In my essay, I spent some time talking about Louise Gluck (poet and alumni) as well as name-dropping William Carlos Williams, Ginsberg, and O’Hara as “alumni” of the university.
Of course, I realized that only Ginsberg had anything to do the school. O’Hara graduated from Harvard, and WCW from Upenn. O’Hara and WCW both resided in New York, but that wasn’t my point in the essay.
Is there anything I should do? (The supplement has already been sent and received.) How big of an error is this, and how much will this hurt my chances? (I’m afraid the admissions guys will think I’m really lazy and didn’t do research on the school.)
I’m guessing this is an ED application? I would just keep my fingers crossed and hope they’re not as observant (though they are likely to check.) It’s best not to do very much as that would just draw more attention it. So i would just wait and if in any case you are granted a deferral, amend it for the next round. Good luck!
I would email them if it’s bothering you. For my applications to Barnard and Dartmouth (if I’m remembering correctly) I accidentally left the description of an activity on the common app half-completed, which was quite a silly error. Emailed them about the mistake and still got in.
However, if the mistake occupies more than one sentence–like about how great it is that these specific alumni influence the school’s culture or something–I would just cross my fingers and hope for the best. Not much you can do about that without rewriting the essay in your email.