. He compares this to Newton’s First law of motion, which he quoted and put at the beginning of his essay.

“…the more I thought about my own greatest personal academic achievement, I realized it was simply getting an A in a college history class my freshman year. Succeeding in this upper-level history class set the tone for all my future college courses and gave me the confidence I needed to achieve greatness, and I am not even a history major.”

Logan talks about his worst subject, History. He recounts how he approached his professor and overcame his weakness. This essay points out that words from others can influence self-growth and confidence. He says he developed faith in his study during college and attained his most outstanding accomplishment.

Are you having problems connecting your ideas smoothly? See this guide on transition words for essays.

After reading through the samples above, it’s time to explore your desired achievement subjects. Here are six prompts about achievements you can use:

Everyone sets expectations for themselves, dependent on the environment they’re in. It can be at work, school, or home. In these cases, the result is just as important as the process.

You can focus your essay on a relatable viewpoint, such as a student who wants to get A+ grades or an office worker who wants to get the Employee of the Month Award. Discuss ways they can excel in their surroundings. Your essay will serve as a guide to help them grow personally and professionally.

Achievements don’t need to be grand. Sometimes, simply getting out of bed is an achievement, especially for those suffering from mental illnesses such as depression. Center your essay on the simple things that can be considered achievements in their way. 

Your essay will not only serve as a reminder that it’s essential to appreciate the small things. It will also comfort those who are going through a hard time.

This topic asks you to highlight the relationship between confidence and achievements. You can interview someone confident in themselves. Ask for tips on building confidence and relay them to your readers while explaining the opportunities they can get by believing in themselves more.

In this busy world, fear is one of the most significant setbacks for people in accomplishing their goals in life. In this essay, you can explain to your readers how acknowledging their fears will help them advance.  

You can also conceptualize the effect of anxiety in achieving your desires and help you set your standard in developing self-growth. Feel free to share your experience with fears and how you plan to deal with them.

To be successful is everyone’s goal. However, sharing steps and tips on how to achieve success is general prompt many writes about. To make your piece stand out, you can tailor it to a group of individuals. For example, a student’s image of success is going on stage and graduating with honors.

Someone’s character is critical to achieving achievements. You can write about a well-known individual who went against the usual route of how success is reached. Such as Steve Jobs, who founded Apple but was a college dropout. 

There are many ways to reach a goal. Tell your readers that they don’t need to follow the conventional method of accomplishing things to get their hands on the achievements they crave.

Do you want to be more confident with your writing? Here are 11 essay writing tips you need to learn today!

Maria Caballero is a freelance writer who has been writing since high school. She believes that to be a writer doesn't only refer to excellent syntax and semantics but also knowing how to weave words together to communicate to any reader effectively.

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Dr. Jennifer B. Bernstein

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Here’s one of the most popular Common Application essay topics that’s going to be used again in the 2020-2021 admissions cycle: “Discuss an accomplishment, event, or realization that sparked a period of personal growth and a new understanding of yourself or others.”

According to the Common Application, in the 2018-2019 cycle, 23.7% of students opted to write about an experience of personal transformation that changed their perception of themselves and others.

What you’re about to read is a significantly updated version of my original article.

Since publishing this article back in 2017, more and more of my own students have written amazing Common App essays on this topic.

As such, I’ve decided to update this article to share more insights into what does and doesn’t work when crafting narratives about experiences of “personal growth.”

Read the whole article or click on one of the following links to jump ahead to any section that interests you:

What DON’T Admissions Officers Want to See in Your Common App Essay?

What DO Admissions Officers Want to Read About in Your “Sparked a Period of Personal Growth” Essay?

Why Are Colleges Interested in Essays on Personal Growth?

What Are Some Unique Ways of Approaching the “Sparked a Period of Personal Growth” Essay?

Stanford Student’s Common App Essay on an Experience that “Sparked a Period of Personal Growth”

What don’t  admissions officers want to see in your common app essay .

Let’s start by stating the obvious.

Your track record—your record of past accomplishments—plays a significant role in the college admissions process.

Many students fixate on this part of how they’re going to be evaluated. Even the most talented students fall prey to this tendency because they want to emphasize all the amazing things they’ve done.

This urge is understandable.

Rest assured that there are plenty of places in your application to showcase your accomplishments.

However, your Common Application essay ISN’T  the place to  just focus on  what you’ve done .

Admissions officers don’t  just want to read an essay that’s all about the end result or the “high impact” of your project, accomplishment, or whatever event it is that you’ve chosen to write about.

Every year, I have myth-busting conversations with students who are suffering under the mistaken idea that the Common App essay needs to be first and foremost a demonstration of some very significant high-impact thing they’ve done.

Pay close attention to my phrasing.

I’m NOT saying you shouldn’t include significant accomplishments in your Common App essay on a “period of personal growth.”

I AM saying that your essay shouldn’t  just be about the accomplishments.

Click here to a ccess all my tips, techniques, and case studies on writing great Common App essays.

What DO   Admissions Officers Want to Read About in Your “Sparked a Period of Personal Growth” Essay?

The reality is that admissions officers are extremely curious about how  YOU have been  transformed by projects, experiences, and accomplishments .

Want to write a great Common App essay on something that “sparked a period of personal growth”?

Then, you need to share your  process of transformation –your before, during , and after .

Just FYI, the best transformation narratives often feature both internal and external transformation.

Many students leap right over the “process” part of the essay. They want to jump from the “before” to the “after” because they feel the process–the “middle” or “during”–isn’t exciting or dramatic.

I know you want to dazzle the people reading your application essays.

However, mere “before and after” narratives aren’t as compelling to admissions officers as those that feature the “during.”

In addition to including the “during” part of your transformation, your “after” shouldn’t  just focus on the external result (especially in the “sparked a period of personal growth” essay). Your “after” should include some philosophical contemplation of your transformation.

I strongly recommend that you read two articles:

“Two Elements of the Best Common Application Essays”

“Techniques Used in the Best College Application Essays”

These articles feature strategies to help you master the art of structuring your Common App essay and include analysis of actual student application essays.

Why Are Colleges Interested in Essays on Personal Growth? 

The answer is simple and sometimes surprising.

Colleges aren’t  just looking at your track record.

They’re also looking forward, out beyond what you’ve already accomplished. Admissions officers need to make what a former Yale president describes as a “hunchy judgement” about your potential.

When Stanford is reviewing your application, they’re looking for signs of your “intellectual vitality”–your “commitment, dedication and genuine interest in  expanding your intellectual horizons” and “the initiative with which you seek out opportunities and  expand your perspective.”

Harvard is considering some key questions when they’re reviewing your application: “Have you reached your maximum academic and personal potential?” Or “do you have reserve  power to do more ?” “How  open are you to  new ideas and people ?” “Will you be able to stand up to the pressures and freedoms of College life?”

Yale is looking for a “desire and ability to  stretch one’s limits.”

GROWTH. EXPANSION. POTENTIAL. OPENNESS.

College is a time of massive intellectual and overall personal growth.

Admissions officers at all colleges are looking for students who are open to this process of growth and have the underlying strategies for handling it .

The best, most memorable college experiences are often ones in which your mind is blow and your perspectives expanded in ways you never could have imagined in high school.

But how can you demonstrate your potential?

How can you demonstrate that you’re ready for the challenge?

Writing your Common App essay about an experience that “sparked a period of personal growth,” especially one that transformed your “understanding of yourself or others,” is an excellent way to show colleges you have the kind of qualities and capabilities described above.

Growth, expansion, openness, and transformation sound lovely. They sound positive. But anyone who has undergone a period of massive growth knows that it’s more complex than it sounds, and there are almost always setbacks and challenges along the way.

The “during” part of your essay is a great place to show that you’ve started cultivating the underlying skills that are essential for navigating your way through the growth process.

What Are Some Unique Ways of Approaching the “Sparked a Period of Personal Growth” Essay? 

There are so many juicy possibilities for writing about an experience that “sparked a period of personal growth.”

Here are some things my students have written about. . .

Getting lost in a foreign city

Losing their passport

Changing a deeply held conviction based on the results of a research project or conversation

Getting called out by an employer for insufficient attention to details

Hurting someone’s feelings by acting in an ungrateful manner

Standing up to someone

Doing something way out of their comfort zone (e.g., working on a farm, going on a solo wilderness hike, etc.)

Taking charge of organizing a family holiday gathering due to a parent’s illness

Student Background:  One of my students who is studying engineering at Stanford was originally planning to write her Common App essay on the time she felt like a failure because she couldn’t answer a judge’s question. ( Click here to read “How to Successfully Apply to Engineering Programs.” )

Problem:  We both agreed that the first draft she wrote felt too stiff and formulaic.

She glossed over the experience with the judge. The experience just seemed like a gimmicky hook that led into a essay that was mainly about the impact her organization had on the young people in her community. That is, she was falling into the trap of trying to write a “LOOK AT WHAT I’VE DONE!!” essay that I mentioned earlier. Plus, the draft featured all the cliches guaranteed to make an admissions officer’s eyes glaze over in “I’ve read this same basic narrative a thousand times” boredom.

There wasn’t sufficient introspection. The juiciest parts of her experience–the ones that would probably matter most to college admissions committees–didn’t even make their way into her essay. The most interesting aspects of her experience had to do with the way she contemplated the implications of her inability to answer the judge’s question about how her project “could change children’s lives” and how this contemplation propelled her into a  process of rethinking the nature of her engineering work and led to the development of her organization.

Solution:  In our conversations, she shared how, up until that moment with the judge, she’d only really focused on pursuing her own intellectual interests. This experience of feeling dumfounded by the judge’s question was painful, but it set her off on a new journey that involved finding applications for her work that could benefit others. She started thinking about the needs of others, not just her own. As it turns out, this was an experience that “sparked a period of personal growth.”

As she worked through the details of this transformation in her goals and approach, she also began transitioning from always being the young person getting mentored to becoming a mentor for the next generation of budding scientists and engineers. One element of her “personal growth” had to do with this shift from always “taking” to being someone who does more “giving.” A fruit of this experience that “sparked a period of personal growth” was her development of what eventually became a high-impact and award-winning program for children in her city. This program was originally the narrative star of her essay (in terms of how much attention she gave it), but now it had even more impact because the whole personal backstory was there.

Our conversations focused on mapping out vivid anecdotes that helped admissions officers see her process of inner and outer transformation. She developed super specific “before, during, and after” anecdotes that also shed light on her family background and culture. She took readers on a journey that started with the seemingly simple question from a science fair judge that plunged her into a process of “personal growth” which ultimately resulted in a “new understanding” of herself and others.

Dr. Bernstein’s Commentary: This student’s essay was now far more psychologically and intellectually nuanced.

Her essay wasn’t filled with exaggerated external drama and didn’t have the light, whippy tone that many websites featuring sample application essays love to emphasize.

Once she let go of many of the common misunderstandings about what matters in this kind of essay, she wrote an essays that was true to her experience and style.

Her vivid “before, during, and after” anecdotes made it possible for readers to really see and feel her “aha” moment in action. It’s very satisfying when readers can feel the “aha”–when they can see your mind and heart in action.

Admissions officers aren’t  just interested in the surface level of what your essay is about.

They’re also interested in your habits of mind–the way you make sense of your experiences, your level of self-awareness, and a whole host of other qualities.

Let’s end by connecting the student’s essay back to what I shared earlier about what Stanford, Harvard, and Yale are looking for in applicants.

Now her essay showed how she keeps “questing” and stretching herself. She’s demonstrating how she has “reserve power to do more” because each significant experience she has sparks more personal growth, contemplation, and action. She’s constantly deepening and expanding her perspectives to benefit not only herself but also others. So even though this essay started with what seemed like a moment of failure (not being able to answer the judge’s question), it was really about her own growth.

WAYS TO WORK WITH DR. BERNSTEIN!

Click here to learn how to schedule a private consultation with Dr. Bernstein.

Click here to learn more about Dr. Bernstein’s ongoing private college preparation and college admissions support .

Click here to learn about the online Get Yourself Into College® program .

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How To Answer Essay Prompt 5 In The Common App: Growth

Understanding the essay prompt: personal growth.

The first step in effectively answering the essay prompt is to fully understand its significance and what is being asked of you. By comprehending the prompt, you can ensure that your response aligns with the expectations of the reader and effectively conveys your personal growth experience. Let's break down this section further:

Importance of the Prompt

Begin by discussing the importance of the essay prompt. Explain why colleges or institutions often include this type of question in their applications. Highlight how this prompt allows admissions officers to gain insight into your character, self-awareness, and ability to reflect on your experiences. Emphasize that this prompt offers you an opportunity to showcase your personal growth and demonstrate your capacity for introspection.

Breaking Down the Prompt

Next, dissect the essay prompt itself. Analyze each component and identify the key elements you need to address in your response. These elements may include discussing the specific accomplishment, event, or realization, as well as the subsequent personal growth and new understanding gained from it. Encourage readers to carefully read the prompt multiple times to ensure a comprehensive understanding.

Identifying Key Elements

Now, focus on identifying the key elements within the essay prompt. Discuss the importance of recognizing and addressing each component separately. Explain how thoroughly addressing each element will help you provide a well-rounded and compelling narrative. Give examples of how different accomplishments, events, or realizations may lead to distinct periods of personal growth and new understandings.

By understanding the essay prompt, breaking it down, and identifying key elements, you lay the foundation for crafting a well-structured and insightful essay. This section sets the stage for the subsequent steps in the essay writing process, enabling you to choose the most suitable topic for your response.

Choosing Your Topic

Once you have a clear understanding of the essay prompt, the next step is to carefully choose a topic that aligns with the requirements and allows you to effectively convey your personal growth experience. Selecting the right topic is crucial in creating an engaging and impactful essay. Let's explore the steps involved in choosing your topic:

Reflecting on Personal Accomplishments

Start by reflecting on your personal accomplishments. Consider moments in your life where you overcame challenges, achieved significant milestones, or demonstrated exceptional skills or qualities. These accomplishments could be academic, athletic, artistic, or even personal achievements. Think about how these accomplishments have contributed to your personal growth and understanding of yourself or others.

Identifying Significant Events

Think about significant events that have shaped your life. These events could be positive or negative, life-changing or transformative. Reflect on experiences such as traveling, volunteering, participating in a community project, or facing a difficult situation. Identify events that have had a profound impact on your personal growth and have provided valuable insights about yourself or others.

Recognizing Realizations for Growth

Consider moments of realization that have sparked personal growth and a new understanding. These realizations could be the result of self-reflection, interactions with others, or even unexpected circumstances. Reflect on instances where you gained a deeper understanding of your values, beliefs, or perspectives, or where you developed empathy and compassion towards others. Identify realizations that have led to transformative periods of growth and self-discovery.

By reflecting on personal accomplishments, identifying significant events, and recognizing realizations for growth, you can narrow down potential topics for your essay. Choose a topic that resonates with you personally and allows you to showcase your journey of personal growth and understanding. Once you have chosen your topic, you can move on to the next step of structuring your response.

Structuring Your Response

After selecting a topic that aligns with the essay prompt, it's essential to structure your response in a clear and organized manner. A well-structured essay not only helps you effectively communicate your ideas but also ensures that your reader can follow your narrative seamlessly. Let's delve into the steps involved in structuring your response:

Creating an Outline

Begin by creating an outline for your essay. An outline serves as a roadmap, guiding you through the writing process and helping you maintain a logical flow of ideas. Divide your essay into sections, such as introduction, body paragraphs, and conclusion. Within the body paragraphs, outline the main points or events you will discuss to support your personal growth journey.

Writing a Strong Introduction

Craft a strong introduction that captures the reader's attention and provides a clear overview of your essay. Start with a compelling hook that draws the reader in, such as an intriguing anecdote or a thought-provoking question related to your topic. Clearly state the purpose of your essay and provide a brief overview of the accomplishment, event, or realization that sparked your personal growth and new understanding.

Developing the Body of Your Essay

The body paragraphs form the core of your essay, where you will elaborate on the accomplishment, event, or realization and its impact on your personal growth and understanding. Start each body paragraph with a topic sentence that introduces the main point you will discuss. Provide specific details, examples, and anecdotes to support each point. Ensure a smooth transition between paragraphs to maintain coherence and flow.

Concluding Your Essay

End your essay with a strong and memorable conclusion. Summarize the main points discussed in the body paragraphs and emphasize the significance of your personal growth journey. Reflect on the lessons learned and the impact it has had on your understanding of yourself or others. Leave the reader with a final thought or reflection that reinforces the transformative nature of your experience.

By following a well-structured approach, you can effectively convey your personal growth journey and engage the reader throughout your essay. Next, we will explore how to demonstrate your personal growth and understanding in a compelling way.

Demonstrating Personal Growth and Understanding

Once you have established a strong structure for your essay, the next step is to effectively demonstrate your personal growth and understanding. This section focuses on showcasing your transformation and highlighting the new insights gained through your experience. Let's delve into the key elements of demonstrating personal growth and understanding:

Highlighting Your Journey

Share the details of your personal growth journey in a vivid and engaging manner. Describe the initial state or mindset you were in before the accomplishment, event, or realization took place. Discuss the challenges or obstacles you faced and how they contributed to your personal growth. Provide specific examples and anecdotes that illustrate the transformational process you underwent.

Showcasing Your Transformation

Emphasize how the accomplishment, event, or realization sparked a period of personal growth. Discuss the specific changes you underwent, both internally and externally. Illustrate how your mindset, beliefs, values, or actions shifted as a result of this experience. Provide evidence of your growth through examples, anecdotes, and reflections that highlight the positive changes you have made.

Presenting New Understandings

Articulate the new understanding you have gained about yourself or others through this experience. Reflect on how your perspective has broadened or deepened as a result. Discuss the insights, empathy, or compassion you have developed through your personal growth journey. Provide examples of how this new understanding has influenced your interactions, relationships, or decision-making process.

By effectively highlighting your journey, showcasing your transformation, and presenting new understandings, you can provide a compelling narrative that demonstrates the depth of your personal growth and understanding. This section allows you to connect your experience to broader themes and showcase the significance of your journey. Next, we will explore the importance of reviewing and refining your essay before finalizing it.

Reviewing and Refining Your Essay

Once you have written your essay, it's crucial to review and refine it to ensure clarity, coherence, and effectiveness. This section will guide you through the important steps of reviewing and refining your essay:

Editing for Clarity and Coherence

Read through your essay with a critical eye, focusing on improving clarity and coherence. Ensure that your ideas are expressed in a clear and concise manner. Check for any repetitive or redundant sentences and eliminate unnecessary information. Pay attention to the flow of your essay, ensuring that each paragraph transitions smoothly to the next. Clarify any confusing or ambiguous statements to enhance the overall readability of your essay.

Proofreading for Grammar and Spelling

Carefully proofread your essay for grammar, spelling, and punctuation errors. Check for commonly misused words and ensure that verb tenses are consistent throughout. Look out for typos, missing punctuation, and other grammatical mistakes. It may be helpful to read your essay aloud or have someone else proofread it to catch any errors that may have been overlooked.

Getting Feedback and Making Revisions

Seek feedback from trusted individuals, such as teachers, mentors, or peers. Ask them to review your essay and provide constructive criticism. Consider their suggestions for improvement and revise your essay accordingly. Pay attention to areas where clarity or coherence may be lacking and make necessary revisions. Remember, feedback can provide valuable insights and help you polish your essay to make it even stronger.

By reviewing and refining your essay, you can ensure that your ideas are effectively communicated, your writing is error-free, and your essay is compelling and engaging. Taking the time to carefully review your work demonstrates your commitment to presenting the best version of your personal growth journey. In the final section, we will conclude by emphasizing the importance of crafting a powerful response to the essay prompt.

Final Thoughts

Crafting a powerful response to the essay prompt requires careful attention to detail and a thoughtful approach. This section will summarize the key points discussed throughout the essay and emphasize the importance of leaving a lasting impression on the reader.

Summarizing the Key Points

Begin by summarizing the main points discussed in your essay. Recap the accomplishment, event, or realization that sparked your personal growth and new understanding. Remind the reader of the specific examples and anecdotes that highlighted your journey and showcased your transformation. Briefly reiterate the significance of your personal growth experience and its impact on your understanding of yourself or others.

Reflecting on Lessons Learned

Reflect on the lessons you have learned throughout your personal growth journey. Discuss the insights, values, or perspectives that have evolved as a result of this experience. Comment on how these lessons have positively influenced your life and interactions with others. Highlight the ongoing relevance and application of these lessons beyond the specific situation discussed in your essay.

Reiterating the Importance of the Journey

Emphasize the significance of your personal growth journey and its relevance to the essay prompt. Discuss how this journey has shaped you into the person you are today and how it will continue to impact your future endeavors. Articulate the newfound self-awareness and understanding you have gained, emphasizing the lasting effects of this transformative experience.

Leaving a Lasting Impression

End your essay with a memorable and thought-provoking statement. Consider leaving the reader with a final reflection or question that encourages further contemplation. Aim to evoke an emotional response or inspire the reader to consider their own personal growth and understanding. Leave a lasting impression that reinforces the power of self-reflection and the value of embracing transformative experiences.

By crafting a powerful conclusion, you can leave a lasting impact on the reader and ensure that your essay stands out from others. Remember to revise and refine your conclusion to ensure it aligns with the overall tone and message of your essay. With a well-crafted response, you can effectively address the essay prompt and showcase your personal growth journey in a compelling and authentic manner.

Writing about personal growth is more than recounting events—it's about sharing the journey of self-awareness and transformation. In essay form, the challenge lies not just in highlighting achievements but in conveying how these moments reshape one's worldview. For prospective students, the most impactful essays come from genuine experiences and introspection. Ultimately, this exercise isn't just about academic merit but about understanding and effectively communicating one's evolving narrative, a skill invaluable for future endeavors.

I hope you found this guide useful. Navigating campus life can be daunting, but you don’t have to do it alone. Once you're accepted into college, hop onto MeetYourClass – your go-to platform to find roommates, friends, and your community. Connect with like-minded students, find your perfect roommate, and immerse yourself in campus culture. As you embark on your application journey, remember: your next chapter of friendships and experiences is just a click away. Best of luck, and we hope to see you soon on MeetYourClass!

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How to Write the Common App Essay–Examples for 2023-2024

So, you’re applying to college and are probably panicking about how to write the hardest part of your application: the Common Application essay. Don’t panic! We’re here to help. If you keep the following tips in mind, we’re confident that you’ll be well on your way to drafting a strong application essay that screams out, “Dear College, this is who I am, and here’s why you want me!”

So, let’s start with some basics.

What is the Common Application Essay?

The Common Application centralizes the admissions process for over 900 schools. These participating colleges and universities all use the same common biographical and academic information forms. Most of the schools also require or accept the Common Application essay. Neat, huh? Essentially, you choose the schools you want to apply to, add them to your application list, fill in the general demographic and biographical information, upload or input academic records and standardized testing information, designate people to write you recommendations, and upload the Common Application essay. All of this is done in one place. That’s it. Simple, right?

Now, many of the top-tiered schools require additional information and essays, but most of these documents can be uploaded into the Common Application. If you’re applying to art schools, the schools will provide extra links on their Common Application sites. Those links will lead you to a website where you can upload your art portfolio and additional documents.  We’ll discuss such additional requirements in another post.

What do I need to include in the Common App Essay?

While the Common Application essay regularly makes adjustments to its essay prompts, for the 2022-2023 college application season, the prompts will remain exactly the same as last year, when the rarely used prompt about solving a problem was replaced with one that was inspired by scientific research on gratitude and kindness, to, according to Common App President & CEO Jenny Rickard, “help students think about something positive and heartfelt in their lives.” The 2023-2024 Common App Essay prompts also still contain the optional COVID-19 prompt that appeared in 2020.

• Some students have a background, identity, interest, or talent so meaningful they believe their application would be incomplete without it. If this sounds like you, please share your story.

The lessons we take from obstacles we encounter can be fundamental to later success. Recount a time when you faced a challenge, setback, or failure. How did it affect you, and what did you learn from the experience?

Reflect on a time when you questioned or challenged a belief or idea. What prompted your thinking? What was the outcome?

Reflect on something that someone has done for you that has made you happy or thankful in a surprising way. How has this gratitude affected or motivated you?

Discuss an accomplishment, event, or realization that sparked a period of personal growth and a new understanding of yourself or others.

• Describe a topic, idea, or concept you find so engaging it makes you lose all track of time. Why does it captivate you? What or who do you turn to when you want to learn more?
• Share an essay on any topic of your choice. It can be one you’ve already written, one that responds to a different prompt, or one of your own design.

Did you notice a common theme among these questions? At its core, the Common Application essay is designed to make you answer the question, “WHO are you?”  What colleges and universities want to know is (1) how your experiences or background have shaped you into the person you are today and (2) how who you are today is going to affect your future academic performance.

Why is the Common App Essay important?

This essay is one of the most important parts of your application, and in some cases, especially for top-tiered schools, it is weighed as much as, or more than, your grades and test scores—estimates say that they can account for anywhere from 10 to 30% of admission decisions. Why? Well, think about it. If most of the applicants applying to a top college have similar academic profiles, how can the schools distinguish one candidate from another? It’s all in the story you craft, and we’re here to help you present the best version of you !

Preparing to Write Your Common App Essay

A good starting point for writing a successful application essay is reading Common App essay examples that got other students admitted to their schools of choice. However, keep in mind that you do that for inspiration only and that your goal is not to copy anyone—ultimately, you’ll have to come up with your very own story and present it in your very own way. The tips and “dos and don’ts” below can help you do exactly that as you prepare to write or rewrite your Common Application essay.

You are also well advised to ask your teachers, counselors, and other mentors for advice at any step of the process: Maybe come up with a list of potential topics and let someone who knows you and is aware of your goal (to get into your school of choice) give you feedback on what they think suits or doesn’t suit you. Or make a draft of your story (maybe just in your head) and call your mentor to ask them if they would choose you as a prospective student based on that story. You can of course also seek out professional proofreaders like us to help you revise your personal statement and make it shine!

The two main points of getting yourself ready for writing your Common App essay are (1) that admissions committees have no preference for which prompt you choose and (2) that your essay is not a place to restate what you already said on your resumé or in the Common App “activities” section. You also don’t have to prove that you somehow changed the world or did something heroic. Instead, the essay is a chance for you to show the admissions committee the “you” that your friends, classmates, teachers, and family know. Our advice for where to start is to brainstorm the best (most interesting, most meaningful, most unique…) stories about your life that you can think of, and then look at the question prompts and decide which one your story could be an answer to.

Common App Essay Writing Timelines

Now that we agree on how important your Common App essay is, you will not be surprised if we recommend that you start working on it several months before the actual deadline. Why so early? Because you don’t want to rush or force it or regret your choice of topic when it’s too late to change. If you see this as a creative process that needs time, you’ll make the most out of it and also learn a lot along the way that will help you with writing other essays and assignments once you got into your school of choice!

Timeline 1: Write a Common App Essay in three months

Now you have one finished essay to apply with and two more weeks to show it around for more feedback in case you get second thoughts or to change it up again after sleeping on it for a couple of days.

If this seems like way too much time to invest in and focus on your essay, then try this:

Timeline 2: Write your Common App Essay in one month

Since you don’t have much time for feedback if you start that late, make sure you contact your advisors/teachers well in advance to let them know when you’ll be ready so that they can schedule you in or tell you when they are available. You don’t want to pressure people and step on their toes when you need their valuable input!

Great Common App Essay Examples for 2023-2024

We found some of the best Common App essay examples from this year and years past to give you a sense of what kinds of essays work best to captivate admissions officials. We have listed essay examples in each section by their corresponding essay prompt to help you understand what kinds of responses are most suitable. Although your essay will be unique and might vary significantly from the examples below, read through each one to get an overall idea.

Common App Essay Examples: Prompt #1

Some students have a background, identity, interest, or talent that is so meaningful they believe their application would be incomplete without it. If this sounds like you, then please share your story.

This prompt asks applicants to write about what makes them uniquely them. Whether you’re writing about a hobby, your background, or how you define yourself, it’s important to tell a story so central to who you are that your application would be incomplete without it.

When answering this prompt, it’s easy to repeat information that you are already presenting outside of the essay. Avoid this at all costs. Remember: the essay is supposed to add a new dimension to your application.

See this sample essay to get a sense of what a great response to this prompt could look like.

• Handiwork – An essay about interest in creating crafts. This student expertly illustrates their dedication to a hobby by presenting anecdotes packed with sensory details.

Excerpt from “Handiwork”

I’ve always been a crafter. From the early days of Kindergarten macaroni ornaments, to making my own prom dress last year, I’ve had a knack for creating things. For drafting sketches, drawing plans, making calculations, gathering supplies, adding finishing touches. There is something so satisfying about holding something you, and you alone, have made—something that was just an image in your mind until you set about to bring it into existence, to create something new, something different. I’m sure there are hundreds of doll furniture sets out there in that same gray and pink, but there is only one with fitted (albeit with sloppy stitching) navy blue covers. There’s a sense of pride there, however small.

Common App Essay Examples: Prompt #2 

This is one of the more challenging prompts. It can be difficult to demonstrate strength and potential while writing about failure. However, if you’re comfortable with introspection and making yourself a bit more vulnerable, this prompt is a great option.

A good response to this prompt demonstrates a high level of confidence and maturity as well as humility and a willingness to learn. Simply writing about a failure does nothing; students should focus on how they handled their failures in positive ways.

This essay example demonstrates how to approach this prompt.

• Striking Out – An essay about setbacks and overcoming obstacles. Note the effectiveness of this kind of narrative in showing your abilities and perseverance.

Excerpt from “Striking Out”

About a week later, some of my friends from the team got together at the park to hang out. When I arrived, I was a little surprised that no one seemed to be mad at me – after all, I’d lost us the game, and they had to be disappointed about not making it to the semifinals. It wasn’t until we split into teams for an impromptu pickup game that I started to realize why no one was upset. Maybe it was the excitement of reaching the playoffs or the pressure of living up to my brothers’ examples, but sometime during that game, I’d lost sight of why most of us played summer league baseball. It wasn’t to win the championship, as cool as that would have been. It was because we all loved to play. I didn’t need a trophy or a Hollywood come-from-behind win to have fun playing baseball with my friends, but maybe I needed to strike out to remember that.

Common App Essay Examples: Prompt #3

This is an extremely broad question – students could write about nearly anything they have ever questioned. It is important to keep in mind, however, that not all ideas and beliefs make great essays.

Students should not write about something superficial; they should write about ideas and beliefs that are central to their identities. A response to this prompt should demonstrate thoughtfulness, open-mindedness, and an ability to think analytically.

The following essay demonstrates what it takes to address this prompt effectively.

• Gym Class Hero – An essay about challenging an idea despite all the odds being stacked against you. Note the author’s use of internal monologue to move the narrative along and captivate the reader.

Excerpt from “Gym Class Hero”

Where did my doubt come from? No one ever said to me, “Oh, you can’t run a mile.” I don’t even remember any askance looks, any raised eyebrows implying I was out of my depth. Middle-schoolers can be a cruel bunch, but not that day. There was just that voice in my head, as clear as a bell: “You’ll never be able to run a mile. You can’t even climb stairs without getting winded. It’s going to hurt. You’ll probably pass out. You could never run a mile.’ A whole mile? That voice was right. It was, in my mind, impossibly long. What was I going to do?

Common App Essay Examples: Prompt #4 

As mentioned above, this prompt was added last year and inspired by scientific research on gratitude and kindness, specifically, by research on the benefits of writing about the positive influence that other people have on our lives.

While this prompt may seem to be asking a simple question, your answer has the potential to provide deep insights into who you are to the admissions committee. Explaining what you are grateful for can show them your culture, your community, your philosophical outlook on the world, and what makes you tick.

Common App Essay Examples: Prompt #5 

We all have had experiences that helped us grow and mature, and this prompt is therefore a good option for most—if not all—applicants.

The key here is to choose the “right” accomplishment, event, or realization and then write about it in a way that showcases depth and self-analytical skills. When identifying a period of personal growth, try to stay within the past few years. You want to show the admissions officers who you are now, and a childhood story is not likely to accomplish this as effectively.

This essay is a great example of how to properly approach this prompt.

• Student Teacher – An essay about an event that sparked personal growth. This essay example shows how demonstrating mental growth and wisdom can be just as effective as retelling how you overcame a difficulty. 

Excerpt from “Student Teacher”

Anthony’s success wasn’t just his plane. He had succeeded in making me aware of my own failures. Here was a student who was never taken seriously and had developed a bunch of behavioral issues as a result. I never stopped to look for his potential, discover his interests, or get to know the kid beneath the facade. I had grossly underestimated Anthony, and I am grateful that he was able to disillusion me. I like to think that I’m an open-minded, liberal, and non-judgmental person. Anthony taught me that I’m not there yet.

Common App Essay Examples: Prompt #6

Describe a topic, idea, or concept you find so engaging that it makes you lose all track of time. Why does it captivate you? What or who do you turn to when you want to learn more?

Like Prompt 3, Prompt 6 is very broad, and allows students to write about nearly any interest they might have. The purpose of this question is to learn what excites and motivates an applicant. Therefore, this option is ideal for students with concrete and established passions. On the other hand, students who are not sure what they are enthusiastic about should probably consider a different prompt.

To approach this prompt, start by listing all the topics, ideas, and concepts you care most about and then narrow those down to those you can describe, justify, and explain .

See the following essay, taken from this collection of “essays that worked” , to get a sense of what makes a great response to this prompt about passion for a hobby.

Excerpt from “Left and Right Don’t Exist”

Through flying, I began to consider all points of view, regardless of my personal perspective. Perhaps it was my ability to scan the horizon to communicate a single story, uniting contrasting outlooks, that drew me to my love for journalism and the diverse melting pot that was my community. To me, journalism modernizes the ancient power of storytelling, filled with imperfect characters and intricate conflicts to which I am the narrator. As editor-in-chief for my school newspaper, The Wildcat’s Tale, I aim to share the uncensored perspective of all students and encourage my editorial groups to talk — and listen — to those with whom they disagree. Starting each newspaper edition with a socratic, round-table discussion, I ask the other journalists to pursue stories that answer the questions: why did this happen and where will it lead?

Additional Common App Essay Writing Tips

There are a few other common essay mistakes you should avoid, and reading about these in advance might help you steer clear of making a fundamental error when it comes to choosing your application essay topic.

Preparing Your Common App Essay for Submission

We know we keep repeating ourselves, but after writing your application essay, be sure to have it reviewed by a trusted friend or colleague, and edited by a professional editing service like Wordvice before you finally hand it in. And while writing, make use of our hundreds of admissions resources on making your way through the college and university admissions process.

An outstanding admissions essay should have a great topic. However, it should also use clear, crisp, engaging language and be free of errors. If you require further help on this front, check out Wordvice’s full suite of English editing and proofreading services , including our essay editing services . These services are ideal for international students who struggle with English or any students who want to take their essays to the next level. 

Wordvice essay editors not only correct grammatical and stylistic errors but also provide suggestions on how you can improve the content of your essays. We are proud to say that we were ranked best admissions essay editing service by Wired.com. Check out Wordvice’s free AI proofreading tool and admissions editing services to learn how our editors can elevate your writing and help you get into your dream school.

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January 31, 2024

Strategy for Writing an Accomplishment Essay (with examples)

Maybe you’re familiar with macros – the nutrients your body needs to function. Achieving the proper balance of macros leads to optimal health. When it comes to writing your MBA personal statements and application essays, it might be helpful to think of your accomplishments as the carbohydrates, protein, and fat – in other words, the macros – you need to make your submissions the best they can be. A fascinating brainstorming session among Accepted’s admissions consultants revealed that applicants don’t always understand how MBA adcoms define an accomplishment, so we wrote this post to explain what goes into the recipe for an enticing “accomplishments sandwich” and remove the guesswork on your part. Here are the simple macros:

Carbohydrates = Impact and Initiative

Protein = Overcoming Obstacles

Fats = Demonstrating Leadership

Carbohydrates are known as the “staff of life,” something nearly everyone considers a staple of their diet. Similarly, for your accomplishment essay, your “carbs” are what will . 

For example, maybe you took the initiative to boost membership in a group or led a team to victory. Perhaps you built a coalition in student government. Or you increased sales, cut costs, or found a solution to a problem that paved the way for a critical deal to go forward.

When you assess whether your achievements belong in a greatest accomplishment essay, think impact and initiative . 

Do awards count? It depends. If you won an award for a published story, an athletic competition, or some other “personal best,” then yes, those would be excellent choices for an essay about a personal achievement. More often, however, you will be asked to write about a significant achievement with impact beyond your own personal growth . In these situations, an award you’d like to write about would have had to result from an effort – either academic or professional – that involved a team or people other than yourself. This is the kind of achievement that transcends a “personal best.”  

By now, you can probably see the difference between a primarily personal achievement and a career-related one. You might even already recognize which of your accomplishments are notable enough to write about. But let’s say you don’t have much that feels important enough. How you can identify potential experiences for your accomplishments essay?

A good place to start is by reviewing your resume. Ideally, it will be loaded with as many quantifiable achievements as possible, from both professional and extracurricular roles. If you work in marketing and clinched four new accounts in a single year, leading to a promotion, that’s an achievement. If you work in a social service agency and developed a new intake system for clients that the agency adopted, leading to a more organized and streamlined process, that’s an achievement. In college, you might have been involved in a student organization that promotes career development and leadership among minority students, and even became president of that organization. That’s an achievement.

Which experiences on your resume stand out to you now? No doubt you’ll start to see things popping out at you.

Seemingly small achievements can also be big. The following sample essay offers a great example where the impact seems limited to one person but radiates outward: 

From the first day I was tasked to mentor a new hire, Thomas, it was a challenge. He had strong work experience in product development at his previous job, but he was soft-spoken and reserved, and had a strong stutter. I felt pain for him as he struggled to complete a word or a sentence, but it was also awkward for both of us as I waited for him to finish his point. During a department meeting, someone actually rolled her eyes as Thomas was answering a question. I just glared at her for being so cold. At our weekly department lunches, which were meant to be a relaxed social time for everyone, Thomas hung back quietly, seeming like he was a million miles away. 

I still didn’t understand why Thomas seemed a little slow to catch on to the ways of our department. He was clearly very intelligent. It was taking me longer to complete my own work because of the extra time I was spending with him on his assignments. One afternoon on a whim, I invited him to join me for dinner at a popular burger place. He looked surprised but agreed.

That night broke the ice. Thomas relaxed and enjoyed his dinner, and I noticed his speech was more fluid as well. We discovered a mutual love of soccer and political thriller novels. I really enjoyed his company and told him so. We went out again the following week to an Italian place that he chose. On our third “date,” Thomas opened up about a broken engagement that happened just before he started this new job. He knew that his grief was distracting him, clouding his thinking, and making his stutter worse. 

“I know I’ve not been easy to train,” he told me, “but I’m starting to come out of it now.” After that night, Thomas’s work improved rapidly. He risked speaking up more at the weekly lunches and at meetings, and everyone was patient when he struggled to say something, though those occasions were less frequent. 

I consider this mentoring experience one of my greatest accomplishments, because in trying to befriend a coworker, I not only gained a true friend for myself but also helped him gain confidence and perform to his capacity at work. It was the first time in my life I felt I had such a strong and positive impact on another person. It showed me the power of small gestures of friendship and understanding. 

This writer’s decision to offer a listening ear to a coworker who was clearly in some sort of distress became an inspiring achievement that was both personal and professional. His actions had impact that flowed outward beyond just Thomas to the entire department and organization. 

Protein= Overcoming Obstacles

Overcoming obstacles such as a lack of resources – time, money, talent, or people – magnifies your accomplishments. Our best-laid plans rarely go smoothly, so make sure you discuss any difficulties you faced. By the way, the obstacle can work “double-duty,” representing a failure that you experienced and chose to learn from, while also showing that you emerged wiser and more capable at the end. When discussing either obstacles or failures, make sure not to blame other people or circumstances, or to complain about the unfairness of it all. Pointing fingers makes you look small and as though you want to avoid accountability. State the facts simply, and the situation will speak for itself. 

Here’s an example of how one applicant dealt with a significant obstacle: 

My book launch had been planned for nearly one year. This was my first book, a biography about my great-grandmother, a trailblazing homeopathic physician who lived at a time when even regular women MDs were a rarity. I wanted to self-publish but knew there was a huge amount of work involved that I didn’t feel suited for. There was editing, design, layout, marketing, getting the book accepted into the book distribution system, logistics, and more. Most published books are quickly forgotten and sell few copies. I didn’t want that to happen to mine. 

My solution was to sign an agreement with my friend Haley to publish my book. She was a talented graphic artist who had set up her own publishing company to publish her husband’s book. Our agreement spelled out our individual financial obligations and responsibilities, but I had a nagging worry. Her marriage was tumultuous, and she could make impulsive decisions. 

Six weeks before the publishing date, a popular book blogger promised a 5-star review on her blog. I also sold an excerpt to a women’s magazine with more than 4 million readers. I was still doing my “happy dance” when Haley called to tell me that our deal was off. She was leaving her husband and driving to stay with her mother, who lived in another state. She said she’d be in touch to work something out. She didn’t say when.

I was furious and anguished. My biggest problem was that the book’s ISBN (identification) numbers for print and digital downloads were assigned to Haley’s company and could not be reassigned to anyone else. Haley also had the distribution and payment agreements in her name. I could have kicked myself for not listening to my intuition, which warned me against working with someone whose life was so upside-down.

I researched my options. The ISBNs could not be transferred to me, but if I bought her publishing company, I would also own her ISBNs. I had no idea if Haley would agree to this or how we would work out terms, but the only way to save my book was to do the very thing I had tried to avoid: become a publisher myself. 

The following week, Haley agreed to sell me her publishing company for a token amount. It had no assets, and I had already paid for all book-related costs, except for Haley’s time. She also promised to help me with the transition of all the accounts. I decided not to look too far ahead and just focus on giving my book the best send-off into the world that I could. I named the publishing company after my great-grandmother. 

This story about a close call with a publishing disaster revealed the writer’s achievement of stretching beyond what she thought she could do and moving forward because she had to. Making lemonade out of lemons this way was certainly an achievement worth sharing.  

Let’s review where we are so far with our “macros”       

Protein = Overcoming Obstacles 

Now, let’s incorporate our “fats.”       

Leadership accomplishments that work well in application essays usually involve one’s ability to influence, motivate, persuade, direct, and work effectively with others. This adds much needed energy to your essay.                

Think about how you have worked with other people – how you led a team, what you learned, and so on. What specifically did you do to demonstrate leadership skills? What did you learn about leadership , and how have you grown as a leader through the experience?

In this next example, the writer’s accomplishment through leadership seemed almost accidental:

My job teaching in a private school began uneventfully. I had a class of bright 4th graders, with only a handful expected to be “challenging.” I loved my supervisor, Monica, who was a gifted teacher but new to her role as a team lead overseeing the 3rd and 4th grades. In addition to having one class of her own, Monica was supposed to create interventions for struggling students, incentivize specific behavior or achievements, plan events and trips, and offer guidance to teachers. 

Monica quickly showed that her skill set was strong in the classroom but not in administration. She let requests from teachers for interventions or advice pile up, and she got testy when I reminded her that I was waiting for her feedback. I wanted to work with her and not against her, so I offered to help. I suggested we meet twice a week after school to review her in-box, which was when I discovered that just by having me sit and listen to her discuss the situations, she focused much better. Although I only had two years’ experience as a teacher, Monica still seemed to value my opinion on handling awkward situations, such as when a wealthy parent who was on the school’s board of directors refused to face the reality of her daughter’s chronically aggressive behavior in class. This case was bigger than the both of us. We agreed that Monica needed to bring it to the headmistress of the school for her intervention.

About halfway through the year, Monica and I were still meeting regularly. It was an unexpected partnership, and it was clear to both of us that she wanted to return to full-time teaching. I realized that the administrative tasks and decision-making came more naturally to me than to her, and that after a few more years of teaching experience and a master’s degree in education, I might enjoy having a job like hers. 

Another person in her situation might have simply become angry or resentful at my trying to play a role in her job. She could have shut me out completely. But Monica and I became friends, and I learned a lot from watching her dynamism in the classroom. Additionally, she courageously told the headmistress about our arrangement and asked if the school could pay me for my extra hours – which it did. 

This was a totally unexpected situation that helped me realize that I wanted to take a fork in the road of my career in education. 

Finding the experiences in your life where you have shown initiative and impact, overcome obstacles, and demonstrated leadership will help you write an essay deserving of a chef’s kiss!

Are you thinking about what you could include in a winning accomplishments essay? Team up with Accepted’s consultants for help identifying your best material. As your partner and guide in this process, we will ensure that your selections make you stand out for all the right reasons!

By Judy Gruen, former Accepted admissions consultant. Judy holds a master’s in journalism from Northwestern University. She is also the co-author of Accepted’s first full-length book, MBA Admission for Smarties: The No-Nonsense Guide to Acceptance at Top Business Schools . Want an admissions expert help you get accepted? Click here to get in touch!

Related Resources:

• From Example to Exemplary , your guide to writing outstanding essays
•   Four Ways to Show How You’ll Contribute in the Future
• Four Tips for Highlighting Your Strengths in Your Application Essays

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Personal Accomplishment Essay Writing Secrets To Bear in Mind

EssayEdge > Blog > Personal Accomplishment Essay Writing Secrets To Bear in Mind

Most of what is applicable to writing a successful  personal growth  essay holds here for Accomplishment pieces: Colleges use the relation of accomplishments to get insight into applicants’ personalities and character traits. Some schools ask targeted questions, while others leave the topic open for applicant interpretation.

An important point is to refrain from repeating information found elsewhere in the application. Some “overachievers” try to include virtually all their accomplishments in one essay, missing the point of the exercise altogether. A laundry list of academic, extracurricular, and work successes will not give admissions officers much more insight into your personality. In fact, they may infer that you do not realize that, in college, you will not be able to be essay editor , editor-in-chief of the school newspaper, president of the honor society, captain of the football team, and president of the class all at the same time. The mature applicant knows that college will require a student to focus on a few interests but spend more time and effort pursuing them.

Need help? Check out EssayEdge editing services:

For those of you who were not the school “all-star,” do not worry. Some of the best Accomplishment essays have been written about what could be construed as mundane events—learning how to bake a cake, miraculously getting the engine in your first car (which you affectionately call your “clunker”) to start, or getting your elderly and bed-ridden neighbor to smile by performing your cheesy stand-up routine. The accomplishment does not need to be earth-shattering, but you do need to show why it is important for you and how it has affected you in a discernible way.

Discussing and revealing some writing secrets is a good idea, but not all information should be publicized. If you plan to regularly text us and say: “I need help editing my essay ,” let it be your small proofreading tip. The smartest person always wins, so we’ll be happy to see our clients get accepted to their dream colleges.

Sample Essays And Comments

• Well Done Accomplishments Essay

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How to Write the Common Application Essays 2023-2024 (With Examples)

The Common App essay is one of the most important parts of your application, but it can be extremely daunting if you’re not familiar with creative writing or what admissions officers are looking for.

In this blog post, we’ll provide advice on how to break down these prompts, organize your thoughts, and craft a strong, meaningful response that admissions officers will notice. If you’d like more free personalized help, you can get your essays reviewed and explore school-by-school essay help on CollegeVine.

Why the Common App Essay Matters

Admissions is a human process. While admissions committees look at grades, test scores, and extracurriculars, there are five students that have great qualifications in those areas for every spot in a university’s class. As an applicant, you need an admissions counselor to choose you over everyone else — to advocate specifically for you. 

This is where essays come in; they are an opportunity for you to turn an admissions counselor into an advocate for your application! Of your essays, the Common App is the most important since it is seen by most of the colleges to which you apply. It is also your longest essay, which gives you more space to craft a narrative and share your personality, feelings, and perspective.

It’s not hyperbole to say that getting the Common App essay right is the single most important thing you can do to improve your chances of admission as a senior. 

Overview of the Common App

The Common App essay is the best way for admissions committees to get to know you. While SAT scores, your past course load, and your grades provide a quantitative picture of you as a student, the Common App essay offers adcoms a refreshing glimpse into your identity and personality. For this reason, try to treat the essay as an opportunity to tell colleges why you are unique and what matters to you.

Since your Common App essay will be seen by numerous colleges, you will want to paint a portrait of yourself that is accessible to a breadth of institutions and admissions officers (for example, if you are only applying to engineering programs at some schools, don’t focus your Common App on STEM at the expense of your other applications — save that for your supplemental essays).

In short, be open and willing to write about a topic you love, whether it is sports, music, politics, food, or watching movies. The Common App essay is more of a conversation than a job interview.

What Makes a Great Common App Essay?

A great Common App essay is, first and foremost, deeply personal. You are relying on the admissions committee to choose you over someone else, which they are more likely to do if they feel a personal connection to you. In your essay, you should delve into your feelings, how you think about situations/problems, and how you make decisions.

Good essays also usually avoid cliche topics . A couple overdone themes include an immigrant’s journey (particularly if you’re Asian American), and a sports accomplishment or injury. It’s not that these topics are bad, but rather that many students write about these subjects, so they don’t stand out as much. Of course, some students are able to write a genuine and unique essay about one of these topics, but it’s hard to pull off. You’re better off writing about more nuanced aspects of your identity!

You should also, of course, pay close attention to your grammar and spelling, use varied sentence structure and word choice, and be consistent with your tone/writing style. Take full advantage of the available 650 words, as writing less tends to mean missed opportunities.

Finally, it’s a good practice to be aware of your audience – know who you are writing for! For example, admissions officers at BYU will probably be very religious, while those at Oberlin will be deeply committed to social justice.

See some examples of great Common App essays to get a better idea of what makes a strong essay.

How your Common App Essay Fits with Your Other Essays

The Common App is one part of a portfolio of essays that you send to colleges, along with supplemental essays at individual colleges. With all of your essays for a particular college, you want to create a narrative and tell different parts of your story. So, the topics you write about should be cohesive and complementary, but not repetitive or overlapping. 

Before jumping in to write your Common App essay, you should think about the other schools that you’re writing essays for and make sure that you have a strategy for your entire portfolio of essays and cover different topics for each. If you have strong qualifications on paper for the colleges you are targeting, the best narratives tend to humanize you. If you have weaker qualifications on paper for your colleges, the best narratives tend to draw out your passion for the topics or fields of study that are of interest to you and magnify your accomplishments. 

Strategy for Writing the Common App Essays

Because the Common App essay is 650 words long and has few formal directions, organizing a response might seem daunting. Fortunately, at CollegeVine, we’ve developed a straightforward approach to formulating strong, unique responses.

This section outlines how to: 1) Brainstorm , 2) Organize , and 3) Write a Common App essay.

Before reading the prompts, brainstorming is a critical exercise to develop high-level ideas. One way to construct a high-level idea would be to delve into a passion and focus on how you interact with the concept or activity. For example, using “creative writing” as a high-level idea, one could stress their love of world-building, conveying complex emotions, and depicting character interactions, emphasizing how writing stems from real-life experiences.

A different idea that doesn’t involve an activity would be to discuss how your personality has developed in relation to your family; maybe one sibling is hot-headed, the other quiet, and you’re in the middle as the voice of reason (or maybe you’re the hot-head). These are simply two examples of infinitely many ideas you could come up with.

To begin developing your own high-level ideas, you can address these Core Four questions that all good Common App essays should answer:

• “Who Am I?”
• “Why Am I Here?”
• “What is Unique About Me?”
• “What Matters to Me?”

The first question focuses on your personality traits — who you are. The second question targets your progression throughout high school (an arc or journey). The third question is more difficult to grasp, but it involves showing why your personality traits, methods of thinking, areas of interest, and tangible skills form a unique combination. The fourth question is a concluding point that can be answered simply, normally in the conclusion paragraph, i.e., “Running matters to me” or “Ethical fashion matters to me.”

You can brainstorm freeform or start with a specific prompt in mind.

Sometimes, it can be helpful to start by jotting down the 3-5 aspects of your personality or experiences you’ve had on a piece of paper. Play around with narratives that are constructed out of different combinations of these essential attributes before settling on a prompt. 

For example, you might note that you are fascinated by environmental justice, have had success in Model Congress, and are now working with a local politician to create a recycling program in your school district. You may also have tried previous initiatives that failed. These experiences could be constructed and applied to a number of Common App prompts. You could address a specific identity or interest you have associated with public advocacy, discuss what you learned from your failed initiatives, explore how you challenged the lack of recycling at your school, fantasize about solving waste management issues, etc. 

Selecting a prompt that you identify with

For example, consider the following prompt: The lessons we take from obstacles we encounter can be fundamental to later success. Recount a time when you faced a challenge, setback, or failure. How did it affect you, and what did you learn from the experience?

Perhaps you had been a dedicated and active member of your school’s debate team until one of your parents lost their jobs, leaving you unable to afford the high membership and travel dues. You decided to help out by getting a job after school, and responded to your familial hardship with grace and understanding (as opposed to anger). A few months later, and after speaking with your former debate coach and your parents, you set up a system to save up for your own trips so that you could still participate in debate!

In general, the most common mistake CollegeVine sees with Common App essays is that they aren’t deeply personal. Your essay should be specific enough that it could be identified as yours even if your name wasn’t attached. 

If you get stuck, don’t worry! This is very common as the Common App is often the first personal essay college applicants have ever written. One way of getting unstuck if you feel like you aren’t getting creative or personal enough is to keep asking yourself “why”

For example: I love basketball…

• Because I like having to think on the fly and be creative while running our offense.

It can often help to work with someone and bounce ideas off them. Teachers are often a bad idea – they tend to think of essays in an academic sense, which is to say they often fail to apply the admissions context. Further, it is unlikely that they know you well enough to provide valuable insight. Friends in your own year can be a good idea because they know you, but you should be careful about competitive pressures applying within the same high school. Older friends, siblings, or neighbors who have successfully navigated the admissions process at your target universities (or good universities) strike that medium between no longer being competitive with you for admissions but still being able to help you brainstorm well because they know you.

Overall, there is no single “correct” topic. Your essay will be strong as long as you are comfortable and passionate about your idea and it answers the Core Four questions.

Common App essays are not traditional five-paragraph essays. You are free to be creative in structure, employ dialogue, and use vivid descriptions—and you should! Make sure that context and logic are inherent in your essay, however. From paragraph to paragraph, sentence to sentence, your ideas should be clear and flow naturally. Great ways to ensure this are using a story arc following a few major points, or focusing on cause and effect.

The traditional approach

This involves constructing a narrative out of your experiences and writing a classic personal essay. You are free to be creative in structure, employ dialogue, and use vivid descriptions—and you should! Make sure that context and logic are inherent in your essay, however. From paragraph to paragraph, sentence to sentence, your ideas should be clear and flow naturally. Great ways to ensure this are using a story arc following a few major points, or focusing on cause and effect.

The creative approach

Some students prefer to experiment with an entirely new approach to the personal essay. For example, a student who is passionate about programming could write their essay in alternating lines of Binary and English. A hopeful Literature major could reimagine a moment in their life as a chapter of War and Peace, adopting Tolstoy’s writing style. Or, you could write about a fight with your friend in the form of a third person sports recap to both highlight your interest in journalism and reveal a personal story. Creative essays are incredibly risky and difficult to pull off. However, a creative essay that is well executed may also have the potential for high reward.

Your Common App essay must display excellent writing in terms of grammar and sentence structure. The essay doesn’t need to be a Shakespearean masterpiece, but it should be well-written and clear.

A few tips to accomplish this are:

• Show, don’t tell
• Be specific
• Choose active voice, not passive voice
• Avoid clichés
• Write in a tone that aligns with your goals for the essay. For example, if you are a heavy STEM applicant hoping to use your Common App essay to humanize your application, you will be undermined by writing in a brusque, harsh tone.

“Show, don’t tell” is vital to writing an engaging essay, and this is the point students struggle with most.  Instead of saying, “I struggled to make friends when I transferred schools,” you can show your emotions by writing, “I scanned the bustling school cafeteria, feeling more and more forlorn with each unfamiliar face. I found an empty table and ate my lunch alone.”

In many cases, writing can include more specific word choice . For example, “As a kid, I always played basketball,” can be improved to be “Every day after school as a kid, I ran home, laced up my sneakers, and shot a basketball in my driveway until the sun went down and I could barely see.”

To use active voice over passive voice , be sure that your sentence’s subject performs the action indicated by the verb, rather than the action performing onto the subject. Instead of writing “this project was built by my own hands,” you would say “I built this project with my own hands.”

Finally, avoid clichés like adages, sayings, and quotes that do not bring value to your essay. Examples include phrases like “Be the change you wish to see in the world” (it’s also important to know that sayings like these are often seriously misquoted—Gandhi did not actually utter these words) and lavish claims like “it was the greatest experience of my life.”

A few tips for the writing (and re-writing!) process

• If you have enough time, write a 950 word version of your personal statement first and then cut it down to the official word limit of 650. In many cases, the extra writing you do for this draft will contain compelling content. Using this, you can carve out the various sections and information that allow you to tell your story best. 
• Revise your draft 3-5 times. Any more, you are probably overthinking and overanalyzing. Any less, you are not putting in the work necessary to optimize your Common App essay.
• It can be easy for you to get lost in your words after reading and rereading, writing and rewriting. It is best to have someone else do your final proofread to help you identify typos or sentences that are unclear.

Deciding on a Prompt

This section provides insights and examples for each of the 7 Common App essay prompts for the 2023-2024 cycle. Each of these prompts lends itself to distinct topics and strategies, so selecting the prompt that best aligns with your idea is essential to writing an effective Common App essay.

Here are this year’s prompts (click the link to jump to the specific prompt):

Some students have a background, identity, interest, or talent that is so meaningful they believe their application would be incomplete without it. If this sounds like you, then please share your story.

The lessons we take from obstacles we encounter can be fundamental to later success. recount a time when you faced a challenge, setback, or failure. how did it affect you, and what did you learn from the experience, reflect on a time when you questioned or challenged a belief or idea. what prompted your thinking what was the outcome, reflect on something that someone has done for you that has made you happy or thankful in a surprising way. how has this gratitude affected or motivated you, discuss an accomplishment, event, or realization that sparked a period of personal growth and a new understanding of yourself or others., describe a topic, idea, or concept you find so engaging that it makes you lose all track of time. why does it captivate you what or who do you turn to when you want to learn more, share an essay on any topic of your choice. it can be one you’ve already written, one that responds to a different prompt, or one of your own design..

This prompt offers an opportunity to engage with your favorite extracurricular or academic subject, and it allows you to weave a narrative that displays personal growth in that area. An essay that displays your personality and a unique interest can be attention-grabbing, particularly if you have an unconventional passion, such as blogging about Chinese basketball or unicycling.

Don’t feel intimidated if you don’t have a passion that is immediately “unique,” however. Even an interest like “arctic scuba diving” will fail as an essay topic if it’s not written with insight and personality. Instead of attempting to impress the Admissions Officer by making up unusual or shocking things, think about how you spend your free time and ask yourself why you spend it that way. Also think about your upbringing, identity, and experiences and ask yourself, “What has impacted me in a meaningful way?”

Here Are A Few Response Examples:

Background – A person’s background includes experiences, training, education, and culture. You can discuss the experience of growing up, interacting with family, and how relationships have molded who you are. A background can include long-term interactions with arts, music, sciences, sports, writing, and many other learned skills. Background also includes your social environments and how they’ve influenced your perception. In addition, you can highlight intersections between multiple backgrounds and show how each is integral to you.

One student wrote about how growing up in a poor Vietnamese immigrant family inspired her to seize big opportunities, even if they were risky or challenging. She describes the emotional demand of opening and running a family grocery store. (Note: Names have been changed to protect the identity of the author and subjects in all the examples.)

The callouses on my mother’s hands formed during the years spent scaling fish at the  market in Go Noi, Vietnam. My mother never finished her formal education because she  labored on the streets to help six others survive. Her calloused hands not only scaled fish, they  also slaved over the stove, mustering a meal from the few items in the pantry. This image  resurfaces as I watch my mother’s calloused hands wipe her sweat-beaded forehead while she  manages the family business, compiling resources to provide for the family. 

Living in an impoverished region of Vietnam pushed my parents to emigrate. My two  year-old memory fails me, but my mother vividly recounts my frightened eyes staring up at her on my first plane ride. With life packed into a single suitcase, my mother’s heart, though,  trembled more than mine. Knowing only a few words of English, my mother embarked on a  journey shrouded in a haze of uncertainty. 

Our initial year in America bore an uncanny resemblance to Vietnam – from making one  meal last the entire day to wearing the same four shirts over and over again. Through thin walls, I  heard my parents debating their decision to come to the United States, a land where they knew  no one. My grandparents’ support came in half-hearted whispers cracking through long-distance  phone calls. My dad’s scanty income barely kept food on the table. We lived on soup and rice for  what seemed an interminable time. 

However, an opportunity knocked on my parents’ door: a grocery store in the town of  Decatur, Mississippi, was up for rent. My parents took the chance, risking all of their savings.  To help my parents, I spent most of my adolescent afternoons stocking shelves, mopping floors,  and even translating. My parents’ voices wavered when speaking English; through every attempt to communicate with their customers, a language barrier forged a palpable presence in each  transaction. My parents’ spirits faltered as customers grew impatient. A life of poverty awaited us in Vietnam if the business was not successful. 

On the first day, the business brought in only twenty dollars. Twenty dollars. My mother and my father wept after they closed the shop. Seeing the business as a failure, my mom commenced her packing that night; returning to Vietnam seemed inevitable. 

The next business day, however, sales increased ten-fold. More and more customers  came each successive day. My mom’s tears turned into—well, more tears, but they were tears of  joy. My mother unpacked a bag each night. 

Fifteen years later, my parents now own Blue Bear Grocery. My parents work, work,  work to keep the shelves stocked and the customers coming. The grocery store holds a special  place in my heart: it is the catalyst for my success. My parents serve as my role-models, teaching  me a new lesson with every can placed on the shelf. One lesson that resurfaces is the importance  of pursuing a formal education, something that my parents never had the chance of. 

When the opportunity to attend the Mississippi School for Mathematics and Science  (MSMS) presented itself, I took it and ran, as did my parents by leaving Vietnam and by buying  the store. Although I am not managing hundreds of products, I am managing hundreds of  assignments at MSMS – from Mu Alpha Theta tutoring to lab reports to student government to British literature. 

Had I not immigrated, my hands would be calloused from the tight grip of the knife  scaling fish rather than from the tight grip on my pencil. My hands would be calloused from scrubbing my clothes covered in fish scales rather than from long hours spent typing a research paper. 

Although the opportunities that my parents and I pursued are different, our journey is  essentially the same: we walk a road paved with uncertainty and doubt with the prospect of success fortified by our hearts and our hands.

Identity – this can mean racial identity, sexual orientation, gender, or simply one’s place within a specific community (even communities as unique as, say, players of World of Warcraft). With the topic of racial identity, it’s important to remember the audience (college admissions counselors often lean progressive politically), so this might not be the best place to make sweeping claims about today’s state of race relations. However, reflecting on how your culture has shaped your experiences can make for a compelling essay. Alternatively, focusing on a dominant personality trait can also make for a compelling theme. For example, if you’re extremely outgoing, you could explain how your adventurousness has allowed you to learn from a diverse group of friends and the random situations you find yourself in. One important thing to note: the topic of identity can easily lack originality if you cover a common experience such as feeling divided between cultures, or coming out. If such experiences are integral to who you are, you should still write about them, but be sure to show us your unique introspection and reflection.

One student detailed how growing up as an American in Germany led to feelings of displacement. Moving to America in high school only exacerbated her feelings of rootlessness. Her transcultural experiences, however, allowed her to relate to other “New Americans,” particularly refugees. Helping a young refugee girl settle into the US eventually helped the writer find home in America as well:

Growing up, I always wanted to eat, play, visit, watch, and be it all: sloppy joes and spaetzle, Beanie Babies and Steiff, Cape Cod and the Baltic Sea, football and fussball, American and German. 

My American parents relocated our young family to Berlin when I was three years old. My exposure to America was limited to holidays spent stateside and awfully dubbed Disney Channel broadcasts. As the few memories I had of living in the US faded, my affinity for Germany grew. I began to identify as “Germerican,” an ideal marriage of the two cultures. As a child, I viewed my biculturalism as a blessing. I possessed a native fluency in “Denglisch” and my family’s Halloween parties were legendary at a time when the holiday was just starting to gain popularity outside of the American Sector. 

Insidiously, the magic I once felt in loving two homes was replaced by a deep­rooted sense of rootlessness. I stopped feeling American when, while discussing World War II with my grandmother, I said “the US won.” She corrected me, insisting I use “we” when referring to the US’s actions. Before then, I hadn’t realized how directly people associated themselves with their countries. I stopped feeling German during the World Cup when my friends labeled me a “bandwagon fan” for rooting for Germany. Until that moment, my cheers had felt sincere. I wasn’t part of the “we” who won World Wars or World Cups. Caught in a twilight of foreign and familiar, I felt emotionally and psychologically disconnected from the two cultures most familiar to me. 

After moving from Berlin to New York state at age fifteen, my feelings of cultural homelessness thrived in my new environment. Looking and sounding American furthered my feelings of dislocation. Border patrol agents, teachers, classmates, neighbors, and relatives all “welcomed me home” to a land they could not understand was foreign to me. Americans confused me as I relied on Urban Dictionary to understand my peers, the Pledge of Allegiance seemed nationalistic, and the only thing familiar about Fahrenheit was the German after whom it was named. Too German for America and too American for Germany, I felt alienated from both. I wanted desperately to be a member of one, if not both, cultures. 

During my first weeks in Buffalo, I spent my free time googling “Berlin Family Seeks Teen” and “New Americans in Buffalo.” The latter search proved most fruitful: I discovered New Hope, a nonprofit that empowers resettled refugees, or “New Americans,” to thrive. I started volunteering with New Hope’s children’s programs, playing with and tutoring young refugees. 

It was there that I met Leila, a twelve-­year-­old Iraqi girl who lived next to Hopeprint. In between games and snacks, Leila would ask me questions about American life, touching on everything from Halloween to President Obama. Gradually, my confidence in my American identity grew as I recognized my ability to answer most of her questions. American culture was no longer completely foreign to me. I found myself especially qualified to work with young refugees; my experience growing up in a country other than that of my parents’ was similar enough to that of the refugee children New Hope served that I could empathize with them and offer advice. Together, we worked through conflicting allegiances, homesickness, and stretched belonging. 

Forging a special, personal bond with young refugees proved a cathartic outlet for my insecurities as it taught me to value my past. My transculturalism allowed me to help young refugees integrate into American life, and, in doing so, I was able to adjust myself. Now, I have an appreciation of myself that I never felt before. “Home” isn’t the digits in a passport or ZIP code but a sense of contentedness. By helping a young refugee find comfort, happiness, and home in America, I was finally able to find those same things for myself.

The above essay was written by Lydia Schooler, a graduate of Yale University and one of our CollegeVine advisors. If you enjoyed this essay and are looking for expert college essay and admissions advice, consider booking a session with Lydia .

Interests – Interest are basically synonymous to activities, but slightly broader (you could say that interests encompass activities); participation in an interest is often less organized than in an activity. For instance, you might consider cross country an activity, but cooking an interest. Writing about an interest is a way to highlight passions that may not come across in the rest of your application. If you’re a wrestler for example, writing about your interest in stand-up comedy would be a refreshing addition to your application. You should also feel free to use this topic to show what an important activity on your application really means to you. Keep in mind, however, that many schools will ask you to describe one of your activities in their supplemental essays (usually about 250 words), so choose strategically—you don’t want to write twice on the same thing.

Read a successful essay answering this prompt.

This prompt lends itself to consideration of what facets of your personality allow you to overcome adversity. While it’s okay to choose a relatively mundane “failure” such as not winning an award at a Model UN conference, another (perhaps more powerful) tactic is to write about a foundational failure and assess its impact on your development thereafter.

There are times in life when your foundation is uprooted. There are times when you experience failure and you want to give up since you don’t see a solution. This essay is about your response when you are destabilized and your actions when you don’t see an immediate answer.

For example, if you lost a friend due to an argument, you can analyze the positions from both sides, evaluate your decisions, and identify why you were wrong. The key is explaining your thought process and growth following the event to highlight how your thinking has changed. Did you ever admit your fault and seek to fix the problem? Have you treated others differently since then? How has the setback changed the way you view arguments and fights now? Framing the prompt in this way allows you to tackle heavier questions about ethics and demonstrate your self-awareness.

If you haven’t experienced a “big” failure, another angle to take would be to discuss smaller, repeated failures that are either linked or similar thematically. For example, if you used to stutter or get nervous in large social groups, you could discuss the steps you took to find a solution. Even if you don’t have a massive foundational challenge to write about, a recurring challenge can translate to a powerful essay topic, especially if the steps you took to overcome this repeated failure help expose your character.

One student described his ignorance of his brother’s challenges — the writer assumed that because his brother Sam was sociable, Sam  was adjusting fine to their family’s move. After an angry outburst from Sam  and a long late-night conversation, the writer realizes his need to develop greater sensitivity and empathy. He now strives to recognize and understand others’ struggles, even if they’re not immediately apparent.

“You ruined my life!” After months of quiet anger, my brother finally confronted me. To my shame, I had been appallingly ignorant of his pain.

Despite being twins, Max and I are profoundly different. Having intellectual interests from a young age that, well, interested very few of my peers, I often felt out of step in comparison with my highly-social brother. Everything appeared to come effortlessly for Max and, while we share an extremely tight bond, his frequent time away with friends left me feeling more and more alone as we grew older.

When my parents learned about The Green Academy, we hoped it would be an opportunity for me to find not only an academically challenging environment, but also – perhaps more importantly – a community. This meant transferring the family from Drumfield to Kingston. And while there was concern about Max, we all believed that given his sociable nature, moving would be far less impactful on him than staying put might be on me.

As it turned out, Green Academy was everything I’d hoped for. I was ecstatic to discover a group of students with whom I shared interests and could truly engage. Preoccupied with new friends and a rigorous course load, I failed to notice that the tables had turned. Max, lost in the fray and grappling with how to make connections in his enormous new high school, had become withdrawn and lonely. It took me until Christmas time – and a massive argument – to recognize how difficult the transition had been for my brother, let alone that he blamed me for it.

Through my own journey of searching for academic peers, in addition to coming out as gay when I was 12, I had developed deep empathy for those who had trouble fitting in. It was a pain I knew well and could easily relate to. Yet after Max’s outburst, my first response was to protest that our parents – not I – had chosen to move us here. In my heart, though, I knew that regardless of who had made the decision, we ended up in Kingston for my benefit. I was ashamed that, while I saw myself as genuinely compassionate, I had been oblivious to the heartache of the person closest to me. I could no longer ignore it – and I didn’t want to.

We stayed up half the night talking, and the conversation took an unexpected turn. Max opened up and shared that it wasn’t just about the move. He told me how challenging school had always been for him, due to his dyslexia, and that the ever-present comparison to me had only deepened his pain.

We had been in parallel battles the whole time and, yet, I only saw that Max was in distress once he experienced problems with which I directly identified. I’d long thought Max had it so easy – all because he had friends. The truth was, he didn’t need to experience my personal brand of sorrow in order for me to relate – he had felt plenty of his own.

My failure to recognize Max’s suffering brought home for me the profound universality and diversity of personal struggle; everyone has insecurities, everyone has woes, and everyone – most certainly – has pain. I am acutely grateful for the conversations he and I shared around all of this, because I believe our relationship has been fundamentally strengthened by a deeper understanding of one another. Further, this experience has reinforced the value of constantly striving for deeper sensitivity to the hidden struggles of those around me. I won’t make the mistake again of assuming that the surface of someone’s life reflects their underlying story.

This prompt is difficult to answer because most high schoolers haven’t participated in the types of iconoclastic protests against societal ills that lend themselves to an awe-inspiring response. A more tenable alternative here could be to discuss a time that you went against social norms, whether it was by becoming friends with someone who seemed like an outcast or by proudly showing off a geeky passion.

And if you ever participated in a situation in tandem with adults and found some success (i.e., by blogging, starting a tutoring organization, or participating in political campaigns), you could discuss your experiences as a young person without a college degree in professional circles. However, avoid sounding morally superior (as if you’re the only person who went against this convention, or that you’re better than your peers for doing so).

Another way to answer this prompt is to discuss a time when you noticed a need for change. For example, if you wondered why medical records are often handwritten, or why a doctor’s visit can be long and awkward, maybe you challenged the norm in healthcare by brainstorming an electronic-recording smartphone app or a telemedicine system. In a similar way, if you led a fundraiser and recognized that advertising on social media would be more effective than the traditional use of printed flyers, you could write about a topic along those lines as well. Focus on what action or experience caused you to recognize the need for change and follow with your actions and resulting outcome.

As a whole, this prompt lends itself to reflective writing, and more specifically, talking the reader through your thought processes. In many cases, the exploration of your thought processes and decision-making is more important than the actual outcome or concept in question. In short, this essay is very much about “thinking,” rumination, and inquisition. A good brainstorming exercise for this prompt would be to write your problem on a sheet of paper and then develop various solutions to the problem, including a brief reason for justification. The more thorough you are in justifying and explaining your solutions in the essay, the more compelling your response will be.

While this prompt may seem to be asking a simple question, your answer has the potential to provide deep insights about who you are to the admissions committee. Explaining what you are grateful for can show them your culture, your community, your philosophical outlook on the world, and what makes you tick. 

The first step to writing this essay is to think about the “something” and “someone” of your story. It is imperative to talk about a unique moment in your life, as the prompt asks for gratitude that came about in a surprising way. You will want to write about a story that you are certain no one else would have. To brainstorm, ask yourself: “if I told a stranger that I was grateful for what happened to me without any context, would they be surprised?” 

Note that the most common answers to this prompt involve a family member, teacher, or sports coach giving the narrator an arduous task ─ which, by the end of the story, the narrator becomes grateful for because of the lessons they learned through their hard work. Try to avoid writing an essay along these lines unless you feel that your take on it will be truly original.

Begin your essay by telling a creative story about the “something” that your “someone” did that made you thankful. Paint a picture with words here ─ establish who you were in the context of your story and make the character development of your “someone” thorough. Show the admissions committee that you have a clear understanding of yourself and the details of your world. 

Keep in mind, however, that the essay is ultimately about you and your growth. While you should set the scene clearly, don’t spend too much time talking about the “something” and “someone.”

Your story should then transition into a part about your unexpected epiphany, e.g. “Six months after Leonard gave me that pogo stick, I started to be grateful for the silly thing…” Explain the why of your gratitude as thoroughly as you can before you begin to talk about how your gratitude affected or motivated you. Have a Socratic seminar with yourself in your head ─ ask yourself, “why am I grateful for the pogo stick?” and continue asking why until you arrive at a philosophical conclusion. Perhaps your reason could be that you eventually got used to the odd looks that people gave you as you were pogoing and gained more self-confidence. 

Finally, think about how learning to be grateful for something you would not expect to bring you joy and thankfulness has had a positive impact on your life. Gaining more self-confidence, for example, could motivate you to do an infinite number of things that you were not able to attempt in the past. Try to make a conclusion by connecting this part to your story from the beginning of the essay. You want to ultimately show that had [reference to a snippet of your introduction, ideally an absurd part] never have happened, you would not be who you are today.

Remember to express these lessons implicitly through the experiences in your essay, and not explicitly. Show us your growth through the changes in your life rather than simply stating that you gained confidence. For instance, maybe the pogo stick gift led you to start a pogo dance team at your school, and the team went on to perform at large venues to raise money for charity. But before your pogo days, you had crippling stage fright and hated even giving speeches in your English class. These are the kinds of details that make your essay more engaging. 

This prompt is expansive in that you can choose any accomplishment, event, or realization that sparked personal growth or new understanding.

One option is to discuss a formal accomplishment or event (whether it is a religious ritual or social rite of passage) that reflects personal growth. If you go this route, make sure to discuss why the ritual was meaningful and how specific aspects of said ritual contributed to your personal growth. An example of this could be the meaning of becoming an Eagle Scout to you, the accomplishment of being elected to Senior Leadership, or completing a Confirmation. In the case of religious topics, however, be sure to not get carried away with details, and focus on the nature of your personal growth and new understanding — know your audience.

Alternatively, a more relaxed way to address this prompt is using an informal event or realization, which would allow you to show more personality and creativity. An example of this could be learning how to bake with your mother, thus sparking a newfound connection with her, allowing you to learn about her past. Having a long discussion about life or philosophy with your father could also suffice, thus sparking more thoughts about your identity. You could write about a realization that caused you to join a new organization or quit an activity you did not think you would enjoy, as doing so would force you to grow out of your comfort zone to try new things.

The key to answering this prompt is clearly defining what it is that sparked your growth, and then describing in detail the nature of this growth and how it related to your perception of yourself and others. This part of the essay is crucial, as you must dedicate sufficient time to not undersell the description of how you grew instead of simply explaining the experience and then saying, “I grew.” This description of how you grew must be specific, in-depth, and it does not have to be simple. Your growth can also be left open-ended if you are still learning from your experiences today.

One student wrote about how her single mother’s health crisis prompted her to quickly assume greater responsibility as a fourteen-year-old. This essay describes the new tasks she undertook, as well as how the writer now more greatly cherishes her time with her mother.

Tears streamed down my face and my mind was paralyzed with fear. Sirens blared, but the silent panic in my own head was deafening. I was muted by shock. A few hours earlier, I had anticipated a vacation in Washington, D.C., but unexpectedly, I was rushing to the hospital behind an ambulance carrying my mother. As a fourteen-year-old from a single mother household, without a driver’s license, and seven hours from home, I was distraught over the prospect of losing the only parent I had. My fear turned into action as I made some of the bravest decisions of my life. 

Three blood transfusions later, my mother’s condition was stable, but we were still states away from home, so I coordinated with my mother’s doctors in North Carolina to schedule the emergency operation that would save her life. Throughout her surgery, I anxiously awaited any word from her surgeon, but each time I asked, I was told that there had been another complication or delay. Relying on my faith and positive attitude, I remained optimistic that my mother would survive and that I could embrace new responsibilities.

My mother had been a source of strength for me, and now I would be strong for her through her long recovery ahead. As I started high school, everyone thought the crisis was over, but it had really just started to impact my life. My mother was often fatigued, so I assumed more responsibility, juggling family duties, school, athletics, and work. I made countless trips to the neighborhood pharmacy, cooked dinner, biked to the grocery store, supported my concerned sister, and provided the loving care my mother needed to recover. I didn’t know I was capable of such maturity and resourcefulness until it was called upon. Each day was a stage in my gradual transformation from dependence to relative independence.

Throughout my mother’s health crisis, I matured by learning to put others’ needs before my own. As I worried about my mother’s health, I took nothing for granted, cherished what I had, and used my daily activities as motivation to move forward. I now take ownership over small decisions such as scheduling daily appointments and managing my time but also over major decisions involving my future, including the college admissions process. Although I have become more independent, my mother and I are inseparably close, and the realization that I almost lost her affects me daily. Each morning, I wake up ten minutes early simply to eat breakfast with my mother and spend time with her before our busy days begin. I am aware of how quickly life can change. My mother remains a guiding force in my life, but the feeling of empowerment I discovered within myself is the ultimate form of my independence. Though I thought the summer before my freshman year would be a transition from middle school to high school, it was a transformation from childhood to adulthood.

This prompt allows you to expand and deepen a seemingly small or simple idea, topic, or concept. One example could be “stars,” in that you could describe stargazing as a child, counting them, recognizing constellations, and then transforming that initial captivation into a deeper appreciation of the cosmos as a whole, spurring a love of astronomy and physics.

Another example could be “language,” discussing how it has evolved and changed over the course of history, how it allows you to look deeper into different cultures, and how learning different languages stretches the mind. A tip for expanding on these topics and achieving specificity is to select particular details of the topic that you find intriguing and explain why.

For example, if you’re passionate about cooking or baking, you could use specific details by explaining, in depth, the intricate attention and artistry necessary to make a dish or dessert. You can delve into why certain spices or garnishes are superior in different situations, how flavors blend well together and can be mixed creatively, or even the chemistry differences between steaming, searing, and grilling.

Regardless of your topic, this prompt provides a great opportunity to display writing prowess through elegant, specific descriptions that leverage sensory details. Describing the beauty of the night sky, the rhythms and sounds of different languages, or the scent of a crème brûlée shows passion and captivation in a very direct, evocative way.

The key to writing this essay is answering the question of why something captivates you instead of simply ending with “I love surfing.” A tip would be to play off your senses (for applicable topics), think about what you see, feel, smell, hear, and taste.

In the case of surfing, the salty water, weightlessness of bobbing over the waves, and fresh air could cater to senses. Alternatively, for less physical topics, you can use a train of thought and descriptions to show how deeply and vividly your mind dwells on the topic.

Well-executed trains of thought or similar tactics are successful ways to convey passion for a certain topic. To answer what or who you turn to when you want to learn more, you can be authentic and honest—if it’s Wikipedia, a teacher, friend, YouTube Channel, etc., you simply have to show how you interact with the medium.

When brainstorming this particular essay, a tip would be to use a web diagram, placing the topic in the middle and thinking about branching characteristics, themes, or concepts related to the topic that are directly engaging and captivating to you. In doing so, you’ll be able to gauge the depth of the topic and whether it will suffice for this prompt.

In the following example, a student shares their journey as they learn to appreciate a piece of their culture’s cuisine.

As a wide-eyed, naive seven-year-old, I watched my grandmother’s rough, wrinkled hands pull and knead mercilessly at white dough until the countertop was dusted in flour. She steamed small buns in bamboo baskets, and a light sweetness lingered in the air. Although the mantou looked delicious, their papery, flat taste was always an unpleasant surprise. My grandmother scolded me for failing to finish even one, and when I complained about the lack of flavor she would simply say that I would find it as I grew older. How did my adult relatives seem to enjoy this Taiwanese culinary delight while I found it so plain?

During my journey to discover the essence of mantou, I began to see myself the same way I saw the steamed bun. I believed that my writing would never evolve beyond a hobby and that my quiet nature crippled my ambitions. Ultimately, I thought I had little to offer the world. In middle school, it was easy for me to hide behind the large personalities of my friends, blending into the background and keeping my thoughts company. Although writing had become my emotional outlet, no matter how well I wrote essays, poetry, or fiction, I could not stand out in a sea of talented students. When I finally gained the confidence to submit my poetry to literary journals but was promptly rejected, I stepped back from my work to begin reading from Whitman to Dickinson, Li-Young Lee to Ocean Vuong. It was then that I realized I had been holding back a crucial ingredient–my distinct voice. 

Over time, my taste buds began to mature, as did I. Mantou can be flavored with pork and eggplant, sweetened in condensed milk, and moistened or dried by the steam’s temperature. After I ate the mantou with each of these factors in mind, I noticed its environment enhanced a delicately woven strand of sweetness beneath the taste of side dishes: the sugar I had often watched my grandmother sift into the flour. The taste was nearly untraceable, but once I grasped it I could truly begin to cherish mantou. In the same way the taste had been lost to me for years, my writer’s voice had struggled to shine through because of my self-doubt and fear of vulnerability.

As I acquired a taste for mantou, I also began to strengthen my voice through my surrounding environment. With the support of my parents, peer poets, and the guidance of Amy Tan and the Brontё sisters, I worked tirelessly to uncover my voice: a subtle strand of sweetness. Once I stopped trying to fit into a publishing material mold and infused my uninhibited passion for my Taiwanese heritage into my writing, my poem was published in a literary journal. I wrote about the blatant racism Asians endured during coronavirus, and the editor of Skipping Stones Magazine was touched by both my poem and my heartfelt letter. I opened up about being ridiculed for bringing Asian food to school at Youth Leadership Forum, providing support to younger Asian-American students who reached out with the relief of finding someone they could relate to. I embraced writing as a way to convey my struggle with cultural identity. I joined the school’s creative writing club and read my pieces in front of an audience, honing my voice into one that flourishes out loud as well.

Now, I write and speak unapologetically, falling in love with a voice that I never knew I had. It inspires passion within my communities and imparts tenacity to Asian-American youth, rooting itself deeply into everything I write. Today, my grandmother would say that I have finally unearthed the taste of mantou as I savor every bite with a newfound appreciation. I can imagine her hands shaping the dough that has become my voice, and I am eager to share it with the world.

Your GPA and SAT don’t tell the full admissions story

We’ll let you know what your chances are at your dream schools!

This prompt allows you to express what you want to express if it doesn’t align directly with the other prompts. While this prompt is very open-ended, it doesn’t mean you can adapt any essay you’ve written and think it will suffice. Always refer back to the Strategy section of this article and make sure the topic and essay of your choice addresses the Core Four questions necessary for a good Common App essay.

This prompt, more than the others, poses a high risk but also a high-potential reward. Writing your own question allows you to demonstrate individuality and confidence. Here, you can craft an innovative essay that tackles a difficult topic (for example, whether to raise or lower taxes) or presents information with a unique format (such as a conversation with an historical figure).

We encourage you to try something unconventional for this prompt, like comparing your personality to a Picasso painting, using an extended philosophical metaphor to describe your four years of high school, or writing in a poetic style to display your love of poetry. If you are extremely passionate about a topic or an expert in a certain area, for example Renaissance technology or journalism during World War II, you can use this prompt to show your authority on a subject by discussing it at a high level.

Be careful to frame the essay in a way that is accessible to the average reader while still incorporating quality evidence and content that would qualify you as an expert. As always, exercise caution in writing about controversial social or political topics, and always make sure to consider your audience and what they’re looking for in a student.

Sometimes an unconventional essay can capture Admissions Officers’ attention and move them in a profound way; other times, the concept can fly completely over their heads. Be sure to execute the essay clearly and justify your decision by seeking high-quality feedback from reliable sources. As always, the essay should demonstrate something meaningful about you, whether it is your personality, thought process, or values.

Here’s what the experts have to say about this prompt…

This prompt, like the others, is really asking you to tell the story of who you are. Your essay should be personal and should talk about something significant that has shaped your identity.

Here are a few broad themes that can work well: academic interest; culture, values, and diversity; extracurricular interests; and your impact on the community. You should highlight one of these themes using creative, vividly descriptive narrative. Make sure to not fall into the common pitfall of talking about something else -- an extracurricular activity, for example -- more than yourself.

A student I advised had a great idea to respond to this prompt -- an essay about how they do their best thinking while sitting on a tree branch near their home. Not only was it unique and personal, but it allowed the student to show what they think about, dream about, and value. That's the main goal for any applicant responding to prompt 7.

Alex Oddo Advisor on CollegeVine

All of the Common App prompts are broad in scope, but this one really takes the cake! I typically advise using the first six prompts as guardrails for your brainstorm, but in doing so, you may come up with a topic that doesn’t cleanly fit with any of the first six prompts. That’s where this prompt can come in handy.

Or, you might have an idea that’s really out there (like writing about your love of sonnets as a series of sonnets). Essentially, this prompt is a good fit for essays that are anywhere from slightly unconventional to extremely atypical.

If this all feels a bit confusing - don’t worry! How you write your story is much more important than what prompt you end up choosing. At the end of the day, these are just guides to help you cultivate a topic and are not meant to stress you out.

Priya Desai Advisor on CollegeVine

Students who want to complete the CommonApp’s seventh prompt need to have already gone through the other prompts and determined that their story cannot fit with those. Thus, generally speaking, I advise my students to not use the final prompt unless it is absolutely necessary.

If an admission officer believes that your essay could have been used with one of the other prompts, this may lead them to have a perception about you as a student that might not be accurate.

Nevertheless, as my colleagues have pointed out, what matters is the essay the most and not necessarily the prompt. That being said, the test of whether or not you as a student can follow directions is part of the prompt selection and how well you answer it. If you choose the final prompt and yet your answer could work with another available prompt, this will not put you in your best light.

In conclusion, only use this prompt when absolutely necessary, and remember that the purpose of the personal statement is to give the admissions officers a glimpse into who you are as a person, so you want to use this space to showcase beautiful you.

Veronica Prout Advisor on CollegeVine

Where to get your common app essay edited.

At selective schools, your essays account for around 25% of your admissions decision. That’s more than grades (20%) and test scores (15%), and almost as much as extracurriculars (30%). Why is this? Most students applying to top schools will have stellar academics and extracurriculars. Your essays are your chance to stand out and humanize your application. That’s why it’s vital that your essays are engaging, and present you as someone who would enrich the campus community.

Before submitting your application, you should have someone else review your essays. That’s why we created our free  Peer Essay Review tool , where you can get a free review of your essay from another student. You can also improve your own writing skills by reviewing other students’ essays. 

If you want a college admissions expert to review your essay, advisors on CollegeVine have helped students refine their writing and submit successful applications to top schools.  Find the right advisor for you  to improve your chances of getting into your dream school!

Related CollegeVine Blog Posts

College 101

Common app 5: accomplishment or event.

Discuss an accomplishment, event, or realization that sparked a period of personal growth and a new understanding of yourself or others.

Introduction

His name was Eric Ramirez: fifteen years old with an unblemished, peach-fuzz face of innocence. Most fifteen-year-old boys worry about chasing girls and wearing the right clothes; Eric Ramirez, along with so many young boys in Violencia, California, worried about surviving high school.

To many, Eric Ramirez is just another statistic, a footnote in the bloody gang history of this place. I knew him, though. We were partners one time in health class. I didn't know him enough to mourn, or even go to his funeral. As cliché as it sounds, whoever said death changes people must have known what they were talking about. I used to think it just made people sad, but it's actually just a huge reality check.

I remember when I found out about Eric's death. My peers and I filed past the security guards and barbed wire fence on a regular Tuesday morning. At first, nothing was unusual about that day, but I did notice a group of girls wearing matching airbrushed t-shirts; I couldn't quite make out the lettering at the time. I eventually found out that they said "Remember Eric."

The principal didn't say anything about Eric in the morning announcements like the time those girls died in a car crash. They didn't offer school-wide counseling this time either. I found out through a classmate. Eric was walking with his friend down the street when two girls of a rival gang approached them. Without a word, one of them took out a knife. Eric's friend ran in the other direction, but Eric wasn't so lucky. I don't know the details, and I assume they won't cover it in the news.

I was nothing like Eric. At fifteen, I played Super Mario and wore the same sweatshirt every day. I rode my mountain bike to school and let my mom give me haircuts. I had an average of high C's and low B's, but that's only because I didn't really care. School wasn't important to me. I was just a dumb kid. My friends were pretty much the same, yet one by one, my circle of friends was getting smaller. The temptation must have been too great for them.

The day I found out about Eric was the day I started thinking seriously about my future. Was I going to be another dumb kid who didn't care? Or was I going to get my act together and stay as far away from that lifestyle as possible?

I'm sure you can guess which way I went. I transferred to GATE as soon as I could, which qualified me for Honors and AP classes the following year. I also joined orchestra, took woodshop, and I found out I have an artistic side. My English teacher even entered a few of my poems into some writing competitions. My GPA is still a bit wounded from freshman year, but a weighted average of 3.8 isn't so bad.

I see Eric Ramirez everywhere I go. I see him in all the young, hooded men walking down the street wearing bandanas of a certain color. I think about these men and Eric, and I'm reminded: it could have been me. I look at my two older brothers, who are more like Eric than I am, and I'm reminded: it more easily could have been them. It probably was almost them a few times. It could have so easily been me, too.

So why wasn't it me?

I don't have a good answer to that question. I guess I had the right friends and the right teachers. I guess I watched the right TV shows and played the right video games. I don't know. At fifteen, my lifestyle wasn't something I consciously chose. I had no idea what I was doing. On that blurry Tuesday, as my classmates solemnly went about their day, I had this realization—I'm lucky. And I'm especially lucky that I figured this out before it was too late.

And for that, I'll always be grateful to Eric Ramirez.

Why This Essay Works

We'll tell you why this essay works: it's moving, intense, and emotive without being heavy, over-the-top, and dramatic. The author draws us in with their introductory paragraph—who is Eric Ramirez? What happened to him? We're intrigued; tell us more.

The paragraphs are well-organized and they flow into each other well. We end up getting a good idea of the author's life and how they experienced growth.

The answer to the prompt is subtle: Eric Ramirez' death acted as a catalyst for the author's growth. The author didn't use any of the text from the prompt in their essay. Admissions officers have to read the same words over and over again, Shmoopers. Give 'em something to connect the dots with. They can handle it.

How the author answered the prompt was also excellent. A cliché is mentioned in the introduction, but knowingly. How a young boy's death managed to help this author's life is a very interesting focus—and totally not cliché.

This language in this essay shows that the author is…

Want your rhetoric as smooth as this? Check out our Shmoop Grammar Guide .

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Common App Essay Example #12

Topic #5: Discuss an accomplishment, event, or realization that sparked a period of personal growth and a new understanding of yourself or others.

I love the game of football and in sixth grade I decided I wanted to play on a team.   I was sure it would be great.  I picked up my equipment a few days before the first practice and strolled in thinking this would be easy. However, it was a disaster!  I was out of shape, the coach yelled all the time, and I was completely unprepared.  I went home devastated and refused to go back. The failure and embarrassment stuck with me and at the end of my freshman year of high school I wanted to try again.  I attended team meetings, started working out, signed up for a skills camp, and attended practices – but this time I didn’t quit, and I made the team.     

Our high school football team traditionally was not very good, but my coach understood our potential.  One night, he watched a television program about another high school team a few states away that was one of the best in the country, and decided he wanted us to play that team.  While the other team was not interested, in the alternative, my coach asked what team in that area was the toughest and meanest team that no one wanted to play.  It turned out to be a reform school and he scheduled a game for the following season.

When the day finally came, we climbed into the buses at our comfortable, upper-middle class high school and traveled a few hours to the reform school.  We felt out of place the moment we arrived.  We stayed in a room with bars on the windows until it was time to warm up – it felt like a prison.  The other team arrived after us and as they took the field the line of players seemed to go on forever.  They outnumbered us 3 to 1 and were much bigger and tougher looking than we were.   In fact, I will never forget lining up on my first play against an opposing player that had his initials carved into his arm by what I can only guess had been a razor blade.  

Under the guidance of our wise coach, we focused, played valiantly and competed well, but we lost by a touchdown.  Afterwards, our coach assembled the team together and began pacing and shaking his head.  We were convinced he was going to start yelling, but instead he turned to one of the other adults and said: “They really messed up, didn’t they?” and the response come back in the affirmative.  Then my coach looked at us and explained that we had messed up not because we had lost but because we had proven that we could compete with the biggest and toughest team.  Therefore, we could no longer hide behind excuses for not playing hard and winning when we returned home.  It took us all by surprise, but it changed our outlook and gave us confidence.  We returned home a new team.  

We had a historic season that year.  We went undefeated in the regular season and were the top team in the Washington D.C. area.  While we did eventually loose in the semi-finals of the state tournament, the experience was the pinnacle of all of our young lives.  We learned how to win, we learned how to push ourselves to new limits, and we gained a new level of confidence.  This experience was particularly sweet for me as I remembered back to sixth grade and how far I had come from the boy who quit after one practice.  

As I look forward to college, I want to continue to embody these principles and be someone who tries hard, pushes his limits, has confidence, and does not hide behind excuses. 

Choose Your Test

Sat / act prep online guides and tips, 177 college essay examples for 11 schools + expert analysis.

College Admissions , College Essays

The personal statement might just be the hardest part of your college application. Mostly this is because it has the least guidance and is the most open-ended. One way to understand what colleges are looking for when they ask you to write an essay is to check out the essays of students who already got in—college essays that actually worked. After all, they must be among the most successful of this weird literary genre.

In this article, I'll go through general guidelines for what makes great college essays great. I've also compiled an enormous list of 100+ actual sample college essays from 11 different schools. Finally, I'll break down two of these published college essay examples and explain why and how they work. With links to 177 full essays and essay excerpts , this article is a great resource for learning how to craft your own personal college admissions essay!

What Excellent College Essays Have in Common

Even though in many ways these sample college essays are very different from one other, they do share some traits you should try to emulate as you write your own essay.

Visible Signs of Planning

Building out from a narrow, concrete focus. You'll see a similar structure in many of the essays. The author starts with a very detailed story of an event or description of a person or place. After this sense-heavy imagery, the essay expands out to make a broader point about the author, and connects this very memorable experience to the author's present situation, state of mind, newfound understanding, or maturity level.

Knowing how to tell a story. Some of the experiences in these essays are one-of-a-kind. But most deal with the stuff of everyday life. What sets them apart is the way the author approaches the topic: analyzing it for drama and humor, for its moving qualities, for what it says about the author's world, and for how it connects to the author's emotional life.

Stellar Execution

A killer first sentence. You've heard it before, and you'll hear it again: you have to suck the reader in, and the best place to do that is the first sentence. Great first sentences are punchy. They are like cliffhangers, setting up an exciting scene or an unusual situation with an unclear conclusion, in order to make the reader want to know more. Don't take my word for it—check out these 22 first sentences from Stanford applicants and tell me you don't want to read the rest of those essays to find out what happens!

A lively, individual voice. Writing is for readers. In this case, your reader is an admissions officer who has read thousands of essays before yours and will read thousands after. Your goal? Don't bore your reader. Use interesting descriptions, stay away from clichés, include your own offbeat observations—anything that makes this essay sounds like you and not like anyone else.

Technical correctness. No spelling mistakes, no grammar weirdness, no syntax issues, no punctuation snafus—each of these sample college essays has been formatted and proofread perfectly. If this kind of exactness is not your strong suit, you're in luck! All colleges advise applicants to have their essays looked over several times by parents, teachers, mentors, and anyone else who can spot a comma splice. Your essay must be your own work, but there is absolutely nothing wrong with getting help polishing it.

And if you need more guidance, connect with PrepScholar's expert admissions consultants . These expert writers know exactly what college admissions committees look for in an admissions essay and chan help you craft an essay that boosts your chances of getting into your dream school.

Check out PrepScholar's Essay Editing and Coaching progra m for more details!

Want to write the perfect college application essay? Get professional help from PrepScholar.

Your dedicated PrepScholar Admissions counselor will craft your perfect college essay, from the ground up. We'll learn your background and interests, brainstorm essay topics, and walk you through the essay drafting process, step-by-step. At the end, you'll have a unique essay that you'll proudly submit to your top choice colleges.

Don't leave your college application to chance. Find out more about PrepScholar Admissions now :

Links to Full College Essay Examples

Some colleges publish a selection of their favorite accepted college essays that worked, and I've put together a selection of over 100 of these.

Common App Essay Samples

Please note that some of these college essay examples may be responding to prompts that are no longer in use. The current Common App prompts are as follows:

1. Some students have a background, identity, interest, or talent that is so meaningful they believe their application would be incomplete without it. If this sounds like you, then please share your story. 2. The lessons we take from obstacles we encounter can be fundamental to later success. Recount a time when you faced a challenge, setback, or failure. How did it affect you, and what did you learn from the experience? 3. Reflect on a time when you questioned or challenged a belief or idea. What prompted your thinking? What was the outcome? 4. Reflect on something that someone has done for you that has made you happy or thankful in a surprising way. How has this gratitude affected or motivated you? 5. Discuss an accomplishment, event, or realization that sparked a period of personal growth and a new understanding of yourself or others. 6. Describe a topic, idea, or concept you find so engaging that it makes you lose all track of time. Why does it captivate you? What or who do you turn to when you want to learn more?

7. Share an essay on any topic of your choice. It can be one you've already written, one that responds to a different prompt, or one of your own design.

Now, let's get to the good stuff: the list of 177 college essay examples responding to current and past Common App essay prompts. 

Connecticut college.

• 12 Common Application essays from the classes of 2022-2025

Hamilton College

• 7 Common Application essays from the class of 2026
• 7 Common Application essays from the class of 2022
• 7 Common Application essays from the class of 2018
• 8 Common Application essays from the class of 2012
• 8 Common Application essays from the class of 2007

Johns Hopkins

These essays are answers to past prompts from either the Common Application or the Coalition Application (which Johns Hopkins used to accept).

• 1 Common Application or Coalition Application essay from the class of 2026
• 6 Common Application or Coalition Application essays from the class of 2025
• 6 Common Application or Universal Application essays from the class of 2024
• 6 Common Application or Universal Application essays from the class of 2023
• 7 Common Application of Universal Application essays from the class of 2022
• 5 Common Application or Universal Application essays from the class of 2021
• 7 Common Application or Universal Application essays from the class of 2020

Essay Examples Published by Other Websites

• 2 Common Application essays ( 1st essay , 2nd essay ) from applicants admitted to Columbia

Other Sample College Essays

Here is a collection of essays that are college-specific.

Babson College

• 4 essays (and 1 video response) on "Why Babson" from the class of 2020

Emory University

• 5 essay examples ( 1 , 2 , 3 , 4 , 5 ) from the class of 2020 along with analysis from Emory admissions staff on why the essays were exceptional
• 5 more recent essay examples ( 1 , 2 , 3 , 4 , 5 ) along with analysis from Emory admissions staff on what made these essays stand out

University of Georgia

• 1 “strong essay” sample from 2019
• 1 “strong essay” sample from 2018
• 10 Harvard essays from 2023
• 10 Harvard essays from 2022
• 10 Harvard essays from 2021
• 10 Harvard essays from 2020
• 10 Harvard essays from 2019
• 10 Harvard essays from 2018
• 6 essays from admitted MIT students

Smith College

• 6 "best gift" essays from the class of 2018

Books of College Essays

If you're looking for even more sample college essays, consider purchasing a college essay book. The best of these include dozens of essays that worked and feedback from real admissions officers.

College Essays That Made a Difference —This detailed guide from Princeton Review includes not only successful essays, but also interviews with admissions officers and full student profiles.

50 Successful Harvard Application Essays by the Staff of the Harvard Crimson—A must for anyone aspiring to Harvard .

50 Successful Ivy League Application Essays and 50 Successful Stanford Application Essays by Gen and Kelly Tanabe—For essays from other top schools, check out this venerated series, which is regularly updated with new essays.

Heavenly Essays by Janine W. Robinson—This collection from the popular blogger behind Essay Hell includes a wider range of schools, as well as helpful tips on honing your own essay.

Analyzing Great Common App Essays That Worked

I've picked two essays from the examples collected above to examine in more depth so that you can see exactly what makes a successful college essay work. Full credit for these essays goes to the original authors and the schools that published them.

Example 1: "Breaking Into Cars," by Stephen, Johns Hopkins Class of '19 (Common App Essay, 636 words long)

I had never broken into a car before.

We were in Laredo, having just finished our first day at a Habitat for Humanity work site. The Hotchkiss volunteers had already left, off to enjoy some Texas BBQ, leaving me behind with the college kids to clean up. Not until we were stranded did we realize we were locked out of the van.

Someone picked a coat hanger out of the dumpster, handed it to me, and took a few steps back.

"Can you do that thing with a coat hanger to unlock it?"

"Why me?" I thought.

More out of amusement than optimism, I gave it a try. I slid the hanger into the window's seal like I'd seen on crime shows, and spent a few minutes jiggling the apparatus around the inside of the frame. Suddenly, two things simultaneously clicked. One was the lock on the door. (I actually succeeded in springing it.) The other was the realization that I'd been in this type of situation before. In fact, I'd been born into this type of situation.

My upbringing has numbed me to unpredictability and chaos. With a family of seven, my home was loud, messy, and spottily supervised. My siblings arguing, the dog barking, the phone ringing—all meant my house was functioning normally. My Dad, a retired Navy pilot, was away half the time. When he was home, he had a parenting style something like a drill sergeant. At the age of nine, I learned how to clear burning oil from the surface of water. My Dad considered this a critical life skill—you know, in case my aircraft carrier should ever get torpedoed. "The water's on fire! Clear a hole!" he shouted, tossing me in the lake without warning. While I'm still unconvinced about that particular lesson's practicality, my Dad's overarching message is unequivocally true: much of life is unexpected, and you have to deal with the twists and turns.

Living in my family, days rarely unfolded as planned. A bit overlooked, a little pushed around, I learned to roll with reality, negotiate a quick deal, and give the improbable a try. I don't sweat the small stuff, and I definitely don't expect perfect fairness. So what if our dining room table only has six chairs for seven people? Someone learns the importance of punctuality every night.

But more than punctuality and a special affinity for musical chairs, my family life has taught me to thrive in situations over which I have no power. Growing up, I never controlled my older siblings, but I learned how to thwart their attempts to control me. I forged alliances, and realigned them as necessary. Sometimes, I was the poor, defenseless little brother; sometimes I was the omniscient elder. Different things to different people, as the situation demanded. I learned to adapt.

Back then, these techniques were merely reactions undertaken to ensure my survival. But one day this fall, Dr. Hicks, our Head of School, asked me a question that he hoped all seniors would reflect on throughout the year: "How can I participate in a thing I do not govern, in the company of people I did not choose?"

The question caught me off guard, much like the question posed to me in Laredo. Then, I realized I knew the answer. I knew why the coat hanger had been handed to me.

Growing up as the middle child in my family, I was a vital participant in a thing I did not govern, in the company of people I did not choose. It's family. It's society. And often, it's chaos. You participate by letting go of the small stuff, not expecting order and perfection, and facing the unexpected with confidence, optimism, and preparedness. My family experience taught me to face a serendipitous world with confidence.

What Makes This Essay Tick?

It's very helpful to take writing apart in order to see just how it accomplishes its objectives. Stephen's essay is very effective. Let's find out why!

An Opening Line That Draws You In

In just eight words, we get: scene-setting (he is standing next to a car about to break in), the idea of crossing a boundary (he is maybe about to do an illegal thing for the first time), and a cliffhanger (we are thinking: is he going to get caught? Is he headed for a life of crime? Is he about to be scared straight?).

Great, Detailed Opening Story

More out of amusement than optimism, I gave it a try. I slid the hanger into the window's seal like I'd seen on crime shows, and spent a few minutes jiggling the apparatus around the inside of the frame.

It's the details that really make this small experience come alive. Notice how whenever he can, Stephen uses a more specific, descriptive word in place of a more generic one. The volunteers aren't going to get food or dinner; they're going for "Texas BBQ." The coat hanger comes from "a dumpster." Stephen doesn't just move the coat hanger—he "jiggles" it.

Details also help us visualize the emotions of the people in the scene. The person who hands Stephen the coat hanger isn't just uncomfortable or nervous; he "takes a few steps back"—a description of movement that conveys feelings. Finally, the detail of actual speech makes the scene pop. Instead of writing that the other guy asked him to unlock the van, Stephen has the guy actually say his own words in a way that sounds like a teenager talking.

Turning a Specific Incident Into a Deeper Insight

Suddenly, two things simultaneously clicked. One was the lock on the door. (I actually succeeded in springing it.) The other was the realization that I'd been in this type of situation before. In fact, I'd been born into this type of situation.

Stephen makes the locked car experience a meaningful illustration of how he has learned to be resourceful and ready for anything, and he also makes this turn from the specific to the broad through an elegant play on the two meanings of the word "click."

Using Concrete Examples When Making Abstract Claims

My upbringing has numbed me to unpredictability and chaos. With a family of seven, my home was loud, messy, and spottily supervised. My siblings arguing, the dog barking, the phone ringing—all meant my house was functioning normally.

"Unpredictability and chaos" are very abstract, not easily visualized concepts. They could also mean any number of things—violence, abandonment, poverty, mental instability. By instantly following up with highly finite and unambiguous illustrations like "family of seven" and "siblings arguing, the dog barking, the phone ringing," Stephen grounds the abstraction in something that is easy to picture: a large, noisy family.

Using Small Bits of Humor and Casual Word Choice

My Dad, a retired Navy pilot, was away half the time. When he was home, he had a parenting style something like a drill sergeant. At the age of nine, I learned how to clear burning oil from the surface of water. My Dad considered this a critical life skill—you know, in case my aircraft carrier should ever get torpedoed.

Obviously, knowing how to clean burning oil is not high on the list of things every 9-year-old needs to know. To emphasize this, Stephen uses sarcasm by bringing up a situation that is clearly over-the-top: "in case my aircraft carrier should ever get torpedoed."

The humor also feels relaxed. Part of this is because he introduces it with the colloquial phrase "you know," so it sounds like he is talking to us in person. This approach also diffuses the potential discomfort of the reader with his father's strictness—since he is making jokes about it, clearly he is OK. Notice, though, that this doesn't occur very much in the essay. This helps keep the tone meaningful and serious rather than flippant.

An Ending That Stretches the Insight Into the Future

But one day this fall, Dr. Hicks, our Head of School, asked me a question that he hoped all seniors would reflect on throughout the year: "How can I participate in a thing I do not govern, in the company of people I did not choose?"

The ending of the essay reveals that Stephen's life has been one long preparation for the future. He has emerged from chaos and his dad's approach to parenting as a person who can thrive in a world that he can't control.

This connection of past experience to current maturity and self-knowledge is a key element in all successful personal essays. Colleges are very much looking for mature, self-aware applicants. These are the qualities of successful college students, who will be able to navigate the independence college classes require and the responsibility and quasi-adulthood of college life.

What Could This Essay Do Even Better?

Even the best essays aren't perfect, and even the world's greatest writers will tell you that writing is never "finished"—just "due." So what would we tweak in this essay if we could?

Replace some of the clichéd language. Stephen uses handy phrases like "twists and turns" and "don't sweat the small stuff" as a kind of shorthand for explaining his relationship to chaos and unpredictability. But using too many of these ready-made expressions runs the risk of clouding out your own voice and replacing it with something expected and boring.

Use another example from recent life. Stephen's first example (breaking into the van in Laredo) is a great illustration of being resourceful in an unexpected situation. But his essay also emphasizes that he "learned to adapt" by being "different things to different people." It would be great to see how this plays out outside his family, either in the situation in Laredo or another context.

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Example 2: By Renner Kwittken, Tufts Class of '23 (Common App Essay, 645 words long)

My first dream job was to be a pickle truck driver. I saw it in my favorite book, Richard Scarry's "Cars and Trucks and Things That Go," and for some reason, I was absolutely obsessed with the idea of driving a giant pickle. Much to the discontent of my younger sister, I insisted that my parents read us that book as many nights as possible so we could find goldbug, a small little golden bug, on every page. I would imagine the wonderful life I would have: being a pig driving a giant pickle truck across the country, chasing and finding goldbug. I then moved on to wanting to be a Lego Master. Then an architect. Then a surgeon.

Then I discovered a real goldbug: gold nanoparticles that can reprogram macrophages to assist in killing tumors, produce clear images of them without sacrificing the subject, and heat them to obliteration.

Suddenly the destination of my pickle was clear.

I quickly became enveloped by the world of nanomedicine; I scoured articles about liposomes, polymeric micelles, dendrimers, targeting ligands, and self-assembling nanoparticles, all conquering cancer in some exotic way. Completely absorbed, I set out to find a mentor to dive even deeper into these topics. After several rejections, I was immensely grateful to receive an invitation to work alongside Dr. Sangeeta Ray at Johns Hopkins.

In the lab, Dr. Ray encouraged a great amount of autonomy to design and implement my own procedures. I chose to attack a problem that affects the entire field of nanomedicine: nanoparticles consistently fail to translate from animal studies into clinical trials. Jumping off recent literature, I set out to see if a pre-dose of a common chemotherapeutic could enhance nanoparticle delivery in aggressive prostate cancer, creating three novel constructs based on three different linear polymers, each using fluorescent dye (although no gold, sorry goldbug!). Though using radioactive isotopes like Gallium and Yttrium would have been incredible, as a 17-year-old, I unfortunately wasn't allowed in the same room as these radioactive materials (even though I took a Geiger counter to a pair of shoes and found them to be slightly dangerous).

I hadn't expected my hypothesis to work, as the research project would have ideally been led across two full years. Yet while there are still many optimizations and revisions to be done, I was thrilled to find -- with completely new nanoparticles that may one day mean future trials will use particles with the initials "RK-1" -- thatcyclophosphamide did indeed increase nanoparticle delivery to the tumor in a statistically significant way.

A secondary, unexpected research project was living alone in Baltimore, a new city to me, surrounded by people much older than I. Even with moving frequently between hotels, AirBnB's, and students' apartments, I strangely reveled in the freedom I had to enjoy my surroundings and form new friendships with graduate school students from the lab. We explored The Inner Harbor at night, attended a concert together one weekend, and even got to watch the Orioles lose (to nobody's surprise). Ironically, it's through these new friendships I discovered something unexpected: what I truly love is sharing research. Whether in a presentation or in a casual conversation, making others interested in science is perhaps more exciting to me than the research itself. This solidified a new pursuit to angle my love for writing towards illuminating science in ways people can understand, adding value to a society that can certainly benefit from more scientific literacy.

It seems fitting that my goals are still transforming: in Scarry's book, there is not just one goldbug, there is one on every page. With each new experience, I'm learning that it isn't the goldbug itself, but rather the act of searching for the goldbugs that will encourage, shape, and refine my ever-evolving passions. Regardless of the goldbug I seek -- I know my pickle truck has just begun its journey.

Renner takes a somewhat different approach than Stephen, but their essay is just as detailed and engaging. Let's go through some of the strengths of this essay.

One Clear Governing Metaphor

This essay is ultimately about two things: Renner’s dreams and future career goals, and Renner’s philosophy on goal-setting and achieving one’s dreams.

But instead of listing off all the amazing things they’ve done to pursue their dream of working in nanomedicine, Renner tells a powerful, unique story instead. To set up the narrative, Renner opens the essay by connecting their experiences with goal-setting and dream-chasing all the way back to a memorable childhood experience:

This lighthearted–but relevant!--story about the moment when Renner first developed a passion for a specific career (“finding the goldbug”) provides an anchor point for the rest of the essay. As Renner pivots to describing their current dreams and goals–working in nanomedicine–the metaphor of “finding the goldbug” is reflected in Renner’s experiments, rejections, and new discoveries.

Though Renner tells multiple stories about their quest to “find the goldbug,” or, in other words, pursue their passion, each story is connected by a unifying theme; namely, that as we search and grow over time, our goals will transform…and that’s okay! By the end of the essay, Renner uses the metaphor of “finding the goldbug” to reiterate the relevance of the opening story:

While the earlier parts of the essay convey Renner’s core message by showing, the final, concluding paragraph sums up Renner’s insights by telling. By briefly and clearly stating the relevance of the goldbug metaphor to their own philosophy on goals and dreams, Renner demonstrates their creativity, insight, and eagerness to grow and evolve as the journey continues into college.

An Engaging, Individual Voice

This essay uses many techniques that make Renner sound genuine and make the reader feel like we already know them.

Technique #1: humor. Notice Renner's gentle and relaxed humor that lightly mocks their younger self's grand ambitions (this is different from the more sarcastic kind of humor used by Stephen in the first essay—you could never mistake one writer for the other).

My first dream job was to be a pickle truck driver.

I would imagine the wonderful life I would have: being a pig driving a giant pickle truck across the country, chasing and finding goldbug. I then moved on to wanting to be a Lego Master. Then an architect. Then a surgeon.

Renner gives a great example of how to use humor to your advantage in college essays. You don’t want to come off as too self-deprecating or sarcastic, but telling a lightheartedly humorous story about your younger self that also showcases how you’ve grown and changed over time can set the right tone for your entire essay.

Technique #2: intentional, eye-catching structure. The second technique is the way Renner uses a unique structure to bolster the tone and themes of their essay . The structure of your essay can have a major impact on how your ideas come across…so it’s important to give it just as much thought as the content of your essay!

For instance, Renner does a great job of using one-line paragraphs to create dramatic emphasis and to make clear transitions from one phase of the story to the next:

Suddenly the destination of my pickle car was clear.

Not only does the one-liner above signal that Renner is moving into a new phase of the narrative (their nanoparticle research experiences), it also tells the reader that this is a big moment in Renner’s story. It’s clear that Renner made a major discovery that changed the course of their goal pursuit and dream-chasing. Through structure, Renner conveys excitement and entices the reader to keep pushing forward to the next part of the story.

Technique #3: playing with syntax. The third technique is to use sentences of varying length, syntax, and structure. Most of the essay's written in standard English and uses grammatically correct sentences. However, at key moments, Renner emphasizes that the reader needs to sit up and pay attention by switching to short, colloquial, differently punctuated, and sometimes fragmented sentences.

Even with moving frequently between hotels, AirBnB's, and students' apartments, I strangely reveled in the freedom I had to enjoy my surroundings and form new friendships with graduate school students from the lab. We explored The Inner Harbor at night, attended a concert together one weekend, and even got to watch the Orioles lose (to nobody's surprise). Ironically, it's through these new friendships I discovered something unexpected: what I truly love is sharing research.

In the examples above, Renner switches adeptly between long, flowing sentences and quippy, telegraphic ones. At the same time, Renner uses these different sentence lengths intentionally. As they describe their experiences in new places, they use longer sentences to immerse the reader in the sights, smells, and sounds of those experiences. And when it’s time to get a big, key idea across, Renner switches to a short, punchy sentence to stop the reader in their tracks.

The varying syntax and sentence lengths pull the reader into the narrative and set up crucial “aha” moments when it’s most important…which is a surefire way to make any college essay stand out.

Renner's essay is very strong, but there are still a few little things that could be improved.

Connecting the research experiences to the theme of “finding the goldbug.”  The essay begins and ends with Renner’s connection to the idea of “finding the goldbug.” And while this metaphor is deftly tied into the essay’s intro and conclusion, it isn’t entirely clear what Renner’s big findings were during the research experiences that are described in the middle of the essay. It would be great to add a sentence or two stating what Renner’s big takeaways (or “goldbugs”) were from these experiences, which add more cohesion to the essay as a whole.

Give more details about discovering the world of nanomedicine. It makes sense that Renner wants to get into the details of their big research experiences as quickly as possible. After all, these are the details that show Renner’s dedication to nanomedicine! But a smoother transition from the opening pickle car/goldbug story to Renner’s “real goldbug” of nanoparticles would help the reader understand why nanoparticles became Renner’s goldbug. Finding out why Renner is so motivated to study nanomedicine–and perhaps what put them on to this field of study–would help readers fully understand why Renner chose this path in the first place.

4 Essential Tips for Writing Your Own Essay

How can you use this discussion to better your own college essay? Here are some suggestions for ways to use this resource effectively.

#1: Get Help From the Experts

Getting your college applications together takes a lot of work and can be pretty intimidatin g. Essays are even more important than ever now that admissions processes are changing and schools are going test-optional and removing diversity standards thanks to new Supreme Court rulings .  If you want certified expert help that really makes a difference, get started with  PrepScholar’s Essay Editing and Coaching program. Our program can help you put together an incredible essay from idea to completion so that your application stands out from the crowd. We've helped students get into the best colleges in the United States, including Harvard, Stanford, and Yale.  If you're ready to take the next step and boost your odds of getting into your dream school, connect with our experts today .

#2: Read Other Essays to Get Ideas for Your Own

As you go through the essays we've compiled for you above, ask yourself the following questions:

• Can you explain to yourself (or someone else!) why the opening sentence works well?
• Look for the essay's detailed personal anecdote. What senses is the author describing? Can you easily picture the scene in your mind's eye?
• Find the place where this anecdote bridges into a larger insight about the author. How does the essay connect the two? How does the anecdote work as an example of the author's characteristic, trait, or skill?
• Check out the essay's tone. If it's funny, can you find the places where the humor comes from? If it's sad and moving, can you find the imagery and description of feelings that make you moved? If it's serious, can you see how word choice adds to this tone?

Make a note whenever you find an essay or part of an essay that you think was particularly well-written, and think about what you like about it . Is it funny? Does it help you really get to know the writer? Does it show what makes the writer unique? Once you have your list, keep it next to you while writing your essay to remind yourself to try and use those same techniques in your own essay.

#3: Find Your "A-Ha!" Moment

All of these essays rely on connecting with the reader through a heartfelt, highly descriptive scene from the author's life. It can either be very dramatic (did you survive a plane crash?) or it can be completely mundane (did you finally beat your dad at Scrabble?). Either way, it should be personal and revealing about you, your personality, and the way you are now that you are entering the adult world.

Check out essays by authors like John Jeremiah Sullivan , Leslie Jamison , Hanif Abdurraqib , and Esmé Weijun Wang to get more examples of how to craft a compelling personal narrative.

#4: Start Early, Revise Often

Let me level with you: the best writing isn't writing at all. It's rewriting. And in order to have time to rewrite, you have to start way before the application deadline. My advice is to write your first draft at least two months before your applications are due.

Let it sit for a few days untouched. Then come back to it with fresh eyes and think critically about what you've written. What's extra? What's missing? What is in the wrong place? What doesn't make sense? Don't be afraid to take it apart and rearrange sections. Do this several times over, and your essay will be much better for it!

For more editing tips, check out a style guide like Dreyer's English or Eats, Shoots & Leaves .

What's Next?

Still not sure which colleges you want to apply to? Our experts will show you how to make a college list that will help you choose a college that's right for you.

Interested in learning more about college essays? Check out our detailed breakdown of exactly how personal statements work in an application , some suggestions on what to avoid when writing your essay , and our guide to writing about your extracurricular activities .

Working on the rest of your application? Read what admissions officers wish applicants knew before applying .

Want to improve your SAT score by 160 points or your ACT score by 4 points? We've written a guide for each test about the top 5 strategies you must be using to have a shot at improving your score. Download it for free now:

The recommendations in this post are based solely on our knowledge and experience. If you purchase an item through one of our links PrepScholar may receive a commission.

Anna scored in the 99th percentile on her SATs in high school, and went on to major in English at Princeton and to get her doctorate in English Literature at Columbia. She is passionate about improving student access to higher education.

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Great Ideas From Readers

Flipping the Script on the College Essay With Help From The New York Times

How one teacher uses personal narratives to help high school seniors write application essays that are “powerful, meaningful and clear”

By Sharon Murchie

As we kick off a third year of our student narrative writing contest , we bring you an idea from Sharon Murchie, a 10th and 12th grade English teacher at Okemos High School in Okemos, Mich. , for how to use personal essays from The Times to help students write meaningful and authentic college application essays.

Year after year, Ms. Murchie, who was also a member of the 2020-21 cohort of The New York Times Teaching Project , watched her high school seniors freeze in the “proverbial headlights of the college essay.” So she decided to “flip the script” by having them write their essays first, before ever seeing the application prompts. Below, she tells us about her “Common App Essay Boot Camp,” featuring Times mentor texts and The Learning Network’s personal narrative writing unit .

If you have a teaching idea to share, tell us about it here , or browse our full collection of Reader Ideas .

— The Learning Network

Writing the college application essay is both a rite of passage for high school seniors and a stumbling block for many of them.

Every year, my incoming seniors are panicked about the essay that they have to submit for the Common App, the nation’s most used application. For some reason, their 17- and 18-year-old brains have suddenly decided that everything they have ever learned about writing with voice and “show, don’t tell” and addressing their audience should fly out the window when faced with the terrifying unknown: The College Entrance Committee. They often try to sound like anyone other than themselves, resorting to the thesaurus and picking the biggest word instead of believing in their own voices. They can’t envision an audience that is shrouded in mystery out there, somewhere, the panel of judgment, the gatekeepers to the rest of their lives.

The resulting essays that they panic-write are often dull, formulaic, filled with clichés, and attempting to sound wise beyond their 18 years of life. They write tortured sentences like “I look back, now cognizant of the piteous ineptitude of my 13-year-old self” and “I try to remember what life was once like before the new normal, the unprecedented time of Covid.”

I’ve tried to stress to them for years that the Common App essay is just a short personal narrative written to a fairly open-ended prompt, but so many students feel they have nothing meaningful to write about. I needed to flip this experience upside down for them, and have students write their stories first, before they looked at the actual prompts and started to sweat.

Thus, the Common App Essay Boot Camp, featuring The New York Times, was born.

I started with the Learning Network’s unit on narrative writing , which is rich with prompts and mentor texts. The resources provide scaffolding for students to draft short but vivid personal essays about seemingly insignificant moments in their lives: a grudge they held, a lie they told, a risk they took, a sunrise they saw. Each mentor text lesson teaches a different key element of narrative writing, provides examples of the skill in Times narrative essays, and then challenges students to use it in their own writing. Students are encouraged to write what they know, honor their own voices, and tell their unique stories.

I wanted to use a similar approach, but adapt it for high school seniors who are writing their college application essays. So I created a unit where students would write personal narratives, inspired by Times mentor texts that would be applicable to the Common App prompts. Then, I would reveal the prompts and they would already have drafts that they could work with and modify for their college application.

Finding Inspiration in Times Narrative Essays

To find personal narratives for students to emulate, I combed through the Lives column , which ran in The Times for over 20 years and invited writers to tell short, powerful stories about meaningful life experiences. I also searched through the college application essays on money, work and social class that The Times publishes every year.

From those, I chose just four essays to use as mentor texts that could easily align with the Common App prompts.

Each week, we read a New York Times essay as a mentor text, annotated it for specific “writer’s moves,” discussed it, and then wrote our own essays, mirroring some of the craft moves that the authors had made in the mentor texts. Then, we worked through a writing workshop feedback and revision process, where students noted evidence in each other’s essays of the specific writing moves that had been the focus that week. Finally, students submitted their polished essays for a grade or class credit.

Week 1: Sensory Description

We started with sensory description, using the mentor text “ This Cold House ” by Elizabeth Gilbert. The author’s moves we focused on this week were word choice and use of sensory details in order to engage the reader in the moment. Students then wrote about a favorite memory from their lives with as much of this kind of detail as possible.

Week 2: Identity

We moved into personal reflection using the mentor text “ I Live on the Edge ” by Tillena Trebon. The author’s moves we focused on were word choice, syntax and voice. I invited students to discuss how the author organizes her writing and all of the different “edges” she lives on. Then, they wrote about two worlds that they balance between.

I want students to see that they have a story, no matter how “normal” or “uneventful” they think their lives might be. Every student straddles multiple identities, and most college applications ask students to write about some aspect of their identities.

Week 3: Memorable Moments

I followed The Learning Network Writing Curriculum’s suggestion to write narratives that tell a short, memorable story , using the mentor text “ My Secret Pepsi Plot ” by Boris Fishmann. We discussed how the author moves back and forth between a “little kid understanding” and an “adult understanding” throughout the text, and how he reveals significant things about himself through this insignificant moment of taking returnables back to the store.

Students wrote about an insignificant moment in their own lives that said something significant about them or their background. I challenged them to try to stay in the moment, at the age that moment occurred, to make it really come to life.

Week 4: Direct and Indirect Explanation

We ended with “ A Slacker of Jakarta ” by Eka Kurniawan and discussed the concepts of author’s context, implicit and explicit evidence, and the different lenses through which we view ourselves. Mr. Kurniawan discusses his relationship with his mother throughout the piece, but sometimes that relationship is revealed through an action, instead of a direct explanation. Mr. Kurniawan also calls himself a “slacker,” and this led to rich discussions in the classroom about lenses and whose eyes he was judging himself through.

For their final personal narrative, students wrote about a piece of advice they had been given that they may or may not have followed. I’ve found that everyone has a “piece of advice story.” (When I was 18, for example, my mom earnestly insisted when I got my nose pierced that I’d never get a real job.) I reminded my students to tell the story, including the context, of that piece of advice, and to reveal the relationship between themselves and the advice-giver in both explicit and implicit ways.

Writing to the Common App Essay Prompts

After completing this cycle for four weeks (and promising students that we really were working on their college essays this whole time), I introduced students to the Common App essay prompts . Here they are for the 2021-22 school year:

Some students have a background, identity, interest, or talent that is so meaningful they believe their application would be incomplete without it. If this sounds like you, then please share your story.

The lessons we take from obstacles we encounter can be fundamental to later success. Recount a time when you faced a challenge, setback, or failure. How did it affect you, and what did you learn from the experience?

Reflect on a time when you questioned or challenged a belief or idea. What prompted your thinking? What was the outcome?

Reflect on something that someone has done for you that has made you happy or thankful in a surprising way. How has this gratitude affected or motivated you?

Discuss an accomplishment, event, or realization that sparked a period of personal growth and a new understanding of yourself or others.

Describe a topic, idea, or concept you find so engaging that it makes you lose all track of time. Why does it captivate you? What or who do you turn to when you want to learn more?

Share an essay on any topic of your choice. It can be one you’ve already written, one that responds to a different prompt, or one of your own design.

Instead of trying to write a new essay to specifically address one of the prompts, students could use one of the personal narratives they’d already written and turn it into an amazing application essay.

First, I had them identify key words in each prompt, and then consider which of their four essays might fit each prompt. Next, working with their writing groups, they chose their favorite essay and prompt combination and discussed what, if anything, would need to be altered. Finally, students revised their pieces to ensure that the key words they had identified from the prompt appeared somewhere within their essays, and that their essays were within the recommended 650-word limit .

Three Student Essays, One Generative Exercise

To show you how this works, here are three essays written by students. They all chose the narratives they wrote in response to Tillena Trebon’s mentor text “ I Live on the Edge ” about balancing between two worlds. But they revised their essays to respond to three different Common App essay prompts.

Naseeb Oluwafisiayomi Bello chose the first Common App prompt: Some students have a background, identity, interest, or talent that is so meaningful they believe their application would be incomplete without it. If this sounds like you, then please share your story.

Naseeb writes about how growing up straddling two cultures shaped his identity as someone who is Black, African and American. Naseeb’s essay begins:

I was made in one country and born in another. I am the end of an original generation and still the start of a new one. My parents left with history and my life begins with mystery. It was planned that I would become the nexus of both. I live in a home mostly dominated by one culture and leave the home exposed to a new one. I ask my mom “What’s for dinner?” expecting the same flavors. I suggest dinner ideas hoping to taste the melting pot. The distinct aroma of my home reminds me of the scent in the home of my parents in Nigeria. When we cook, we open the doors and windows, initiating the invasion of the air outside. The aroma of my house melts into the outside.

Read the rest of Naseeb’s essay .

Harshil Chidura decided to respond to the fifth prompt: Discuss an accomplishment, event, or realization that sparked a period of personal growth and a new understanding of yourself or others.

Harshil’s essay tackles that phase between childhood and adulthood, and how treasuring his younger self has helped him confront a daunting future. Harshil writes:

I still feel like someone who watches Minecraft “Let’s Play” episodes in his free time, who plays football in his backyard, and whose greatest source of excitement is a GameStop gift card on his birthday. I still feel like I should be nervous about starting the fifth grade, eating Popsicles after a long day of playing outside with super soakers, and celebrating my half birthday. And yet, it has been years since I have done any one of those things, nor am I particularly interested in them now. My interests and hobbies have matured along with me and the rest of my peers. But still, I feel like no time has passed at all.

Read Harshil’s full essay.

Zachary Flink responded to the last prompt: Share an essay on any topic of your choice. It can be one you’ve already written, one that responds to a different prompt, or one of your own design.

Zachary writes about feeling like there are two versions of himself. His essay begins:

I live each day as two different people. The daily swallowing of a pill takes out my brain and replaces it with another. This statement seems so ridiculous. A tiny 50 milligram pill doesn’t seem like it has the power to change who you are for seven hours. From 8 a.m. to 3 p.m., I live life as an overly determined robot.

Read the rest of Zachary’s essay.

For the summative unit assessment, I had students follow the model of The Learning Network’s Annotated by the Author series, in which student writers reveal their writing process through annotations and a short video interview. I asked students to create their own videos in Flipgrid , explaining which essay they chose for their Common App and why, and outlining the author choices and moves they made.

Here are videos from three students:

Seoah An talks about how she used word choice and sentence structure to highlight her feelings of alienation and cultural difference in her essay “The Name Game.”

Teagan Hemmerly discusses how she deployed sensory details to show the pressure she feels to be perfect.

Shreya Ravipati tells viewers why she chose a “nonsensical topic” — everything bagels — to show her personal growth.

Rising seniors are often trapped in the quicksand of thinking they know it all, and yet knowing they know nothing. Giving them personal essay mentor texts from The Times, and using the Learning Network’s narrative-writing framework, helps them see that they really do have a story worth telling, and that their own voices can be powerful, meaningful and clear.

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Scholarship Essay Examples That Won Money

Scholarships & Financial Aid Student Success

Updated on December 22nd, 2023

Scholarship application essays often carry a TON of weight when deciding who will receive the most scholarship money, but it’s not always easy to stand out in the crowd of applications. Even if your student fits the scholarship criteria  exactly , they’re still likely to be one of a number of applicants with similar grades, accomplishments, community involvements, and aspirations.

That’s where an excellent scholarship application and scholarship essay format becomes a necessity and the  key  to winning the money. The scholarship essay provides the scholarship committee an opportunity to learn more about the individual behind the application and gives them a much more detailed look at your student’s school and home life. Additionally, the essay is your child’s greatest chance to shine and make their case for why they should be awarded the scholarship.

So, what do you need in order to write a great essay and maximize your chances of winning?! Check out these  scholarship essay examples from scholarship winners that won money!

If you and your student are working on the scholarship process, make sure you don’t miss our free scholarship training. I cover exactly where you can find more scholarships your student is actually  eligible for  and are  legitimate . Grab your spot here:  6 Steps to Quickly Securing Scholarships for College .

• 1.1 Learn About Different Essay Prompts
• 1.2 Understand What’s Considered Unique and Compelling
• 1.3 Explore Different Styles to Find Your Voice
• 1.4 See What Resonated with the Scholarship Committee
• 2.1 Winner #1: Special Attribute or Accomplishment Essay
• 2.2 Winner #2: Plan beyond college essay 
• 2.3 Winner #3: Special Attribute or Accomplishment Essay
• 2.4 Winner #4: Plan beyond college essay 
• 2.5 Winner #5: Special Attribute or Accomplishment Essay
• 2.6 Winner #6: Plan beyond college essay 
• 3.1 Example 1:
• 3.2 Example 2:
• 4 How to Use Scholarship Essay Examples to Win Scholarships

Why Reviewing Scholarship Essay Examples Is Time Well Spent

Many students may wonder whether reviewing scholarship examples that won money is worth doing. After all, scholarship essays should tell a personal story, so anything covered by another student might not relate to your student at all.

However, there are several benefits to checking out scholarship essay examples. Here’s a look at why reading them is time well spent.

Learn About Different Essay Prompts

Every winning scholarship essay is based on a specific essay prompt. While many organizations use similar prompts, a scholarship provider can ask students unique questions, too.

When students explore example scholarship essays, they usually learn about the prompt that inspired them. That can help your college or high school student find out more about what a scholarship committee may present as a prompt before they begin their scholarship journey. Then, they can consider how they’d respond to each of the given questions, leaving them better prepared for the road that lies ahead.

Essentially, checking out the essays and prompts encourages them to reflect on their lives to identify moments that can become the basis for their essays. It could even inspire them to write practice essays based on the prompts they discover, allowing them to familiarize themselves with the scholarship essay format and writing process.

Plus, practice essays are opportunities to get feedback from parents, teachers, or friends before they begin the process of pursuing this type of financial aid. As a bonus, if a particular practice essay is incredibly strong, they can always save it for future use in case a scholarship provider presents that prompt, allowing them to have a functional head start.

Understand What’s Considered Unique and Compelling

The most widely given advice to students who are preparing to write scholarship essays is to make sure what they’re sharing is unique and compelling. But what exactly does that entail? In many cases, the guidance feels very ambiguous or vague, particularly to students who may not know whether various aspects of their lives may stand out.

When reviewing examples of scholarship essays that won money, students see precisely what a scholarship committee deemed unique and compelling enough to win the award. That may help students determine whether a particular community service experience, personal statement, education abroad experience, or other aspect of their lives is intriguing enough to separate them from the pack.

It also gives students insights into their competition. By seeing what a scholarship provider selected as a winning essay, students can understand what other students may present to the scholarship committee. Then, they can figure out how to ensure what they write goes above and beyond what most students submit, increasing their odds of landing scholarships that will help them achieve their educational and career goals.

Explore Different Styles to Find Your Voice

While scholarship essays typically use a particular format, students need to use the right voice when telling their stories. Since many students don’t spend much time writing about their lives, figuring out how to share information in a way that aligns with their personality (but also meets scholarship committee expectations) isn’t always easy.

Fortunately, reviewing scholarship essay examples that won money can make the process easier. It’s a chance to explore how other students express themselves in writing, and that often leads to powerful insights.

Additionally, checking out several essays shows that a wide variety of approaches are effective. In many cases, that can make the process of finding their voice less intimidating to students, as it demonstrates that students have far more flexibility in how they present themselves than they may expect.

See What Resonated with the Scholarship Committee

Often, a scholarship provider has specific values and perspectives that guide the actions and decisions of the scholarship committee. As a result, what resonates with one may not connect as well with another.

While students can learn a bit about an organization’s values and perspective by doing some research, that may not give them a comprehensive picture of what the scholarship committee is hoping to see. But if students can find scholarship essay examples that won money from a specific scholarship provider, they can learn how to connect with that particular scholarship committee.

When reviewing the essays, they’ll see what types of stories, formats, and tones caught the eyes of committee members, and they can use that to shape how they approach writing their own essays. In some cases, that could allow students to increase their odds of landing the award, making the time spent reviewing the submissions worthwhile.

The Scholarship System Winning Scholarship Essay Examples

Prompts for our scholarship essay:

• Discuss a special attribute, experience or accomplishment that sets you apart. How do you think that will help you succeed in college? (500 – 750 words) (Hint: we ask for ONE attribute, experience or accomplishment so please choose only ONE to talk about.)
• Discuss your plan beyond college. Where do you see yourself in 5 years? Please include what you majoring in and how you plan on using that in your career. (250 words maximum)

Winner #1: Special Attribute or Accomplishment Essay

“Two and a half years ago if I had been asked if I wanted to be a part of the HOSA organization I honestly would not have had a clue what that meant or where to begin!  I did know that I wanted to pursue a career in the health field and was guided to Tolles Career & Technical Center where I was accepted into the Pre-Vet two year program.  At the start of my Junior year I was introduced to HOSA, an organization for Future Health Professionals. The mission of HOSA is “to empower HOSA-Future Health Professionals to become leaders in the global health community through education, collaboration, and experience”.  I became a member immediately and participated locally in many of the community events and service projects. I also competed in the Ohio HOSA competition for medical innovation and advanced to the local, regional and state level.

I then decided to run for one of the seven Distinguished Representative positions for all of Ohio.  This was an intense process! I was required to first take a test over HOSA rules, regulations, and guidelines.  I was then asked to set goals for the organization and give a speech regarding my goal ideas in front of several hundred people, the current state delegates and officer team.  The final step was a vote by the current state delegates and officer team. I was successfully elected as Historian and my HOSA experience was in full swing.

My first HOSA conference as the Historian was the International Leadership Conference in Orlando, Florida in June 2017.  Over 2,500 students came together to learn from five outstanding healthcare professionals. Topics included exploring healthcare careers, changes in healthcare, and medical innovations needed in the industry.  I had the opportunity to have an active role in facilitating and participating in workshops and meetings for HOSA members. The goal of these workshops and meetings was to develop practical leadership skills, effective communication skills with people of all ages, and to understand the importance of encouraging individual and group achievements.  Exceptional qualities that I plan on using in my career.

In September 2017 I participated in the HOSA Washington Leadership Conference where 400 officers from all the states learned strategies to improve our leadership skills. These interactive workshops included topics on self-motivation, problem-solving skills, managing others, and professionalism. I collaborated with representatives from many different states in preparation for our meeting with our political leaders both from the House of Representatives and the Senate to discuss with them the value of Career & Technical Education.  We explored and presented evidence regarding the importance of funding for these types of educational opportunities. Upon completion of this conference I reported back to the local Board of Education sharing my experiences and the success of our meetings. Both of these conferences taught me what it takes to be successful in healthcare.

As my tenure was coming to a close, I organized meetings with the local students who were planning to run for local and state officer positions.  I met with them in groups and individually to help prepare them for the interview process, and to emphasize the importance of maintaining the high standard of leadership in the global health community, if elected.  In May 2018 the Ohio HOSA State Leadership Conference was held in Columbus, Ohio. I had an integral role in interviewing, selecting, and presenting the new Ohio State Officers to over 1500 students and advisors from around the state.  

In conclusion, my HOSA experience helped provide me with improvements in leadership, communication, and team work skills.  As I move onto college each of these skills will help me in defining my goals, establishing lasting friendships and relationships, and working with others for common goals for the betterment of our local, state, and national health communities.  I am confident that all of these qualities that I have learned and practiced through HOSA will contribute to my success in every aspect of my future!”

Winner #2: Plan beyond college essay 

“The day was May 28, 2014.  My doctor told my parents that I would need Spinal Fusion Surgery with rods and screws, and it had to happen quickly.  Before surgery, the doctor suggested strength training for the muscles in my back so that I’d recover faster. I immediately went to the local gym and began working with a personal trainer, Justin.  I learned so much from him including how the body works and how surgery takes time to heal. After surgery, I knew that I wanted to use my experience to help others, just like Justin helped me. My ultimate goal is to own my own gym to help others, just like Justin helped me.  I will also include a nutritional supplement line to make sure clients are fit inside and out. I know I will successfully reach my goals!

I will be pursuing a Bachelor’s Degree in Exercise Science with a Minor in Business.   These areas of study will give me the knowledge and background to achieve my ultimate goal.  In association with this area of study, I will also be taking an entrepreneurial class and participating in entrepreneurial study group.  This will help me in understanding the energy, perseverance, financial commitment, and planning needed to open my own business.

Upon graduation in 4 years, I plan on getting a job in a field associated with my goals, continuing to learn about the field, investing and saving to achieve my dream of having my own gym.”

If you and your student are working on the scholarship process, make sure you don’t miss our free scholarship training. It’s about 45 to 60 minutes long and I cover exactly where you can find more scholarships your student is actually eligible for and are legitimate. Grab your spot here:  6 Steps to Quickly Securing Scholarships for College.

Winner #3: Special Attribute or Accomplishment Essay

“I wake up to the sounds of chickadees singing outside my bedroom window and the delicious smell of breakfast cooking downstairs. A feeling of contentment washes over me as I slip out of bed and into my slippers. I saunter downstairs and sit at the kitchen bar as I rub the sleepy dirt from my eyes and wait to taste my mom’s delicious cooking. I love my laid back mornings.  No alarms are jolting me out of a deep sleep followed by a mad rush to get ready and catch a bus like the other children in the neighborhood.

From the time I entered kindergarten until my eighth-grade year, I had the privilege of being homeschooled. It was during these formative years that I developed a love of reading and learning. My siblings and I used a literature-based curriculum which made history and other subjects come alive. My favorite part of the school day was our read-aloud books. My mom would sit on the couch, and the four of us would gather around her to see the pictures and hear the stories and then discuss the adventures we just went on. It was so enjoyable that it hardly seemed like school and we would beg for more. The schooled kids I would talk with were all jealous and wished they could be taught at home, too.

I was a late reader and had difficulties with spelling, but I didn’t realize that as my mom let me progress at my own pace and never compared me to others. I had plenty of opportunities to be a child and learn through play during the early years and to explore and follow my interests, which often centered around horses and animals. The freedom to pursue my interests is how my passion for architectural design also began as I got a little older. In the early years, my mom would dictate for me and allow me to answer questions orally while my written expression and spelling developed. My mom was a firm believer in “better late than never,” when it came to reading and learning. This method worked well for me. I learned much later that I had dyslexia, and I believe if I had started off in public school I would have been frustrated and realized I was struggling more than the other children. My love for learning very well may have been hampered.

 The joy of reading and learning is just the tip of the iceberg of how I benefited from being taught at home. I got to grow up surrounded by my family, interacting with them, working as a team, and calling my siblings my best friends.  I developed valuable life skills as a result of doing life together. I learned to cook, do laundry, watch younger siblings, plant a garden, clean, and I learned a lot about good health. I learned responsibility, time management, and how to work independently. I became self-motivated and took an interest in my learning.

Homeschooling laid a firm foundation; my values are firmly rooted. My work ethics are strong. I can stand on my own two feet and function independently. I have the skills to manage both my education and my personal life outside of my home. I have the skills necessary to be a successful college student and to pursue a higher level of learning. I give much of this credit to the experience I received as a homeschooled student early on in my formative years.”

Winner #4: Plan beyond college essay 

“In five years I will have a four-year degree in Industrial & Innovative Design and a year of work experience under my belt with a design firm. My degree will provide me with the skills, tools, and technology necessary to digitally design. Communication and interpersonal skills will also be part of my educational foundation as interaction with clients will be an essential part of my job. There are several avenues I could pursue with my degree, but my passion lies in residential architectural design. I will be working in a position where I will be talking to clients, drawing out their dreams in a house, designing it, watching it come to life before my eyes, and seeing them move in, making that space their own. As I gain knowledge and expertise, I envision myself  volunteering for an organization like Habitats for Humanity which provide housing for those in need of a place to call home.”

Winner #5: Special Attribute or Accomplishment Essay

“I never felt so out of place before.

The battlefield was a scrap-littered felt carpet, white fold-up chairs graffitied by permanent marker and frozen yogurt bowls full of worn-down pencils. Ahead, lied the lone boys’ art class at my church. I was the lone volunteer, deploying only two open ears as a weapon, and had to coax their participation in the annual Christmas craft bonanza that they dreaded for weeks. My first and most impactful lesson in teaching had begun.

The class quickly degenerated into anarchy. I spent the first twenty minutes watching as elbows sent pencils overboard and handmade tattoos crawled up arms. With chaos mounting, I was paralyzed by the inability to speak. I forced myself to listen, as their conversations progressed to artistic ideas: Spiderman ornaments, Batman Christmas cards, ninja star origami. I  expected a stir of artistic energy as their art took shape, but all I heard was the crinkling of paper and scattering of markers as ideas never became reality.  

Then, it clicked. I could fulfill my duty as a teacher by cultivating the artistic visions I heard.  I didn’t need to employ bubbly enthusiasm or commanding words. Rather, I could listen, and use my observation to empower their artistic expression. Slowly, I worked to tailor to each fantasy-infused idea, with Pinterest, bubble cuts, and mounds of tape to aid me. As class ended with an assortment of festive superhero projects, I saw a glimpse of the impact that I could make by responding to my observations.  

Now, I cherish the chance to act based on what I hear. Through teaching at Kumon and church and leading volunteer organizations, I’ve worked to develop and implement my style of listening to benefit others. Listening is a skill that I feel is often under appreciated in leadership. People usually flock to the figure in the center of the room, not the person on the side listening. But from my experience, it’s clear that I can guide others by harnessing my observations to benefit the inspirations and passions of those around me. My college plans are only avenues to further explore this ideology, as I’ll have the unique perspectives of thousands of other students, and professors to listen to.

While in college, I hope to impact my own learning experience and that of the student body around me by taking an active listening approach. Rather than sink back to my high school mindset that purely focused on soaking in knowledge and regurgitating it for grades, I plan to adopt a posture of employing my listening abilities to curate and act upon a stronger understanding of the lives and perspectives of my campus. Whether it be reciprocating the advice I receive in my summer transition program to my future roommates or finding campus opportunities best fit for my classmates while in conversation with upperclassmen, I believe that I will be able to positively impact both my own individual growth and the intellectual development of others by harnessing my observations and parlaying them into new opportunities, connections, and insights for others.

At a large school, I will be able to work alongside a student body with a swath of complex and fresh career plans, and it is through my observations and subsequent response that I hope to help others move further along their path to reaching their ideals while pursuing my own career in medicine. In doing so, I am confident that I will be able to forge the deep, lasting bonds that I consider critical for personal development all while building up skills in observation and interaction- traits that I consider integral to a successful medicinal career.

Whether it’s in a lecture hall or while stepping foot into my first Christian club meeting, I’ll be surrounded by a myriad of unique voices, experiences, and insights. I can hear it now, and I can’t wait to listen.”

Winner #6: Plan beyond college essay 

“Having worked in children’s education for years, I’m enthralled by child psychology. From shaping my Kumon students’ work ethic through positive reinforcement to employing associative learning to help my church students anchor their understanding of scripture, I have become experienced in using my knowledge of psychological concepts to help children manifest their cognitive and social abilities. Based on my experience working and bonding with youth, I want to be able to integrate psychological concepts into my future work as a pediatrician to develop supportive and insightful relationships with my patients.

As a psychobiology major, I hope to continue building a strong, fundamental understanding of the mental aspects of human well-being to complement with a growing knowledge of the physical aspects involved in bodily development. While learning, I plan to integrate and enhance an expanding grasp of psychological concepts within my volunteer and extracurricular activities, as I find new organizations and clubs that allow me to teach children and gain further insight into how psychological ideas can impact the health of a child.

Following this experience, I plan to attend medical school, where I will be able to harness my undergraduate education to explore medical concepts in depth while also receiving more hands-on experience shadowing and observing the work of current and future physicians.

Ultimately, I plan to discover a career path that fits both my strong interest in the underlying mental and physical factors that shape child development and translate my knowledge into becoming a dependable and caring pediatrician.”

Additional Winning Scholarship Essay Examples That Won:

Essay Prompt: Submit an essay (750-1,000 words) on the following topic:

• Tell us about that time you did something extraordinary with money.
• What did you accomplish and why?
• How did that experience shape you as a person?
• What did you learn?
• What can you share with others so they can also learn from your story?

Standing outside in the rain shuffling through the wet mail is about as riveting as it sounds. I was going through a handful of car dealership coupons and bills when I saw an envelope at the bottom of the stack addressed to me—something that doesn’t happen often when you’re twelve. Inside was an $800 check for a radio show I worked on called “Adventures in Odyssey.” That day was my first taste of money, and I felt like a millionaire. Then I asked my mom how much our house cost because I was curious, and the numbers that came out of her mouth were more than middle school me could have imagined. Suddenly $800 didn’t seem like so much. My mind immediately went to the fact that one day I would have to pay my own rent, electricity bill, and buy my own groceries, not to mention pay for college, which I had already heard about from my friends’ parents and older siblings. I knew I had to think up a way to start earning and saving money as soon as possible, and the idea of starting my own business was one that stuck.

I’ve been drawing and painting since I was three or four, and the most popular request I got when I took my sketchbook out in school was, “Could you draw me?” It occurred to me that it was the perfect way to start my own business selling my art, and since I was my own boss, I could work whenever I had the time from the comfort of my own home. Eventually, word got out at my middle school that I was selling drawings and people I didn’t even know began to reach out to me to buy them. I ended up making well over a hundred dollars in my first two weeks.

At one point, people started asking me if I could sell a piece to a friend of theirs who didn’t go to our school. The drawings and money changing hands made it difficult because both had to go through someone else to reach me, and the person who ordered the art. I started to think about how I could start selling my art to people outside my school in an easier way, and the perfect platform dropped into the palm of my hand when I discovered Tumblr. It was a social media platform like Facebook or Twitter, but it was dominated by people who were around my age at the time. I found dozens of art blogs that said that they sold their art through online commissions, and everything seemed to click. I created a blog and set up a Paypal account so I could sell my art to people from all around the world, and that was the birth of Kohana Illustrations, a company I still run to this day.

The experience of starting my own company completely changed my point of view about money. Being a family of artists, our income was inconsistent, so we learned to be smart with our money. But actually earning money for myself for the first time made me even more financially conscious and taught me how to handle, track, and save money. I remember using some of the money I made to go to the store after school to buy a little black notebook, which I decided would be my “money log” to keep track of my income and expenses. My parents told me when they got a paycheck, they would put aside 10% of their earnings for charity and another 10% to put towards investments (another term I learned that day). I decided to do the same thing whenever I got paid. I drew a four-column chart in my notebook and kept track of my total earnings, investment savings, charity donations, and expenses. This is a system that has stuck with me to this day. It has taught me to not only retain money but also the value of giving back. I’ve donated to several charities including Nourish the Children, a charity that feeds malnourished children, and the ACF, which works to bring love back to children affected by the trauma of child abuse and family violence. In terms of investments, as I earned more money, I decided to open a Roth IRA account when I was fourteen. I’ve been contributing to it for the past four years and I’m proud to see a 34% gain to date!

Kohana Illustrations has taught me nearly everything I know about money so far through experience. If I had never created it, I wouldn’t have the money to give back to charity or start my retirement fund at such a young age. Working for my own money taught me its value and how to best utilize it so I can retain it over time. This scholarship would be a huge step towards my graduating with as little debt as possible, and I hope that people can learn from my experience and my story. If I can share anything with others, it would be that you’re never too young to start saving and investing in your own future.

Essay Prompt: unknown

Ever since the birth of modern America, community and school-driven sports have brought families and friends closer for decades. Competition is the fuel behind this fire and has sparked both rivalries and college careers. I have played sports since a very young age and it has taught me many life lessons through the years and I believe it has prepared me in a positive way to pursue not only my college education, but my life goals as well.

I started playing sports when I was 5 years old. Ironically it was soccer, which is a sport I haven’t pursued as a player, but one that I referee now. Also I was coached by none other than Bruce Elvington. His son, Logan, was on the team as well and we have maintained a steady friendship through the years. I have lived in Howe all my life so it was only natural that I started playing pee-wee football when I was 6 years old because that is what my friends did in Howe. Playing with my buddies has always been the biggest thing I enjoy about sports and a lesson I learned early on which started in pee-wee football. It helped me to connect with my friends outside of school with a sport that arguably does the best job of bringing guys closer together and forming an almost unbreakable bond.

I started playing baseball about the same time I started playing football which, as anyone with kids can imagine, was a nightmare in terms of scheduling. I played every year until kid-pitch and I managed to break my arm which forced me to miss a whole season of baseball. This was my first lesson of injury in a sports season which was something I had never before experienced. Missing that first season of kid pitch was rough because I felt I was a year behind and after that I had to work long hours to improve my skills to achieve the same level of the other guys. However, this turned out to be a positive situation of sorts because it was a small step in preparing me for high school sports and the real-world. How? It forced me to work harder.

I continued to play sports throughout middle school including football, basketball, track in school and baseball with Howe Youth Sports Association. Upon entering high school I continued these 4 sports and did my part as a freshman, working hard to help the program and fill spaces. My sophomore year I didn’t play football because it was difficult to manage my Type 1 Diabetes in the heat, and the risk of concussions, so I tried powerlifting and quickly realized I had the technique and strength to truly be good at it. I placed 8th in the Region in the 165 weight class and was looking forward to the next year. I played baseball that spring as well and just focused on my mechanics. I knew I did not want to play sports at the collegiate level. I simply enjoyed playing for the sake of competition, physical conditioning, discipline and being part of a brotherhood.

My junior year, which was last year, was probably the most interesting year yet. I decided again to not play football, I focused on my offseason workouts and getting ready for powerlifting. That is what I thought about every day until football was over. The very first meet we went to, the S&S powerlifting meet, I was on my final squat lift of 440 pounds. I went down and as I pushed to come up, I felt a sharp pain in my lower back and knew something was wrong. They walked me to the training room and was told that I strained my lower back quite severely. I was devastated. I had been working so hard all offseason and my third lift of the season I get hurt? It sucked and it was a huge lesson and mental struggle to get over those facts. The biggest lesson I took from that ordeal is that sometimes you work extremely hard for something and it can be taken away in a split second. It just showed me even more that life really is not fair. On the bright side, I made a decently quick recovery and was able to compete in the Howe meet and I managed to qualify for Regionals. I was sitting in 6th place after my bench lift during the Regional powerlifting meet in Chico, Texas. I had one more chance to qualify for state or at least qualify for state alternate. The odds were not looking good until the very last lift of two guys in front of me. They decided to go for a crazy weight and both ended up dropping the bar which automatically disqualifies them. I did well enough to place 3 rd and was able to go with my friends to the state powerlifting meet as the first alternate in the 165 weight class.

This year, I decided to play football to be with my buddies for my senior year and because I believe in what Coach J is bringing to our program. Our season was rough and there were many different struggles we all shared as a football family. Through all we went through, all the hurts and pains and discomforts, I would do it all again for my brothers. Football showed me what it can be to have a strong bond with the guy next to you. It’s almost like a less intense version of serving in the military. I’m blessed I did not have to be called to serve. Coach J did that for us.

Throughout my high school career of sports, I have learned my different lessons, big and small that have helped me grow as a young man and be prepared for the world today. I have been accepted to Southwestern Assemblies of God University and plan to get my degree in something pertaining to the ministry. Playing sports in high school has shown me the enormous amount of discipline it takes to keep up with school, sports, and extracurricular activities so I will be better prepared for college schedules and be much less overwhelmed. I am so thankful for the lessons I have learned playing these sports and the many memories and laughs I have had with all my friends. It is something I will always remember and treasure for many years. I want to give a big thank you to every coach and parent that has contributed to this journey because without them, none of it would have been possible. My parents deserve a heap of praise as well for supporting me and carting me to every practice and every game. Playing sports has had an enormously positive impact on my life, my future and has taught me countless life lessons both big and small and for that I will be forever grateful.

How to Use Scholarship Essay Examples to Win Scholarships

As students review scholarship essay examples, they may wonder how they can leverage them to increase their odds of winning scholarships or other financial aid that requires essays. First, students need to remember that plagiarizing another student’s essay is never a smart move. Many scholarship committees will use a variety of tools to see if any content is copied from another source. Additionally, they’ll likely recall any of the winning essays sent to their organization.

Ultimately, students need to treat the examples of winning scholarship essays as learning opportunities and sources of inspiration. Students can see which scholarship essay format typically works best, how to approach story-telling, what type of tone connects with committee members, and much more. That information can turn them into better essay writers, ensuring their responses to scholarship essay prompts meet or exceed expectations.

Additionally, scholarship essay examples help students figure out what moments in their lives are unique and compelling. Essentially, it gives them a point of comparison, allowing them to determine whether the topic or event they were going to discuss is likely to catch the attention of scholarship committee members.

By keeping all of that in mind, students can hone their essay-writing skills before they start applying for scholarships. Then, when it’s time to submit their scholarship essays, they’ll be in the strongest possible position with the knowledge and tools they need to stand out from the pack.

If you’re looking for additional helpful information regarding writing scholarship essays? Here are some additional articles to explore:

How to Write Winning Scholarship Essays

• Make Scholarship Essays Stand Out by Avoiding These 4 Clichés

• Pinterest 460

December 4, 2020 at 3:01 pm

These essays are so impressive and enjoyable to read, they really are the best scholarship essays I have come across. Thanks very much for posting they are very educative.

April 7, 2021 at 7:42 am

I like how personal they were. Each essay has got it’s own uniqueness and I have learned a lot from reading them. Thank you @thescholarshipsysytem.

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Common App Essay | Discuss an accomplishment, event, or realization that sparked a period of personal growth | Valerie

Valerie , University of Pennsylvania Class of 2024

Discuss an accomplishment, event, or realization that sparked a period of personal growth and a new understanding of yourself or others..

10:00 AM – Museum of Modern Art (MoMA)

12:30 PM – Lunch at Blacktap

2:00 PM – Wicked on Broadway

6:00 PM – Rockefeller Center and Lego Store

As the informally designated family vacation planner, I made sure to accommodate each of my family member’s interests along with my personal desire to constantly make the most of each opportunity, which meant that our schedule was always filled to the brim.

After a long day of dragging my family through the streets of New York City on a hot day in June, I was eyeing the cheesecake in a bakery window when my mom asked, “So, honey, what was your favorite piece at the MoMA?”

I thought back to the quick two hours we’d spent at the MoMA, the place I’d been begging to go for years, but I realized I couldn’t distinctly remember anything about the museum. It was a feeling of unfounded emptiness that I’d felt all too many times before- the same one that seemed to pervade my entire junior year of high school.

I’d become set on continuing every activity I’d joined over the years while self-studying for extra AP exams and taking on extra tutoring jobs on the side. Time fled and my commitments grew, and I found myself missing my brother’s swim meets and friends’ birthday parties just to keep up.

As my final summer of high school grew dauntingly close, I found myself sitting in my room one day, gazing at the growing collection of awards I’d accumulated over the years. There was one in particular that stood out: the trophy for winning second runner-up at the 2018 National American Miss pageant.

I’d signed up for the competition out of determination to disprove the stereotype of pageant queens being trademarked for their blonde hair and fair skin. But, looking back- despite tireless months of orientations, interviews, and speeches to prepare- the initial excitement of winning had died down, and the only thing I could truly remember was the diverse and amazing girls I’d met. It’s the friends I made and the stories they shared that make me smile, not the crown.

From that moment on, I knew that making my last year of high school truly memorable meant not only pursuing end results but also appreciating the paths to get there and the people that made them possible. Over the summer, I stayed after work to grab coffee with colleagues from my internship and took my family with me on my trip to the national championship of my debate tournament.

And as the school year approached, instead of spending evenings hidden in my room, trying to get ahead on an article I’d been writing, I laugh and chat along with the rest of my family after dinner. Following a particularly difficult physics exam, I head to a local bubble tea shop to play Uno with some friends to relax (although that can be more intense than the exam itself). Just these seemingly small changes have made school both less stressful and more rewarding.

Half a year later, I headed back to the MoMA. As I’m writing this, I’m sitting at Café 2- sipping a latte and overlooking the sculpture garden. After an entire day allotted to studying and learning about a couple of the exhibitions in the museum, I can undoubtedly say that my favorite piece I saw was Frida Kahlo’s “Fulang-Chang and I”: a reflection of Kahlo’s strength through a difficult time, grounding herself in her artwork and relationships.

Through my time in college and beyond, there’s no doubt that I’ll keep myself busy- going from an Economics seminar to volunteering at the library, and then from dance practices to working on my own startup. But I’ll make sure to enjoy each moment; rather than trying to fit 30 hours into a day, I’ll fully appreciate the 24 hours I have.

University of Pennsylvania 2024

About the author 🎓, major: economics, concentrating in marketing, accepted universities: university of pennsylvania (wharton), new york university (stern), university of southern california (marshall), georgetown university, university of california - berkeley, university of california - los angeles, university of north carolina chapel hill, university of virginia, university of maryland, northeastern university, hometown: bethesda, maryland, more essays, common app essays →, harvard essays →, mit essays →, princeton essays →, stanford essays →, yale essays →, common application essay: describe a problem you’ve solved or a problem you’d like to solve | dyllen.

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Tell us about something that is meaningful to you and why The day’s memories flash through my mind as I lie in bed. The piano

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