As a very ambitious and anxious senior, I am wrapping up my college applications for the early action deadline. Most colleges require or have optional essay questions that students have to answer. I have come across some pretty awful ones.

I think it is important to show the world my list of the top 10 worst questions from this year’s set of applications.

10: Describe your pets
This question could be very interesting and fun to answer. However, Illinois State University only gave applicants 10 characters to answer the question. That limit is not enough to list a couple of pets let alone describe them.

9: Describe why you want to go there in exactly 47 words
Schools asking “why us” is very common, but this limit on words is very peculiar. In my opinion, the word limit is making an already stupid question even worse. What do the colleges get out of these answers?

8: What’s your favorite word and why?
To be honest, this question could really be fun to answer, but I don’t understand the point of it. Right now my favorite word is “yas,” and that is not even a word. How am I supposed to explain that to college admissions directors?

7: What is the truest thing that you know?
Now, this just confuses me. I understand that this is supposed to be one of those questions that allow everyone to get personal, but this is a little too personal.

6: This I believe: (25 words or less)
I’m sorry, what? Where am I supposed to go with this when I am only given 25 words. This is just asking for generic responses.

5: You have a day to spend on the beach at the waterfront of St. Mary’s College. How would you spend it, with whom, and why?
This is a common question with a bunch of different iterations depending on the college and every single time I see it I think the same thing; what does this really show about me? It bugs me so much that people want to know who I want to spend time with. Fine, I admit it, I want to spend a day on the beach with Dove Cameron.

4: We’re in your hometown. Where should we eat and what should we order? (30 words)
Now, I like talking about food more than your average person but I really do not know how this is supposed to show who I am as a person or where I come from. But, if you were wondering, I would tell them to go to Portillo’s and order an Italian beef with an order of cheese fries.

3: If any of these three inanimate objects could talk, how would your room, computer or phone describe you?
This is just flat-out dumb. It is just another way of saying “how would your friends describe you?” I don’t know how these objects would describe me, probably a super tired person who likes her bed a little too much.

2: What’s so easy about pie?
How does someone even answer this? I am sick of schools asking me about food and it somehow means something to me. Pie isn’t even easy.

1: Why us?
If one of my schools had a required question, almost every time this was the question they asked. I am so sick of answering this.

Do they want to hear the brutal truth? Fine, this is what I would love to be able to say to these schools: “I am only applying here because I need safety schools and you are in an area that I could possibly see myself liking if I truly have no other option.” Are you happy now?

Some essay questions were super easy and actually enjoyable to answer. The best ones were the schools that didn’t have any at all. I just hope that one day schools will start to think critically and realize that these questions are not worth anyone’s time.