Edited personal statement essays

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Look for examples of essays written by precocious admits to prestigious schools and compare.

https://uvamagazine.org/articles/class_of_2025_admission_essays

Dump the main points into a Chat GPT and see what it produces.

Read one of your kid's graded English assignments.

Triangulating across, do you hear your DC's voice?

Just read these essays. To me, they all sound THE SAME. Totally same style. Pretty boring.

These are presumably human student written, right? Here is one I coaxed out of ChatGPT with six sentences of prompts:

At six years old, I stood at the edge of a sandbox in suburban Ohio and forgot how to say “hello.”

In Ukraine, I had been the precocious child who read aloud to babusia before I could tie my shoes. I relished the rhythm of Ukrainian folk tales and corrected my parents’ grammar with theatrical confidence. But when we moved to the U.S., I began to watch my language—literally—slip from me. I learned quickly to blend in: a new alphabet, lunchbox English, phonics worksheets that taught me how to flatten the sounds in my name. At home, my mother still spoke to me in Ukrainian, but my responses grew halting, patched with English fillers. I still understood everything. I just didn’t know how to say it anymore.

That quiet erosion stayed with me. It wasn’t just the loss of a mother tongue—it felt like a loss of access to a version of myself. The girl who once asked her great-aunt to explain why words like “viter” (wind) were masculine and “vesna” (spring) were feminine became the girl who stayed silent during Ukrainian Skype calls with relatives.

But I never stopped chasing language. If anything, the disappearance of one made me more determined to explore others. When Latin was offered at my high school, I leapt. Here was a language no one spoke—but everyone used. I found it strangely comforting: etched into stone, fixed in endings, immune to forgetting. Parsing the first sentence of Caesar’s Gallic Wars was like watching a machine unspool its parts. I didn’t just want to understand the sentence—I wanted to understand the way Latin thought.

This curiosity turned obsessive. I memorized conjugation charts like other kids memorize song lyrics. I taught myself the Greek alphabet over spring break. I started writing down bits of dialogue from old Roman plays and translating them as puzzles on the bus ride to school. My Latin teacher, Mr. Templeton, eventually gave me a key to the supply cabinet so I could check out textbooks that hadn’t been touched since 1994.

Yet, learning Latin also made me think about the languages that aren’t preserved in textbooks. At night, I started recording my grandmother’s phone calls, trying to recover forgotten idioms. I’d cross-reference them with old Ukrainian grammar books I found online, piecing together a voice I thought I had lost. It was like being an archaeologist of my own childhood.

If Classics has taught me anything, it’s that language isn’t just a tool—it’s a memory. A monument. A map of how people once made sense of the world. Studying Latin hasn’t just made me a better linguist; it’s made me braver about reclaiming what I once let slip away.

At Harvard, I hope to study Classics with the same hunger I once brought to those lost Ukrainian lullabies. I want to ask hard questions—not just about syntax and scansion, but about identity, belonging, and what it means to carry more than one tongue.

And this time, I won’t forget how to say “hello.”

This wreaks of AI.
So many tell take signs. And a genericness.

Actually this passed the auto AI checks I tried. If readers flag this, they may have to flag many real students who read extensively and have precocious vocabulary. As for genericness, have you read many real college student essays? Even the ones complimented by AOs often reek (not wreak) of genericness.

The more a student subjectively presents their own experiences and reflects upon them, an essay should be less generic, but the problem may people be writing to assumptions of AO expectations instead.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Look for examples of essays written by precocious admits to prestigious schools and compare.

https://uvamagazine.org/articles/class_of_2025_admission_essays

Dump the main points into a Chat GPT and see what it produces.

Read one of your kid's graded English assignments.

Triangulating across, do you hear your DC's voice?

Just read these essays. To me, they all sound THE SAME. Totally same style. Pretty boring.

These are presumably human student written, right? Here is one I coaxed out of ChatGPT with six sentences of prompts:

At six years old, I stood at the edge of a sandbox in suburban Ohio and forgot how to say “hello.”

In Ukraine, I had been the precocious child who read aloud to babusia before I could tie my shoes. I relished the rhythm of Ukrainian folk tales and corrected my parents’ grammar with theatrical confidence. But when we moved to the U.S., I began to watch my language—literally—slip from me. I learned quickly to blend in: a new alphabet, lunchbox English, phonics worksheets that taught me how to flatten the sounds in my name. At home, my mother still spoke to me in Ukrainian, but my responses grew halting, patched with English fillers. I still understood everything. I just didn’t know how to say it anymore.

That quiet erosion stayed with me. It wasn’t just the loss of a mother tongue—it felt like a loss of access to a version of myself. The girl who once asked her great-aunt to explain why words like “viter” (wind) were masculine and “vesna” (spring) were feminine became the girl who stayed silent during Ukrainian Skype calls with relatives.

But I never stopped chasing language. If anything, the disappearance of one made me more determined to explore others. When Latin was offered at my high school, I leapt. Here was a language no one spoke—but everyone used. I found it strangely comforting: etched into stone, fixed in endings, immune to forgetting. Parsing the first sentence of Caesar’s Gallic Wars was like watching a machine unspool its parts. I didn’t just want to understand the sentence—I wanted to understand the way Latin thought.

This curiosity turned obsessive. I memorized conjugation charts like other kids memorize song lyrics. I taught myself the Greek alphabet over spring break. I started writing down bits of dialogue from old Roman plays and translating them as puzzles on the bus ride to school. My Latin teacher, Mr. Templeton, eventually gave me a key to the supply cabinet so I could check out textbooks that hadn’t been touched since 1994.

Yet, learning Latin also made me think about the languages that aren’t preserved in textbooks. At night, I started recording my grandmother’s phone calls, trying to recover forgotten idioms. I’d cross-reference them with old Ukrainian grammar books I found online, piecing together a voice I thought I had lost. It was like being an archaeologist of my own childhood.

If Classics has taught me anything, it’s that language isn’t just a tool—it’s a memory. A monument. A map of how people once made sense of the world. Studying Latin hasn’t just made me a better linguist; it’s made me braver about reclaiming what I once let slip away.

At Harvard, I hope to study Classics with the same hunger I once brought to those lost Ukrainian lullabies. I want to ask hard questions—not just about syntax and scansion, but about identity, belonging, and what it means to carry more than one tongue.

And this time, I won’t forget how to say “hello.”

This is really really bad. People, don't do this.

I've definitely read essays like this when I was an editor. You have to beat it out of kids brains to not sound like the online examples or YouTubers and actually write like they would tell their story. Many students need creative writing classes more than an actual consultant.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Look for examples of essays written by precocious admits to prestigious schools and compare.

https://uvamagazine.org/articles/class_of_2025_admission_essays

Dump the main points into a Chat GPT and see what it produces.

Read one of your kid's graded English assignments.

Triangulating across, do you hear your DC's voice?

Just read these essays. To me, they all sound THE SAME. Totally same style. Pretty boring.

These are presumably human student written, right? Here is one I coaxed out of ChatGPT with six sentences of prompts:

At six years old, I stood at the edge of a sandbox in suburban Ohio and forgot how to say “hello.”

In Ukraine, I had been the precocious child who read aloud to babusia before I could tie my shoes. I relished the rhythm of Ukrainian folk tales and corrected my parents’ grammar with theatrical confidence. But when we moved to the U.S., I began to watch my language—literally—slip from me. I learned quickly to blend in: a new alphabet, lunchbox English, phonics worksheets that taught me how to flatten the sounds in my name. At home, my mother still spoke to me in Ukrainian, but my responses grew halting, patched with English fillers. I still understood everything. I just didn’t know how to say it anymore.

That quiet erosion stayed with me. It wasn’t just the loss of a mother tongue—it felt like a loss of access to a version of myself. The girl who once asked her great-aunt to explain why words like “viter” (wind) were masculine and “vesna” (spring) were feminine became the girl who stayed silent during Ukrainian Skype calls with relatives.

But I never stopped chasing language. If anything, the disappearance of one made me more determined to explore others. When Latin was offered at my high school, I leapt. Here was a language no one spoke—but everyone used. I found it strangely comforting: etched into stone, fixed in endings, immune to forgetting. Parsing the first sentence of Caesar’s Gallic Wars was like watching a machine unspool its parts. I didn’t just want to understand the sentence—I wanted to understand the way Latin thought.

This curiosity turned obsessive. I memorized conjugation charts like other kids memorize song lyrics. I taught myself the Greek alphabet over spring break. I started writing down bits of dialogue from old Roman plays and translating them as puzzles on the bus ride to school. My Latin teacher, Mr. Templeton, eventually gave me a key to the supply cabinet so I could check out textbooks that hadn’t been touched since 1994.

Yet, learning Latin also made me think about the languages that aren’t preserved in textbooks. At night, I started recording my grandmother’s phone calls, trying to recover forgotten idioms. I’d cross-reference them with old Ukrainian grammar books I found online, piecing together a voice I thought I had lost. It was like being an archaeologist of my own childhood.

If Classics has taught me anything, it’s that language isn’t just a tool—it’s a memory. A monument. A map of how people once made sense of the world. Studying Latin hasn’t just made me a better linguist; it’s made me braver about reclaiming what I once let slip away.

At Harvard, I hope to study Classics with the same hunger I once brought to those lost Ukrainian lullabies. I want to ask hard questions—not just about syntax and scansion, but about identity, belonging, and what it means to carry more than one tongue.

And this time, I won’t forget how to say “hello.”

This is really really bad. People, don't do this.

I've definitely read essays like this when I was an editor. You have to beat it out of kids brains to not sound like the online examples or YouTubers and actually write like they would tell their story. Many students need creative writing classes more than an actual consultant.

Wow. It's so bad. There is a ton of opportunity there to customize.
I agree w/you, people need to learn how to write creatively to do this well.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Look for examples of essays written by precocious admits to prestigious schools and compare.

https://uvamagazine.org/articles/class_of_2025_admission_essays

Dump the main points into a Chat GPT and see what it produces.

Read one of your kid's graded English assignments.

Triangulating across, do you hear your DC's voice?

Just read these essays. To me, they all sound THE SAME. Totally same style. Pretty boring.

These are presumably human student written, right? Here is one I coaxed out of ChatGPT with six sentences of prompts:

At six years old, I stood at the edge of a sandbox in suburban Ohio and forgot how to say “hello.”

In Ukraine, I had been the precocious child who read aloud to babusia before I could tie my shoes. I relished the rhythm of Ukrainian folk tales and corrected my parents’ grammar with theatrical confidence. But when we moved to the U.S., I began to watch my language—literally—slip from me. I learned quickly to blend in: a new alphabet, lunchbox English, phonics worksheets that taught me how to flatten the sounds in my name. At home, my mother still spoke to me in Ukrainian, but my responses grew halting, patched with English fillers. I still understood everything. I just didn’t know how to say it anymore.

That quiet erosion stayed with me. It wasn’t just the loss of a mother tongue—it felt like a loss of access to a version of myself. The girl who once asked her great-aunt to explain why words like “viter” (wind) were masculine and “vesna” (spring) were feminine became the girl who stayed silent during Ukrainian Skype calls with relatives.

But I never stopped chasing language. If anything, the disappearance of one made me more determined to explore others. When Latin was offered at my high school, I leapt. Here was a language no one spoke—but everyone used. I found it strangely comforting: etched into stone, fixed in endings, immune to forgetting. Parsing the first sentence of Caesar’s Gallic Wars was like watching a machine unspool its parts. I didn’t just want to understand the sentence—I wanted to understand the way Latin thought.

This curiosity turned obsessive. I memorized conjugation charts like other kids memorize song lyrics. I taught myself the Greek alphabet over spring break. I started writing down bits of dialogue from old Roman plays and translating them as puzzles on the bus ride to school. My Latin teacher, Mr. Templeton, eventually gave me a key to the supply cabinet so I could check out textbooks that hadn’t been touched since 1994.

Yet, learning Latin also made me think about the languages that aren’t preserved in textbooks. At night, I started recording my grandmother’s phone calls, trying to recover forgotten idioms. I’d cross-reference them with old Ukrainian grammar books I found online, piecing together a voice I thought I had lost. It was like being an archaeologist of my own childhood.

If Classics has taught me anything, it’s that language isn’t just a tool—it’s a memory. A monument. A map of how people once made sense of the world. Studying Latin hasn’t just made me a better linguist; it’s made me braver about reclaiming what I once let slip away.

At Harvard, I hope to study Classics with the same hunger I once brought to those lost Ukrainian lullabies. I want to ask hard questions—not just about syntax and scansion, but about identity, belonging, and what it means to carry more than one tongue.

And this time, I won’t forget how to say “hello.”

This is really really bad. People, don't do this.

I've definitely read essays like this when I was an editor. You have to beat it out of kids brains to not sound like the online examples or YouTubers and actually write like they would tell their story. Many students need creative writing classes more than an actual consultant.

NP. This raises the question of whether college admissions should value creative writing at all.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Worried that my kids personal statement sounds a bit too polished.

Paid for a private essay coach and I can’t tell if this type of polish is normal? What’s the best way to check?

If too polished means their voice has been taken out, submit original, unedited essay.

+1

One family on another thread also dropped their consultant, worked with their kid themselves and got good results.

[Anonymous]

My "tell" is, "It wasn't just x, it was y."

There are four of them in that Ukrainian essay.

That said, it is well-written. The Romanian one has more specific details, so I don't think that one was as heavily AI-generated.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:My "tell" is, "It wasn't just x, it was y."

There are four of them in that Ukrainian essay.

That said, it is well-written. The Romanian one has more specific details, so I don't think that one was as heavily AI-generated.

Agree. Romanian was not AI, and typical of a well-edited professionally polished college essay.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Edited or re-written? Or just plain written by someone else? I know people who send their kid’s essays to a service and they basically re-write. It’s ridiculous.

But then the college application process is ridiculous and has spawned so many consultants, etc. Are any applications real anymore?

FYI.
The going rate in some private school circles for a polished, fully edited (ready-to-go) rewrite of your Common App draft (draft should be personalized with ample detail and no more than 500 words over the limit) is $1500.
And $1000-2000 for a full suite of supplemental essays (depending on # of essays) for a T30 school.
Add in the Activities and Additional info, plus help with a brag sheet for LOR, and it is $5000 for 1 school.
Would you pay that?
NYC though.

[Anonymous]

Interesting. If I had a list of the tells, I could just quickly get rid of those. As well as ask ChatGPT to include more details. The results I posted were based on a quick prompt I dashed off without many suggested fictional life details.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Edited or re-written? Or just plain written by someone else? I know people who send their kid’s essays to a service and they basically re-write. It’s ridiculous.

But then the college application process is ridiculous and has spawned so many consultants, etc. Are any applications real anymore?

FYI.
The going rate in some private school circles for a polished, fully edited (ready-to-go) rewrite of your Common App draft (draft should be personalized with ample detail and no more than 500 words over the limit) is $1500.
And $1000-2000 for a full suite of supplemental essays (depending on # of essays) for a T30 school.
Add in the Activities and Additional info, plus help with a brag sheet for LOR, and it is $5000 for 1 school.
Would you pay that?
NYC though.

I wouldn’t, but it’s also not for just one school. Everything but the supplemental is the same for every school. Even if you plan to include tweaks to tailor the common app material to each school, that’s something that could be done on your own quite easily. There’s no need for a full overhaul for each application.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Edited or re-written? Or just plain written by someone else? I know people who send their kid’s essays to a service and they basically re-write. It’s ridiculous.

But then the college application process is ridiculous and has spawned so many consultants, etc. Are any applications real anymore?

FYI.
The going rate in some private school circles for a polished, fully edited (ready-to-go) rewrite of your Common App draft (draft should be personalized with ample detail and no more than 500 words over the limit) is $1500.
And $1000-2000 for a full suite of supplemental essays (depending on # of essays) for a T30 school.
Add in the Activities and Additional info, plus help with a brag sheet for LOR, and it is $5000 for 1 school.
Would you pay that?
NYC though.

I wouldn’t, but it’s also not for just one school. Everything but the supplemental is the same for every school. Even if you plan to include tweaks to tailor the common app material to each school, that’s something that could be done on your own quite easily. There’s no need for a full overhaul for each application.

Perhaps for some kids. But many kids applying to a LOT of selective T25 schools have different major strategies, so there should be far more customization in the common app (different Why Major supp essays, different EC descriptions or ordering, diff "Future Plans") etc.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Edited or re-written? Or just plain written by someone else? I know people who send their kid’s essays to a service and they basically re-write. It’s ridiculous.

But then the college application process is ridiculous and has spawned so many consultants, etc. Are any applications real anymore?

FYI.
The going rate in some private school circles for a polished, fully edited (ready-to-go) rewrite of your Common App draft (draft should be personalized with ample detail and no more than 500 words over the limit) is $1500.
And $1000-2000 for a full suite of supplemental essays (depending on # of essays) for a T30 school.
Add in the Activities and Additional info, plus help with a brag sheet for LOR, and it is $5000 for 1 school.
Would you pay that?
NYC though.

TKG (Koppleman) is $10k/school. They pretty much do it all for you.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Using AI to generate an essay or using a coach to ghost an essay will disqualify the kid is detected. Abd you think with hundreds of kids using that coach over the years there isn't a signature?
Have the kid write their own essay and figure out how to cut length.

I think the person who suggested it suggested using the AI generated essay to compare to the kids essay to see if it seems AI-generated or not...not to use it.