How will you write your Common App essay about a belief or idea?
The Common Application prompts give you a chance to answer an interesting question, tell an important or revealing anecdote, and reflect on the ways in which the anecdote reveals something about your character, your beliefs, your values, or your personal priorities. This prompt, especially, focuses on the beliefs that are fundamental to who you are. But sometimes beliefs come into conflict with the beliefs or ideas of others. And sometimes those conflicts are what reveal our character.
What exactly, is the Common App essay about a belief or idea?
Here is the prompt as stated on the Common Application:
Reflect on a time when you questioned or challenged a belief or idea. What prompted your thinking? What was the outcome?
Let’s pick apart each phrase or idea of this prompt for your essay for the Common App.
Belief or Idea
This prompt hinges on some belief, idea, or value that you hold dear. At the core of the story, you must be able to identify this closely-held belief or idea and explain why it is important to you. The focus sets it apart from other prompts that focus more on intellectual ideas, experiences you have had, or feelings of gratitude. This is also different from writing about either your background or identity (which are related, but not identical concepts) or your interests and talents that are addressed in the first prompt on the Common Application. Here you are being asked about a core value you possess. Explaining the importance of this value will help you focus your essay on something critical to your humanity.
Questioned or Challenged
At various times in our lives, we are called upon to defend our ideals or our principles, either because others don’t share these beliefs, or because you may hold a view that is unpopular or out of the ordinary. Your story in this essay revolves around a time when you were called upon to defend your belief or idea against some countervailing force. This force could come from a particular person, a small group of people, or maybe even a very large group of people. What animates this essay, then, is the tension between your belief or idea and the beliefs or ideas of others.
Your Thinking
The “story” that is at the heart of this essay is the genesis of the tension, how you came to realize some sort of conflict or challenge, and how you came to a decision to do or say something in response (or not). Given that your values were under fire, did you do or say something to defend those values? Why or why not? When writing this essay for the Common App, you want to make the effort to explain your thought processes that eventually led to some sort of decision, action, or realization. In fact, the focus on “your thinking” is what encourages the sort of reflection that is necessary in a good Common App essay. You want to examine your thoughts, which should be easier to do as you look in the rearview mirror at the events you are retelling. You are not just recounting a story: you are examining both the narrative of the story, as well as the thoughts and actions of the main character–you.
Outcome
The decision, action, or realization you made is the outcome of the story. You want to be sure to describe the outcome. Don’t stop there, however: explain and analyze that outcome. Was the decision the right one? Did you act to defend your values, and if so, what was the result? Or, perhaps, you acted in a way that did not defend those values, and you later regretted your inability to stand up for your beliefs.
Either way, you are asked in this prompt to reflect upon what you did (or did not do) to defend your beliefs or ideas, and to determine whether you would approach a similar conflict of beliefs or ideas in the same way in the future.
So at the center of this essay is a conflict of ideas. You need to share your ideas and beliefs with your reader and demonstrate how your defense of those ideals may have led to personal growth.
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Need help writing your Common App essay about a belief or idea?
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Want to know how to respond to the other Common Application prompts? Here are some more helpful links.
Background, identity, interest, or talent
Failure or obstacle or challenge
Mark Montgomery
Educational consultant and admissions expert
