At some point, nearly every student who writes a college essay will have doubts about their topic. While doubts are inevitable, and many will be unfounded, there are some good indicators that can tell you if switching your college essay topic is the right call. For the most part, it comes down to what makes a good college essay topic in the first place.
In this blog, a HelloCollege Essay Coach breaks down when you should (and shouldn’t) think about switching your college essay topic.
When Switching Your College Essay Topic Is a Good Idea
You might want to consider switching your college essay topic if:
Your Essay is Too Long or Too Short
For the Common App personal statement, the topic you choose should yield an essay between 500–650 words. In most cases, unless you are a very practiced writer, you will need between 600–650 words to write an essay that feels complete.
It is normal for a first draft to be either significantly under word count or significantly over. But assuming you can produce one draft per week, you should have an essay that is between 500–800 words by the third week. If you’ve spent three weeks working on your essay and you still can’t get it in that range, you should consider switching your college essay topic.
For some students, you may have chosen a perfect topic in theory, one that seems designed for admissions officers, but you don’t actually have that much to say about the topic. Maybe it turns out that what you selected is an event that resolved quickly, didn’t actually teach you that much, or is an interest that is much more straightforward than you thought. Fluff, redundancy, and repetition make for an unenjoyable read. If you’ve already asked yourself probing questions, shared the draft with someone else so they could ask questions, and you’re still falling under 500 words, it may be time to hang it up.
On the other hand, you may have a perfect topic—for a 1,200-word essay. 650 words is a short essay; most of what you see published by newspapers and magazines (even a YouTube video transcript) will be in excess of 1,000 words. If you think of your story as having a beginning, middle, and end, you should be able to set up the beginning in about 200 words or less. Again, if after three weeks (that is, three draft attempts) you’re struggling to set up the story, move through the middle, or conclude it in under 650 words, you should consider switching your college essay topic.
Your Essay Lacks Insight
Your college essay exists alongside your GPA, test scores, teacher recommendations, and extracurriculars. It is meant to provide personal, subjective insights about who you are—insights that college admissions officers cannot observe through the other parts of your application.
This is one of the trickier concepts for students. Consider this:
- If you play a sport, are you identical to everyone on the same team?
- If you are in the arts, are you identical to other students in the same discipline, such as choir or theater?
- If you are in an academic club, are you identical to your teammates in robotics or Math Olympiad?
- If your community is your friends, are you identical to them?
Most likely, you said no to each of these. Even though we may engage in the same activity, our talents within that activity, the stories that led us to it, the experiences that keep us involved, and how we think about it internally are all different. This is what allows two people who play the same instrument in the same band to have very different strengths, weaknesses, memories, and personalities.
A good essay topic is one that allows you to provide insight into who you are. In contrast, a bad essay topic won’t allow you to do this.
Let’s say that you took an extraordinary number of AP classes but only because you wanted to improve your college application. You might initially think that writing about your academic experience is a strong topic. But if AP classes are something you grind through, don’t identify with, and don’t think about outside of class, then writing about them won’t reveal much about you. In this case, your approach to AP classes is probably indistinguishable from every other student grinding through an ordeal for the sake of checking a box.
In general, only the things that really matter to us tend to be areas of insight—areas where our personality comes through.
If your essay isn’t allowing you to provide unique insight into how you approach or understand the topic you’ve chosen, you should switch your essay topic to something that will.
Your Story Doesn’t Center Personal Growth
As mentioned earlier, your essay will have a beginning, middle, and end. But for a college essay, it’s often more useful to think in terms of before growth, during growth, and after growth.
Growth is, again, a tricky concept for students. Sometimes it gets confused with the passage of time. That is, if you start a story in the past and arrive at the present, you might assume that growth took place. But this isn’t always the case.
Consider a commonly chosen topic: a sports injury. Hypothetically, before the injury, you were a baseball pitcher who loves baseball. Then, during the injury, you can’t play. Then, with luck and good rehab, you’re able to play again. And so you do. This is potentially a story of loving baseball, missing baseball, and then loving baseball again. The student didn’t necessarily grow or change in any meaningful way.
In contrast, imagine that before the injury, the student felt invulnerable. After the injury, they felt brittle. To make a comeback, they had to grow mentally: learning to face vulnerability head-on, prepare more carefully for the worst, and approach life with a greater awareness of risk. In this version of the story, growth clearly occurs.
While any interest, hobby, or event in your life might lead to growth, not all of them did. If you read your essay and notice that from beginning to end there isn’t a meaningful change in your personality, beliefs, or perspective, then your essay lacks growth, and you should consider switching your college essay topic.
You’re Not the Main Character
It might seem obvious, but your college essay topic should feature you as the main character. Many students write about parents, grandparents, older siblings, teachers, coaches, and mentors of all kinds. One of the beautiful aspects of writing a personal essay is the opportunity to appreciate the people who have made an impact on our lives, even if we never show them the essay itself.
But if you write an entire essay about what you admire in another person, or tell a story about how they helped you every step of the way, you can very quickly produce 650 words where you never take action yourself and never generate your own insights. In that case, you become a side character telling a story about someone else.
If you read your essay and notice that the advice, ideas, and actions primarily belong to someone else, you should consider switching your college essay topic. It’s hard to write about ourselves; for some students, it even feels embarrassing. But ultimately, the person admissions officers want to understand is you. That doesn’t mean you can’t receive guidance or a helping hand, but the majority of the action should be driven by you. Make sure you choose a topic where you can be the main character.
When Switching Your College Essay Topic is NOT a Good Idea
This is just as important as knowing when to switch, and it flows naturally from everything you just read. If you read your essay and…
- It’s the right length
- It showcases your personal insights
- It shows you before, during, and after growth
- It features you as the main character
Then there is very little reason to switch your college essay topic, especially if you’ve reached a third or fourth draft and you’ve hit all of these points.
At that stage, doubt alone isn’t a reason to start over. Writing a strong college essay often requires sitting with discomfort, pushing through uncertainty, and refining what already works. If your topic meets these criteria, your time is likely better spent revising, clarifying, and deepening the essay rather than abandoning it altogether.
Conclusion
Second-guessing your college essay topic is a normal part of the writing process. What matters most is whether your topic gives you the space to share something meaningful about who you are. If it does, you’re likely on the right track. And if it doesn’t, switching topics can sometimes lead to a stronger, more authentic essay.
If you’d like expert guidance on choosing the right topic and developing a compelling personal statement, our Essay Coaches can help. Schedule a consultation to learn how personalized support can help you craft an essay that truly stands out.
