Comedy and Admissions Essays

Every year, I watch brilliant students, the kind who can explain quantum entanglement or dissect Dostoevsky, panic about their college essays and decide, seemingly overnight, that they need to become comedians.

It never works.

Here's the uncomfortable truth: if you're not naturally funny, your admissions essay is not the place to start your comedy career.

Admissions officers read thousands of essays each cycle. They can spot forced humor from a mile away, and it's painful to read.

Think about it this way: you've spent your entire high school career building a profile as a serious researcher, a dedicated student, someone who spends Saturday nights debugging code or analyzing poetry. Your teachers describe you as "thoughtful," "analytical," and "intellectually curious." Your activities list shows math competitions, research internships, and academic clubs.

Then your essay opens with a zinger about how you "always knew you were destined for greatness when you won the kindergarten spelling bee."

The cognitive dissonance is jarring. Admissions officers aren't reading your application in isolation, they're synthesizing everything. When your essay voice doesn't match the rest of your application, it raises questions about authenticity.

That said, humor can be a powerful tool in college essays, for the right students.

If you're the person who:

• Makes your friends laugh regularly and naturally

• Has been described as "witty" or "funny" by teachers in recommendation letters

• Uses humor as a genuine form of self-expression

• Can land a joke in conversation without overthinking it

...then humor might be an authentic part of your voice. In that case, stripping it entirely from your essay would make you sound less like yourself, not more.

The key word here is authentic. Your essay should sound like you on your best day, thoughtful, articulate, compelling, but still recognizably you.

Here's what's usually happening when bookish students suddenly try to inject humor into their essays: they're terrified of being boring.

I get it. You've read the advice that says "show personality" and "stand out from the crowd." You worry that writing seriously about your genuine interests, research, literature, mathematics. will make you sound like every other applicant.

But here's the secret: depth is more interesting than jokes.

A deeply reflective essay about how you fell in love with computational biology while isolating DNA from strawberries, written with genuine passion and intellectual curiosity, will always beat a forced comedy routine about how "science is like cooking, but with more explosions!"

Admissions officers aren't looking for entertainers. They're looking for thinkers, creators, future scholars and innovators. Your ability to reflect meaningfully on your experiences, to show intellectual growth and curiosity, to demonstrate self-awareness, these qualities are infinitely more valuable than your ability to write a punchline.

If you're worried about sounding dull or one-dimensional, here are better strategies than forcing humor:

1. Use specific, vivid details. Instead of trying to be funny, try to be specific. Don't say "I love biology." Describe the exact moment you first looked at cells under a microscope and realized you were seeing something invisible to the naked eye. Details create engagement.

2. Show genuine enthusiasm. Passion is compelling. When you write authentically about something you care about, your voice naturally becomes more animated and interesting, no jokes required.

3. Embrace your intellectual identity. The "book worm who never told a joke" isn't a liability, it's potentially your greatest asset. Elite universities want serious intellectuals. Own it.

4. Find the narrative arc. Even serious topics can have compelling storytelling. Show how you've changed, what you've learned, where you're going. Story structure creates interest.

5. Use carefully chosen language. Precise, well-crafted sentences are beautiful. You can create rhythm, emphasis, and voice through word choice without relying on humor.

There's a difference between having a light touch and trying to be funny.

A brief, understated moment of self-awareness? Fine.
A gently ironic observation? Can work.
An entire essay structured around comedic timing? Risky unless you're genuinely skilled.

For example:

• Forced: "Little did I know that my obsession with prime numbers would lead me down a rabbit hole deeper than Alice's—minus the Cheshire Cat, but plus a lot of headaches!"

• Natural: "By junior year, I'd spent so many lunch periods working on number theory problems that my friends started leaving me worksheets instead of notes."

The second example shows personality through a specific, relatable detail. It might make someone smile, but it's not trying to be funny, it's just honest.

If your essay is thoughtful, serious, and intellectually focused, perfect. That's probably who you are, and that's exactly who elite universities want.

If that essay naturally includes some wit or humor because that's genuinely how you think and communicate, also perfect.

The worst thing you can do is try to be someone you're not because you think it's what admissions officers want to see.

Your job isn't to entertain. It's to give admissions officers insight into who you are, how you think, and what you'll contribute to their community. Sometimes that's funny. Often it's not. And that's completely fine.

If you are unsure how to incorporate your authentic voice into your essays in a way that distinguishes you from other students, schedule a free consultation with an admissions expert today.