We understand how stressful the college application process can be. And we hope the tips below are able to make your application process less stressful as we see brilliant students make the same easily avoidable mistakes every year, which we hope you are able to avoid.  

1. Should you submit your test scores if a school is test optional?

To give you clarity, when a university says they are test-optional, it doesn't mean they don't care about SAT/ACT scores anymore. It just means that you are welcome to submit your scores if you strongly believe they will strengthen your application. How to know what is a good test score for the school you are applying is by looking up that specific school's freshman class profile and find their 25th percentile mark. A quick Google search saying "University of Chicago 25th percentile SAT/ACT" should give you that range. If your score sits safely within or above their range, go ahead and submit it to give your application a boost. But if your score falls below that 25th percentile, you are better off not submitting it at all. However, you should understand that the rest of your application need to be well strengthened. 

2.  How important are letters of recommendation?

Extremely important. Remember that the common App/Scoir is mostly you talking about yourself, as it lets you self report. Letters of recommendation add an important outside perspective and is often used to differentiate applicants who would otherwise seem similar based on activities, SAT and GPA, but most students often leave it to chance. You have to remember that your teachers are incredibly busy and are likely writing letters for dozens of different applicants. They simply won’t remember every single amazing thing you've done, which is why you must give them a brag sheet. Hand them a quick document outlining exactly what matters to you and what you've achieved. When you sit down with them, gently ask them to focus less on your grades as those can be seen on your transcripts and more on who you actually are in the classroom. Are you naturally curious? Do you go above and beyond on assignments or do extra work for extra credit? What kind of team player are you during group projects? And if you took classes at a local community college, make sure your teacher knows how you used that advanced knowledge to enrich your daily high school class discussions. Giving them specific details helps them write a deeply personalized letter instead of a generic template. You can read more on letters of recommendation tips directly from MIT here. 

1. Personal Statements: Master the Three New Prompts and Align Your Choices. 

The most important thing is to ensure that you do not applying for a history course at one university, economics at another and data science at another. Remember that your personal statement go to all universities you apply to and it will be measured against the course you are applying to. 

You will have a total budget of 4,000 characters to split across three specific questions. Each individual answer must be at least 350 characters, but you can choose how much space to give each section.

• Prompt 1 (Why this course): Skip generic openings like "Ever since I was a child..." and dive straight into the specific theories, concepts, or academic discoveries that genuinely fascinate you.

• Prompt 2 (How your studies prepared you): Talk about the academic skills you already have. Whether it is the A-level courses you took, a Coursera/EdX or summer program/audited a college course and highlight specific modules, research projects, or analytical skills you’ve developed that directly relate to your university course. Less is more. It is much better you focus on a study/theory or two rather than name dropping and not deep diving on how your current studies have shaped you for the course you are applying for. 

• Prompt 3 (Preparation outside of education): This is where you mention relevant podcasts, volunteer, unpaid internship or other work experience. The secret here is the "why useful" part, reflect on what these experiences actually taught you about your subject.

2. Keep AI Completely Out of Your Answers

It is incredibly tempting to throw the three prompts into ChatGPT to let it spit out clean answers, but it will do more harm than good for your application. And frankly speaking, it is lazy to do so as US applications not only require a common app essay but also a lot of universities require their own specific essays. You have one personal statement to shine through so best to put a lot of effort, especially when applying to competitive universities. Admissions tutors read thousands of responses for the exact same course back-to-back. They know the standard, sterile, and completely hollow vocabulary that AI produces. When you let a chatbot write or "enhance" your text, it strips out the human character, your natural phrasing and your work lack soul, for a lack of a better word. So as cliche as it sounds, be yourself. 

3. Be Realistic: Look Up the Course Minimums.

The UK system is quite straightforward when it comes to entry requirements. Before you lock in your choices, you must visit the official university websites or use the UCAS Course Search tool to look up the absolute minimum grade entry requirements for a particular course. If you are not applying with IB/Cambridge then look up your country's entry requirement. If a competitive program requires a predicted or achieved grade profile of AAA, and you are sitting at A*BB and there is no ground to be considered for a contextual offer, applying there is an instant rejection and a waste of a slot. Be fiercely realistic with your profile evaluation so you can target schools where you are likely to get an offer.