<p>I was wondering if my experience is a good hook because I have based my entire essay on it.</p>
<p>In 9th grade, I was involved in a drunk driving accident. My mother was drunk and hit another car. She lost her job, kept drinking, moved away, and had a major heart attack later on in the year.</p>
<p>I had a severe laceration on my face and it required over 100 stitches and I will have a scar the rest of my life.</p>
<p>My essay focuses on how I used school work as my foundation to get me through the emotional hard times and how I ended up valedictorian after missing exams and several days of school.</p>
<p>Each person is unique and it sounds like you learned and grew from your difficult circumstances. This is admirable & colleges will be interested & hopefully love your essay & ap.</p>
<p>"Hooks" are mainly things people are geographically diverse from the rest of the student body or wahtever the school happens to be looking for to fill their profile at that point in time.</p>
<p>It depends as there are many students in any given year that will have overcome some type of adversity. some will have survived life threatening illnesses, others loss of parents, etc. In 2001 you had survivors of the 9/11 attacks, this year you will have Katrina survivors.</p>
<p>While you do not have a hook (thank goodness you have survived) it could make for an interesting essay depending on how you present it.</p>
<p>Sorry, but applicants involved in car crashes are not uniquely desirable. Nor are applicants who targeted some emotion (loss, hatred, fear) towards something else (such as academics).</p>
<p>If I were you, I'd take a look at the school's political philosophy--conservative, middle, liberal. Then I would think in terms of political correctness. Building upon your accident essay, for instance with a liberal school, has it enabled you to build a club that will save the world, constructing a new paradigm in the understanding of the underpriveleged riffraff.</p>
<p>Hopefully you catch my drift that I was kidding in the above paragraph. They read thousands of essays and after awhile I would imagine get really bored with all the saving the world, change my life crap that almost every kid falls for thinking that's what they want to hear. You really need something to stand out and sell yourself in the short timeframe of about 250 to 400 words.</p>
<p>You could build upon that accident theme but need a different angle and twist other than what is predictable.</p>
<p>I think you're confused about what a hook actually is. It's not just something that makes you unique although that often is the case...it's something about yourself the college can utilize, such as sports (you can help the college win), geography or race (you help the college to have a more balanced student body), music (can take a needed spot in their band or orchestra) etc. Now if you had, for example, utilized your experience to help others (like anti drunk driving activities for example) then that might be a hook if you were to continue those activities into college. (I'm not implying you should have done that, I'm just giving an example!). Sorry you had to go through all that but it should make for an interesting essay and I'm happy to hear you did so well. Good luck.</p>