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"Back in January, when I asked high school seniors to send in college application essays about money, class, working and the economy, I wasn't sure what, if anything, would come in over the transom. But 66 students submitted essays, and with the help of Harry Bauld, the author of "On Writing the College Application Essay," we've selected four to publish in full online and in part in this column. That allowed us to be slightly more selective than Princeton itself was last year. What these four writers have in common is an appetite for risk. Not only did they talk openly about issues that are emotionally complex and often outright taboo, but they took brave and counterintuitive positions on class, national identity and the application process itself. For anyone looking to inspire their own children or grandchildren who are seeking to go to college in the fall of 2014, these four essays would be a good place to start."

"When students hear essay they think: Five paragraphs, written to impress teacher, mostly to show that the student has been paying attention in class and/or doing the reading. Make sure to cite sources because: plagiarism. Also, use block quotes because that looks good. Don't forget the conclusion that summarizes everything staring with, "In conclusion." Never use "I." Contractions…bad. This is why most essays are unpleasant for students to write, and boring for instructors to read. They are treated not as an occasion to discover something previously unknown - to the author above all - but a performance for an audience of one, the teacher. One hoop among many to be jumped through as part of the college grind. Because of the disconnect, instructors often have a different hoop in mind, and so when students jump through the hoop they know, but it's not the hoop the instructor was envisioning we get…a debate about whether or not we should even assign essays. Instead of assigning essays, in my course, I now feature "writing-related problems.""

"What makes a good essay? And what makes a bad one? Educational consultant Dave Marcus joins Here & Now's Jeremy Hobson to offer his advice by using examples from student submissions including the opening of senior Michele Hau's essay."

An interesting post about how real essays are nothing like the 5-paragraph essay we learned in school

If you're a regular Times reader, you've no doubt enjoyed, and maybe even taught with, some of the 1,000-plus personal essays from the Magazine's Lives column, which has run weekly for decades. But did you know that NYTimes.com also regularly features personal writing on everything from love and family to life on campus, how we relate to animals, living with disabilities and navigating anxiety? In this post we suggest several ways to inspire your students' own personal writing, using Times models as "mentor texts," and advice from our writers on everything from avoiding "zombie nouns" to writing "dangerous" college essays."

"In the middle of the school year, I always regret my choice of becoming an AP and Honors English teacher. Not because I hate to teach, but because I'm always swimming in essays that I have to grade. In order to accommodate the load, I adapted the elementary way of thinking and formed a writers' workshop for my own classroom. Once they participate in the workshop, students are able to learn how to revise their own essays. Because of this, the time it takes for me to grade essays is literally cut in half. Suggestions for Implementing a Writers' Workshop in Your Classroom"

"Modern Love is a series of weekly reader-submitted essays that explore the joys and tribulations of love. Each week, an actor also reads one of the essays in a podcast. Though the stories are often about romantic love, they also take on love of family, friends, and even pets. This teacher finds their themes universal and the range of essays engaging models to help her students find their own voices."

We grown-ups often assume that children are oblivious to our money talk, ignorant of our budget woes and uninterested in how adults make financial decisions. Better to protect them from all that for as long as possible, right? But the best entries of this year's crop of college application essays about money prove that they are watching and listening - always - and picking up every little thing by osmosis."

"The SAT college admission test will no longer require a timed essay, will dwell less on fancy vocabulary and will return to the familiar 1600-point scoring scale in a major overhaul intended to open doors to higher education for students who are now shut out."

Interesting essay on giving and taking writing criticism

Interesting advice on literary analysis essay writing: "There should be more or less of a jumble in your head or on your note paper after the first time and even after the second. Much that you will think of in connection will come to nothing and be wasted. But some of it ought to go together under one idea. That idea is the thing to write on and write into the title at the head of your paper… One idea and a few subordinate ideas - [the trick is] to have those happen to you as you read and catch them - not let them escape you… The sidelong glance is what you depend on. You look at your author but you keep the tail of your eye on what is happening over and above your author in your own mind and nature."

"We asked students to write about a meaningful life experience. Here are the eight winning essays, as well as runners-up and honorable mentions."

"Students still use computers for writing outside of class, especially essays, but all writing in class happens by hand: notes from the whiteboard, notes from somebody's discussion comment, notes about which shoes to wear to Jim and Julia's party…. I tell them about the research, and, yes, they're skeptical-of course they are. It's like taking all their cuddly toys from the crib and convincing them it's still a place called home. But at least I know they're all present, if only functionally. I don't need to constantly worry about what might be going on in screenland. The classroom feels more like a classroom than an office, the conversations stronger precisely because more students usually otherwise engaged get involved. It comes down to a sense of kids being present together in a unified space, a space that allows for communities and communication to develop. Romantic, yes, as students are rarely present in the ways we aspire for them to be, but at least without technology, they space-out within the confines of their own imaginations. For instance, doodling when distracted instead of resorting to a virtual rabbit warren of visual excitement. As doodlers they are makers."

For those of you who do the movie/book comparison essay: "If I have a relationship with a book and it's poorly done on the big screen, on some level, I'm galled. But on the other hand, not every movie can be "Watchmen," and by now, I should be able to accept the nuance of adaptation, being an adult and all. On the whole, I'd argue that haggling over which is better, the book or the movie, is mostly pointless. The operative word being "mostly." Because there are extreme cases where book-lover rage is justifiable. Which cases? I pulled the Metacritic critic ratings of the top 500 movies on IMDb tagged with the "based on novel" keyword.1 I then2 found the average user rating of the source novel for each film on Goodreads, a book rating and review site.3 In the end, there was complete data for 382 films and source novels."

"Writing coaches asked students to think of a family recipe with a backstory - and then write an essay around that dish. The 81 recipes and their accompanying stories that resulted make up a cookbook of global cuisine with a heartfelt touch, revealing that storytelling may be the most important step in any recipe."

"Carrie is a professor at a university. She had asked me how to turn an area of her expertise, secondary school education, into writing that the general public would find rewarding and enjoyable. That's when I began talking about scenes, using her accident as an example of how to approach her work. Almost all creative nonfiction, essays or books, are, fundamentally, collections of small stories - or scenes - that together make one big story."

"Every day during the school year we invite teenagers to share their opinions about questions like these - on topics from hip-hop to climate change - and hundreds do, posting arguments, reflections and anecdotes to our Student Opinion feature. With this, our first-ever Student Editorial Contest, we're asking you to channel that enthusiasm into something a little more formal: short, evidence-based persuasive essays like the editorials The New York Times publishes every day."

"Draft features essays by grammarians, historians, linguists, journalists, novelists and others on the art of writing - from the comma to the tweet to the novel - and why a well-crafted sentence matters more than ever in the digital age."

"In a well-crafted essay, explain three ways drones would be an improvement over traditional methods. Before you do the task, you might… Pay close attention to the instructions. Understand that the prompt is asking only for ways that drones would be an improvement. Watch this video that explains additional ways that drones might be used in the future. Write down all the possible benefits to drone use explained in the article and observed in the video."

"This media gallery from American Masters: Salinger features a series of videos that explores how Salinger felt about his writing, his struggle to be published in The New Yorker magazine, and how Holden Caulfield was a reflection of his own life. The associated materials include a background essay, discussion questions and a student activity."