Books

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The Perfect Topic: Right Under Your Nose

  College Application Essays: Search For the Perfect Topic It’s Closer Than You Think   I’ve learned a lot about what makes a great essay topic over the last six years I’ve helped students with their college application essays. If you’re...

How to Answer Prompt #1 of the New Common Application

College Admissions Essays: The Common App. Prompt #1  My Favorite  Out of the seven prompts you can chose from to write your application essay for The Common Application, I like the first one a lot. (UPDATE: As of 2017, you can now write about any topic you want. See...

Common App Prompt 4: When Your Problem is a Good Thing!

How to Answer Prompt 4 for the Common App for your College Application Essay Prompt 4: Describe a problem you’ve solved or a problem you’d like to solve. It can be an intellectual challenge, a research query, an ethical dilemma—anything that is of personal...

The New Common App Prompts: The Good, Bad and the Ugly

  College Application Essays How To Answer the New Common App Questions The best news about his year’s Common Application (2015-16) is that you can still write about almost any topic you want—these prompts are very open-ended. And they also added a...

Find Your Defining Qualities

No matter what the prompt asks for, almost any effective college essay should showcase one or several of what I call your “defining qualities.” If the prompt asks you to write a personal statement (for The Common App), tell about yourself or wants to know...

Personal Quality, Talent, Accomplishment…UC Prompt #2

UPDATE: as of March 23, 2016 The University of California announced NEW essay prompts for 2016-17. Read about how to answer them HERE. This post is now outdated. The information is no longer relevant!!    College Admissions Essay: How to Nail Prompt #2 for UC Essays...

Still Looking for That Magic Topic? Try a Sample!

  College Admissions Essays: Samples Samples of College Admissions Essays and Personal Statements– and Why They Can Help You Write Yours!!   I always tell my students that one of the best ways to find great topic ideas is to read the essays of other...

Twilight as a Topic? No Way!

College Admissions Essays: Finding topics in unlikely places   I would never have believed that writing about the Twilight series could be a super essay topic–not in a million years. But below, I’m going to share how one of my brightest students...