How to Use ChatGPT to Brainstorm College Essay Ideas

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How should you actually use ChatGPT for your college essay? There’s a right way and a wrong way. Use it to generate options, not answers. Ask ChatGPT questions about your topic?

Use it to pressure test your thinking? That’s legit. The moment you paste from ChatGPT, you’ve lost the thing that makes your essay yours the way you think. ChatGPT will always hit the bullseye of the wrong target.

Short answer: Use it to generate options, not answers.

Longer answer: Ask ChatGPT questions about your topic. Let it suggest angles, structures, prompts. Use it to pressure-test your thinking. That’s legitimate.

What you can’t do is let it write the actual sentences. The moment you paste ChatGPT prose into your essay, you’ve lost the thing that makes your essay yours — the way you think.

Fun fact: ChatGPT knows the average of everyone. It does not know you.

Reference: the Common App essay prompts.

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