Newest College Application Essays

To my future roommate,

Over the summer, I became somewhat of a trail mix connoisseur. I discovered a deep love of trail mix while spending time in a residential program where I essentially subsisted on the stuff. It makes sense for me to want to...

I watched as eight people plummeted at the speed of lightning towards surefire slaughter. I watched lines of people eagerly waiting to embrace the same fate. I watched my sister giddy with excitement for her turn. Being voluntarily strapped to a...

When I was nine, my parents purchased a seemingly unspectacular piece of land. Eight years ago it was just mud and brick surrounded by a boundary wall. Today, it’s my home. Every weekend my father, an impassioned civil engineer, would drag me to...

Every Friday at seven a shouting match commences in my house. The same argument is dredged up week after week like clockwork but the end result is always different. Sides change and so do loyalties. Some days it’s children versus adults and on...

“Feminism is witchcraft.” someone said.

Adrenaline rushes through my body. Friends I’ve had for years vanish when we discover that we held polarizing stances on at least this issue and perhaps more. I found myself in a similar situation during...

After five years of cooking, I can confidently say that I am the master of burnt meat. As a middle schooler, I found the siren’s call for cooking when watching the show Chopped. After that first unforgettable attempt into cooking, I took it upon...

I sat stagnantly in confusion with Gabriel Garcia Marquez's "One Hundred Years of Solitude" open in my hands. Bewildered, I closed the book. On the cover, transcribed in glittering gold, was a sticker with the words: "Nobel Prize Winner!".

How did...

“This has to be the worst summer ever,” I thought to myself. The only television in our apartment broke.

Unsettled by pure boredom, I started to flip through books on the shelf. I read voraciously that summer, and became inevitably fascinated with...

Public speaking isn’t my forte and yet one day I found myself speaking in front of around 55 software engineers.

Now don’t get me wrong, I wasn’t terrified of public speaking, but I was never good at it. My legs would shake, my voice would quiver...

During P.E., my friend whispered to me that “Aunt Flo was visiting” and she didn’t have a pad. I took a pad from my backpack and handed it over to her, only for her to squeal “Don’t take it out so obviously!” Followed by, “I don’t have a pocket,...

I was ten when I saw a documentary on Haiti for the first time. There was one scene where a few refugees brawled, vigorously attacking each other. The reporter then revealed what they were fighting for: a moldy pile of bread.

For a piece of bread,...

I collect rocks.

I promise it isn’t as lame as it sounds.

On a winter afternoon, the wet mulch crunched under my feet as I walked towards the school bus after my third-grade field trip to the Boston Science Museum. My small, calloused hands held...

I once believed my extraordinary skill with numbers would take me to great heights and greater happiness. I was wrong.

Numbers- quantitative indicators, widely believed to factor the quality of one’s life - galvanized significant achievements, but...

The American Ballet Theater (ABT) Gillespie School parent/student meeting back in March started off with nothing exciting, nothing new. New drop off and pickup procedures. The June showcase. Spring evaluations. Yawn. But then the school’s artistic...

What if you were eighty-one years old when you saw a photo of yourself for the first time? Elma was.

We sounded joyless as we warbled, “Take me out to the balllllgame, take me out to the crowwdd, buy me some peanuts and crackerjacks…” our voices...

I possess superpowers that I inherited from my namesake, Geraldine, my dad’s late mother. Grandma Jeri was the daughter of Portuguese immigrants who worked on the pineapple plantations of Hawaii and the Pearl Harbor Naval Shipyard (during the 1941...

As kids living in Colorado suburbs, most of my friends and I rarely disagree with each other on politics. Fortunately, in my high school, my teachers come from a variety of different locations. And I love their different perspectives. In my AP...

Shang, Zhou, Qin, Han; Shang, Zhou, Qin, Han; Sui Tang Song, Sui Tang -

Suddenly, while I was singing the names of the ancient Chinese dynasties in preparation for my early morning Chinese class, I was interrupted by a flash of red and a blast of...

"Why are you so quiet?"

"Do you speak?"

Those few words would make the color of my pale cheeks turn to the brightest shade of red because they always sounded so judgemental. To many, it's only a simple question. Steaming curiosity formed from the...

“Shayna and Dominique, you can come see her now”.

The nurse’s grey scrubs complemented the calming atmosphere of the waiting room. My mom had just finished her surgery. My sister and I were finally allowed to see her after two hours of eating...

It took two hours to get home, a three mile drive that should have taken a few minutes. A drive we’d made countless times without thinking. But things were different now. Everything was different now. Dad presented his license to the National...

My mother is a high school dropout with a daughter at 16.

Sitting alone surrounded by grey-toned seats on my number five elementary school bus, my eyes are stuck to a large, bold letter “B” stamped onto a stark white piece of paper. I look up out...

I find it humorous when my family debates who looks more Asian versus White, me or my twin brother. My parents also joke that Brandon and I would be even taller or better at math had it not been for the “shortcomings” each contributed to our...

My stomach started itching uncontrollably when I was ten years old and in the middle of Mr. John’s fourth-grade class. I remember asking myself whether I had been bitten by a bug. The itching became unbearable and I sought permission from Mr. John...