<p>On college essays, is it ok to use abbreviations for well-known institutes, such as the NIH or the USAMRIID?</p>
<p>Better practice is to write it out for the first appearance in an essay. It’s fine to use the abbreviation after that.</p>
<p>yeah, write it out the first time you mention it, and right after it, put its abbreviation in parentheses. then you can refer to it by its abbreviation afterward.</p>
<p>e.g. I was really involved in the National Institute of Health (NIH)! blablabla. I really learned a lot from NIH.</p>
<p>horrible example, but you get my gist</p>