I am in love with music and music means so much to me, but how can I apply to college using music if I am not majoring in any sort of music?
Applying to college can be scary. There are so many options and so many decisions that have to be made, beginning with the decision of what to write the application essay on. I personally got very overwhelmed when I was told that it was time to look at the prompts and pick one to respond to. Like many of my friends, there were several prompts that I felt I could give a good answer to. We were told to start writing a response for each one and that we would soon find the one we were meant to use.
As I began to write these responses, I struggled to figure out what to write about. As I was talking with one of my teachers, they asked me, “What is one thing that really makes you YOU?” After pondering the answer to that question, one of my essays began to take off. This essay was about how music has shaped who I am and how music has influenced my life. Music has impacted me in a way that I felt I should showcase in my essay. I quickly discarded all the other essays because I felt this was it.
When I took this essay to my teacher to get edits and make it absolute perfection, we began to talk about what I was majoring in. When I responded that I was not majoring in anything music related, my teacher told me something that I felt proud of myself for. What was said to me was: writing about something that is completely different from what you want to study shows the admissions people and whoever reads this how diverse you are and that you are involved in so many different things.
After hearing that sentence for the first time, I felt that I began to hear it more and more. Don’t feel that you must write about something related to your major because more times than not, colleges want to see you write about something unrelated. They want to see all sides of your person and all sides of what makes you the best for their campus.
Never be afraid to express your creativity in your writing. Since most colleges have done away with interviews for every student, the essay and information you submit is how they get a picture of who you are. Why not make your essay about something that means a lot to you? No matter if that something is what you are going to be studying or not, write about it. Write about something that you are passionate about and that makes you special. Happy application writing!