what is mapping in essay writing

What Is Mapping Writing? Best 4 Techniques

Struggling to organize your ideas when you’re writing? Here, we’ll explore how to use the technique of mapping writing.

Whether you’re in the brainstorming portion of your prewriting or have a solid plot line and are ready to move forward, creating a mind map can be an intelligent way to get your thoughts in order before you begin creative or academic writing. Creating a map is a way to visually categorize your thoughts so that you can see your ideas on paper before you begin to develop your written work.

Story maps typically involve placing a central idea at the center of a paper, drawing a circle around it, then making several branches that connect to related ideas. From there, additional branches can allow you to add ideas to your initial concept further.

There’s no one way to story map. However, as you’ll see below, creating a concept map is just one way to develop your ideas. Freewriting, using mind mapping software, creating a flowchart, and using story mapping apps are all great ways to kickstart your writing process before you begin the first draft of your work.

Without further ado, let’s dig in and check out some ways to map your ideas before your writing begins.

How-To Try Story Mapping

1. freewriting, 2. mind mapping software, 3. flowchart, 1. take your time when learning how to map, 2. figure out what techniques work for you, 3. know when to map–and when to stop.

If you’re new to story mapping, fear not–it’s an easy and fast process, and you’ll be glad you tried it out.

To create your first story map:

Step 1: Get a blank sheet of paper.

Step 2: Set a timer for five minutes. Start the timer.

Step 3: Write the start of your story in the center of your paper, and put a circle around it. Make several “branches” (straight lines) stemming away from the center circle.

Step 4: Add ideas you’d like to include in your story or academic writing at the end of each new branch.

Step 5: If necessary, add additional branches to each new idea, creating new, smaller branches from each subtopic to add new support.

Step 6: Take a moment to step back and look at what you’ve created when your timer goes off. If you need more time, set your timer again.

Step 7: Creating a story map should give you a sense of whether your initial topic has enough meat to create the story or academic writing project you want. You may find that you need to spend time between mapping sessions to give your brain time to develop new ideas.

It’s wise to create your first story map a few weeks before your assignment is due to give your mind plenty of time to flesh out your ideas. Here is an excellent  example of a story map to give you an idea of how you can get started.

Best Mapping Writing Techniques

Now that you’ve got the basics of writing mapping down, it’s time to dig into different ways to organize your ideas as you start to think about how you’ll flesh out your writing. Here, we’ll look at four different options for organizing your thoughts before you begin to write, including freewriting, using mind mapping software, creating a flowchart, and writing an outline.

Freewriting is exactly what it sounds like–getting your ideas out of your head and onto your paper with no judgment or stopping to think. Like standard story mapping, it’s wise to set a timer before starting freewriting. You can also limit yourself to one page (or half a page). The key to freewriting: don’t stop writing until your time or length requirement is satisfied. Give yourself some grace when you’re freewriting. Not all ideas in your freewriting will be winners, and you must be able to get the good out with the bad. When you’re done freewriting, use a highlighter to indicate the ideas you’d like to keep and feel free to strike through the ideas you don’t care for.

If you’re not a fan of using paper and pencil to map out your stories, it can be wise to try out mind mapping software and apps to help you digitally get your thoughts together before you start writing. Popular options include Lucid Chart , Coggle , MindMeister , and Bubbl.us . As with any new software, getting used to a new program can take some time. So give each option a few tries before deciding whether it’s a good fit to support your writing process.

If you’re writing a narrative story, using a flowchart can help you move from one idea to another. A chronological story often necessitates a different type of structure from academic writing. Creating a flowchart can help you seamlessly move your story from one event to the next. A flowchart can give you a good representation of what parts of your story deserve more attention and which you can let go of with fewer details. When you create a flowchart to guide your writing, it’s key to remember that you don’t need to follow an exact format. Writing down different ideas and notes as you go is OK; developing a flowchart format that works well for you.

A standard outline can be a good fit if you’re not a fan of a standard story map’s visual and artistic aspects. People who prefer checking things off as they go may find that a standard outline is a solid fit. Cool bonus: it’s just as easy to create an outline on a computer as it is on a piece of paper.

Tips For Mapping in Writing

Whether you’re just getting started with essay writing or have been an author for years, it’s important to note that you never outgrow story mapping. No matter how solid an idea seems in your mind, writing it down (as well as your subtopics) can help you find holes in your plot or areas in which your academic writing could use a bit more support.

Don’t judge yourself when you’re starting with a story map (or ever–but that’s another topic for another day). Getting your ideas on paper for the first time means you’ll have some great and not-so-great ideas. That’s OK. Taking the time to put your thoughts in front of you can help you separate the good from the bad, one idea at a time.

Note whether you prefer story mapping and freewriting by hand or using a software program. Every writer is different, and you may find that one method is more effective for getting your ideas out than others. If you’re a pen-and-paper person, there’s no reason to force yourself to use a story mapping software program if it’s not a good fit.

Know when it’s time to stop mapping and start writing. When you feel anxious about an assignment or project, it can be easy to spend too much time in the prep phase instead of digging into the writing. Remember, you can always return to your map or revise your work if necessary, but the important thing is that you eventually get started once your ideas are organized and ready to go.

If you are interested in learning more, check out our essay writing tips !

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10 Concept Mapping

Creating a concept map is a way of organizing your brainstorming around key concepts.

This video from the University of Guelph offers a brief and helpful overview of concept mapping: [1]

Ready to get started with a concept map? This KPU learning aid can also help guide you through the process.

Let’s use our example where an instructor has given us the assignment: Write a 1,500 word persuasive essay that responds to the question: “Are transit services effective for Kwantlen University students?” Include your own perspective in your analysis and draw on two primary and two academic sources.

We’ll follow the seven steps of concept mapping outlined in the video above and I’ll include some examples.

• Identify the main topic
• Brainstorm everything you know about the topic
• Use relevant content from course, lectures, textbooks, and course material

Sticky notes can be a great way of jotting down ideas – you can move the notes around as you begin to identify similarities and differences. You can also ask questions and include reminders of work that that you need to do. See the example below of some sticky notes I might use to start my assignment:

I’ll add more sticky notes with key questions that relate back to the assignment – I’ll need to find primary and academic sources:

I can use these questions as I begin my research process and identify the primary and academic sources I need to support the argument that I will make.

To find out more about the research process, ask a librarian , or check out the KPU Library’s Research Help guide.

This video, included in KPU Library’s Research Help page, provides a good overview of working with an assignment to make sure that you develop a response that is specific and well-supported:

• Organize information into main points 

After noting down what I know about my topic and identifying key questions that I’ll need to research everything, I can focus on a few things that will be important to describe and analyze in my essay. I’ve made a list of some that I can use:

Based on what I’ve done so far, I’m setting up a descriptive comparison of transit options for KPU students, but will emphasize that current transit options are not effective. I want to look for further connections between ideas and see how I can shape my argument.

Step Three :

• Start creating map
• Begin with main points
• Branch out to supporting details

Give it a try! Based on your experience of public transit and the ideas that I’ve outlined so far, how might you start to create a concept map? You can use a piece of paper, or concept mapping software, to make note of ideas and start to connect them.

Step Four :

• Review map and look for more connections
• Use arrows, symbols, and colours, to show relationships between ideas

I start to build layers of connections and relationships in my map:

Step Five :

• Include details

This is where I can provide more information about each point – below, I’ve taken one of the points and added to it:

• Analyze and improve map by asking questions
• How do ideas fit together?
• Have all necessary connections been made?

This is where I can step back and review my map and keep the purpose of my assignment in mind. This is also a good time to follow up on questions that I might have – I can talk through my ideas with a classmate or visit my instructor as I continue to develop and refine my ideas.

Step Seven :

• Update concept map as you learn more
• Ask key questions about connections between ideas

I’ll keep my map with me as I meet with my instructor to discuss my ideas and when I visit the library to locate any academic resources that I might need; this way, I can keep everything together.

• “ How to Create a Concept Map ” by University of Guelph Library CC BY-NC-SA 4.0 ↵

Academic Writing Basics Copyright © 2019 by Megan Robertson is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 4.0 International License , except where otherwise noted.

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Clustering/Mapping

Clustering or mapping can help you become aware of different ways to think about a subject. To do a cluster or “mind map,” write your general subject down in the middle of a piece of paper. Then, using the whole sheet of paper, rapidly jot down ideas related to that subject. If an idea spawns other ideas, link them together using lines and circles to form a cluster of ideas. The whole purpose here is to use lines and circles to show visually how your ideas relate to one another and to the main subject. Note that there are also many free mind mapping software sites.

A cluster or map combines the two stages of brainstorming (recording ideas and then grouping them) into one. It also allows you to see, at a glance, the aspects of the subject about which you have the most to say, so it can help you choose how to focus a broad subject for writing.

This video shows how to use mapping to develop a topic.

And this video explains how to use mapping to develop an essay once you have a topic.

(this page’s text © Empire State College)

• video Brainstorming Your Essay. Provided by : GoReadWriteNow. Located at : https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cNLN0Ws8pJs . License : Other . License Terms : YouTube video
• video Mapping Your Research Ideas. Provided by : UCLA Library. Located at : https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jj-F6YVtsxI&t=30s . License : Other . License Terms : YouTube video
• Clustering/Mapping. Authored by : Susan Oaks, Elaine Handley. Provided by : Empire State College. Located at : https://www.esc.edu/online-writing-center/resources/academic-writing/process/prewriting-developing-ideas/clustering/mapping/ . Project : Writing Resources. License : All Rights Reserved . License Terms : Copyright, Empire State College. Used with permission.

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Prewriting Strategies

Five useful strategies.

Pre-writing strategies use writing to generate and clarify ideas. While many writers have traditionally created outlines before beginning writing, there are several other effective prewriting activities. We often call these prewriting strategies “brainstorming techniques.” Five useful strategies are listing, clustering, freewriting, looping, and asking the six journalists' questions. These strategies help you with both your invention and organization of ideas, and they can aid you in developing topics for your writing.

Listing is a process of producing a lot of information within a short time by generating some broad ideas and then building on those associations for more detail with a bullet point list. Listing is particularly useful if your starting topic is very broad, and you need to narrow it down.

• Jot down all the possible terms that emerge from the general topic you are working on. This procedure works especially well if you work in a team. All team members can generate ideas, with one member acting as scribe. Do not worry about editing or throwing out what might not be a good idea. Simply write down as many possibilities as you can.
• Group the items that you have listed according to arrangements that make sense to you. Are things thematically related?
• Give each group a label. Now you have a narrower topic with possible points of development.
• Write a sentence about the label you have given the group of ideas. Now you have a topic sentence or possibly a  thesis statement .

Clustering, also called mind mapping or idea mapping, is a strategy that allows you to explore the relationships between ideas.

• Put the subject in the center of a page. Circle or underline it.
• As you think of other ideas, write them on the page surrounding the central idea. Link the new ideas to the central circle with lines.
• As you think of ideas that relate to the new ideas, add to those in the same way.

The result will look like a web on your page. Locate clusters of interest to you, and use the terms you attached to the key ideas as departure points for your paper.

Clustering is especially useful in determining the relationship between ideas. You will be able to distinguish how the ideas fit together, especially where there is an abundance of ideas. Clustering your ideas lets you see them visually in a different way, so that you can more readily understand possible directions your paper may take.

Freewriting

Freewriting is a process of generating a lot of information by writing non-stop in full sentences for a predetermined amount of time. It allows you to focus on a specific topic but forces you to write so quickly that you are unable to edit any of your ideas.

• Freewrite on the assignment or general topic for five to ten minutes non-stop. Force yourself to continue writing even if nothing specific comes to mind (so you could end up writing “I don’t know what to write about” over and over until an idea pops into your head. This is okay; the important thing is that you do not stop writing). This freewriting will include many ideas; at this point, generating ideas is what is important, not the grammar or the spelling.
• After you have finished freewriting, look back over what you have written and highlight the most prominent and interesting ideas; then you can begin all over again, with a tighter focus (see looping). You will narrow your topic and, in the process, you will generate several relevant points about the topic.

Looping is a freewriting technique that allows you to focus your ideas continually while trying to discover a writing topic. After you freewrite for the first time, identify a key thought or idea in your writing, and begin to freewrite again, with that idea as your starting point. You will loop one 5-10 minute freewriting after another, so you have a sequence of freewritings, each more specific than the last. The same rules that apply to freewriting apply to looping: write quickly, do not edit, and do not stop.

Loop your freewriting as many times as necessary, circling another interesting topic, idea, phrase, or sentence each time. When you have finished four or five rounds of looping, you will begin to have specific information that indicates what you are thinking about a particular topic. You may even have the basis for a tentative thesis or an improved idea for an approach to your assignment when you have finished.

The Journalists' Questions

Journalists traditionally ask six questions when they are writing assignments that are broken down into five W's and one H:  Who? ,  What? ,  Where? ,  When? ,  Why? , and  How?  You can use these questions to explore the topic you are writing about for an assignment. A key to using the journalists' questions is to make them flexible enough to account for the specific details of your topic. For instance, if your topic is the rise and fall of the Puget Sound tides and its effect on salmon spawning, you may have very little to say about  Who  if your focus does not account for human involvement. On the other hand, some topics may be heavy on the  Who , especially if human involvement is a crucial part of the topic.

The journalists' questions are a powerful way to develop a great deal of information about a topic very quickly. Learning to ask the appropriate questions about a topic takes practice, however. At times during writing an assignment, you may wish to go back and ask the journalists' questions again to clarify important points that may be getting lost in your planning and drafting.

Possible generic questions you can ask using the six journalists' questions follow:

• Who? Who are the participants? Who is affected? Who are the primary actors? Who are the secondary actors?
• What? What is the topic? What is the significance of the topic? What is the basic problem? What are the issues related to that problem?
• Where? Where does the activity take place? Where does the problem or issue have its source? At what place is the cause or effect of the problem most visible?
• When? When is the issue most apparent? (in the past? present? future?) When did the issue or problem develop? What historical forces helped shape the problem or issue and at what point in time will the problem or issue culminate in a crisis? When is action needed to address the issue or problem?
• Why? Why did the issue or problem arise? Why is it (your topic) an issue or problem at all? Why did the issue or problem develop in the way that it did?
• How? How is the issue or problem significant? How can it be addressed? How does it affect the participants? How can the issue or problem be resolved?

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How to Create a Mind Map for Essay Writing

Last Updated: December 1, 2023 Fact Checked

Generating Your Map

Organizing your map for writing, expert q&a.

This article was co-authored by Jake Adams . Jake Adams is an academic tutor and the owner of Simplifi EDU, a Santa Monica, California based online tutoring business offering learning resources and online tutors for academic subjects K-College, SAT & ACT prep, and college admissions applications. With over 14 years of professional tutoring experience, Jake is dedicated to providing his clients the very best online tutoring experience and access to a network of excellent undergraduate and graduate-level tutors from top colleges all over the nation. Jake holds a BS in International Business and Marketing from Pepperdine University. This article has been fact-checked, ensuring the accuracy of any cited facts and confirming the authority of its sources. This article has been viewed 287,761 times.

If you’re a visual learner or just looking to switch up how you outline your essays, mind maps can be a game-changer. They make coming up with ideas for your essay and organizing them super easy. If you’ve never used a mind map for essay writing before, don’t worry—we break down everything you need to know to get started in the steps below.

Things You Should Know

• Get out a piece of paper and write your topic in the center. This can be a single word or sentence.
• Then, write down any words and ideas that relate to your topic. Circle them and then draw lines or arrows to connect them to the topic.
• Label each bubble idea according to where it fits into your paper. This can be a specific paragraph or a general section, like the introduction.

• Lay out the colored markers or pencils to which you have assigned meaning.
• Orient your paper so that it is in landscape position.
• If you don't have colored pencils or markers, don't worry. You can still make a mind map with just a pen or pencil!

• Circle your topic.

• Each thing you write down may give you another association. Write that down as well. For instance, writing "Impairment vs. disability" might remind you of "wheelchair ramps."
• Try to cluster related thoughts together ("wheelchair ramps"—"access to public life"), but don't worry if it doesn't always happen—you can draw a line between things you wish to connect.
• Look for connections between your unrelated thoughts and jot them into the picture.

• You might also label them "supporting argument," "evidence," "counterargument" etc.

• Include doodles if they occur to you, but again, don't get caught up in making them perfect.
• Depending on your age and essay topic, you might want to focus more on drawing pictures than writing out words.

• While there are plenty of programs available for purpose, you can also use free online mapping tools like Bubble.us, Mind42, or Coggle.

• Add details as you go. For instance, you may write some of the sources you are planning to use to the sections of your essay to which they apply.

• If you do this, you can start by drawing bubbles for the sections and continue by filling in the thoughts and associations.
• You can also organize your revised mind map into bubble for topic sentences that branch into smaller bubbles for supporting arguments and evidence.
• Once you've done this, you practically have a rough draft of your paper.

• Start each paragraph with a sentence that introduces the ideas of that paragraph, and write until you have incorporated all the information for that section.
• If you end up adding things that weren't on your map, look at your map to check that they fit, and consider penciling them in. One of the virtues of the map is that it keeps you on topic.
• Make sure you're not cramming too many points from your mind map into a single paragraph.

You Might Also Like

• ↑ https://www.adelaide.edu.au/writingcentre/sites/default/files/docs/learningguide-mindmapping.pdf
• ↑ https://emedia.rmit.edu.au/learninglab/content/how-create-mind-map
• ↑ https://learningcenter.unc.edu/tips-and-tools/using-concept-maps/
• ↑ Jake Adams. Academic Tutor & Test Prep Specialist. Expert Interview. 20 May 2020.

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Mind Maps for Essay Writing (Guide + Examples)

In this article we’ll show you how to use mind maps for essay writing . Mind maps can not only make this often dreadful task a whole lot easier, but also save you a huge amount of time. If you want to learn how this simple yet effective technique works, just follow the steps as outlined below.

Looking for even more ways to use mind maps? Get inspired with these 13 mind map examples .

What Is a Mind Map?

A mind map is a diagram that displays information visually. You can create mind maps using pen and paper, or you can use an online mind mapping tool such as MindMeister . Whatever you use, the rules for creating a mind map are simple:

1) Write the subject in the center of your paper / canvas.

2) Draw branches that point away from the center. Each branch symbolizes one thought or idea related to the subject. Use meaningful keywords to write these ideas onto the branches.

3) From each branch more ideas can branch off . There is no limit to the number of hierarchical levels in a map.

4) Use colors, icons and images whenever possible. These function as mental triggers and can help spark new ideas in you, which is important during brainstorming sessions .

Now that you know how to create a basic mind map, let’s go over how you can use mind maps for essay writing.

Step 1: Using a Mind Map to Find a Good Topic for Your Essay

If you have the opportunity to choose the topic for your paper yourself, try to find one that’s been covered by other researchers before but still gives you a chance to come up with new findings and conclusions . If you choose a topic that has already been explored in depth by a gazillion other researchers, you might be hard-pressed to develop a unique perspective.

Ideally, the topic should be something you are also personally interested in, or at least something you can relate to in some way. This will make the whole task of writing your essay a little less dreadful. The best way to find such a topic is a  brainstorming session .

How to brainstorm topic ideas in a mind map

Create a new mind map and simply write “My Essay” or “My Paper” in the center of the map. Now, start adding ideas around the center. These can be things your professor suggested, related subjects you discussed in class, or anything else relevant to get you started.

Next, note down your own areas of interest and see where they intersect with the former. Once you have a few good ideas for the subject of your paper, you can start weighing them against each other, noting down pros and cons . Eliminate topics until you’re left with only one. This will be the topic of your paper.

In the example below, the only requirement that had been given was to write a paper about literature from the English Renaissance. You’ll see various famous writers of this time mentioned in the map, as well as various aspects of their work that could be examined in a paper, such as the symbolism, dramatic conflicts or themes.

Step 2: Start the Research Process

While working through both primary and secondary sources, it’s quite easy to get confused about the numerous arguments and counterarguments mentioned by the different authors. Many students get frustrated and waste time just trying to figure out how to make all the different pieces of information fit together into a coherent text.

What you need, therefore, is a system to collect and structure all this information  in one central place, so you can easily review the materials while you write.

How to collect research in a mind map

Create a new mind map for each source (book, article, essay) you read and take notes in this mind map while you work through the text . Alternatively, you can use  one single map where you list all your sources and create branches for every page/paragraph/quote you want to use in your paper.

In the map below, you’ll see that — based on our initial brainstorming session — we chose ‘Love in Romeo and Juliet’ as the topic of our paper. For our research map, we wrote this topic in the center and created individual branches for each secondary source we read.

Next to the book title, we noted down the topics covered in the source, its central question as well as important passages that we thought we might want to quote in our essay.

Here are some practical tips to set you up for success:

• Use colors , arrows and icons to indicate connections between the arguments and quotes.
• Be sure to add the page numbers of your secondary sources to the topics in the map so you can quickly go back to do some more fact checking if necessary. If you’re working with online sources, you can also attach their links directly to the topics in your map.
• As you go along, you can restructure the sources according to their common themes. This usually provides a better overview of the material you have available for each section of your paper.

Here’s another example of a research map. This is the map we used to take notes while reading Shakespeare’s Romeo and Juliet , the subject of our paper. As you can see, we created branches for each of the text passages we wanted to analyze in the essay.

Step 3: Outline Your Paper in a Mind Map

Before you start with the actual writing , it’s very important that you first  create an outline of your paper . This will help you create a coherent structure of your arguments, counterarguments, examples, quotes, and the sources you want to reference in each argument.

You can quickly review this outline whenever you get sidetracked in your writing process, or when you’re unsure about how to continue. A mind map is a great format for such an outline because it provides you with a visual overview of your thesis statement  and the entire text structure .

If you’re using mind mapping software such as MindMeister , you can also…

• Link the individual topics in your map with the respective research maps you’ve created.
• Add notes and deadlines to each step to make sure your writing stays on schedule.
• Export your finished outline as a Word document and use it as the basis for your paper.

Using mind maps to plan and outline your essay will not only make the writing process a lot easier. It will also enable you to work through sources more efficiently and help you find and review information more quickly . Of course, you can use mind mapping for all types of writing assignments — from essays to short stories and from book reports to blog posts . Try it out!

Plan and outline your essays

See also: The Student’s Guide to Mind Mapping

How to Explore Ideas Through Clustering

• An Introduction to Punctuation
• Ph.D., Rhetoric and English, University of Georgia
• M.A., Modern English and American Literature, University of Leicester
• B.A., English, State University of New York

In composition , a discovery strategy in which the writer groups ideas in a nonlinear fashion, using lines and circles to indicate relationships.

• " Clustering (sometimes also known as 'branching' or 'mapping') is a structured technique based on the same associative principles as brainstorming and listing . Clustering is distinct, however, because it involves a slightly more developed heuristic (Buzan & Buzan, 1993; Glenn et al., 2003; Sharples, 1999; Soven, 1999). Clustering procedures vary considerably, although the fundamental objective is to equip students with tools for arranging words, phrases, concepts, memories, and propositions triggered by a single stimulus (i.e., a piece of information, a topic, a provocative question, a metaphor , a visual image). As with other [invention] techniques..., clustering should first be modeled and practiced in class so students can eventually incorporate the tool into their own repertoire of invention and planning strategies." (Dana Ferris and John Hedgcock, Teaching ESL Composition: Purpose, Process, and Practice , 2nd ed. Lawrence Erlbaum, 2005)

Guidelines for Teaching the Clustering Process

• Tell students that they are going to use a tool that will enable them to write more easily and more powerfully, a tool similar to brainstorming.
• Encircle a word on the board--for example, energy --and ask students, "What do you think of when you see that word?" Encourage all responses. Cluster these responses, radiating outward. When they have finished giving their responses, say, "See how many ideas there are floating around in your heads?" Now, if you cluster all by yourself, you will have a set of connections as unique to your own mind as a thumbprint is to your thumb.
• Now ask students to cluster a second word for themselves. Before they begin, tell them that the clustering process should take no more than one or two minutes and that the paragraph they will write should take about eight minutes. Ask them to keep clustering until the "Aha!" shift, signaling that their mind is holding something they can shape into a whole. In writing, the only constraint is that they "come full circle": i.e., that they do not leave the writing unfinished. Some excellent words are afraid or try or help .
• After they finish writing, ask students to give a title to what they have written that is suggestive of the whole.

Mind-Mapping

• "Mind-mapping is a colorful and creative method of generating, organizing, and remembering ideas. To mind-map, write your topic in the center of a blank page within a visual representation of your topic, such as a giant musical note, a sailboat, or scuba gear. If no central image comes to mind, use a box, heart, circle, or other shape. Then use various colors of ink to color-code related ideas. From the central figure draw radiating lines like the rays of the sun or branches and roots of a tree. Then, as you think of parts of the subject you wish to discuss, jot down pictures, key words, or phrases on or near these lines. Also add examples and subparts using branching lines and more images and words. If you do not already have a central focus for your essay, watch for a key phrase or image as you complete your exploration." (Diana Hacker and Betty Renshaw, Writing With a Voice , 2nd ed. Scott, Foresman, 1989)

Also Known As: branching, mapping

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Whether you’re writing an essay, creating a presentation, or brainstorming strategies with your team, it’s a challenge to sort ideas effectively. There’s a simple solution to this, used by students and established writers alike: mind maps! A mind map helps you organize your ideas in a systematic manner and reveals clues for you to arrange your material better.

In this article, we’ll explore what mind mapping is and learn how to make a creative map for your ideas. We’ll also take a look at some mind map examples to show you unique and innovative ways to create a mind map. But before we begin, let’s establish a mind mapping definition.

What is a mind map?

A mind map is a visual tool used for brainstorming, problem-solving, and organizing ideas. It is a diagram that starts with a central idea and branches out to related subtopics and details.

As you lay out different topics and subtopics visually, you can clearly see the connections between them. In this way, mind mapping helps you see the relationships between different ideas and understand complex topics easily. It’s time to throw away those hefty notes and make note-taking a fun activity!

Let’s see how you can use a mind map in different ways.

Why use mind maps?

Is there any advantage to mind mapping beyond the obvious joy of drawing out your thought process? It’s all very well that you avoid working like a grumpy professor, but what beyond this? 

Here are some benefits of using a mind map:

• Learning becomes a stimulating process.
• Difficult topics can be simplified and easy to understand.
• You can visualize complex points to easily remember and recall dense pieces of information.
• The freedom to connect ideas without a specific order leads to creative and innovative solutions.
• You can come up with a hierarchy of points by easily differentiating between primary and secondary topics.
• The engaging act of making a mind map speeds up brainstorming and improves productivity.
• Easy collaboration allows an entire team or group to work together on a presentation or project.

Mind mapping allows you to see connections and relationships between different ideas. The process makes it easier to understand complex topics and make the right decisions. In this way, a mind map enhances your memory, comprehension, and productivity.

How to make a mind map

It’s quite easy to create a mind map. All you need is a pen and paper! If you prefer working on a laptop, there are several tools you can use, our mind map template being one of them. Scroll down and you’ll find our template.

Follow these steps to make a mind map:

1.  Start with a central idea

Write down the central idea or topic in the center of a blank page. This can be your essay title, an area of research, or a problem you need to solve. Make sure you leave enough space on all sides to create a spreading map.

We’ll add a step-by-step mind map example to help you understand the process. Let’s say you had to brainstorm an essay on types of democracy. Your first step will begin at the central point.

2. Add related ideas

Think of the most important subtopics or areas of interest and arrange them around the central idea. Connect these to the main topic with lines or arrows to indicate the relationship between the two.

So for an essay mind map, the first relevant bubble will be the essay introduction, which will further lead to your thesis statement . For now, we’ll show you the second stage of mind mapping in this example:

3. Create a hierarchy of ideas

Keep adding more layers until you get a spreading map that starts with your central idea and ends with specific facts, evidence, and examples. As you break down your information into smaller and smaller points, you’ll also need to denote the connections between them.

If any facts from separate subtopics are connected, draw a dotted line or arrow between them to indicate this. When you open your mind map later, all hierarchies and connections should be instantly clear to you. Come up with a system of arrows and lines to denote various types of connections between points and subpoints.

Our mind map example will outline this for you:

4. Review and refine the map

If you don’t have a rough essay outline in your mind, you can just focus on getting everything out on the page. After seeing the rough layout, you can decide on the final set of points and remove everything else.

So, the last step is to review your mind map and refine it until you are satisfied with the outcome. In this stage, you’ll add all the smallest details to your mind map and establish important connections through lines.

In a mind map for essay writing, the last few points will be the evidence you use to support your arguments. It’s a good idea to mark the page numbers or other citation indicators so you don’t have to go looking for them later.

Your mind map should look something like the example below:

5. Add symbols and images to help you remember

While making mind maps for writing essays, it’s essential to use any techniques that can help you remember information better. A great way to ensure this is to use symbols and images to signify specific things.

You could develop a system of meanings for different signs. A star can represent important data figures, while a vertical arrow can highlight ascending or descending order. While you can utilize mind mapping tools and software to achieve this, it helps to use symbols that are personal to you. This way, it’s much easier to memorize things!

Let’s add some symbols to our mind map example and breathe life into it.

If you’d like us to add more mind mapping examples, let us know in the comments below!

Note: Keep your mind maps clean! Add only the most central points in one or two words rather than writing entire phrases or sentences. Making a cluttered and chaotic mind map serves no purpose. Keep your focus on the bigger picture and what you want to achieve through the mind map.

If you’re using the mind map for essay writing, you should know how to transfer ideas and information from your map to your essay. Knowing how to write a MEAL paragraph can help! 

Done brainstorming and writing your essay? Let’s make it perfect Get started

Free mind map templates

If you need innovative mind map ideas and templates, we have no shortage of them! Mind mapping for writing differs from mind mapping for a presentation or brainstorming session. Accordingly, mind mapping methods also differ from one another.

So, we’ve created four blank mind map templates to help you find the format that works best for you. Based on your requirements, you can choose from the mind map templates available below. 

1. Basic map that radiates outward

2. template to brainstorm a topic, 3. mind map for writing an essay, 4. mind map that uses arrows for cause-and-effect.

If you’ve created a mind map for your assignment and need an editing and proofreading service , we’re here to help.

Keep reading with more resources from your loyal editors and proofreaders:

• Top 10 Essay Editing Services of 2023
• 5 Elements of a Short Story & 6 Stages of a Plot  
• An Exclusive List of Writing Contests in 2023  
• Research Paper Outline: Templates & Examples  
• Why is it Important to Cite Your Sources?  

Frequently Asked Questions

What is mind mapping software, what are the compulsory elements of a mind map, how do students create a mind map, what are some other names for a mind map, what is the best mind mapping method.

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Thought Mapping/Webbing

Prewriting is an important step in the writing process. Fully exploring your ideas and planning out how they will take shape in your paper will ensure you are able to achieve your purpose. Depending on your learning style, some prewriting strategies may work better for you than others.

One common prewriting method is  thought mapping/webbing , which can complement kinesthetic and visual learning styles.

How do you thought map/web?

To create a map or a web, you can start at the core topic and work your way out by adding branches. These branches could determine your subtopics (which could also produce more subtopic branches).

You could also begin with a narrower topic (branch) and connect it to a broader topic. When explored, these branches can lead to other sub points/topics that you may not have thought about before.

Keep in mind:

• Thought mapping/webbing often have to be done on paper since it’s time consuming to do them on the computer (but you can use the “Smart Art” tools in Word or use drawing apps with a stylus if you feel that works better for you than by hand).
• The ideas in a map or web can be transformed into or used as a visual form of  outlining .
• Thought mapping or webbing is almost always used when your topic is more general or broad or not constrained by time or space, and the ideas do not need to be written in a particular order.
• Mapping/webbing coaches the writer into thinking about how the first draft will be organized. It is not meant to help you determine organization quite yet but can help you develop ideas in context with one another to start to see the structure/organization you might use.

Why should you map/web?

• Thought mapping/webbing helps you to identify gaps in your knowledge to research later.
• Thought mapping/webbing has the most visual appeal of any of the prewriting strategies.
• With thought mapping/webbing, you are able to work on a blank open space canvas, and are not restricted to the lines on a piece of paper (you are also not limited to single sheet of paper, especially if you work on the computer).
• Thought mapping/webbing can help generate subtopics. It can also help you figure out if your topic is too narrow or too broad (can see broader topics, narrower topics, and associated topics). You can either step forward (if too broad) or step backward (if too narrow).
• Thought mapping/webbing can help to determine relationships between points or processes and to see the start to an order in their chaos of ideas.

Tip: Staying Organized

Color coding, using shapes, and manipulating the size of your various elements can keep you organized and your thought map/web from getting too confusing. Different points will relate to each other or need to show a hierarchal order, so these tools can come in handy.

Did you know?

While we have talked about thought mapping/webbing as part of the prewriting process, it can be used in other ways. These prewriting strategies build on one another and aren’t mutually exclusive – you can use one and then use another to further hone your ideas.

https://www.uis.edu/learning-hub/writing-resources/handouts/learning-hub/freewritingYou could start with something like  freewriting  or  listing , and then your second step is to take the information you gathered and then map it out – it might be a second step instead of the first step in your writing process. Experiment with them and see what works best for you and your learning style!

Thought Map Example One

This student was very visual with this thought map – they drew out elements of their topic to make it more interesting, recognizable, and inspiring.

This thought map is organized into groups – “important events,” “baseball teams,” “soccer clubs,” and “others” – to help the author begin to think about organization.

This student used two prewriting strategies to get started on their paper. You can see their freewrite below. From this, they were able to create the thought map above, which pushes them closer toward finding their organization for their paper, and details for their body paragraphs.

Thought Map Example Two

There’s an app for that!

This student used the website  bubbl.us  to create this thought map – it’s a neat software that allows you to organize your ideas in a variety of visual ways to create successful and effective thought maps. While the above example is extremely visual with drawings to keep the student interested in the task, not all thought maps need to be. So try out bubbl.us or draw out your own web just using text and a series of lines to sort out points and subpoints!

The app automatically color codes the various levels of your web, so use that to your advantage!

This student has organized their thoughts by looking at various themes of a movie, and which film elements they could discuss as evidence for their claims. They could easily turn this into an outline as a “step 2” of the prewriting process!

How to Use Concept Mapping for Writing

How to Do an In-Depth Analysis Essay

Concept mapping is a method of organizing thoughts in a manner which allows them to flow clearly and logically. Occasionally referred to as clusters or concept webs, concept maps include a central theme or topic and related branches showing how the ideas are connected. Writers often find concept mapping to be a powerful tool in generating and categorizing ideas in a logical, hierarchical fashion. Often the use of concept maps allows writers to work more quickly and efficiently.

Decide what general topic or title you will be writing about and print it in the center of a piece of paper. Draw a circle or square around it.

Consider ideas related to the general topic (a process called "brainstorming") and write them on a separate piece of paper. Do not worry about the order of the ideas; simply generate as many as you can.

Select the words and phrases that fit in best with the general topic and support the main ideas of your writing.

Write these words or phrases on your paper around the circle or square that contains your topic. Circle them or draw a square around them, and connect them to the main topic with a line.

Repeat the process of brainstorming and branching for each of the subtopics you have circled on your paper until you have enough ideas and information to write about.

Use the concept map to organize your writing. Ideas which are closely connected on your concept map should be closely connected in your writing as well.

Refer to your concept map often while writing, as it is a visual representation of the points you wish to make and how they are connected.

Words near the center of the concept map should represent more general information and ideas, while words toward the edge of the map should represent more specific information. There is no correct number of branches or ideas that must be included in a concept map; the goal is to generate and categorize ideas, not to adhere to a strict structure.

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• Words near the center of the concept map should represent more general information and ideas, while words toward the edge of the map should represent more specific information.
• There is no correct number of branches or ideas that must be included in a concept map; the goal is to generate and categorize ideas, not to adhere to a strict structure.

Essay Mapping Tool

Instructions.

Effective writing at university is a process:

Analyse the task → Gather content → Plan → Draft → Edit

This tool may help you to bridge from planning to drafting by helping you arrange your sentences in a logical order. It also provides tips for each component of an essay – the introduction, body, and conclusion. It can be used to improve your understanding of essay writing in general or as a planning tool for one of your university assignments.

Because this tool is for your personal use only, you may decide to write in bullet points, but we recommend full sentences. Once you have filled in each section, a complete essay overview will be generated which can be printed.

1. Introduction

Three paragraphs planning spaces have been provided for you. You can add or delete as necessary.

The purpose of the body is to logically develop the points made in your thesis and outline statements. There are no rules about the number of paragraphs required in assignment, but in general, you are advised to develop one idea per paragraph. This is done with a clear and coherent structure which introduces the topic in a topic sentence, defines or clarifies which aspect of the topic you are going to discuss, develops and supports your discussion and (optionally) concludes your discussion.

A topic sentence generally has two parts. You may refer to the overall essay topic and also introduce the specific aspect you plan to discuss in this paragraph. This is referred to as topic + controlling idea . You can also use a topic sentence to link to or contrast with the previous paragraph. This is an effective strategy to use with the second body paragraph onwards. You may choose to conclude the paragraph with a summary sentence; however, you are advised not to overuse this type of sentence as it may seem repetitious.

Cohesion and coherence refer to how effectively sentences are connected and how smoothly the writing flows. This is not simply achieved by following a logical paragraph structure, but also by using linking words (e.g. however/furthermore/consequently ) and referring words (e.g. this/that/these/those )

When you develop your argument, remember to use a range of support. You can use examples, logical reasoning, speculation, statistics and citations

Paragraph 1

Write the topic and controlling idea (one sentence).

Support your controlling idea using evidence, examples, elaboration or explanations. Do not go off topic. Do use in-text references.

Sum up the paragraph and link to your thesis OR link to the next paragraph (one sentence).

Paragraph 2

Paragraph 3, 3. conclusion.

The purpose of the conclusion is to summarize the key points you have discussed; however, it often contains a paraphrase of the thesis statement. This helps link the whole essay together. A conclusion may also contain a statement which links the essay to the broader topic or suggests a future action.

You can begin with the phrase ' In conclusion, ' but there are other phrases you could consider: In summary/This assignment has…/In this essay, I have… . Avoid Finally/Briefly/

Remember to reference any sources you have used. Refer to CDU Library for more information on referencing.

Introduction

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What is a map in writing?

A map in writing refers to the technique of visually organizing information or ideas. It helps in creating a visual representation of the relationships among different concepts or ideas. A map provides a clear and structured way to present information and helps in generating and organizing thoughts on a specific topic.

What is a concept map in writing?

A concept map in writing is a visual representation of information using charts, diagrams, or other graphical organizers. It can take the form of flowcharts, Venn diagrams, or timelines. Concept maps are especially useful for students who are visual learners, as they can effectively group and show the relationships among different ideas or concepts.

What is mapping in essay writing?

In essay writing, mapping refers to a set of techniques used to organize one’s thoughts and ideas before starting the actual writing process. It involves creating a visual representation of the main ideas, supporting details, and their relationships. Mapping can include strategies like mind mapping, listing, brainstorming, and other techniques to help structure the essay effectively.

How do you describe a map?

A map is a graphical representation or drawing that displays selected features or characteristics of a place. It visually presents information about the world in a simplified manner. Maps show the sizes and shapes of countries, the locations of various features, and the distances between places. They serve as tools to teach and understand geography by providing a visual representation of the Earth’s surface.

What is mapping in reading and writing?

Mapping in reading and writing refers to a set of techniques that help children organize their thoughts and ideas early in the writing process. It includes various strategies like mind mapping, listing, brainstorming, and others, which assist in structuring and developing ideas related to reading and writing tasks.

IELTS Writing Task 1 Map Vocabulary

There is no specific information available in the provided article.

How do you write a writing map?

To create a writing map, you can follow these steps:

• Step 1: Write out your scenes or key points.
• Step 2: Identify the main story threads and the related dramatic questions for each thread.
• Step 3: Organize the scenes according to their relevance to each plot thread.
• Step 4: Create a visual diagram or map representing the structure and flow of your writing.

What does map stand for in reading?

MAP stands for Measures of Academic Progress. MAP is a standardized assessment that measures a student’s knowledge and proficiency in reading, language usage, and mathematics. It provides valuable information about a student’s academic progress and helps educators tailor instruction to individual student needs.

How do you describe a map for kids?

For kids, a map can be described as a visual representation of a place or area. It uses symbols, colors, and labels to show features such as rivers, lakes, mountains, buildings, roads, and boundaries. Maps can also display information that cannot be seen, such as distances between places or different types of regions. They help children understand the layout and characteristics of a specific location or the world.

How do you describe a map in writing Task 1?

To describe a map in Writing Task 1, you can follow these steps:

• Master the basic vocabulary related to maps.
• Understand the objectives of the task and the information provided in the map.
• Provide a detailed description of the key elements on the map.
• Discuss any changes or patterns represented in the map.
• Combine all the information into a cohesive and well-structured essay.

What is a map scale in words?

A map scale is a representation of the relationship between distances on a map and the corresponding distances in the real world. It can be expressed in words, as a ratio, or as a fraction. For example, “one centimeter to one hundred meters” or 1:10,000 represents that one centimeter on the map is equivalent to one hundred meters in reality. The scale helps users understand the proportion and relative distances on the map.

Why is mapping important in writing?

Mapping is important in writing as it helps in organizing thoughts and ideas, and provides a visual representation of the structure and flow of the writing. It allows writers to see the relationships among different ideas and helps them determine the best way to present information in a logical and coherent manner. Mapping also aids in identifying gaps or areas that require further development and helps writers stay focused on the main topic or argument.

What is an academic map?

An academic map is a term-by-term sequence of courses that helps students plan their path to degree completion. It serves as a guide or default schedule, providing students with the critical courses they need to complete each semester to stay on track and ensure they are meeting the requirements for their chosen degree. Academic maps can be customized based on a student’s program or major.

What is a concept map in a simple sentence?

A concept map is a visual representation or diagram that shows key ideas related to a particular topic and illustrates how these ideas are interconnected. It helps in organizing and structuring knowledge by presenting information in a clear and organized manner.

How do you map a literature review?

There are two approaches to mapping a literature review:

• Mapping with key ideas or descriptors: This approach involves identifying keywords from research topics and using them to create a conceptual map of the literature.
• Author mapping or citation matching: This approach focuses on identifying key experts or authors in the field and mapping their relationships and contributions using citations or other sources.

How do you start an essay map?

To start an essay map, you can follow these steps:

• List the main ideas or key points about your topic that you plan to include in your essay.
• For each main idea, provide at least three supporting details or pieces of evidence.

How do you write a simple map?

To create a simple map, you can use the following steps:

• Choose a map template that suits your purpose.
• Label important locations or areas on the map using text or graphics such as symbols or icons.
• Add a compass to indicate directions.
• Include a legend to explain the meaning of different symbols or colors used on the map.

What is a map assignment?

A map assignment typically refers to an academic task or project that involves creating or working with maps. It can include activities such as data visualization, creating annotated maps, or analyzing and interpreting geographic information. Map assignments are often used in geography, social studies, or other related subjects to enhance students’ understanding of spatial relationships and geographical concepts.

What is a map example?

There are various types of maps that serve different purposes. Examples include:

• Physical maps that show physical features like mountains, rivers, and forests.
• Street maps that display street names and businesses or buildings in a specific area.
• Political maps that show boundaries between countries, states, or regions.
• Topographic maps that depict the elevation and contours of the land surface.

How do you make a map for kids?

To make a map for kids, you can follow these steps:

• Ask the child to draw the starting and ending points of the map (e.g., home and school).
• Together, fill in the landmarks or significant places along the route.
• Use colors and symbols to represent different features on the map, matching them as closely as possible to the real locations.

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Semantic Mapping: A Visual and Structured Pre-Writing Strategy in the Process of Essay Writing

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Knowledge at Wharton Podcast

What does your writing style say about you, july 23, 2024 • 15 min listen.

Wharton’s Jonah Berger explains how writing style can predict future success.

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Wharton marketing professor Jonah Berger discusses his published study, “ Topography of Thought ,” which was co-authored with Olivier Toubia , business professor at Columbia Business School. The paper examines how someone’s writing style can be indicative of their future success, and where generative AI might come into the picture.

Read an edited transcript below.

Studying How Successful People Think

Angie Basiouny: Give us an overview of this paper by way of explaining your title. What is topography of thought?

Jonah Berger: I don’t have to tell you that we all use language all the time. We write emails, make presentations, and submit job applications. We use language all the time. And language, in some sense, is a fingerprint. It reveals or reflects things about the people who produce it. You can predict how extraverted someone is, for example, based on the words they use.

But beyond the individual words people use, might the pattern of ideas they put out there, the way they organize their ideas, reveal something interesting about them and their likelihood of future success?”

I think it’s important to talk about what I mean about the pattern of ideas. When someone talks about something, they can cover a small amount of ground or a large amount of ground. If you ask someone about their work history, for example, they can talk about a variety of things they’ve done or a smaller set of things they’ve done. They can cover a lot of ground or a little bit of ground.

If you want to use an analogy here, you can almost think about going for a run. Someone can go for a run and go all the way around the city, or they can go for the same number of miles, but just go around the block a number of times. In both cases, they did the same distance, but they covered more ground in one than the other. So, one way we express ideas is the amount of ground we cover. We cover more ground with our ideas, or less. We can talk about more ideas, more topics, more themes, more things that are disparate from one another, or things that are related to one another.

But it’s not just that. It’s also the speed with which we move between adjoining ideas. Imagine a movie. It can cover more or less ground across the course of the movie, but it can also move faster or slower between ideas. If a movie has one scene, for example, that’s at the beginning of a wedding, if the next scene is the later part in a wedding, that’s related to the first part. Different things may happen, but it’s pretty closely related. But if you jump from a wedding to an action scene, that would be really different sorts of ideas. They’re not very related. They’re moving further across those two points.

We wondered if these two ideas, how much ground someone covers, and how quickly they move between ideas, might tell us something about their likelihood of future success.

Basiouny: You’re not talking about the length of the piece of writing. You’re not talking about whether it’s a 500-word essay or 1,000-word essay. It’s really about how they use that space to move through their ideas. Correct?

Berger: Yes, great point. It’s not about the length. It’s about the ground covered. Are they covering a lot of ground in their hundred or thousand words, whatever it is? Or are they covering less ground? Someone talking about their vacation could share 1,000 words, but they could use those words to talk just about the food they ate, or also to talk about the sights they saw and the places they visited.  The former would cover less ground while the latter would cover more.

Basiouny: How did you go about studying this?

Berger: The same ideas can be applied to any type of content, but here we looked at college applications. In other work we’ve looked at online reviews, and in related work we looked at books, movies, and TV shows.

We took 40,000 college application essays from a variety of folks who were applying to school, and we looked at what they wrote and the topography of thought of what they wrote — how much ground they covered in that essay. Again, similar length, but how much ground they covered, and how quickly they moved between ideas. And we looked at their future success. How well did they do in school? What was their GPA once they got there? We were interested in seeing whether, not just the individual words they use, but the way they express ideas might that reveal something or predict how likely they are to be successful in the future.

The Essay Writing Style That’s Linked to Greater Success

Basiouny: What did you find?

Berger: We found two very important things. First, covering more ground, that notion of covering a broad range of things in the same amount of length, was linked to greater success. But doing so while moving rather slowly, was also important.

Think about the numbers arrayed on a circular clock. You could cover a lot of ground by moving in a circle, (e.g., going from 12 to 1 to 2 to 3 to 4) or by traversing the same ground but going from like 12 to 6 to 1 to 7 to 3 to 11. You’ve covered the same amount of ground, but you’ve taken a much longer route between each individual point.

What we found is that folks who are successful in school are able to blend these two things that might seem mutually exclusive. It might seem like covering a lot of ground requires moving really quickly between points to get there. But folks that end up doing well in school figure out a way to cover that ground really efficiently. They’re able to do so by moving slowly between these points, and they don’t have to take a lot of big jumps along the way.

Basiouny: In this paper, you controlled for some socioeconomic factors. Can you talk about that a little bit?

Berger: Yes, so someone could wonder, “OK, so you’ve found that people did well in school, and you’re using writing as a way to indicate how they think. But does it indicate something else?” Maybe it’s just that people who do better on the SAT also have higher grades and also tend to write a certain way. Maybe it’s that people who have parents who are more educated tend to write a certain way and also do better in school. Or maybe people who have parents who are more educated can afford to pay for an essay consultant who helps them write a certain way and also helps them do better in school.

So, we controlled for a variety of different things. We controlled for what they wrote about. Maybe certain types of people tend to write about certain types of things, rather than other types of things. Maybe it’s not about how they write, it’s about what they wrote about — the topics or themes they discussed. No, it wasn’t that.

Maybe it’s parents’ education. No, we controlled for that. Maybe it’s SAT scores. No, we can control for that. What this suggests is that the topography of thought goes beyond things related to just socioeconomic factors or family background. It’s not just that people who might have had wealthier families, for example, tend to write a certain way or have application consultants and do better in school because they get tutoring. No, it really suggests that writing reveals something about the way we think, which can reveal or predict our likelihood of being successful in the future.

Implications Beyond College Essay Writing

Basiouny: There are other critical forms of writing that we do every day in business, like cover letters, resumes, a press release, communications to the C-suite. Can you take this research and translate it into a business context?

Berger: What I find fascinating about these ideas is yes, we looked at the case of college application essays, but it doesn’t have to be only about application essays. These same ideas should apply more broadly to a variety of contexts, whether it’s a cover letter that someone writes, whether it’s an online review that someone puts together, whether it’s the emails they write at the office — all these things provide insight into who people are and what they’re likely to do in the future. I think on a previous episode that you had me on, I talked about a paper I loved recently, where they can tell whether someone is going to default on the loan or not by the language they use in their application. Similarly, you can predict whether someone is going to get promoted or fired or leave a job for a better opportunity elsewhere based on the language they use in their email.

Most of this work that I just mentioned is using individual words, but I think what our work suggests beyond the individual words someone used, you can get insight into who they are, how they think, and how well they’re going to do in the future, based on the pattern of ideas that they have or their topography of thought.

Basiouny: As a manager, it gives you an indication of how they might move through their physical work or their knowledge work, right?

Berger: Yes, one thing we’re looking at right now is, as people learn more, does that change the way their topography of thought looks? Obviously, as we gain more knowledge in a given domain, we may talk differently. We may think about ideas differently. One thought we have is, “Hey, if people who are able to cover a lot of ground really efficiently by moving slowly between points, how did they get there? Are they naturally that way?” Probably not. They may have gained more knowledge along the way that allows them to represent their ideas differently.

One thing we’re doing right now is looking at online forums where people write multiple reviews over time. Someone, for example, might write hundreds of wine reviews over the years. They’ve learned more about wine years later. We’re looking at how do they represent ideas differently as they gain knowledge? And that may help us understand why people who represent ideas certain ways end up doing better.

Humans Still Write Better than ChatGPT and Gen AI — For Now

Basiouny: ChatGPT and artificial intelligence have entered the conversation. People have access to these free tools that can help them perfect their cover letters and written business communication. How does this change things? We can’t really tell how good someone’s topography of thought is if they have an AI-assisted piece of writing. What do we do?

Berger: Yes, so I’d say a couple of things. I agree with much of what you said, except one word. I’m not sure they allow you to “perfect” your writing. At least at the moment. What they do is allow you to write something pretty good quickly and easily. You give it a prompt, and it produces content that’s pretty interesting, does a pretty good job of doing something that might have been difficult for you to do.

And to a degree it uses your own content somehow. Like you could say, “Take my CV and use it to put together a cover letter based on my past experiences.” So that is based on you, and someone else’s might look different, to the degree that their CV is different, but I wouldn’t say it necessarily perfects anything. At least at the moment.

Certainly, tools like ChatGPT and others have made the production of content much easier, and I can imagine a time down the road where we do use them for many tasks, rather than writing ourselves. But I still think there is a lot to be understood about how language reflects the people that produce it and how to write more effective content, based on understanding what makes language impactful.

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5 Books About The College Application Process To Read This Summer

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Cornell University

In the increasingly competitive landscape of top college admissions, strategy and preparation are critical for crafting a standout application. The process of planning high school coursework, selecting extracurriculars, writing essays, and navigating financial aid can be overwhelming and stressful — even taking a toll on the relationship between students and their parents. However, with the right resources, families can recover the joy and excitement that comes with entering this new phase of a student’s journey.

Whether a student is preparing to start their freshman or senior year of high school in the fall, summer is an optimal time for students and their families to educate themselves about the college admissions process. If you’re lounging poolside or passing time on a flight, bring along the following books for engaging and instructive perspectives on the college admissions process:

1. The Truth about College Admission: A Family Guide to Getting In and Staying Together by Brennan Barnard and Rick Clark

In The Truth about College Admission , Brennan Barnard, a college counselor, and Rick Clark, then the director of undergraduate admissions at Georgia Tech, provide a refreshing and honest look at the college application process. The book emphasizes maintaining family harmony and reducing stress while navigating the complexities of college admissions. With a focus on fostering open communication and realistic expectations, Barnard and Clark offer invaluable insights for both students and their families. For those who are hungry for more information, the authors also host a podcast with the same name, bringing together expert guests to share their insights on the college admissions process.

2. The Exceptional Applicant: For College Admission, You Don't Have to Be Perfect, You Just Have to Be Original by Deborah Bedor

Florida braces for ‘dirty rain.’ what that means, there is only one actor who can take over as mcu wolverine from hugh jackman, northern lights forecast: here’s where you could see aurora borealis tonight.

Deborah Bedor’s The Exceptional Applicant is a strategic guide aimed at high-achieving students aspiring to join the ranks at Ivy League and other top universities. A seasoned college admissions consultant, Bedor offers targeted insights to help students in every stage of the process develop an admissions strategy and craft an original and compelling profile. The book covers everything from selecting extracurricular activities to writing compelling essays and preparing for interviews. Bedor's insights are particularly valuable for students seeking to articulate their unique voice and perspective in an increasingly competitive admissions landscape.

3. Who Gets In and Why: A Year Inside College Admissions by Jeffrey Selingo

In Who Gets In and Why , journalist Jeffrey Selingo takes readers behind the college admissions curtain at Emory University, Davidson College, and the University of Washington to reveal insights into the secrets and nuances of the admissions process. Through meticulous reporting and interviews with admissions officers, Selingo reveals the strategies and decisions that admissions committees use to shape each incoming class. The book provides a nuanced understanding of what colleges are looking for in applicants and offers practical advice for students aiming to stand out. Selingo’s articulation of admissions officers’ processes makes this book an eye-opening read for students and parents embarking on the college admissions process.

4. On Writing the College Application Essay: The Key to Acceptance at the College of Your Choice by Harry Bauld

Harry Bauld’s On Writing the College Application Essay is a classic guide that has helped countless students craft essays that stand out in the decades since its original publication in 1987. A former admissions officer at Brown and Columbia, Bauld provides an insider’s perspective on what makes an essay memorable. The book offers practical tips on brainstorming, writing, and revising essays, as well as avoiding common pitfalls. Bauld’s lighthearted and engaging style makes this a must-read for any student facing the daunting task of writing their college application essays this summer.

5. Where You Go Is Not Who You'll Be: An Antidote to the College Admissions Mania by Frank Bruni

For families seeking an alternative to the frenzied culture of college admissions preparation, New York Times columnist Frank Bruni offers a more nuanced approach to the process, challenging the conventional wisdom that people’s future success is determined by the prestige of the colleges they attend. In Where You Go Is Not Who You'll Be , Bruni argues that the obsession with elite institutions is misplaced and that students can achieve success and fulfillment at a wide range of schools. A Times review of Bruni’s book states : “He doesn’t deny the networking value of attending a prestigious college — especially for those with the dubious dream of working on Wall Street — but he knows that this value is overstated, that the exhilaration of winning the prize is often a prelude to exhaustion, and that on every elite college campus the mental-health services are overstretched.” Bruni’s thought-provoking book provides a much-needed perspective to free students and parents caught up in the “mania” of college admissions—or to save them from getting caught up in it in the first place.

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The Gunman and the Would-Be Dictator

Violence stalks the president who has rejoiced in violence to others.

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When a madman hammered nearly to death the husband of then–House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, Donald Trump jeered and mocked . One of Trump’s sons and other close Trump supporters avidly promoted false claims that Paul Pelosi had somehow brought the onslaught upon himself through a sexual misadventure.

After authorities apprehended a right-wing-extremist plot to abduct Michigan Governor Gretchen Whitmer, Trump belittled the threat at a rally. He disparaged Whitmer as a political enemy. His supporters chanted “Lock her up.” Trump laughed and replied , “Lock them all up.”

Fascism feasts on violence. In the years since his own supporters attacked the Capitol to overturn the 2020 election—many of them threatening harm to Speaker Pelosi and Vice President Mike Pence—Trump has championed the invaders, would-be kidnappers, and would-be murderers as martyrs and hostages. He has vowed to pardon them if returned to office. His own staffers have testified to the glee with which Trump watched the mayhem on television.

Now the bloodshed that Trump has done so much to incite against others has touched him as well. The attempted murder of Trump—and the killing of a person nearby—is a horror and an outrage. More will be learned about the man who committed this appalling act, and who was killed by the Secret Service. Whatever his mania or motive, the only important thing about him is the law-enforcement mistake that allowed him to bring a deadly weapon so close to a campaign event and gain a sight line of the presidential candidate. His name should otherwise be erased and forgotten.

It is sadly incorrect to say, as so many have, that political violence “has no place” in American society. Assassinations, lynchings, riots, and pogroms have stained every page of American political history. That has remained true to the present day. In 2016 , and even more in 2020, Trump supporters brought weapons to intimidate opponents and vote-counters. Trump and his supporters envision a new place for violence as their defining political message in the 2024 election. Fascist movements are secular religions. Like all religions, they offer martyrs as their proof of truth. The Mussolini movement in Italy built imposing monuments to its fallen comrades. The Trump movement now improves on that: The leader himself will be the martyr in chief, his own blood the basis for his bid for power and vengeance.

Christopher R. Browning: A new kind of fascism

The 2024 election was already shaping up as a symbolic contest between an elderly and weakening liberalism too frail and uncertain to protect itself and an authoritarian, reactionary movement ready to burst every barrier and trash every institution. To date, Trump has led only a minority of U.S. voters, but that minority’s passion and audacity have offset what it lacks in numbers. After the shooting, Trump and his backers hope to use the iconography of a bloody ear and face, raised fist, and call to “Fight!” to summon waverers to their cause of installing Trump as an anti-constitutional ruler, exempted from ordinary law by his allies on the Supreme Court.

Other societies have backslid to authoritarianism because of some extraordinary crisis: economic depression, hyperinflation, military defeat, civil strife. In 2024, U.S. troops are nowhere at war. The American economy is booming, providing spectacular and widely shared prosperity. A brief spasm of mild post-pandemic inflation has been overcome. Indicators of social health have abruptly turned positive since Trump left office after years of deterioration during his term. Crime and fatal drug overdoses are declining in 2024; marriages and births are rising. Even the country’s problems indirectly confirm the country’s success: Migrants are crossing the border in the hundreds of thousands, because they know, even if Americans don’t, that the U.S. job market is among the hottest on Earth.

Yet despite all of this success, Americans are considering a form of self-harm that in other countries has typically followed the darkest national failures: letting the author of a failed coup d’état return to office to try again.

One reason this self-harm is nearing consummation is that American society is poorly prepared to understand and respond to radical challenges, once those challenges gain a certain mass. For nearly a century, “radical” in U.S. politics has usually meant “fringe”: Communists, Ku Kluxers, Black Panthers, Branch Davidians, Islamist jihadists. Radicals could be marginalized by the weight of the great American consensus that stretches from social democrats to business conservatives. Sometimes, a Joe McCarthy or a George Wallace would throw a scare into that mighty consensus, but in the past such challengers rarely formed stable coalitions with accepted stakeholders in society. Never gaining an enduring grip on the institutions of state, they flared up and burned out.

Trump is different. His abuses have been ratified by powerful constituencies. He has conquered and colonized one of the two major parties. He has defeated—or is on the way to defeating—every impeachment and prosecution to hold him to account for his frauds and crimes. He has assembled a mass following that is larger, more permanent, and more national in reach than any previous American demagogue. He has dominated the scene for nine years already, and he and his supporters hope they can use yesterday’s appalling event to extend the Trump era to the end of his life and beyond.

The American political and social system cannot treat such a person as an alien. It inevitably accommodates and naturalizes him. His counselors, even the thugs and felons, join the point-counterpoint dialogue at the summit of the American elite. President Joe Biden nearly wrecked his campaign because he felt obliged to meet Trump in debate. How could Biden have done otherwise? Trump is the three-time nominee of the Republican Party; it’s awkward and strange to treat him as an insurrectionist against the American state—though that’s what Trump was and is.

David Frum: Biden’s heartbreaking press conference

The despicable shooting at Trump, which also caused death and injury to others, now secures his undeserved position as a partner in the protective rituals of the democracy he despises. The appropriate expressions of dismay and condemnation from every prominent voice in American life have the additional effect of habituating Americans to Trump’s legitimacy. In the face of such an outrage, the familiar and proper practice is to stress unity, to proclaim that Americans have more things in common than that divide them. Those soothing words, true in the past, are less true now.

Nobody seems to have language to say: We abhor, reject, repudiate, and punish all political violence, even as we maintain that Trump remains himself a promoter of such violence, a subverter of American institutions, and the very opposite of everything decent and patriotic in American life.

The Republican National Convention, which opens this week, will welcome to its stage apologists for Vladimir Putin’s Russia and its aggression against U.S. allies. Trump’s own infatuation with Russia and other dictatorships has not dimmed even slightly with age or experience. Yet all of these urgent and necessary truths must now be subordinated to the ritual invocation of “thoughts and prayers” for someone who never gave a thought or uttered a prayer for any of the victims of his own many incitements to bloodshed. The president who used his office to champion the rights of dangerous people to own military-type weapons says he was grazed by a bullet from one such assault rifle.

Conventional phrases and polite hypocrisy fill a useful function in social life. We say “Thank you for your service” both to the decorated hero and to the veteran who barely escaped dishonorable discharge. It’s easier than deciphering which was which. We wish “Happy New Year!” even when we dread the months ahead.

Adrienne LaFrance: Thoughts, prayers, and Facebook rants aren’t enough

But conventional phrases don’t go unheard. They carry meanings, meanings no less powerful for being rote and reflexive. In rightly denouncing violence, we are extending an implicit pardon to the most violent person in contemporary U.S. politics. In asserting unity, we are absolving a man who seeks power through the humiliation and subordination of disdained others.

Those conventional phrases are inscribing Trump into a place in American life that he should have forfeited beyond redemption on January 6, 2021. All decent people welcome the sparing of his life. Trump’s reckoning should be with the orderly process of law, not with the bloodshed he rejoiced in when it befell others. He and his allies will exploit a gunman’s vicious criminality as their path to exonerate past crimes and empower new ones. Those who stand against Trump and his allies must find the will and the language to explain why these crimes, past and planned, are all wrong, all intolerable—and how the gunman and Trump, at their opposite ends of a bullet’s trajectory, are nonetheless joined together as common enemies of law and democracy.

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1 in 3 College Applicants Used AI for Essay Help. Did They Cheat?

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Last spring, Makena, then a high school senior, was deep into cranking out some 70 essays for 20 college applications when her creativity started to wane.

So, she turned to a high-tech brainstorming partner: artificial intelligence.

One essay prompt asked Makena to describe a class she’d want to teach if she were a college professor. “I had no idea,” said Makena, who asked to be identified only by her first name to speak candidly about the admissions process. “I had never thought about it.”

She put her intended major and some favorite topics into an AI tool, which spit out a list of potential courses. Makena selected one and crafted her essay around it, without any further AI assistance.

In Makena’s mind, this wasn’t cheating.

“I wrote my own essays, 100 percent,” she said. After all, she could have found the same information on Google or by picking up a course catalogue. AI was just more efficient.

About a third of high school seniors who applied to college in the 2023-24 school year acknowledged using an AI tool for help in writing admissions essays, according to research released this month by foundry10 , an organization focused on improving learning.

About half of those students—or roughly one in six students overall—used AI the way Makena did, to brainstorm essay topics or polish their spelling and grammar. And about 6 percent of students overall—including some of Makena’s classmates, she said—relied on AI to write the final drafts of their essays instead of doing most of the writing themselves.

Meanwhile, nearly a quarter of students admitted to Harvard University’s class of 2027 paid a private admissions consultant for help with their applications .

The use of outside help, in other words, is rampant in college admissions, opening up a host of questions about ethics, norms, and equal opportunity.

Top among them: Which—if any—of these students cheated in the admissions process?

For now, the answer is murky.

Colleges permit students to use pricey admissions coaches . But they are mostly silent on how AI can be used in crafting essays.

That’s created “this ethical gray area that students and [high school] counselors don’t have any guidance” on how to navigate, said Jennifer Rubin, a senior researcher at foundry10 and the lead author the report.

A ‘double standard’ on college admissions

Generative AI tools like ChatGPT have put a high-tech twist on decades-old questions of fairness in the college admissions process.

The system has “never been a level playing field,” Rubin said, citing the advantages that mostly benefit wealthier students, such as SAT tutors, paid college admissions coaches, and savvy, college-educated parents. “I think [AI] is just complicating it a little bit more because it’s a tool that’s readily available to everyone.”

To get a sense of the public’s perceptions on AI in college admissions, foundry10 included an experimental portion in its survey.

Participants reviewed an identical portion of a college essay. But one group was instructed that the applicant had help from ChatGPT in brainstorming ideas, refining content, and polishing the final draft—essentially the same tasks Makena used AI for.

Another group was told the applicant got assistance with the same parts of the writing process, from a paid college admissions coach. A third group was informed that the student worked entirely alone.

Participants rated the applicant who used ChatGPT as less authentic, less ethical, and less likable than the student who paid for professional help. (The student who worked solo got the highest ratings.)

Rubin perceives a “double standard” at work.

A student who can pay “thousands of dollars to someone who has the knowledge of how a [particular college] works and what’s needed or wanted in a college admissions essay is going to have an undue advantage,” she said.

College admissions coaching services typically cost from $60 to $349 per hour, according to data cited in Rubin’s report from Prepmaven, an admissions-preparation company.

The website of one such service, Ivy College Essay , advertises its Harvard connections. For between $1,500 and $4,800, depending on the number of applications, students receive help in brainstorming topics and “extensive written notes, comments, and guidance, focusing on both content and structure,” according to the site.

“We go back and forth as many times as needed until we have a very strong and solid Ivy League college application!” the company promises.

Assistance from ChatGPT on similar tasks “probably isn’t going to be as strong” as what such a service offers, Rubin said. “But it might provide students some form of feedback that they might not be able to get in their lives because they don’t have parents or caregivers” who have the savvy to help.

These issues are especially personal for Rubin, a first-generation college graduate who attended a private high school on scholarship. She had the help of her school counselors in applying to college.

But that assistance couldn’t make up for the gap between Rubin and many of her peers with highly educated parents, who could offer all sorts of support, she said.

Big questions on AI use go mostly unanswered by colleges

For now, high school counselors aren’t sure what to tell their students when it comes to how AI can be ethically used in the admissions process.

“My seniors have come to me and said, ‘Hey, I’ve got to write an essay about this. Where do I even start?’ Or ‘is it OK if I use ChatGPT?’” said Melissa Millington, a school counselor in Missouri. “I just really hit on, you cannot pass that off as your own work, because that’s not ethical.”

But, like Rubin, she sees some possibility for the technology in crafting applications that stop short of making AI a sole, uncredited ghost writer.

“If you are going to use it to get a starting point, that’s totally fine,” she said she’s told students. “Or if you want to write your essay, and then put it in there and ask it to clean [the] grammar,” that’s likely fair game.

While most colleges and universities are silent on the AI issue, some individual institutions have given applicants the green light to use AI in a limited fashion.

One of the country’s most prestigious institutions focusing on science, math, engineering and technology, CalTech, tells prospective students that it’s unethical to copy and paste an essay written entirely by generative AI. But it is acceptable to use AI to brainstorm or check grammar and spelling, the college says.

Georgia Polytechnical Institute, another highly regarded STEM-focused university, has a similar policy .

“If you choose to utilize AI-based assistance … we encourage you to take the same approach you would when collaborating with people,” the school’s website says. “Use it to brainstorm, edit, and refine your ideas.”

But for other colleges, any use of AI is unacceptable, at least officially. Brown University, for instance, cites its fraud policy and tells applicants that the use of AI is “not permitted under any circumstances.”

‘It always been an honor system’

Brown and other institutions have no real way of enforcing those policies, Rubin said.

AI detectors are notoriously unreliable. And they are disproportionately likely to flag writing by students who are not native English speakers, even if they didn’t use AI.

In fact, Kristin Woelfel, a policy counsel specializing in equity in civic technology for the Center for Democracy & Technology, a nonprofit organization that aims to shape technology policy, has gone so far as to say the detectors have the potential to violate students’ civil rights .

It doesn’t really matter if colleges have guidelines that prohibit AI use, Rubin said, because there’s no way to check on what kind of assistance an applicant received, human or not.

“It’s always been on the honor system,” she said.

Colleges that haven’t outlined their policies on AI in the application process are ignoring the obvious—and making life harder for high school counselors and their students, said Maritza Cha, who worked as a school counselor in Southern California for nearly a decade and has taught high school counseling as an adjunct professor.

“We’re at the point of either you can kind of put your head down in the sand and pretend it’s not happening, which is not realistic,” Cha said. “Or you can just acknowledge that they’re using some kind of AI” in the admissions process.

Counselors can model proper use of AI in the college search

While much of the work in setting clear guidelines needs to happen at the college level, there are steps high school educators can take.

Rubin believes that if counselors and teachers are really thinking about leveling the playing field between first-generation college students from low-income families and their peers, it might be helpful to show how generative AI can ethically guide the college admissions process.

For instance, students could put areas of study they are interested in and a desired geographic region into a tool like ChatGPT and ask for recommendations on where to apply.

“Generative AI can provide them some really concrete information,” Rubin said. Even though they should check that data against more accurate sources, it can help a student narrow their search.

Students can even have a “conversation back and forth” with AI if they don’t have access to a college counselor at school who can meet with them consistently, she said.

And they can model how to use AI to spur their creativity or proofread final drafts, without crossing the line into wholesale cheating, she said.

But, ultimately, high school educators and college officials need to have conversations about what responsible use of AI looks like, including in crafting college applications, Rubin said.

In Rubin’s view, those discussions should acknowledge that many students already have access to other types of help—whether that’s from professional consultants or parents and older siblings familiar with the process of applying to college.

Makena, for instance, thinks she can write a stronger, more personal essay than anything ChatGPT could cook up. She didn’t feel the need to pay a private counselor either, since she wanted to rely on her own voice as much as possible.

She did, however, have a low-tech, presumably cost-free assistant: Her father, who edited all 70-plus of her essays.

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ChatGPT: Disruptive or Constructive?

Thursday, Jul 18, 2024 • Jeremiah Valentine : [email protected]

What is Chat GPT?

ChatGPT is a popular emerging technology using Artificial Intelligence. GPT stands for Generative Pre-trained Transformer, which describes an AI program that looks for patterns in language and data learning to predict the next word in a sentence or the next paragraph in an essay. The website has a friendly interface that allows users to interact with AI in a n efficient conversational tone . ChatGPT provides another opportunity for students, instructors, researchers, workers, and others to find practical solutions to everyday and complicated problems.

At the root of this conversation is Artificial Intelligence. I plan to explore applicable uses of AI and ChatGPT in the classroom , entrepreneurial potential uses, and applications in industry .

Everyday Uses of Artificial Intelligence

The use of Artificial I ntelligence varies based on the user and their end goal. While many individuals will use certain programs or websites to meet specific objectives , many companies and apps have begun to utilize this emerging technology to better meet their customer's needs.

Duolingo is a popular foreign language learning application that I use to supplement my Spanish studies . The app uses Artificial Intelligence to assess users' knowledge and understanding as they interact with the program , thus streamlining users learning outcomes.

As another example, Khan Academy is a free online resource that helps teachers and students learn any level of math or other grade school topics for free. They have created Khanmigo , using AI. The model acts as a tutor that helps work through a problem while not directly providing the answer. It can assist in writing an essay or solving a complex math problem step by step.

These everyday applications continue a trend of companies implementing this new technolog y into students and teachers' lives . . This new AI technology also allows business professionals to enhance aspects of their processes.

Entrepreneurs, A.I. and the Advantages

While AI already provides companies and organizations with new ways to interact with and better support their customers, AI could also provide emerging industries and entrepreneurs with new paths to business success. 

According to Entrpreneur.com, most businesses currently use AI for customer service purposes , however , AI could also help entrepreneurs create effective spreadsheets cataloging useful data with accuracy that can be incredibly specific or broad. Specifically with customer service, AI can quickly find what a customer needs and solve their problems efficiently. It could also analyze how effective marketing campaigns are influencing customers’ purchases.

As I researched for more information about this topic, I found an article in The Journal of Business Venturing Insights published in March 2023, sharing different techniques business students can use ChatGPT as an asset to generate entrepreneurial business pitches. The article titled “ The Artificially Intelligent Entrepreneur” written by Cole Short, an Assistant Professor of Strategy at Pepperdine University, and Jeremy C. Short, a UTA alumni and Professor at the University of North Texas at Denton, showcased different elevator pitch scenarios.

Students and entrepreneurs study CEOs who have impacted an industry dynamically; the CEO's mentality is an asset . I had the opportunity to question Dr. Jeremy Short on how he arrived at the initial question of using AI as a CEO archetype business consultant. An archetype is a symbol, term, or pattern of behavior which others have replicated or emulated.

He responded, “ We used this existing framework and selected a CEO from each archetype and used ChatGPT to create elevator pitches, social media pitches, and crowdfunding pitches. The strength of ChatGPT is based largely on the creativity of the prompt, which is where we aim as authors.”

CEO Archetypes and Prompt Engineering

ChatGPT allows the user to understand the archetypes of successful CEOs and collaborate with entrepreneurial styles. These archetypes are accessible options to consult with AI. Let ’ s break down different CEO archetypes students used during this study:

Creator CEOs are typically serial entrepreneurs and serve during the growth stages of developing new businesses. These individuals are risk takers recognizing opportunities that others don ’ t see. Elon Musk, CEO of Tesla, SpaceX, and Twitter is the creator archetype.

Transformer CEOs are created by climbing the ladder of a successful business and adding new ideas . They have a firm understanding of the company's culture and work to dramatically change the company, separating it from missteps in the past. Indra Nooyi CEO of PepsiCo is the transformer archetype.

Savior CEOs rescue businesses on the verge of failure with disciplined actions, unique experience and insights they forge a successful path forward for declining businesses. Lisa Su, CEO of AMD is the savior archetype.

ChatGPT was prompted to write an elevator pitch in the style of the previously listed CEOs. 

The response for Elon Musk included language about “ building” a product with “ cutting-edge technology.” 

Indra Nooyi ’s response included phrases like “ the world is changing” and making “ a positive impact in the world.” 

Lisa Su's response produced a pitch speaking about being “ accountable, tough and disciplined” with an emphasis on “ a strong focus on efficiency and performance.”

However, I believe these positions can help entrepreneurs develop their own successful business practices; creating a product your former employer could use to gain an advantage over the competition is disruptive. B uying a company on the brink of bankruptcy that has been mismanaged is a scenario entrepreneurs have explored and practiced .

Prompt engineering is the description of a task AI can accomplish , with instructions embedded in the input. Using prompt engineering, users can fine-tune their input to achieve a desired output incorporating a task description to guide the AI model. 

Conversation around ChatGPT and Artificial Intelligence

I asked Dr. Short about how students could use this technology as an asset that guides their learning and, additionally, how instructors can use this as well. He spoke about an assignment he is currently using in his classes. “ Chat GPT might be valuable in helping create a recipe for material that students can then refine. For example, in my social entrepreneurship class students create crowdfunding campaigns for either DonorsChoose , a platform that caters to public school teachers or GoFundMe , a service which allows a variety of project types to a larger userbase . I plan on students using ChatGPT to create a ‘rough draft’ to show me so I can see how they refine their responses for their particular campaigns this upcoming fall.” Th is approach allows students to take advantage of popular technology in a constructive way.

The journal article provided some notable conclusions about ChatGPT , i ncluding “ quality control is essential when using automated tools; a hallmark of success for large language models is their vast associative memory, this strength can also be a weakness. Specifically, models such as OpenAI’s GPT-3.5 and GPT-4 are capable of confidently generating “ hallucinated” output that appears correct but, it is incorrect or completely fabricated. ChatGPT serves as an emerging tool that can efficiently and flexibly produce a range of narrative content for entrepreneurs and serve to inspire future research at the intersection of entrepreneurship and AI.” ChatGPT ’s limitations and potential applications are continually being explored.

Industry Application

After researching various applications of AI, I spoke with Dr. George Benson, Professor and Department Chair of the Department of Management at The University of Texas at Arlington, about AI and ChatGPT from an industry perspective. His research focuses on Artificial Intelligence with Human Resource Management .

Dr. Benson told me that Artificial Intelligence is being invested heavily by human resource departments who are looking to automate hiring practices. Specifically, he mentioned “ HR is using this as a market opportunity. AI is a useful tool to sift through potential applicants by scanning their resumes for qualifications and experiences. Allowing professionals to hire applicants faster.”

This application allows the technology to handle low-level tasks, but the results generated are being handed to a human to review and act on. He spoke about the potential of A.I. “ There are a lot of unknowns, but the technology is new and getting better.” Looking towards the future, technology is already being applied in different ways . These applications are being explored in the classrooms of UTA as well.

Exploration of AI at UTA

The College of Business conduct ed a survey to understand the faculty’s attitude towards A I in the classroom. It was a part of the “Teaching with Chat GPT” workshop on Friday February 9 th , which focus ed on how to integrate Chat GPT and other AI platforms into teaching . 

Dr. Kevin Carr, a Clinical Assistant Professor of Marketing at UTA, was a part of the workshop ; he currently teaches Advanced Business Communication . I talked to him about the purpose of the workshop and what he hopes to gain from the group's sessions. 

Dr. Carr explained "The point of the workshop is designed to give faculty ideas for instruction and to develop classroom activities to work with students . Our goal for th e workshop is to introduce Artificial Intelligence as a teaching tool for faculty, including showing what AI can do potentially in the classroom. We are going to be very open to faculty’s direction, in terms of ongoing discu ssions and meetings.”

Personal Take

Artificial Intelligence or Chat GPT , in my view, is another useful tool in the toolbox of technology. It will take the air out of certain industries, and it will change jobs, yet every major technological advancement has the potential to do so. The automobile was considered radical, the use of plastic, computers in the workplace, and alternative energy have been impactful on society. 

Alternative energy was headlined as the end of oil use. The automobile changed the way cities were formed and led to the creation of a national highway system. Society has always found a way to adapt and overcome major technological innovations, artificial intelligence is not any different.

AI is the technology of tomorrow. It reminds me of something Dr. George Benson said , “ It's cool software that is a sophisticated search engine.” Google, one of the most popular search engines, reshaped the internet, as you search for resources, it is a natural starting point. AI and ChatGPT are an evolution, for students it is a tremendous resource consulting a CEO archetype, creating business pitches, and most importantly shaping the future .

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What Democrats Need to Do Now

By David Brooks

Opinion Columnist, reporting from Milwaukee

In 2016, MAGA was just a slogan — or at best a spasm of resentments and instincts about issues like immigration. Over the last eight years, think tankers, activists and politicians have developed MAGA into a worldview, a worldview that now transcends Donald Trump.

Across the Western world, right-wing parties have ceased to be parties of the business elites and have become working-class parties. MAGA is the worldview that accords with this shifting reality. It has its roots in Andrew Jackson-style populism, but it is updated and more comprehensive. It is the worldview that represents one version of working-class interests and offers working-class voters respect.

JD Vance is the embodiment and one of the developers of this worldview — with his suspicion of corporate power, foreign entanglements, free trade, cultural elites and high rates of immigration. In Milwaukee this week, with Vance as Trump’s pick for vice president, it became clear how thoroughly MAGA has replaced Reaganism as the chief operating system of the Republican Party.

If Democrats want to beat MAGA, it’s not enough to say: Orange man bad. Talking endlessly about Jan. 6 does no good. If Democrats hope to win in the near future they have to take the MAGA worldview seriously, and respectfully make the case, especially to working-class voters, for something better.

At its best, what is MAGA, anyway?

Well, in any society, there is a legitimate tension between security and dynamism. In a volatile world, MAGA offers people security. It promises secure borders and secure neighborhoods. It offers protection from globalization, from the creative destruction of modern capitalism. It offers protection from an educated class that looks down on you and indoctrinates your children in school. It offers you protection from corporate predators. As Senator Josh Hawley argued in Compact magazine this week, “The C-suite long ago sold out the United States, shuttering factories in the homeland and gutting American jobs.”

To those who rightly feel buffeted by vast and destabilizing forces, Trump emerges as a kind of Aaron Sorkin character: “You want me on that wall. You need me on that wall.” He offers security so people can get on with their lives.

A Timeline of Lies, Chaos and Damage: This Is Trump’s Record as President

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Trump picks Ohio Sen. J.D. Vance, ‘Hillbilly Elegy’ author, as running mate

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J.D. Vance once positioned himself to Republican voters as an alternative to Donald Trump, questioning his ability to solve the problems of average Americans and branding Trump as “cultural heroin.”

But in time the Ohio senator and author of the acclaimed memoir “Hillbilly Elegy” became one of Trump’s most fervent supporters, and Trump rewarded that loyalty Monday by naming Vance his running mate. By a resounding voice vote, the delegates at the Republican National Convention in Milwaukee approved Vance as the Republican nominee for vice president.

In Vance, Trump has a feisty and often aggressive ally who will appeal to the former president’s base.

“As Vice President, J.D. will continue to fight for our Constitution, stand with our Troops, and will do everything he can to help me MAKE AMERICA GREAT AGAIN,” Trump said in a post on Truth Social.

Vance entered the convention auditorium Monday, grinning and shaking hands with attendees, as Merle Haggard’s country song “America First” played in the background.

“J.D. is the embodiment of the American dream. He came from humble beginnings. And even as his life took him to places he might have never imagined, he never forgot where he came from,” said Ohio’s Lt. Gov. Jon Husted, who formally nominated Vance. “Ohio values are in his blood.”

Trump’s decision defied speculation early in the campaign that the former president would choose a person of color or a woman to broaden his political base. Instead, Trump-Vance creates the kind of team found throughout American history: two men, both white, though Trump, at 78, is twice the age of the 39-year-old Vance.

Vance, whose full name is James David Vance, will turn 40 in August. Like his wife, Usha Chilukuri Vance, he has a law degree from Yale, where the two met. They have three children.

For weeks, Trump had reportedly been courting Vance, along with Florida Sen. Marco Rubio and North Dakota Gov. Doug Burgum, as potential vice presidential picks — drawing out the suspenseful announcement and creating comparisons to a casting call from his time as head honcho of the reality TV show “The Apprentice.”

“Donald Trump was a success,” Vance said in a promotional video released by the campaign moments after Trump’s announcement. “The results were good, and we could have a growing economy and a peaceful world if we just bring back Donald Trump for round two.”

In a remarkable departure from modern political history, Trump picked a running mate different from his first term, former Vice President Mike Pence. Pence lost favor with Trump when he refused his former boss’ calls to reject the 2020 election results.

Pence’s choice to certify the 2020 election results on Jan. 6, 2021, the day pro-Trump protesters stormed the Capitol, prompted chants of “Hang Mike Pence!” Pence said earlier this year that he would not endorse Trump for president.

“Donald Trump picked J.D. Vance as his running mate because Vance will do what Mike Pence wouldn’t on Jan. 6: bend over backwards to enable Trump and his extreme MAGA agenda, even if it means breaking the law and no matter the harm to the American people,” said Jen O’Malley Dillon, Biden-Harris 2024 chair, in a statement.

Asked by White House reporters about Trump’s pick as he was boarding Air Force One, President Biden said, “A clone of Trump on the issues.” Vance, like Trump, fervently opposes military aid to Ukraine, and has called for strong border enforcement.

Vance attained international renown for his 2016 bestselling memoir, “Hillbilly Elegy: A Memoir of a Family and Culture in Crisis,” which details Vance’s childhood in Middletown, Ohio, a steel mill town in America’s heartland. Vance also recounts serving in the Marines in Iraq and attending Yale, where he felt like a “cultural alien.”

“Why has no one else from my high school made it to the Ivy League?” he wrote. “Why are people like me so poorly represented in America’s elite institutions? Why is domestic strife so common in families like mine?”

Vance described his mother, who became pregnant as a teenager, as someone struggling with addiction, mental health issues and unstable relationships. Vance went to live with his grandmother — a hard-working woman he affectionately calls Mamaw, from Kentucky.

“Hillbilly Elegy” reads as a love letter to Vance’s family — their struggles with addiction, disruptive relationships and tight-knit love. But perhaps more so, it is an epistle on the state of working-class white people — the same demographic that Trump counts as the bedrock of his base.

Vance was not always in Trump’s camp.

In an interview in 2016 , the year Trump first ran for president, he said, “I’m not a Trump supporter, but I even feel a certain attachment, and I get a little bit cheery when he says certain things on the campaign trail, when he criticizes the elites in such strong language — it’s a little refreshing, even if you disagree with the substance of the remarks.”

That same year, in a piece for the Atlantic , he wrote, “Trump is cultural heroin. He makes some feel better for a bit. But he cannot fix what ails them, and one day they’ll realize it.”

That view changed. “I actually think Trump is a much better model of statesman, which is he’s tough, he’s funny, he sometimes says things unfiltered,” Vance said in an interview last month . “But when it comes to actual decision making, he’s much more careful and cautious than any person currently representing the country.”

Vance, already an outspoken critic of Democrats and Biden, became even more so recently. This week he even blamed Democrats for the attempted assassination of Trump, even as the shooter’s motives remain unknown.

“Today is not just some isolated incident,” he posted on the social media platform X. “The central premise of the Biden campaign is that President Donald Trump is an authoritarian fascist who must be stopped at all costs. That rhetoric led directly to President Trump’s attempted assassination.”

After serving in the Marine Corps in Iraq, attending Ohio State University and Yale Law School, Vance moved to San Francisco and worked as an investor for the Silicon Valley venture capital firm Mithril Capital. He became a protege of Peter Thiel, once a Republican megadonor who gave $10 million to Vance’s Senate campaign. Thiel previously donated to Trump, but told the Atlantic that he would not give to any politicians in the 2024 election.

“When the Twin Towers came down, J.D. Vance enlisted in the Marine Corps, gung-ho to exact justice on America’s enemies. Subsequently he came to believe the Forever Wars were a mistake,” David Sacks, a Silicon Valley venture capitalist who recently hosted a fundraiser for Trump, wrote on X. “This is who I want by Trump’s side: an American patriot, with the courage to fight America’s wars but the wisdom to know when to avoid them.”

“Hillbilly Elegy,” which was later made into a Netflix film, launched Vance into international stardom. He penned think pieces and reportedly harbored presidential aspirations with close advisors.

In a 2017 essay in the New York Times, Vance wrote about identifying parts of himself in former Presidents Clinton and Obama, who also grew up in underprivileged environments, largely raised by their grandparents. Of Obama, he wrote, “It is one of the great failures of recent political history that the Republican Party was too often unable to disconnect legitimate political disagreements from the fact that the president himself is an admirable man.”

Vance perhaps would repeat the same sentiment toward his new boss, whom he spilled copious amounts of ink warning America about during the 2016 election.

“During this election season, it appears that many Americans have reached for a new pain reliever. It too, promises a quick escape from life’s cares, an easy solution to the mounting social problems of U.S. communities and culture,” Vance wrote in the piece for the Atlantic. “It enters minds, not through lungs or veins, but through eyes and ears, and its name is Donald Trump.”

Yet six years later, Trump singled Vance out of a competitive race for Ohio Senate, endorsing him in the 2022 midterm elections. Vance soared to the front of the pack and won against seasoned Democrat Tim Ryan.

A few months into his first Senate term, Vance dealt with a crisis in his state — a train derailed in East Palestine. But as his term wore on, Vance turned his attention to more election-worthy national issues: immigration, China and Trump’s criminal trials.

Soon, Vance rose to the top of Trump’s vice presidential short list.

Times staff writer Noah Bierman and columnist Mark Z. Barabak contributed to this report.

More to Read

What President Biden’s decision means for Gov. Newsom

July 23, 2024

Trump holds rally, his first after assassination attempt, with running mate Vance

July 20, 2024

Takeaways from the RNC: What we learned about the Republicans

July 19, 2024

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Faith E. Pinho is a reporter for the Los Angeles Times, covering national and political news, including the 2024 election.

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