<p>These are just a few essay ideas that I've been bouncing around, but haven't actually written any of them yet. Which one(s) would you suggest me to write for the common app?</p>
<ol>
<li><p>Joining the fencing team my sophomore year, while progressing to varsity my junior year. (This one is a bit cliche i feel, and might end up sounding wrong)</p></li>
<li><p>Difficulties of being born in the US with ethnic background in Asia, since the people of both regions think of me as an outsider. (Again, not sure how often this is written about, or whether race is a topic to stay away from anyways)</p></li>
<li><p>Doing cross country throughout high school, and improving a lot, but still not good enough to be on the varsity team.</p></li>
</ol>
<p>These are just a few ideas that I've thought of. I'm really quite clueless as to writing the essay, so any help/tips are appreciated. Feel free to post here or pm me.</p>
<p>Thanks for the response! I also have a few other ideas that I forgot about (these are a bit less cliche in my opinion, but more risky):</p>
<ol>
<li><p>My regrets about quitting piano in middle school, after having played for 7 years. (Only thing about this, is it doesn’t really pertain to my high school experience at all. However, I didn’t really start regretting it until high school)</p></li>
<li><p>My experience in eating strange foods while visiting China. (Frog legs, “drunk” raw shrimp, etc…)</p></li>
<li><p>My experience in Future Problem Solving, and how it progressed over the 7 years I was in the program.</p></li>
</ol>
<p>hmmm… I dont like 1 or 6. Out of all of them, I’d pick 2. I do think it is a cliche topic, but I feel that you can talk about that more than you can talk about cross country. Thats just my opinion…</p>