Let me tell you about the night I almost set my kitchen on fire trying to make microwave s’mores during a college essay meltdown. Senior year, right? My Common App draft was filled with phrases like “passion for learning” and “winning the regional debate championship” (spoiler: we got 8th place). It felt as stale as last week’s Dunkin’ donut.
Here’s the thing nobody tells you: The best college essay topics aren’t under some Spotlight Achievement™️ marquee. They’re hiding in your grandma’s weird Christmas Jell-O recipe, the way your hands shook handing out fries at your Chick-fil-A shift, or that time you taught your dog to high-five during lockdown.
My “aha” moment came when my younger sister read my 10th draft and said, “This sounds like a LinkedIn post written by ChatGPT.” Ouch. But she was right. I’d been trying to sound impressive instead of being human. So I scrapped everything.
What actually worked:
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The “No Trophy” Rule
I made a list of 23 moments that mattered but would never make a resume:- Accidentally wearing two different Crocs to school junior year (long story)
- Crying in a Target parking lot after my first breakup
- Learning to fix my dad’s ’98 Ford pickup by watching YouTube Shorts
That last one became my essay — not because I’m a mechanic prodigy, but because fixing that clunky truck taught me how to troubleshoot panic (mine) and carburetors (the truck’s).
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The Walmart Test
If your topic could also describe the kid behind you in the checkout line (“I love science and helping people!”), dig deeper. My friend wrote about reorganizing the shampoo aisle during her overnight Walmart stocker job. She connected it to solving “invisible problems” — way more memorable than her 4.0 GPA. -
Embrace the “So What?”
Admissions officers read 500 essays about mission trips. They haven’t read one about your family’s 20-year feud over Monopoly rules. I helped my cousin rewrite his essay around losing spectacularly to his aunt every Thanksgiving (“Sometimes failure tastes better than turkey”). He got into Brown.
Watch out for:
- The Trauma Trap: You don’t owe strangers your hardest memories. Write about healing, not just hurt.
- The Thesaurus Plague: If “ameliorate” isn’t in your texts to friends, don’t put it in your essay.
- Grandparent Eulogies: Unless Nana taught you something wildly specific (mine taught me to cheat at Bingo “for Jesus”), tread carefully.
A year after submitting my truck essay, I mentioned it to an admissions counselor at a campus event. She grinned: “Oh! You’re the carburetor kid. We debated your file over Insomnia Cookies.” Turns out they remembered the Jell-O story too — another applicant wrote about using her Slovak grandma’s recipe to cope with moving states.
Your move:
Grab a notebook. Set a 10-minute timer. Write every small, weird, glowing memory that comes up — even if it’s just that time you convinced your math club to prank the principal with pi-themed puns. The gold is in the gravel.
And if you get stuck? Try making s’mores in a microwave. Just…watch the timer. (RIP my mom’s Tupperware.)