How to Start a College Essay (Blank Page Edition)

Every August, I meet students frozen in the same place: cursor blinking, Common App open, and a well-meaning adult’s advice ringing in their ears — “you just need a great hook.”

Let me take some pressure off. You don’t need a hook. You need a true, specific moment — the hook will grow out of it. Here’s the process I use with my own students.

Step 1: Three brainstorms, no writing

Don’t draft yet. Instead, make three lists, fast and messy:

1. Moments that changed your mind. Not big events — mind-changes. The day you realized your little brother was funny. The conversation that made you quit (or start) something.
2. Things you know how to do that most people don’t. Braiding challah. Reading bus schedules in two languages. Calming down a scared horse, or a scared freshman.
3. What you’d talk about for 20 minutes with no notes. If your friends say “oh no, don’t get her started on—” that topic belongs on this list.

The overlaps between lists are your essay territory. Colleges aren’t looking for impressive; they’re looking for specific and real — the student only you can be.

Step 2: Write the middle first

The opening paragraph is the hardest one, so don’t start there. Start with the moment itself — what happened, what you did, what you thought while it was happening. Write it like you’re telling a friend. Openings are much easier to write once you know what they’re opening.

Step 3: The one rule — your voice

Read your draft out loud. Every sentence that doesn’t sound like you — every “plethora,” every “instilled in me a passion for” — gets rewritten in the words you’d actually say. Admissions readers go through thousands of essays; a real voice is rarer than a perfect one, and far more memorable.

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That’s the start. The shaping, the supplementals, and the it’s-due-Friday panic? That’s what I’m here for. Learn about college essay coaching, or book a free intro call — bring your three lists, and we’ll find the essay in them together.