How to Write a Hook for an Essay
The ApplyTexas college application contains many essay prompts, and each of the most popular colleges in Texas has different requirements for which essays they expect applicants to answer. So how do you get advice on writing your best ApplyTexas essays, no matter which school you're applying to? Look no further than this article, which completely unpacks all possible ApplyTexas essay prompts. We'll explain what each prompt is looking for and what admissions officers are hoping to learn about you. In addition, we'll give you our top strategies for ensuring that your essay meets all these expectations, and help you come up with your best essay topics. To help you navigate this long guide, here is an overview of what we'll be talking about: The ApplyTexas application is basically the Texas version of the Common Application, which many US colleges use. It's a unified college application process that's accepted by all Texas public universities and many private ones. (Note that some schools that accept ApplyTexas also accept the Common App.) The ApplyTexas website is a good source for figuring out whether your target college accepts the ApplyTexas application. That said, the best way to confirm exactly what your school expects is to go to its admissions website. Admissions officers are trying to put together classes full of interesting, vibrant students who have different backgrounds, strengths, weaknesses, goals, and dreams. One tool colleges use to identify a diverse set of perspectives is the college essay. These essays are a chance for you to show admissions officers those sides of yourself that aren't reflected in the rest of your application. This is where you describe where you've come from, what you believe in, what you value, and what has shaped you. This is also where you make yourself sound mature and insightful—two key qualities that colleges are looking for in applicants. These are important because colleges want to find young people who will ultimately thrive when faced with the independence of college life. Filling a freshman class is like dealing with those Every-Flavor jelly beans from Harry Potter: admissions just wants to make sure to avoid the ones that taste like earwax. There are four essay prompts on the ApplyTexas application for freshman admission (Topics A, B, C, and D). For topics A, B, and C there are slight variations on the prompt for transfer students, or those looking to be readmitted. We'll cover each variation just below the main topic breakdown. There are also several short answer prompts for UT Austin and Texas A&M, as well as an additional Topic E for transfer students only. While there are no strict word limits, colleges usually suggest keeping the essays somewhere between one and one and a half pages long. All Texas colleges and universities have different application requirements, including which essay or essays they want. Some schools require essays, some list them as optional, and others use a combination of required and optional essays. Several schools use the essays to determine scholarship awards, honors program eligibility, or admission to specific majors. Here are some essay submission requirement examples from a range of Texas schools: Dazzled by her options, she was overcome with hopeful optimism. And cuteness. Want to write the perfect college application essay? Get professional help from PrepScholar. Your dedicated PrepScholar Admissions counselor will craft your perfect college essay, from the ground up. We'll learn your background and interests, brainstorm essay topics, and walk you through the essay drafting process, step-by-step. At the end, you'll have a unique essay that you'll proudly submit to your top choice colleges. Don't leave your college application to chance. Find out more about PrepScholar Admissions now: There are three ApplyTexas essay topics that try to get to the heart of what makes you the person you are in three different ways. But since Topics A, B, and C all focus on things that are essential to you as a person, it can be difficult to come up with a totally unique idea for each—especially since on a first read-through, these prompts can sound really similar. Before I dissect all of the ApplyTexas essay prompts, let's see how A, B, and C differ from one another. You can then keep these differences in mind as you try to think of topics to write about. Here are the most recent prompts for Topics A, B, and C on the ApplyTexas application. Tell us your story. What unique opportunities or challenges have you experienced throughout your high school career that have shaped who you are today? Most students have an identity, an interest, or a talent that defines them in an essential way. Tell us about yourself. You've got a ticket in your hand—where will you go? What will you do? What will happen when you get there? One helpful way to keep these topics separate in your mind is to create a big-picture category for each one: Topic A is outside, Topic B is inside, and Topic C is the future. In other words, Topic A is asking about the impact of challenges or opportunities on you, and how you handled that impact. On the other hand, Topic B is asking about your inner passions and how these define you. Finally, Topic C wants to know where you're going from here. These very broad categories will help as you brainstorm ideas and life experiences you can use for your essay. Although many of the stories you think of can be shaped to fit each of these prompts, think about what the experience most reveals about you. If it's about how your external community shaped you, that'd probably be a good fit for Topic A. If it's a story about your passions, save it for Topic B. If it's primarily about an event that you think predicts your future, it'll likely work well for Topic C. (Note: if you are a transfer student writing the essay variation for topics A, B, or C keep in mind that these variations still ask you about the outside, inside, or future respectively.) That time a spilled crate of stuffed frogs made you want to learn everything there is to know about French cooking? Probably Topic C. Now, we'll do a thorough deconstruction of everything you need to know about Topic A, the first ApplyTexas essay prompt. Tell us your story. What unique opportunities or challenges have you experienced throughout your high school career that have shaped who you are today? This prompt wants to see how your external environment as a high school student has shaped you. You can tell from the fact that the prompt uses the phrase "your story" that it wants to know what you believe has had the biggest impact on you. The first part of the prompt is about identifying and describing specific experiences you've had as a high school student. You don't want your essay coming across too vague, so make sure you're focusing on one or two specific experiences. The prompt suggests zeroing in on something "unique," or something that has impacted you in a way it hasn't impacted anyone else. You'll want to choose some aspect of your environment that you can describe vividly and that's really important to you. It doesn't necessarily have to be important in a positive way, but it does need to have had a significant impact on your personal development. It should also be some aspect of your environment that has been part of your life for a while. You're describing something that's affected you "throughout your high school career," after all. You shouldn't just describe your environment—you also need to discuss how that environment impacted you as a person. How did this particular aspect of your environment turn you into the person you are today? It's best if you can think of one or two concrete anecdotes or stories about how your environment as a high school student has shaped you. For example, don't just say that your family made you a hard-working person—describe in detail how watching your mother come home from a full day of work just to get ready to go to nighttime classes showed you that working toward your goals is worthwhile, even when it's hard. Being a tomato in a peapod was hard on Frank, who could never really quite understand the peas' obsession with photosynthesis. Readers are looking for two main things. First, they want to see that you can be mature and thoughtful about your surroundings. Are you curious about the world around you? If you've really observed and engaged with your surroundings, you'll be able to describe the people and places that have impacted you as a high school student in a nuanced, insightful way. Second, they want to see how you stand out from your environment. This can be accomplished in one of two ways: (1) you can emphasize how you are somehow different from your environment and how that impacted you, or (2) you can emphasize how you learned positive qualities from the environment around you. Basically, how did your environment turn you into a special, interesting person? How can you make sure your essay is really answering the prompt? Here are some key strategies. You'll need to select something particular in your overall surroundings to zero in on. You can take ideas such as your family, home, neighborhood, or community in several directions. For example, your family could describe your immediate family, your extended family, or a found family. Your home could be the specific house or houses you grew up in, but it could also be your hometown, block, apartment building, or even country. Your neighborhood could be your street, subdivision, cul-de-sac; it could be an urban area or the rural countryside. Your community could be any community you've been part of, from your school community to your church community to your city. When you consider what aspect of your environment to choose, think about significant things that happened to you in connection with your environment. Remember, you'll need to get beyond just describing how the setting is important to you to show how it makes you important. You then need to consider what about your environment turned you into a person who stands out. Again, this can be about how you overcame some aspect of your environment or how your environment positively fostered qualities or traits in you. You want to make sure you have a clear message that links your environment to one, two, or three special traits you have. Try to think of specific stories and anecdotes related to your interactions with your environment, and then thoughtfully analyze these to reveal what they show about you. Important adults in your life can help you brainstorm potential ideas. Like a good movie script, a college essay needs characters, some action, and a poignant but ultimately happy ending. When you're planning out your personal statement, try to think of the story you're telling in movie terms. This way you can ensure your essay has the following features: Did you feel ALL the feelings? Can you even name all of these feelings? Oh, yeah? Then what's the one in the bottom-right called? Your essay will really stand out if you add effective examples and descriptions. For example, imagine Karima decides to describe how learning to navigate public transit as a high school freshman made her resourceful and helped her explore the city she grew up in. She also discusses how exploring the city ultimately impacted her. How should she frame her experience? Here are some options: Version 1 I was nervous about taking the El by myself for the first time. At the station, there were lots of commuters and adults who seemed impatient but confident. At first, I was very afraid of getting lost, but over time I became as confident as those commuters. V ersion 2 I felt a mixture of nerves and excitement walking up the Howard red line turnstile for the first time. What if I got lost on my way to the museum? I was worried that I would just seem like a nuisance to all of the frowning commuters who crowded the platform. If I needed help, would they help me? Was I even brave enough to ask? When the metal doors opened, I pressed my nails into my palms and rushed in after a woman with a red briefcase. Success! At least for the first step. I found a sideways-facing seat and clutched my macrame bag with my notebook and sketching supplies. A map hung above my seat. Pressing my finger to the colorful grid, I found my stop and counted how many I still had to go. I spent the entire train ride staring at that map, straining my ears for everything the conductor said. Now, when I think about the first time I rode the El by myself, I smile. What seemed so scary at the time is just an everyday way to get around now. But I always look around on the platform to see if any nervous kids linger at the edges of the commuter crowds and offer them a smile. Both versions set up the same story, plot-wise, but the second makes the train ride (and because of this, the author) come alive through the addition of specific, individualizing details, such as the following: There's no one best topic for this essay prompt (or any other), but I've included some potential ideas below to help you get started with your own brainstorming: If you are applying to transfer or to be readmitted, you likely already have some college experience. So in this case, ApplyTexas offers a personal statement option that allows you to write about your life beyond the high school years. This option still asks you to demonstrate what in your external environment has turned you into a unique individual. But if, for instance, you left college and now are reapplying, you'll want to address how some aspect of that experience made an impact on who you are now. Otherwise, follow the advice above for the standard Topic A prompt. And that's when I realized that I, too, had become an ostrich, accepted by and adapted into their culture of pecking and running. Want to build the best possible college application? We can help. PrepScholar Admissions is the world's best admissions consulting service. We combine world-class admissions counselors with our data-driven, proprietary admissions strategies. We've overseen thousands of students get into their top choice schools, from state colleges to the Ivy League. We know what kinds of students colleges want to admit. We want to get you admitted to your dream schools. Learn more about PrepScholar Admissions to maximize your chance of getting in. Next up, let's go through the same process for ApplyTexas Topic B, taking it apart brick by brick and putting it back together again. Most students have an identity, an interest, or a talent that defines them in an essential way. Tell us about yourself. At first glance, this prompt seems pretty vague. "Tell us about yourself" is not exactly the most detailed set of instructions. But if we dig a little deeper, we can see that there are actually two pretty specific things this question is asking. This prompts posits that "most students"—which likely includes you!—have some kind of defining trait. This could be "an identity, an interest, or a talent," so you need to express what that defining trait is for you specifically. For instance, are you an amazing knitter? Do you spend your free time researching cephalopods? Are you a connoisseur of indie movies or mystery novels? Or maybe you have a religious, cultural, ethnic, or LGBTQ+ identity that's very important to you. Any of these things could plausibly be the main, framing theme of your essay. Even though you have some kind of defining trait, that's not the entirety of you. Essentially, you need to contextualize your defining trait within your broader personality and identity. This is where the "tell us about yourself" part comes in. What does your defining trait say about you as a person? And how does it fit into your overall personality, values, and dreams? Only deep in the woods could she explore her one true passion: moss. Admissions readers are hoping to learn two main things: It's essential that this essay communicates genuine passion for whatever you write about. College is a lot of work, and passion is an important driving force when things get busy. Thus, readers are looking for students who are really engaged in the world around them and excited about things! A strong, well-developed sense of self goes a long way toward helping you weather all the changes you're going to experience when you attend college. Even though you'll change and grow a lot as a person during your college years, having a sense of your own core traits and values will help those changes be exciting as opposed to scary. Colleges are looking for a developed sense of self. Additionally, they are looking for students who can communicate messages about themselves in a clear, confident, and cohesive way. The challenge with this prompt is giving a complete picture of you as a person while still staying on message about your defining trait. You need to be focused yet comprehensive. Let's explore the best ways to show off your passion and frame your identity. First, you need to select that defining trait. This could be pretty much anything, just as long as you're genuinely invested in this trait and feel that it represents some core aspect of you. It should also be something you can describe through stories and anecdotes. Just saying, "I'm a redhead and that defines me" makes for a pretty boring essay! On the other hand, a story about how you started a photography project that consists of portraits of redheads like you and what you learned about yourself from this experience is much more interesting. Be careful to select something that presents you in a broadly positive light. If you select a trait that doesn't seem very serious, such as your enduring and eternal love of onion rings, you risk seeming at best immature and at worst outright disrespectful. You also want to pick something realistic—don't claim you're the greatest mathematician who ever lived unless you are, in fact, the greatest mathematician who ever lived (and you probably aren't). Otherwise, you'll seem out of touch. Next, consider how you can use this trait to paint a more complete picture of you as a person. It's great that you're passionate about skiing and are a member of a ski team, but what else does this say about you? Are you an adventurous daredevil who loves to take (reasonable) risks? Are you a nature lover with a taste for exploration? Do you love being part of a team? Select at least two or three positive messages you want to communicate about yourself in your essay about your key trait. Brody added his special brand of XYZ to everything he ever made for that bro-tisanal touch. It's much more interesting to read about things you do that demonstrate your key traits than it is to hear you list them. Don't just say, "Everyone asks me for advice because I'm level-headed and reasonable." Actually describe situations that show people asking you for advice and you offering that level-headed, reasonable advice. It's important to watch your tone as you write an essay that's (pretty overtly) about how great you are. You want to show your own special qualities without seeming glib, staid, self-aggrandizing, or narcissistic. Let's say Andrew wants to write about figuring out how to grow a garden, despite his yard being in full shade, and how this desire turned into a passion for horticulture. He could launch into a rant about the garden store employees not knowing which plants are right for which light, the previous house owner's terrible habit of using the yard as a pet bathroom, or the achy knee that prevented him from proper weeding posture. Alternatively, he could describe doing research on the complex gardens of royal palaces, planning his garden based on plant color and height, using the process of trial and error to see which plants would flourish, and getting so involved with this work that he often lost track of time. One of these approaches makes him sound whiny and self-centered, while the other makes him sound like someone who can take charge of a difficult situation. Again, there's no single best approach here, but I've outlined some potential topics below: The ApplyTexas variation on Topic B is specifically designed for two different possible application situations. The first is for people who are applying as non-degree seeking or post-baccalaureate students (aka "transient students"). In that case they ask you to discuss the courses you want to take, and what you hope to accomplish if you are admitted. That means they still want you to focus this essay on what you are passionate about, as mentioned above, but they expect that passion to be based on courses the university offers more directly. The second is for students who are reapplying after being suspended for academic reasons. In that case they ask you to describe any actions you have taken to improve your academic performance, and to give them a reason why you should be readmitted. You'll still need to focus on your positive traits in this variation, so this can be a tricky task. As in the example above you'll need to watch your tone and not come across as whiny. Instead, confront the cause of your academic suspension and what you learned from that experience, then turn it into a newfound strength. Maybe you learned new study habits you can describe for them. Maybe working full-time while you were suspended improved your work ethic. Whatever you choose, show how a negative situation changed into a positive learning experience for you, and focus on the better person you are now because of it. Now, we can take apart Topic C to get a good handle on how to tackle this future-facing essay. You've got a ticket in your hand—where will you go? What will you do? What will happen when you get there? If ApplyTexas Topic A and Topic B were all about your past experiences, Topic C wants you to give readers a glimpse of your imagined possibilities. There are basically two potential approaches to this question. We'll break them down here. One approach to this prompt is to use your essay as a chance to describe your long-term goals for your career and life. For some students, this will be a straightforward endeavor. For example, say you've always wanted to be a doctor. You spend your time volunteering at hospitals, helping out at your mom's practice, and studying biology. You could easily frame your "ticket" as a ticket to medical school. Just pick a few of the most gripping moments from these past experiences and discuss the overall trajectory of your interests and your essay would likely be a winner! But what if you're not sure about your long-term goals yet? Or what if you feel like you really don't know where you're going next week, let alone next year or 10 years from now? Read on for Option 2! While you can certainly interpret this as a straightforward question about your future, you can also use it as a chance to be more imaginative. Note that this entire question rests on the metaphor of the ticket. The ticket can take you anywhere; you decide. It could be to a real place, such as your grandmother's house or the Scottish highlands or the Metropolitan Museum. Or it could be somewhere fantastical, such as a time machine to the Paleolithic. The important point is that you use the destination you select—and what you plan to do there—to prove you're a thoughtful person who is excited about and actively engaged with the world around you. Renata doesn't want a train ticket; she just wants a boat. If you're on a direct path to a specific field of study or career, admissions officers definitely want to know this. Having driven, goal-oriented, and passionate students is a huge plus for any college. If this sounds like you, be sure your essay conveys not just your interest but also your deep love of the subject, as well as any related clubs, activities, and/or hobbies you've done during high school. If you take the more creative approach to this prompt, however, realize that in this essay (as in all the other ApplyTexas essays) the how matters much more than the what . Don't worry that you don't have a specific goal in mind yet. No matter where your eventual academic, career, or other pursuits might lie, every activity you've done up to now has taught you something, whether that be work ethic, mastering a skill, learning from a mentor, interacting with peers, dealing with setbacks, understanding your own learning style, or perseverance. Your essay is a chance to show off that knowledge and maturity. So no matter what destination you choose for your ticket (the what), you want to communicate that you can think about future (and imagined!) possibilities in a compelling way based on your past experiences (the how). Whether you take the ideas of "where you are going" and "what you are doing" in a more literal or more abstract direction, the admissions committee wants to make sure that no matter what you study, you'll be able to get something meaningful out of it. They want to see that you're not simply floating through life on the surface but are actively absorbing the qualities, skills, and know-how you'll need to succeed in the world. Here are some ideas for how to show that you have thoughtful and compelling visions of possible futures. Is this going to be a more direct interpretation of your goals (my ticket is to the judge's bench) or a more creative one (my ticket is to Narnia)? Whichever one you choose, make sure that you choose a destination that is genuinely compelling to you. The last thing you want is to come off sounding bored or disingenuous. Another key point is to avoid overreaching or underreaching. For instance, it's fine to say that you'd like to get involved in politics, but it's a little too self-aggrandizing to say that you're definitely going to be president of the United States. Be sure that whatever destination you select for your ticket, it doesn't come off as unnecessary bragging rather than simple aspiration. At the same time, make sure the destination you've chosen is one that makes sense in the context of a college essay. Maybe what you really want is a ticket to the potato chip factory; however, this essay might not be the best place to elaborate on this imagined possibility. While you can of course choose a whimsical location, you need to be able to ground it in a real vision of the kind of person you want to become. Don't forget who your audience is! College admissions officers want to find students who are eager to learn. They also want to be exposed to new thoughts and ideas (and not just new potato chips). Once you've picked a destination, it's time to consider the other components of the question: what are you going to do once you reach your destination? What will happen there? Try to think of some key messages that relate back to you, your talents, and your goals. The way this question is framed is very abstract, so it's important you ground your thoughts about your destination (whether it's more straightforward or more creative) in concrete anecdotes and examples that show you're thoughtful, engaged, passionate, and driven. This is even more important if you go the creative route and are writing about an unusual location. If you don't keep things somewhat grounded in reality, your essay could come across as frivolous. Make sure you make the most of this chance to share real-life examples of your desirable qualities. Imagine Eleanor's essay is about how she wants a ticket to Starfleet Academy (for the uninitiated, this is the fictional school in the Star Trek universe where people train to be Starfleet officers). Which essay below conveys more about her potential as a student? Version 1 My ticket is to Starfleet Academy. There, I would train to become part of the Command division so I could command a starship. Once I was captain of my own starship, I would explore the deepest reaches of space to interact with alien life and learn more about the universe. Version 2 I've loved Star Trek since my dad started playing VHS copies of old episodes for me in our ancient VCR. So if I could have a ticket to anywhere, it would be to Starfleet Academy to train in the command division. I know I would make a superb command officer. My ten years of experience in hapkido have taught me discipline and how to think on my feet. Working as a hapkido instructor in my dojo the past two years has honed my leadership and teaching qualities, which are essential for any starship commander. Additionally, I have the curiosity and sense of adventure necessary for a long career in the unknown reaches of space. Right now, I exercise my thirst for exploration through my photography blog. Using my DSLR camera, I track down and photograph obscure and hidden places I find in my town, on family trips, and even on day trips to nearby cities. I carefully catalogue the locations so other people can follow in my footsteps. Documentation, after all, is another important part of exploring space in a starship. Both versions communicate the same things about the imagined destination, but the second essay does a much better job showing who Eleanor is as a person. All we really learn from the first excerpt is that Eleanor must like Star Trek. We can also infer that she probably likes leadership, exploration, and adventure, since she wants to captain a starship. But we don't really know that for sure. Admissions officers shouldn't have to infer who you are from your essay—your essay should lay it out for them. In the second essay, on the other hand, Eleanor clearly lays out the qualities that would make her a great Command officer, and provides examples of how she exemplifies these qualities. She ties the abstract destination to concrete things from her life such as hapkido and photography. This provides a much more well-rounded picture of what Eleanor could bring to the student body and the school at large. Eleanor just wants to explore the final frontier . I've come up with some sample essay ideas for the two different approaches to this prompt. Remember to tie your imaginative destination to concrete details about your special qualities! ApplyTexas offers a Topic C variant in case there is personal information you want them to consider along with your application, for instance, why you are transferring to a new school. They still want you to focus on the future, but they encourage discussing any hardships, challenges, extenuating circumstances, or opportunities that have impacted your abilities and academic credentials (in a positive way). They also want you to discuss how these circumstances can help you contribute to a diverse college community. In this case, this variation is not fundamentally different from the ticket question, it just asks for a more specific focus. So if this variation applies to you, use the advice above for question C option one. A future as a driving coach for motorcoach drivers was a no-brainer for the founding member of the homonym club. If you're applying to one of several fine arts fields, you might have to write this essay. Personal interaction with objects, images and spaces can be so powerful as to change the way one thinks about particular issues or topics. For your intended area of study (architecture, art history, design, studio art, visual art studies/art education), describe an experience where instruction in that area or your personal interaction with an object, image or space effected this type of change in your thinking. What did you do to act upon your new thinking and what have you done to prepare yourself for further study in this area? If you're applying to study architecture, art, or art history, one of the essays you will likely have to write is this one. This essay topic is trying to ask as broadly as possible about an experience with art that has moved you in some way. This means that your options for answering the question are quite varied. So what are the two different parts of this prompt? Let's take a look. Think of a time you experienced that blown-away feeling when looking at something man-made. This is the reaction and situation the first part of the essay wants you to recreate. The prompt is primarily interested in your ability to describe and pinpoint exactly what quality made you stop in your tracks. The huge set of inspiring object options the prompt offers tells us that your taste level won't be judged here. You can focus on a learning experience, which includes both classes and extracurricular activities, or you can focus on a direct experience in which you encountered an object or space without the mediation of a class or teacher. The only limit to your focus object is that it is something made by someone other than you. Your reaction should be in conversation with the original artist—not a form of navel-gazing. The key for this part of the essay is that your description needs to segue into a story of change and transformation. What the essay topic is asking you to show isn't just that you were struck by something you saw or learned about, but that you also absorbed something from this experience that impacted your own art going forward. When you see the Angkor Wat Temple, you can't help but be psyched that at least humans haven't wasted all their time on earth. This brings us to the second part of the essay prompt: this is where you need to move from the past into the present, and then at least gesture meaningfully toward the future. It's one thing to look at a piece of art, such as a sculpture or a form of architecture, and feel moved by its grace, boldness, or vision. But it's a sign of a mature, creative mind to be able to take to heart what is meaningful to you about this work and then transmute this experience into your own art. This essay wants to see that developing maturity in you; therefore, you should explain exactly how your own creative vision has changed after this meaningful encounter you've described. What qualities, philosophy, or themes do you now try to infuse into what you create? More importantly, this essay prompt asserts that being affected by something once isn't enough. That's why in this second part of the topic you also need to explain what you've been doing to keep having similarly moving encounters with other creative works. You have some choice, too, when it comes to answering, "What have you done to prepare yourself for further study in this area?" For example, you could describe how you've sought out other works by the same artist who moved you the first time. Or you could describe investigating new media or techniques to emulate something you saw. Or you could discuss learning about the period, genre, school, or philosophical theory that the original piece of art comes from in order to give yourself a more contextualized understanding. If you're planning an academic career in the visual arts or architecture, then you're entering a long conversation started by our cave-painting ancestors and continuing through every human culture and society since. This essay wants to make sure that you aren't creating art in a vacuum and that you have had enough education and awareness to be inspired by others. By demonstrating how you react to works that move you—not with jealousy or dismissal but with appreciation and recognition of another's talent and ability—you're proving that you're ready to participate in this ongoing conversation. At the same time, this essay is asking you to show your own creative readiness. Describe not only the work you have produced but also your ability to introduce new elements into that work—in this case, inspired by the piece you described. This way, you can demonstrate that you aren't a one-note artist but are mature enough to alter and develop what you make. What are some best practices for teasing out the complexities of art in written form? Here are some helpful tips as you brainstorm and write your essay. Once you've chosen between these two contexts, narrow down your selection even further. If you're writing about an educational encounter, don't forget that it can come from an informal situation as well. For example, you could write about something you learned on your own from a documentary, museum visit, or art book. If you're writing about a direct experience with art, don't necessarily fixate on a classical piece. Alternatively, you could discuss a little-known public sculpture, a particularly striking building or bridge you saw while traveling, or a gallery exhibition. Whatever you end up writing about, make sure you know some of the identifying details. You don't need to know the answers to all the following questions, but do your best to research so you can answer at least two or three of them: The make-it-or-break-it moment in this essay will be your ability to explain what affected you in the object you're writing about. Why is it different from other works you've seen? Do you think it (or you) was in the right place at the right time to be moved by it, or would it have affected you the same way no matter where or when you saw it? Did it speak to you because it shares some of your ideals/philosophies/tastes, or because it was so different from them? Be careful with your explanation since it can easily get so vague as to be meaningless or so obscure and "deep" that you lose your reader. Before you start trying to put it down on paper, try to talk out what you plan to say either with a friend, parent, or teacher. Do they understand what you're saying, and do they believe you? When you think about what you've been making or thinking about making during your high school career, what is the trajectory of your ideas? How has your understanding of the materials you want to work with changed? What about the message you want your works to convey? Or the way you want your works to be seen by others? What is the reason you feel compelled to be creative? Now that you've come up with this timeline, see whether your changes in thought overlap with the art experience you're planning on describing. Is there a way you can combine what was so exciting to you about this work with the way you've seen your own ideas about art evolve? Just as nothing ruins a joke like explaining it, nothing ruins the wordless experience of looking at art as talking it to death does. Still, you need to find a way to use words to give the reader a sense of what the piece that moved you actually looks like—particularly if the reader isn't familiar with the work or the artist that created it. Here is my suggested trick for writing well about art. First, be specific about the object. Discuss its colors, size, what it appears to be made of, what your eye goes to first (bright colors vs darker, more muted ones, for example), what it is representative of (if it's figurative), where it is in relation to the viewer, whether or not you can see marks of the tools used (such as brush strokes, scrapes from sculpting tools, etc.). Second, step away from the concrete and get creative with language by using techniques such as comparative description. Use your imagination to create emotionally resonant similes. Is there a form of movement (e.g., flying, crawling, tumbling) that this piece feels like? Does it remind you of something from the natural world (e.g., a falling leaf, a forest canopy being moved by wind, waves, sand dunes shifting)? If the work is figurative, imagine what has been happening just before the moment in time it captures. What happened just after this point? Using these kinds of non-literal descriptors will let your reader understand both the actual physical object and its aesthetic appeal. Want to write the perfect college application essay? Get professional help from PrepScholar. Your dedicated PrepScholar Admissions counselor will craft your perfect college essay, from the ground up. We'll learn your background and interests, brainstorm essay topics, and walk you through the essay drafting process, step-by-step. At the end, you'll have a unique essay that you'll proudly submit to your top choice colleges. Don't leave your college application to chance. Find out more about PrepScholar Admissions now: Both UT Austin and Texas A&M require short answers as part of the freshman application. For UT, some are required by all applicants, while others are required by those applying to certain majors or departments. For A&M, engineering applicants must submit an additional short answer. We'll go over the UT Austin prompts followed by the Texas A&M prompt. UT Austin requires three short answers from all freshman applicants and also offers an optional prompt. Each short answer should be no more than 250-300 words, or one paragraph. Short Answer 1: Why are you interested in the major you indicated as your first-choice major? Short Answer 2: Leadership can be demonstrated in many ways. Please share how you have demonstrated leadership in either your school, job, community, and/or within your family responsibilities. Short Answer 3: Please share how you believe your experiences, perspectives, and/or talents have shaped your ability to contribute to and enrich the learning environment at UT Austin, both in and out of the classroom. Optional Short Answer: Please share background on events or special circumstances that may have impacted your high school academic performance, including the possible effects of COVID-19. (NOTE: The inclusion of COVID-19 in this optional question applies through Fall 2021, at minimum.) If you're applying to art and art history, architecture, nursing, or social work, you'll need to submit the following in addition to your short answers above: In 500 words or less, please tell us about a meaningful way in which an artwork, or artist, has changed your life. How has this prompted your ambitions for a life in the arts? What role has creativity played in your education? What are the ways you explore and express your creativity? If applying first-choice, submit responses to the following short answer prompts: Discuss the reasons you chose Social Work as your first-choice major and how a Social Work degree from UT will prepare you for the future. Obviously, these short answer prompts are all asking very different things, but they do have some similarities in terms of their overall goals. The first set of prompts basically want to know what you can offer UT Austin and why you'd be a great fit as a student here. They also want to know why you chose UT Austin and your specific major. In other words, all these prompts essentially work together as a "Why This College?" essay. For the major-specific prompts, you're being asked two basic things: Admissions officers will be looking for evidence that you're genuinely interested in the school, the major you've chosen, and the career you want to pursue. Make sure to identify features of the program that appeal to you. In other words, why UT Austin? What makes you a good fit here? Be as specific as possible in your responses. Since you won't have much room to write a lot, try to focus on a particular anecdote, skill, or goal you have. Admissions officers also want to see that you have an aptitude for your chosen career path, so if you have any relevant work, research, or volunteer experience, they definitely want to know this! It's OK to take a broad view of what's relevant here. Finally, they're looking for individuals who have clear goals as well as a general idea of what they want to do with their degree. Are you interested in working with a specific population or specialty? Why? What led you to this conclusion? All engineering applicants to Texas A&M must submit a short answer to the following prompt: Describe your academic and career goals in the broad field of engineering (including computer science, industrial distribution, and engineering technology). What and/or who has influenced you either inside or outside the classroom that contributed to these goals? This prompt wants to know two essential things: What admissions officers want to know here is simply what your biggest engineering ambition is and how you came to have this goal. Since you don't have a ton of room to write your short answer, you'll want to be as specific as possible. Admissions officers want to see that you have a clear future in mind for what you want to do with your engineering degree. For example, do you plan to go on to a PhD program? Why? Do you have a particular career in mind? In addition, make sure to specify the main inspiration for or motivation behind this goal. For instance, did you have a high school teacher who encouraged you to study engineering? Or perhaps you decided on a whim to take a computer science class, which you ended up loving. Remember that the inspiration for your engineering goals doesn't have to be limited to something school-related. If you get stuck, think broadly about what initially got you interested in the field. Finally, tell a story with this short answer. Admissions officers want to see the clear connection between what inspired you and why you've decided to pursue engineering as a major and career. Don't just state that something made you interested in engineering and that's it. What specifically motivated you to pursue this field and career path? Don't be afraid to get personal, as this will show the admissions committee that you're truly passionate about the major. US transfer students and international transfer students must typically submit an additional essay on the following prompt (or must submit an essay on one of the topic variations listed above). Choose an issue of importance to you—the issue could be personal, school related, local, political, or international in scope—and write an essay in which you explain the significance of that issue to yourself, your family, your community, or your generation. This prompt, which targets transfer students, essentially wants to know what hardship, challenge, or social issue has affected you on a personal level (or a larger group you're part of) and why you think this particular thing is so important to you. For example, maybe you identify as LGBTQIA+ and have personally experienced discrimination in your local community due to your sexual orientation and/or gender identity. Or perhaps you grew up in a wealthy family but have begun to see recently how widespread the issue of homelessness really is and now are making a more conscious effort to find ways to remedy this problem in your own community. The issue you choose doesn't have to relate to a wider social issue; it could be a learning disability you have, for instance, or the fact that you no longer share the same religious beliefs as does your family. The most important part of this question is the connection between the issue and yourself. In other words, why is this issue so important to you? How has it affected your life, your goals, your experiences, etc.? This essay is a way for admissions officers to get to know you and what matters to you personally on a much deeper level than what some of the other essay topics allow, so don't be afraid to dive into topics that are very emotional, personal, or special to you. Furthermore, be sure to clearly explain why this particular issue—especially if it's a broader social issue that affects many people—is meaningful to you. Admissions officers want to know about any challenges you've faced and how these have positively contributed to your own growth as a person. The ApplyTexas application contains four essay prompts (Topics A, B, C, and D), with different schools requiring different combinations of mandatory and optional essays. There are also short answer prompts for UT Austin and Texas A&M, as well as a Topic E only for transfer students. One way to keep these three similar-sounding essay topics (A, B, and C) separate in your mind is to create a big-picture category for each one: Now, let's briefly summarize each essay topic: Essay Topic A Essay Topic B Essay Topic C Essay Topic D Short Answer Prompts Essay Topic E (Transfer Students) Curious about the other college essay choices out there? If your target college also accepts the Common Application, check out our guide to the Common App essay prompts to see whether they would be a better fit for you. Interested to see how other people tackled this part of the application? We have a roundup of 100+ accepted essays from tons of colleges. Stuck on what to write about? Read our suggestions for how to come up with great essay ideas. Working on the rest of your college applications? We have great advice on how to find the right college for you, how to write about your extracurricular activities, and how to ask teachers for letters of recommendation. Want to improve your SAT score by 160 points or your ACT score by 4 points? We've written a guide for each test about the top 5 strategies you must be using to have a shot at improving your score. Download it for free now: 
What Are the ApplyTexas Essays?
Why Do Colleges Want You to Write Essays?
ApplyTexas Essay Requirements
UT Austin
Texas A&M
Southern Methodist University
Texas Christian University
Comparing ApplyTexas Essay Prompts A, B, and C
ApplyTexas Prompts
Topic A
Topic B
Topic C
How to Tell Topics A, B, and C Apart
Dissecting ApplyTexas Essay Topic A
The Prompt
What's the Prompt Asking and How Should You Answer It?
Step 1: Describe Your Environment
Step 2: Explain How This Environment Shaped You
What Are Readers Hoping to Learn About You?
How Can Your Essay Give Them What They Want?
#1: Pick a Specific Aspect of Your Environment
#2: How Did This Environment Make You Special?
#3: Think of the Essay Like a Movie
#4: Add Details, Description, and Examples
ApplyTexas Topic A Essay Ideas
2 ApplyTexas Topic A for Transfer, Transient, or Readmit Students
Dissecting ApplyTexas Essay Topic B
The Prompt
What's the Prompt Asking?
#1: What Defines You?
#2: How Does That Defining Trait Fit Into "You" Overall?
What Are Readers Hoping to Learn About You?
#1: What You're Passionate About
#2: How You View Yourself (and How Successfully You Can Communicate That)
How Can Your Essay Give Them What They Want?
#1: Define the Core Message
#2: Fit Your Message Into the Larger Picture
#3: Show, Don't Tell
#4: Watch Your Tone
ApplyTexas Topic B Essay Ideas
ApplyTexas Topic B for Transfer, Transient, or Readmit Students
Are you a diamond in a world of hearts? Dissecting ApplyTexas Essay Topic C
The Prompt
What's the Prompt Asking and How Should You Answer It?
Option 1: Describe Your Long-Term Goals
Option 2: Demonstrate Thoughtful Imagination
What Are Readers Hoping to Learn About You?
How Can Your Essay Give Them What They Want?
#1: Pick Where You're Going
#2: Don't Overreach or Underreach
#3: Flesh It Out
#4: Ground Your "Journey" in Specific Anecdotes and Examples
ApplyTexas Topic C Essay Ideas
Possibility 1: Your Concrete Goals
Possibility 2: Creative/Abstract Destination
Topic C for Transfer, Transient, or Readmit Students
Dissecting ApplyTexas Essay Topic D
The Prompt
What's the Prompt Asking?
Part 1: Observation and Reaction
Part 2: Absorption
What Are Readers Hoping to Learn About You?
Inspired by Michaelangelo's supposed advice to just "chip away the marble that isn't the sculpture," I will now write my essay by just not using the words that aren't supposed to be on the page. How Can Your Essay Give Them What They Want?
#1: Pick One Piece of Art or Learning Experience
#2: Figure Out Why You Were Struck by This Particular Work
#3: Make a Timeline of Your Own Creative Works
#4: Use a Mix of Concreteness and Comparisons in Your Description
The Stormtrooper's hypnotic performance was like plunging into a diamond-studded Sarlacc pit to be slowly digested over a thousand years by disco music. Dissecting the UT and Texas A&M Short Answer Prompts
UT Austin Short Answer Prompts
Art and Art History
Architecture
Nursing
Social Work
What Are These UT Austin Short Answer Prompts Asking?
How Can You Give UT Austin What They Want?
Or maybe instead of writing short answers, you could just send them this selfie. Texas A&M Short Answer Prompt
What's This Texas A&M Short Answer Prompt Asking?
How Can You Give Texas A&M What They Want?
The thinking doesn't end here for transfer students. Briefly: ApplyTexas Essay Topic E (Transfer Students)
The Prompt
What's the Prompt Asking?
How Can Your Essay Give Them What They Want?
The Bottom Line: Tips for Writing ApplyTexas Essays
What's Next?
About the Author
Anna scored in the 99th percentile on her SATs in high school, and went on to major in English at Princeton and to get her doctorate in English Literature at Columbia. She is passionate about improving student access to higher education.
How to Write a Hook for an Essay
Source: https://blog.prepscholar.com/apply-texas-essays