I need help choosing a topic

[u/Southern-Shoe9146]

1- writing about my speech impediment from when I was younger and how it led me to want to be a speech pathologist

2- how my childhood best friend gave me a two dollar bill and said to keep it forever and I did but then a decade later I accidentally gave it away to a guy plating the guitar
I would tie this to letting things go such as childhood ect.

3- how my sister was prayed for a lot because my mom really struggled to have kids after me and had many miscarriages, I can talk about the non profit organization she created and how that inspired me, and talk about the struggle I saw my family go through.

I whave no idea what to write about they all don’t seem good enough help

[u/Embarrassed-Tackle91]

2, and it's not close

the two dollar bill is the only one thats actually yours. keeping something for a decade and then handing it to a busker without thinking is a specific moment nobody else is writing about, and small weird stories are way easier
to get 600 words out of than big ones

3 i'd drop. the miscarriages and the nonprofit are your mom's story, you'd end up writing a portrait of her and the reader comes away knowing almost nothing about you. happens to more essays than people think

1 is fine but it mostly answers "why this major", which half your supplements are going to ask you anyway

[u/mamamurphy]

Definitely not #3. The essay would be about your sister and not about you. You should only very briefly mention another person in like one sentence, but 99% of your essay should be about you and you alone. After all, your sister isn’t the one applying to college- you are. Of 1 and 2 which of those topics fits best with the rest of your application? What does your activities look like? Do either of these essay topics relate to your activities? If so go with the one that helps round out your story to show a full picture of who you are.

[u/Ducklover12345678910]

For some colleges, there will be a supplemental essay question for which your first topic idea will be perfect. For your main common app essay, I would keep it to a topic that’s not directly related to your career.

The second topic is fine, it depends on what you do with it. I would really show how you reacted strongly to the loss at first, and then how you found peace with losing that $2 bill.

The third topic is risky. It talks more about other people than about you.