How to Survive the College Application Process (Author has Never Applied to College)
The realities of teacher recommendation letters.
With college application season right around the corner, I’ve put together an excellent guide for applying to colleges, written by someone who is not applying for colleges.
- Watch videos of Ivy League students reading their essays and cry about how awful yours is.
There’s actually a lot you can learn from reading how other people wrote their essays and can provide a lot of inspiration. Before wallowing in self doubt and hatred, think about what they do well that you are lacking. Do they show more instead of telling? How are their paragraphs structured? Why does their essay convey more about themselves than mine? And go on from there. Or just cry about it, that also works.
- Take advantage if you’re in a minority group
As the entire process is you trying to convince the administration’s office that you’re “not like the other applicants,” now is the time to use your disadvantages to your advantage. Whether it be race, sexuality, or religion, you too can describe your hardships of discrimination to garner sympathy. Focus more on how it affected you instead of what happened itself and how it changed you as a person.
- No one cares that you scored that one point in basketball
The administration office probably doesn’t care that time slowed down as your heart beat faster and faster as you lined up to make the perfect shot that won the game and everyone was cheering for you and your dad finally came home. You can obviously write about a moment you’re proud of, but don’t spend too long on the details. Instead, focus more on how that event changed you as a person or how it strengthened your passion.
- Harass your English teacher to read your essays
Having someone edit can drastically improve your essays and help you better word and phrase your thoughts. If you don’t have any good English teachers then you can bother your friends, though they tend to be harsher critics and will most definitely laugh at you for sounding like r/im14andthisisdeep.
- Coffeecoffeecoffeecoffeecoffee
When all else fails, turn to substances (IHS Voice does not condone drug abuse). Between homework, sports, and clubs (that you definitely joined to show your school spirit and not so you could say you were a dedicated member after going to two meetings), how could you possibly find time in the day to write your essays? Well ladies and gentlemen, buckle up and get ready to down some coffee to power through the night, and then be shocked at how bad it is when you reread it in the morning.
Maybe drinking from a mug of your dream school will up your chances of getting in.
And finally, remember that you might also get rejected for someone that can throw a football kinda far.
