23 Best Practices and Mistakes to Avoid on your UT-Austin Common App Essay
Changing seasons in Kyoto, Japan
I find that writing a strong or exceptional essay is less about identifying a killer, unique topic that features high-flying metaphors and flair for the dramatic. Instead, the best essays often come from minimizing suboptimal stylistic tendencies and avoiding common missteps. I considered writing two separate posts, one with tips about writing strong essays and another about mistakes to avoid, but I’ve combined them since they’re two sides of the same coin. It’s difficult to discuss what to avoid without sharing potential best practices.
Some of this content shares advice from my third book, College Essay Best Practices and Editing Style Guide, which is available only to my clients.
My initial tips address big-picture content questions about how to choose a topic and what to write. The latter half of this post covers specific stylistic missteps students frequently make. Providing advice specific to your experience isn’t easy to generalize. That’s the sort of brainstorming and idea-formulation work my clients and I do with my premium essay feedback and consulting services.
The easiest way to reach me is by email kevin@texadmissions.com and to complete this questionnaire for a free email admissions assessment and to discuss pricing and services.
1. Understand the goal of the college essays
Your Common App Main Essay, plus university-specific supplements, attempts to persuade reviewers that you deserve a space in your desired program relative to the competition.
Effective college applications communicate a handful of interesting experiences specific to you. That can include anything from major-specific competencies, academic experiences, leadership roles, volunteer commitments, advocacy, work and internships, research endeavors, family obligations, and personal projects. It may involve robotics, band, sports, academic competitions, cultural activities, etc. What’s important to universities is that you articulate interests and identities that are intrinsic to you with reference to specific examples and memories that support your candidacy. There is no such thing as selecting topics or content that admissions reviews “want to hear.”
Thousands of admissions books and blog posts overly complicate college essay roles and goals. They flood the information space with misconceptions, stress, and suboptimal advice. Undoubtedly, ChatGPT-generated and low-effort content will continue complicating the finding of high-quality college essay advice. Reading too many blogs and books offers conflicting perspectives that are difficult to reconcile, partly because the authors don’t reflect on the college essay’s function and goal. I discuss in a subsequent post how you probably shouldn’t read college essay examples, including the ones I feature on this blog.
2. College essays provide an invitation to write
Since your application goal is to share and develop a handful of interesting aspects of your commitments, identities, and interests, you should shape your content based on what you want to share rather than fitting yourself into constraining questions. Applicants often reverse the sequence by looking at a question and attempting to pigeonhole themselves into what they think the universities want to hear.
It requires mental gymnastics to approach your essays by asking, “What do I want to share?” Then, write out your experiences and stories before inserting them into a question rather than examining a question like, “How do your perspectives contribute to our campus?”
That means it doesn’t matter which Common App “choose one of seven” questions you select.
You should approach college essays by identifying the perspectives and dimensions of the experiences you wish to share, rather than getting bogged down in the questions themselves.
The takeaway is not to interpret questions too literally or narrowly. They’re invitations to write. Identify what matters to you and worry later about how to pair it with the prompt.
3. The Common App Main Essay doesn’t need to do everything
Students and families make the common, if unconscious, error of believing that the Main Essay “needs to do everything.” They attempt to cram leadership, volunteering, major-specific experiences, humorous anecdotes, and diversity into a 650-word submission.
The Main Essay only needs to illustrate one, two, or three interesting things about you, nothing more.
Students write outstanding essays on their love for ice cream, caring for plants, how astronomy connects to band, and any number of topics or thematic combinations. Writing one or two themes more deeply rather than superficially overviewing many experiences is always preferable.
4. Where college essay content is distributed among the topics is less important than whether to include it at all
Students almost always stress about where a content chunk goes rather than whether to include it at all. For example, they wish to discuss being the National Honor Society president, but instead of writing out their experiences, they hesitate and don’t write anything. Then, without having written anything, they wonder whether an idea should go in the Main Essay or a supplement. Instead, I recommend writing out the content first and later figuring out where it goes.
One approach is to “pre-question draft” your essays by simply writing about the things that matter to you: rocketry competitions, robotics, band, chess club, DECA, HOSA, etc. Share stories, experiences, examples, or details of how you’ve deepened your commitments. Don’t let questions around “Where will this go?” prevent you from getting started. It’s very rare to submit a Common App Main Essay on the very first topic that comes to mind.
Consequently, that means it’s important to…
5. Experiment with initial college essay drafts
Writing out first drafts only costs time and energy.
You’re also not constrained to writing a perfect 650-word essay on the first try. For my clients, I always recommend they write around twice as many words as the eventual essay submission word limit. I invite my clients to experiment with quirky, idiosyncratic, or unconventional themes or styles.
Some analytically-minded computer science or engineering applicants discover they have a flair for metaphors or storytelling. My humanities and social science students occasionally attempt to write more rationally and logically. Since you’re not writing for a grade, you have the opportunity to at least try something different or outside of your comfort zone.
A writing style that works for one student or an example essay blog post may not fit your temperament, but you can only develop your “writer’s voice” by trying something new. It's no big deal if you try something that doesn't work. The worst-case scenario is that you write something that doesn’t make it into the final submission. Try not to get overly attached to first drafts, but as you work through rewriting and editing, you should also avoid throwing out complete essays.
At some point, you need to settle on both what you’re writing about and how you write it.
6. Choose a Common App Main Essay topic that would benefit from storytelling and might require more space to develop than a shorter supplement
Earlier, I recommended that you pre-draft a handful of themes, experiences, or commitments and then figure out where to place them. Since supplements almost always require a “stick to the facts” approach, you can choose the theme for your Common App essay that would benefit from a deeper dive story or set of stories that develop how you’ve pursued your interests.
Some Common App essays develop a single theme or activity with varied examples or angles to their commitment. Others might create a “hybrid” approach that connects two or three seemingly unrelated themes. For example, one of my former clients wrote two separate shorter essay first drafts about Math Competitions and his hobby for cardistry, which are elaborate and artistic shuffling techniques. We pieced the two themes together in clever ways by connecting them with a discussion around probability, geometry, and permutations.
7. Never write “lingering introductions” or “let me sum up everything I’ve just told you” conclusions
It’s essential to avoid “let me sum up everything I’ve just told you” conclusions or “here is everything I’m going to tell you” introductions.
Most applicants start their Main Essay or supplements with some sort of overview about the importance of service or friendship rather than talking about specific volunteering experiences or a memory with their best friend. Always begin with a moment of action that helps establish the setting of your experience and that provides an action sequence. That requires establishing who, what, when, and where.
For example, an applicant writing about robotics could share the context and setting in their opening sentence. Their first sentence could read, “The buzzer rang in the final round of the FRC robotics state championship my junior year in San Antonio.”
The second sentence can establish an action sequence and address “how” within the context of the experience. “I hurried to our driver, Aditi, while our teammates strategized how to score more points with our alliance in the end-game period.”
Providing a clear setting and action sequence signals to your reviewer what to expect, in this case an essay about robotics. Since admissions reviewers read 20 to 30 applications a day, you don’t want to risk losing them with an ambiguous introduction.
What makes sense in your head might not to an anonymous admissions reviewer who doesn’t have access to your memories.
You must write clearly about what’s going on. Try not to be too clever or try-hard. Introductions also provide an opportunity to introduce a rhetorical device like a simile, metaphor, or symbol.
Introductions don’t require you to start from the beginning chronologically. Often, I find a compelling anecdote in the middle of a student’s first draft, and we move it up to begin the Main Essay with it. Then, after establishing the setting and sharing an anecdote with an action sequence, we use the second paragraph to provide the background or more distant experiences that detail why they’ve pursued their activity in question.
In the case of robotics, a second paragraph could begin, “My seventh-grade technology elective introduced me to robotics when my classmates and me programmed LEGOs Mindstorms.”
Another technique that my clients sometimes use is to encourage them to write whatever comes to mind without trying to force an introduction. Then, I read their first draft, find their single best sentence, and start the essay there. Leading with your best sentence is like a baseball team placing their highest batting average at the top of the lineup. You have one chance to make a fleeting first impression on your reviewers. Don’t drop the ball.
Finally, conclusions are the least important part of any college essay.
It’s okay and almost always preferable for essays to end. Parents in particular love to insert “let me sum up what I’ve told you” conclusions into their child’s essay. Please resist this temptation. Consider how often you read a news article or blog to the end – it’s almost never. Every sentence must provide either new information or tie together a rhetorical device featured in the introduction.
8. Don’t move too fast
Consider the following sentences: ‘While I was volunteering at the animal shelter, I also completed a summer leadership program and earned an A in AP macroeconomics over the summer. I earned a captain position on my soccer team and led us to a UIL regional qualification.’
In this example, the writer underdevelops a few experiences that require additional elaboration. Each experience, like the animal shelter, leadership program, summer school, and soccer captain, provides an opportunity to supply additional context. They moved on to completely unrelated experiences that lacked substance, creating a vague and impersonal submission. College essays are an opportunity to articulate how and why you pursue your commitments and interests rather than a record of what you have done. Slow down and develop a few examples more fully rather than hurrying through many of them.
9. Illustrate and don’t tell – share concrete examples and avoid vagueness
College essays must make every sentence count.
The three most important and overlapping college essay rules of thumb are to illustrate your experiences, avoid vagueness, and write economically.
Conventional writing advice counsels to “show, don’t tell.” I prefer the term “illustrate” because it encourages you to supply details and establish the setting by answering who, what, when, where, why, and how in your introduction and throughout your essays. Illustrating an anecdote helps contextualize how and why the applicant pursues their activities, which complements the resume—illustrating particular examples remedies vagueness.
Illustrate, don’t tell requires supplying anecdotes that provide a visual in your reader’s mind. Illustrations require a significant allocation of words while sharing concrete examples and identifying specifics, which applies to almost any sentence in any essay.
As an editor advising students, I constantly ask myself, “Are there any additional details the writer can supply?”
Most of the suggestions I offer on first or second drafts boil down to “Tell me more,” “Be more specific,” or “Can you provide an example that develops your point?” Clarifying dozens of minor abstractions accumulates into a thoughtful, personal, and unique essay.
There are always opportunities to provide specifics at a sentence or phrase level. You can convert an impersonal sentence like “I look forward to my grandma’s holiday cooking” to “my grandma’s spicy pork tamales smothered in red habanero salsa vanishes every Christmas.”
Consider providing their name or pseudonym whenever you mention a friend, student, or teacher. Rather than speaking generally, by writing, “I would hustle every soccer match sophomore year,” provide a specific match where you hustled the most, like for example, “During our homecoming game sophomore year against our rival Memorial, I defended their Division 1 recruit senior, Michelle. She pushed me harder than any opposing striker since.”
A similar piece of advice is to…
10. Always illustrate food and culture
I’m a big fan of food and culture essays because they provide ample opportunities to describe feelings, sensations, tastes, smells, relationships, influences, and memorable experiences. Family holidays and traditions allow opportunities to build a setting and invite rhetorical devices like symbols and metaphors. Sufficiently developing an anecdote about your grandma’s favorite Thanksgiving dishes can help generalize about connections to your family or its traditions.
Almost every other Common App Main Essay theme can rely on some degree of telling or “sticking to the facts,” but telling without showing and illustrating your food preferences and cultural connections always makes for a mediocre essay. Food and culture essays are deeply personal and specific to the applicant, sidestepping concerns about being generic. More so than any other theme, I encourage students to dig deep into their memories to detail their food and cultural experiences.
Writing about food also provides strong visuals to your reader. It’s easy for them to relate to and imagine sharing the experience. Triggering hunger in your reader is a subtle way for your essay to stand out. Descriptive adjectives include savory, mouthwatering, delectable, fragrant, zesty, succulent, and aromatic. Many precise cooking verbs include sizzle, simmer, steam, whip, marinate, garnish, infuse, caramelize, braise, and poach. Food also provides a perfect vehicle to build an essay around work experience, a cultural extracurricular, or adapting to different environments.
Essays based on culture and religion provide opportunities to illustrate themes from holidays, services, or talents like Indian Classical Dance or Brazilian capoeira. I also expand the definition of food and culture to include reading, music, and, sometimes, television. These themes require you to illustrate specific influences, favorite authors, memorable episodes, or how your literary or cultural interests influence you.
11. Minimize lessons learned
Your essays should almost always favor illustrating specific examples over abstract or generalized “lessons learned.” Sufficiently developed examples will imply resiliency, perseverance, internal motivation, or whichever personality traits. Asserting lessons learned without supporting them with anecdotes or specific experiences produces impersonal, vague, and non-specific essays.
Sometimes, students outline their essays around themes like patience, the value of family, and self-discipline. They provide a paragraph that occasionally illustrates their point but usually drifts into generalization. It’s almost always better to write essays that develop specific experiences and memories and worry about any themes or personality traits later rather than picking a virtue and trying to build an essay around an abstract value.
Funny enough, when you try to construct college essays on ChatGPT, it always inserts unhelpful, abstract “lessons learned” content, presumably because it trained its data on many mediocre college essay examples. You should also avoid writing a “here are the lessons this experience taught me” sort of conclusion. Since almost every applicant writes these conclusions, one easy way to stand out is not to do the same.
12. Clarify generalizations and humanize “other’s centered” content
A typical error in service and volunteering essays is that the applicant writes about helping or saving others, who are usually less fortunate, without adequately humanizing those they are serving. Applicants often generalize about ‘the other side of town’ or an unnamed ‘Third World country.’ The charity recipient usually functions as an object in the story rather than an active participant.
Incorporating the plural we and our rather than the singular ‘I’ or ‘my’ helps produce a more collaborative tone. Providing biographical details about, for example, a student you tutor named Eric, whose favorite team is the Lakers and struggles with adding polynomials, humanizes him rather than serving as a generic placeholder to discuss a service experience.
Similarly, I often receive first drafts incorporating sentiments like: ‘As my work began, I hoped to make their day. Little did I know that THEY would make MY day.’
Avoid this cliché because it often objectifies service recipients by attempting to overemphasize how the volunteers learned more than the students they tutored. While these sentiments about learning from others are preferable to passive volunteer recipients, they almost always lack nuance and specificity. When students write first drafts about how their young learners made their day, I encourage them to share specific examples that illustrate that assertion.
There is no such thing as cliched topics, only cliched implementation, which brings me to my next point to…
13. Avoid hyperbole and cliché
Overreliance on hyperbole became a peculiar issue in 2023. A few clients reported consuming TikTok influencers and other admissions social media, recommending applicants to “really play up their experiences” and “add in flairs for dramatic.”
Almost every client in that cycle attempted to incorporate hyperbole and melodrama or made mountains of molehills. I don’t recall pervasive instances of hyperbole in previous cycles. They frequently asked me how they could make their essays “more emotional and passionate?”
A transfer client even shared how their former college counselor told them to make their essays more emotional without providing concrete feedback about incorporating this suggestion.
My answer is you don’t, ever.
The upside is that if many college applicants consume the same material, the typical college essay submission will be of even lower quality than usual. You must illustrate concrete experiences that support your assertions. College essays are not a fiery speech you give to support your National Honor Society President candidacy or as a politician pounding on the podium.
Hyperboles are exaggerated statements not meant literally. Synonyms include embellishment, aggrandizement, and grandiosity.
Since I serve many families in Texas, the most common clichés I encounter involve the Texas summer heat. ‘I felt like an egg boiling during August marching band practice,’ or ‘The relentless heat in Texas was like walking through an inferno, with every step feeling like a journey across hot coals.’
When setting a scene during a Texas summer, don’t try to describe it. Texas summers are hot, like water is wet.
The most common UT Austin applicant cliché mentions ‘by bleeding orange as a Longhorn’ or ‘I will die before I earn my degree from anywhere but UT.’ I remove every instance of trying too hard to articulate your desire to enroll at UT.
Trying too hard or attempting to be “more emotional and passionate” will not impress your reviewers. Instead, you should rely on sufficiently illustrated memories and experiences that speak for themselves.
14. If you incorporate a rhetorical device, go all the way
Commonly used rhetorical devices include analogies, similes, metaphors, symbols, repetition, or descriptive language that help illustrate your experiences and interests.
Rhetorical devices should always clarify your message to your reader rather than using complex or abstract language for its own sake.
Practical usage of rhetorical devices may emphasize particular ideas that help persuade your reviewer that you’re a competent leader, programmer, club officer, and so on. Compelling college essays do not require rhetorical devices, but almost all of the best submissions incorporate them.
One role rhetorical devices play is helping tie the concluding thoughts with the opening sentences. Students' most common error is half-baking a metaphor, usually in the introduction, that doesn’t reappear in the body paragraphs.
Forcing a rhetorical device when an essay doesn’t require it or using visual language unrelated to or contradictory to the content will detract from submission quality. Consider this ChatGPT-generated example you should avoid:
‘My role as a volunteer coordinator was a lighthouse of guidance in the vast sea of service, yet the storms of unpredictability threatened to erode the foundation of our collective efforts.’
Students rarely deliberately incorporate a rhetorical device into their essays, or when they try, they improperly implement it. Usually, my clients and I stumble upon metaphors or symbols by accident. Then, after identifying a potential image, I encourage students to expand upon and fully develop the potential rhetorical device that they weave as a thread throughout the essay. I almost always need to assist applicants with incorporating rhetorical devices that enhance clarity while abiding by word economy techniques, so my clients and I build and incorporate metaphors on a case-by-case basis.
15. College essay tone straddles formal and informal
College essays don’t fit neatly on the formal-informal spectrum. Cover letters, dissertations, newspaper articles, grant proposals, technical manuals, policy reports, graduate school statements of purpose, and academic journals require a formal tone with varying standards and rules.
Style guides like the Modern Language Handbook (MLA), the Chicago Manual of Style, and the Oxford Style Manual outline strict recommendations for formatting, grammar, and style minutiae for publications. However, college essays don’t need to adhere to a particular style guide like MLA or AP, partly because college applicants don’t cite sources. Many parents derail their child’s college essays by trying to force standards from their professional lives or some other style guide.
College essays only require consistency, so if you use contractions in one instance—and contractions are acceptable—deploy them throughout. Don’t use “do not” in some instances and don’t in others. College essays are more formal than blog posts or diary entries, but are not as formal as science reports or Wikipedia articles. Nevertheless, a college application might incorporate stylistic elements of each. Overly formal essays feel awkward and should primarily reflect the tone of an adolescent emerging into adulthood who is prepared to move away from home. There is no universal college essay style guide.
Here are a few stylistic considerations to help make your essay more word economical and information dense.
16. Rarely begin sentences with dependent clauses, dangling modifiers, adverbial clauses, or infinitive phrases
Consider the following sentence that begins with a dependent clause: ‘Curious to see what else I could create, I bulldozed the skyscraper and developed a picturesque beach scene with a boat and water slide.’
There’s nothing grammatically wrong with beginning sentences with dependent clauses. However, they’re often unnecessary and invite run-on sentences. Dependent clauses tend to diminish rather than improve clarity. In the previous sentence example, we could remove ‘curious to see what I could create’ entirely, and the sentence would communicate the same concept about designing a beach scene.
Writers often lean on dependent clauses, dangling modifiers, adverbial clauses, and infinitive phrases as rhetorical crutches. I receive many first drafts that begin almost every sentence with a phrase followed by a comma, whether optimal or not. Deploy dependent clauses sparingly and intentionally to save on words.
I asked ChatGPT if writers should generally avoid dangling modifiers. It answered, “Yes, writers should generally avoid dangling modifiers. A dangling modifier is a word or phrase intended to modify a noun but placed in a position where it doesn't clearly or logically modify the intended word. This can lead to confusion or awkwardness in the sentence.”
A similar rule of thumb is to almost never start sentences with “whether, although, from, or while.” Beginning sentences with these conjunctions and prepositions invites run-on sentences and underdevelops your experiences. Some writers use these as rhetorical crutches, where almost every sentence in their first draft looks similar. It invites moving too fast between content. Overly cumbersome styles and wordy syntax that doesn’t help you write economically.
17. Split run-on sentences into two or three; simple sentences are your friend
Sentences should rarely exceed 30 or 40 words unless there are explicit rhetorical or information packaging reasons for doing so. If you need more than one breath to read a sentence aloud, chances are it’s a run-on. Starting sentences with the dependent clauses and phrases mentioned in the previous tip also invites run-on sentences. They also tend toward moving too fast, which I discussed earlier. Avoid using complicated syntax for its own sake because you don’t want to risk losing your tired, underpaid, and overworked admissions reader.
Note that only one sentence in this post exceeds 30 words (a 31-word sentence in the introduction).
18. Almost always convert from passive to active voice
Passive voice occurs when the subject of a sentence receives the action of the verb rather than committing the action, usually accompanied by the verb to be. Your essays should minimize passive voice.
ChatGPT and I agree. It says, “Although the passive voice has its uses, it's important to use it judiciously and consider the context and purpose of your writing. Overusing the passive voice can make writing sound indirect or unclear.”
Passive voice also produces impersonal essays that drift toward abstraction.
Your college essays are about you, your actions, and your experiences. Consider the following passive voice sentences and their active, word-economical alternatives.
The Passive voice: James was tossed the ball by Patrick. (seven words)
The Active voice: Patrick tossed James the ball. (five words)
Passive voice: I was surprised by the sudden departure of my math teacher. (eleven words)
The Active voice: My math teacher’s sudden departure surprised me. (seven words)
19. Minimize and substitute be-verbs
Overreliance on the be-verbs am, is, are, was, were, being, and been diminishes your essay’s facility with language and produces imprecise action sequences. Substitute flat be-verbs with active, more descriptive verbs and phrases. Consider the following examples:
Original: The coffee on the table is hot.
Substituted: The coffee steams on the table.
Original: The garden is beautiful.
Substituted: The garden blooms.
Original: The city is busy.
Substituted: The city bustles.
Original: The child is being disobedient.
Substituted: The child defies authority and rules.
Original: The book was interesting.
Substituted: The book’s intriguing storyline reminded me of my childhood.
20. Remove empty or superfluous modifiers
My two favorite books about the craft of writing are Strunk and White’s Elements of Style and Stephen King’s On Writing. They advise against superfluous modifiers. A project is either finished or not—it cannot be completely finished. The adverb completely is redundant, but almost finished could be more appropriate if the writer provides more context because it’s an intermediate state between finished and not.
A phrase like “especially intrigued” detracts from clarity and drifts toward hyperbole. Avoid redundant modifiers like absolutely certain or really excited.
For an “incredibly amazing experience,” amazing implies it’s also incredible. An amazing experience can stand alone. Their usage might work in the spoken word for emphasis or during a political or corporate rally, but we should almost always eliminate them in the written word.
21. Substitute passive verbs for active alternatives
Almost every inexperienced writer relies on a small set of the most frequently used verbs and adjectives. Or they provide obscure words wantonly without considering whether they should write a more common alternative.
Consider alternatives if your passage contains multiple instances of the same verb, like build or cook. The idea isn’t to utilize fancy words for their own sake but to identify precise alternatives that often implicitly bundle verbs with adjectives or adverbs, i.e., walk quickly becomes rush or hurry. I cover collocation substitutions in the next chapter.
Accumulating precise adjectives and active verbs produces stronger visuals in your reader’s mind, increasing your facility with language while illustrating more using fewer words.
Say = Utter, Declare, Express, Announce, State, Vocalize, Articulate, Mention, Convey, Communicate, Voice, Pronounce, Enunciate, Assert, Exclaim, Verbalize, Whisper
Walk = Stroll, Hike, Saunter, Amble, Stride, Trek, Ramble, Roam, Wander, March, Promenade, Mosey, Tramp, Pace, Traipse, Meander, Parade, Patrol
Run = Sprint, Jog, Dash, Gallop, Trot, Bolt, Rush, Race, Hurdle, Hasten, Scamper, Charge, Hurry, Bound, Barrel, Dart, Speed, Zoom, Lope, Hustle, Tear
Do = Accomplish, Perform, Achieve, Complete, Conduct, Fulfill, Implement, Undertake, Act, Realize, Effect, Render, Dispatch
Use = Utilize, Employ, Apply, Operate, Manipulate, Harness, Exploit, Consume, Wield, Exert, Exercise, Improvise, Leverage, Mobilize, Activate, Adopt, Engage, Harness
Make or Build = Construct, Assemble, Fabricate, Craft, Manufacture, Forge, Create, Design, Fashion, Erect, Raise, Sculpt, Carve, Engineer, Frame, Tinker
Find = Discover, Uncover, Locate, Spot, Detect, Identify, Pinpoint, Encounter, Distinguish, Recognize, Ascertain
Set = Arrange, Establish, Place, Fix, Install, Position, Lay, Plant, Place, Deploy, Adjust, Dock, Insert, Fixate, Prepare, Organize, Configure, Situate, Stage, Cultivate
Have = Possess, Own, Hold, Acquire, Maintain, Keep, Retain, Control, Command, Secure, Obtain, Harbor, Host, Reserve, Hoard
Cook = Grill, Roast, Bake, Boil, Fry, Steam, Sauté, Simmer, Broil, Poach, Stir-fry, Barbecue, Smoke, Blanch, Pan-fry, Slow-cook, Blanch, Stew, Marinate
Look = Gaze, Stare, Glance, Peer, Scrutinize, Examine, Survey, Peek, Ogle, Scan, Watch, Study, Contemplate, Peep, Search, Investigate, Browse, Inspect, Eye
Give = Donate, Present, Offer, Provide, Grant, Extend, Contribute, Transfer, Pass, Entrust, Gift, Award, Yield, Deliver, Dispense, Imbue, Bequeath, Share
22. Don’t “decide to” do something, just do it
Writers over-rely on prefacing an action with decided to, as in, ‘I decided to go to school.’ Instead, consider the word economical alternative, “I went to school.” You either commit an action, or not, but in the written word, you cannot “decide to do” something. The act itself implies a made decision, especially if it occurred in the past tense. Any verb in a college essay could feature decided to.
One situation to use decided to if a situation or desire forces an alternative decision, as in, ‘I decided to study computer science but changed my mind before enrolling at my university and opted for informatics instead.’ Still, I enrolled in computer science before changing my major to informatics works sufficiently and word-economically well.
23. Avoid Overediting
Many of my clients and high-achieving people in general understandably tend to be perfectionists. They’re overly meticulous. Overediting tends to begin in the proofreading phase. However, symptoms sometimes appear early in the process when students fail to stay on task or excessively focus time and attention on one essay at the expense of others. Stress and expectations at home or school cause about a quarter of my clients to overedit, and I can never tell in advance who may succumb to its siren song.
Overediting is a common phenomenon that occurs when students have completed their final drafts and are ready to submit, yet they pause, second guess, and descend into analysis paralysis. Days and weeks pass.
It’s counterproductive because overediting delays the application submission, leads to more stress and anxiety, and isn’t a productive use of time. Symptoms include trying too hard to make a great essay better, yet doing the opposite. Subsequent overedited drafts are of lesser quality than previous ones. Continued edits result in less fluency and more clichés. Students substitute specific details with vague generalities to “add more emotion and passion.”
Behaviors include scrutinizing every minutia for issues that may or may not exist and staying up to the wee hours of the morning working on the essays. Over-involved parents dictate what they feel should be included, which may be contrary to the student’s wishes or my professional opinion of what works and what doesn’t. Even the most talented and high-achieving students often don’t know what content is or isn’t critical or effective. They remove and add content without much regard for quality or necessity. They’re like an inexperienced chess player who moves pieces willy-nilly during the middle game.
ChatGPT also can’t help weigh the relative merits of particular content or alternatives. At the end of the essay-building process, students accept suggestions on Grammarly without understanding the change or whether they should incorporate it. Much of my final proofread nowadays consists of reverting AI-inserted changes that might make sense individually but obscure clarity and mangle the student’s experiences when read as a whole.
One downside of “always try your best” is that it is hard to know when your essays are “good enough” and ready to submit. I help my clients assess when their essays are as good as they’re going to get and ready to submit.