Hey! I have a few ideas and was hoping to get some outsider perspective
I’d write this about a mild genetic disability I have had and how it has affected my life and what I want to do in the future. would include some psychological/social analysis of how people treat me / react to it
would discuss my (interesting? idk) upbringing abroad and how moving back to the states after over a decade has affected me. would also include some social analysis and how it has affected me. i would connect it to the 100+ hours of volunteer work I have done within the past few years in the local refugee community
would discuss working in a designer boutique ($1500+ for single items) while volunteering with children in one of the worst ghettos in the country. would also connect this to my upbringing abroad
Will 100% chance back, provide support/advice or whatever! thanks!
something that seems to work is writing about how you applied material learned in school to outside situations. the essays with ridiculous stories seem to appeal to admissions officers for some reason. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=udj0ix4MSq4
For top colleges it is really not the topic that wins but what you do with it. “well-written” has two aspects- style and substance, and for me the substance part is most challenging.
Any of those topics could be strong- and they could all be cliche really, really easily. Don’t try to get the most exotic topic- the top schools read tens of thousands of applications every year, and you will never win in the exotic/unique stakes. The number of people just on CC who have been affected by a health issue and whose future plans have been informed by that experience is staggering. That doesn’t mean that you shouldn’t do it- just that the AdComs will all have read lots of similar essays so standing out is harder.
The more personal the story the easier it is to get lost in the weeds of telling the story - which is obviously intensely important in your life- and harder to bring the level of mature perspective that lifts if from an individual story to something larger. Try reading some old Dear Sugars for examples of taking a narrow specific to something larger. Also, I’m sure you’ve read about [url=<a href=“http://www.businessinsider.com/5-former-ivy-league-admissions-officers-talk-about-college-admissions-essays-2016-4%5Dthis%5B/url”>http://www.businessinsider.com/5-former-ivy-league-admissions-officers-talk-about-college-admissions-essays-2016-4]this[/url] essay, but the commentary is interesting.
So, pick any of them (2 & 3 overlap a lot) and start writing. See where it takes you.
All the three topics sound interesting. But I think the third idea will make a really good essay, provided it is written well. I believe that essay can highlight two very different sides of life and can be a social commentary on poverty and rich poor divide.
…keep in mind that the purpose of the essay is not to show them that you are smart or socially aware or that you can write an essay: it is to sell you as a member of their community. To paraphrase an Ivy dean of admissions (who was talking about service trips), they don’t want to hear about how you appreciate the differences between haves & have nots, or how you now appreciate what you have or even that it “changed” you- they want to know what you have actually done with that change in you.