Anyone feel free to Critique my Waterloo AIF for Management Engineering - application form

Hi, I'm just looking for feed back for my AIF. Anyone is welcome to critique it.

Admission Information Form for Waterloo

Question 1: Reasons for choosing your program and Waterloo
(900 character limit)

I chose to apply to Waterloo because the powerful entrepreneurship culture stood out to me. The world is an inefficient machine, and Waterloo has been known internationally to create innovative minds that make it more efficient. Each program at Waterloo serves the different needs of different entrepreneurs. My passion for problem solving, optimization, and business drew me towards management engineering and computer science. Both programs will allow me to grow my passions by teaching me how to create complex and efficient algorithms to help with real world issues. In addition to growing my passions, both programs offer co-op placements where I can gain practical experience and knowledge simultaneously.

Question 3: Extracurricular Activities - additional information (optional)
(600 character limit)

In grade 11, I joined my school's FIRST Robotics rookie team. In our first year, we made it to the World's championship and won over 8 awards. During the 6 week build period, I was co mechanical, electrical, and design team lead where I designed, prototyped, and built the robot. I used my innovative thinking to design and build the bumpers, climbing mechanism, and powertrain. At the competitions, I fixed the robot, strategized with teams, and was interviewed by judges. For last year's initiatives, I was made this years Captain to lead with my strong leadership and communication skills.

ENGINEERING Question 1: Engineering Interests and Goals
(900 character limit)

My interest in engineering roots from my passion for making things more efficient. Through FIRST Robotics I have learnt that you can make a system more efficient by building upon what you already have rather than wasting time and resources to create something new. During Waterloo's open house and shadow day, I met with students, alumni, and professors from computer, software, systems design, and management engineering. While each program did cater to my passions, management engineering stood out in particular as it is heavily focused on optimization and problem solving and not necessarily on creating something new. Much like the work done by Waterloo's Management Science professor, Ken Mckay, and his team at Oculys with their hospital wait time program where they take all their current resources and predict the amount of time it will take for a doctor to see the patient.

Zain, in the first essay, your academic motivation needs to be tied in with your career objectives or goals. That way, you can focus your response on specific business programs of the university that are attuned with your soon to be professional needs. Try to avoid giving generalized statements such as the one you developed because it is just a bunch of words that are saying things, but not really introducing your basis or criteria for your choice of university. The fact that the information you chose to present at the start comes from public knowledge does not strengthen your response. Instead, you should try to build up your response by removing the general statement at the start and trying to develop a more focused response starting with; " My passion for problem solving, optimization, and business drew me towards management engineering and computer science.

For question number 3, while this is an impressive accomplishment, the problem with it is that it is not an individual accomplishment but rather a group accomplishment. This sort of accomplishment renders your own talents and skills very minimal in participation and thus, is not the central reason the project won. If you can try to present a more recent extracurricular activity that you can say you accomplished on your own and won recognition for, then that would be more impressive. It does not have to be an activity related to your major, it can be related to something altogether different because the point of this prompt is to get to know you beyond your college major related activities. What else do you enjoy doing aside from robotics? What is your second most favorite activity? Discuss that side of your personality instead.

As far as the Engineering question is concerned, I believe your response is appropriate but could use some improvement in terms of your career goals so that you can tie it in with the rest of the information you present. This will create a more comprehensive essay on your part and show that a great deal of thought and analysis has gone into your college major decision making process.

Thanks so much for your advice. I have been trying to got proper advice from peers but most kept saying that my AIF was pretty solid. Would you mind looking over any other drafts I come up with?