Rice University Undergraduate College Application Essays

“O-Week, Beer Bike, & The Rest—we know Will Rice is the Best!”

Returning for the holidays, my friend had incessantly been repeating Will Rice cheers before I even knew what Rice, much less residential colleges, was. But maddening as they were,...

On the sofas in my home theater, I watched Riley struggle to come to terms with her new home in Inside Out, John Nash contribute to game theory in spite of his frequent hallucinations in A Beautiful Mind, and Nina differentiate reality from...

Home-schooled. For the longest time, I assumed that all children, like me, were homeschooled by their mothers. I attended Chinese school and art classes, but my mother delivered my first history lesson around our kitchen table––with an Odyssey...

My younger siblings and I founded Back-to-Eden Ranch Pasture Eggs, & Co., in January 2012. Although our business started small, we expanded rapidly and have since raised several hundred chickens and African guinea fowl, along with starting...

She can’t read; she can’t count; she doesn’t even know her own age. But she is caring, creative, inspirational, and extraordinarily gifted in the art of listening. In the novel “Momo,” Michael Ende’s unconventional character, Momo, is a little...

I revel in an eccentric painting of a curled up, blue-haired woman; I overhear a girl rehearsing a classical monologue, maybe Shakespeare; I soak in the haunting sound of a violinist playing a Tchaikovsky concerto in a nearby classroom. Walking...

In June of 1982, with the harsh sun beating down on their small, rural city, my mother’s community danced throughout the streets in her honor, making music with makeshift instruments as they moved. The quiet town, on the outskirts of Bishoftu,...

As the spectacles of this new city whizzed by the grimy windows, we came to a gradual stop at an intersection. I looked out into a stunningly vast field of greenery, speckled with pink-bricked Byzantine buildings and majestic archways. After...

It’s 7:00, an obnoxiously humid Thursday evening. After 8 hours at school, and 5 at work, I am frankly exhausted: ready to relax, finish my homework, and watch the Texans game. As I open the front door, ready to get a quick start on my tasks, I...

Arriving three hours early to the venue before the scheduled start of a performance can mean many things. Perhaps you are a member of the performance or you may be determined to secure a great place or seat. You could even be tailgating! However,...

I wasn’t happy about the puzzled faces across the auditorium. The pensive frowns weren't exactly pensive. They were looking at the questions with absolute perplexity. I was standing in front of the projection screen, confident that my problems had...

I am what any Colombian would recognize as a Sancocho. I am 32% potato, 11% plantain, 2% cilantro, 16% chicken, 9% cassava, 5% corn, 17% meat, 8% avocado. I could say I am a little bit of everything, but I am a mixture of interests, skills, and...

As I deliberately draw back the taut string of my recurve bow, a faint groan from the strained wooden limbs manages to drown out the commotion of the hundreds of spectators and competing archers. I have attained a state of consummate mental...

The shrill sound of the rushing ambulance pierced the summer air. I hugged the blanket in my arms, stretching to see if the patient has arrived. The glass doors swished open and an entourage of paramedics rushed in. This time, it was an...

It’s 10:30 pm, yet the streets are still filled with cars, with the bustling pedestrians. It doesn’t feel like nighttime. The glare of LED store signs, the glow of open dental clinics, and the glimmer of the myriad of food stalls in the night...

I winced in aversion when the document loaded. Displayed before me was a dauntingly long list of bizarre names, obscure titles, and dates hundreds of years in the past. As I scrolled through the PDF, my disorientation only grew.

Earlier that day,...

“To combat organ trafficking, we must allow people to sell their kidneys!”

Being a Model United Nations delegate has opened my mind to new ideas, whether representing Suriname on the issue of child labor, Iran on the problem of organ trafficking,...

Since moving to Nashville five years ago, I’ve seen how meteoric growth can displace disadvantaged communities from necessary resources. Last summer, I shadowed at a public health lab, exploring the effectiveness of grassroots programs at...

I’ve always enjoyed taking my homework outside. Rice’s thousands of oak trees and expansive quads provide an excellent study environment, and perhaps I’ll sit under one and review notes from my Approaches to Social Policy course. Between outdoor...

Dustin couldn’t read. He knew letters, but not words. I saw him throw his book on the floor, a tired copy of Little Critter, as I plopped down in bus 75 seat 11, the unforgiving Mississippi sun burning through the left-hand window. I looked over...

Meet Julian, Eloise, Damien, Georgie, and Caesar; a few of my best friends. These friends have helped me through the brightest and the darkest days of my life. They inspire me to think creatively, comfort me during the low times, challenge me, and...

I clock my final break on a brutally hot June Thursday. Stepping outside for a phone call, I have one thing on my mind: what is Saturday’s verdict? Dave, my Eagle Project counselor, has been corresponding with Portland Parks and Recreation (PPAR)...