Will volunteering for a month in Africa with those affected by HIV make a good essay topic? Because a lot of articles told me not to write about community service…
It’s cliché. It’s often seen as a rich kid trying to buy empathy.
A good essay can come out of something like that, but you have to ask yourself how that one month fits into your whole lifetime.
A poverty tourism essay could potentially only tell an admissions officer that your parents are wealthy enough to buy you that experience. It’s not talking about YOU, it’s talking about an experience you had. If you write more about “these are the qualities I have that made me effective in this role”, that might make a more interesting and compelling essay.