<p>I am planning to apply to the engineering department but honestly, I have no deep interest in a specific engineering field such as aerospace or civil or electric as of right now. I do love statistics though... so will it hurt me to write about statistics for my academic interests essay rather than one focused on a major engineering field like the ones I mentioned?</p>
<p>Thanks in advance for any replies.</p>
<p>That is problematic. If you apply to engineering you need to apply for a specific major. Your academic interest essay is supposed to help convince the engineering college that you have a real interest in engineering (even if you keep it general and don’t go into the specific major). Statistics is not engineering and basically what you would be doing is indicating that you have applied to engineering but really cannot say you are interested in it. Won’t necessarily keep you out but you should not assume it will help.</p>
<p>Another thought, do a little research on industrial engineering. As a high school senior, there are lots of things out there that you don’t know about yet. For example, you might like stats as applied by industrial engineers. </p>
<p>Keep your essay general enough to communicate that you like solving problems. Exploring the use of math and stats further in college will help you see how those can be used in lots of fields.</p>
<p>Drusba is a major expert on this board, and I don’t want to disagree, but I do think you can do a little research and craft a pretty good essay. Son was in same position as you last year and one part of his essay was about using stats to help solve problems at his high school. He applied to General Engineering and was accepted. Now that he is there, he has some different ideas, because he is getting exposed to LOTS more stuff now than high school classes were able to provide.</p>
<p>Also a plug for Actuarial Science - I did that for 25 years and had a pretty good time.</p>
<p>^Did not mean to imply it is impossible to talk about a subject that is not definitely engineering. If you can fold it into enginnering it can still be fine, e.g., express high interest in math, physics and statistics which fold into engineering while stating interest in engineering but not yet being quite sure which major. Also, the importance of the essay for engineering varies on stats. If you have high stats, the essay is not going to mean much unless you write a real bad one (like proving you cannot write in English). If you are borderline, it takes on real importance.</p>