1. Relax and Get Creative

We know that applying to college can be stressful and overwhelming, but trust us when we say that you’ll write a much better essay if you’re feeling at ease. Make a cup of tea, put on your favorite song, sit down, and write whatever comes to mind. Have a question? Write it down. Think of a joke? Write it down. Remember a dream you had? Write it down. The stuff that matters to you will come to the surface pretty quickly, and you’ll know because you’ll react to it very strongly: hope, fear, excitement, determination. Follow that impulse and see where it leads!

2. Be Yourself

The real you is amazing enough. You don’t have to pretend to be someone else. Your hopes, fears, the things you obsess over, the things that confuse you: all that matters! What you’ve done or what you’ve made is important too, but only because you did it, you made it, and it changed you.

3. Get Help from the Right Places

Once you have a draft, it’s OK to go to a friend, a teacher, or a parent to get their opinion or to have them proofread it for you. But make sure that the real writing comes from you. You’re the one whose voice we want to hear. Also, avoid using digital writing tools like ChatGPT. They may seem like a big help at first, but they cover you up. We can tell when an essay was written by these tools because they all sound the same.

You got this!