In my almost twenty years of working in college admissions, I’ve learned a handful of takeaways. One of the biggest: The college admission process is deeply personal, particularly at the University of Miami.
We admission counselors read hundreds, if not thousands, of applications from high school students like you every year. In doing so we learn about your background, your past, your struggles and adversity throughout it all. Your accomplishments, your passions, your biggest sources of pride. We rely on your essays and your application to learn about you, the human being.
Why dilute your lived experience to a snippet that you plug into an AI tool? It, quite literally, removes the human element from your story, the story that makes you stand out when we are reading applications.
I won’t sit here and say writing a college essay is a cake walk – it’s not. But it should be authentically you, and who knows yourself better than you? Certainly not AI. If you find yourself stumped, I invite you to check out my colleague Kaitlyn’s video with tips to writing a personal college essay. My colleague Charles shared some of his college essay writing tips too.
There’s one other thing I want to mention. When you submit the Common Application, you certify that you, yourself, wrote the information and that it is accurate and true. So alas…proceed with caution, if you choose to use AI at all.
