Newest College Application Essays

My grandfather unknowingly helped define who I am today when he gifted me with a computer ten years ago. I am certain that he could not fully understand how that technology worked, but I believe he had a vision about how important this gift would...

Midnight. I peel myself from my desk, feebly creeping towards the scale. Whispering a prayer of desperation, I step on, my exhausted heart racing, and the reading declares a death sentence: two pounds over. That’s one power bar, half a banana, a...

My primary purpose for entering the Master's program is to gain additional knowledge that will allow me to become a better English teacher at the middle or high school level, or possible at the college level in time. I feel confident that I could...

A person I would be interested in meeting would be Ms. Lise Meitner, an Austrian physicist whose work led to the creation of the atomic bomb. I have always been intrigued about how she might have viewed her scientific discovery and her role in...

Though I am a white male who has grown up in the predominantly uniform communities of Englishtown and Monroe, my life experiences have been far from homogeneous or commonplace. My deep commitments to different clubs and organizations have deeply...

I grew up overseas, frequently visited my home country of Bangladesh, and have interacted with a great variety of people – all experiences that have shaped the person I am today. I have traveled to over twenty countries and lived for an extended...

Archimedes once said, “Give me a firm place to stand and I will move the earth.” Similar sentiments resonate within my mind as I embark on the penultimate round of my race to my goals. Strength is the lot of a few good men, but perseverance sifts...

As I stared out the thick glass windows of the Norman Manley International Airport, tears washing down my cheeks, the plane took off. It hit me: my mother was leaving. I was only nine years old, with the heavy load of separation on my shoulders....

When we were young, we were all asked what we wanted to be in the future. Some of us said a firefighter, some said an engineer or a lawyer, and the some even said school janitor. However, I only had one goal for my future. For me, all those hours...

In retrospect, bouncing out from beneath my comforter as I awoke that balmy seventh of June, I don’t remember feeling so much as a pound of fate’s weight on my scrawny ten-year-old shoulders. Instead, I closed my eyes and breathed in the sweet...

More than anything, the past three years of my life have taught me that the journey, not the destination, matters most. Three years ago, I was frantically trying to conjure up a college essay that would make me stand out from other applicants –...

Cowardice surged through me as Emma sneered down at me. Her eyes pierced my own, seemingly oblivious to the glints of sunlight through the boughs of the shadowy trees.

“Apologize!” Emma demanded, and I trembled. Raising my hand to shield my eyes...

I walk into the darkened nave of the church, ascend the steep incline between the pews, and stop at the vacant and quiet sanctuary. At the top of my climb is an illuminated room full of lively preschool children chattering with one another and...

“Hey fat kid, get the ball!” That’s a comment I heard a lot at my old elementary school, along with comments like “Nice earring, dork,” or “Go play with someone else.” But after all the insults and name calling, today I still know and talk to the...

My mother often reminded me that nothing good would ever come from playing video games. As a young child, I dismissed her words as baseless propaganda to coerce me into doing more chores. After all, I was having plenty of fun catching Pokemon on...

Although I do not affiliate myself with any particular religion, I have been a Buddhist nun at temples and an altar server at Christian churches. I can chant the meditations of Buddha in Thai and Sanskrit and recite Catholic prayers in English and...

The cordial bustle that perpetually flowed through the diner no longer flowed. Conversations stopped. Waitresses stood still, and the clinks and clanks of silverware could no longer be heard. All that I could hear were the dismal tones of “Taps,”...

During the summer of 2007, I worked at a swimming pool, coaching the swim team, giving swim lessons, and lifeguarding. Early on, I realized that this summer job would demand more from me, and in turn give back a lot more, than I had initially...

Nonchalantly browsing through family photos, I hastily flip through the pages when I suddenly get a paper cut. Blood slowly flows from a small slit on my finger and onto the plastic film. The blood lands on a particularly bland picture--but it...

“Hey Sheldon, did you clean the horse pens yet?” Few people hear this question on an average basis. For me, however, it's something I hear very often--but, at the same time, it is only one aspect of my life. Many people think of me more as a city...

I used to run rampant in bicycle gangs of five or six, tearing up the streets lined with quaint suburban duplexes. I can still feel the chilly air tainted with the smell of pine trees flowing through my untamable hair. Our fleets of first-graders...

June 4th 2006

5:50am

The volunteers in the red shirts direct us to enter our corrals. It's race time. Twenty-three thousand of us cram into our assigned areas and stand shoulder-to-shoulder, no room to move. I know what lies in wait—fifty-four...

At the turn of the twenty-first century, the United Nations committed to eradicating poverty by the year 2025. Many foreign nations were skeptical at first and believed that such an ambitious goal was unattainable. But over the past twenty-five...

Del Kon tee. Everything takes time.

Whispered and spoken to me in hundreds of instances, it took me seventeen years to comprehend the essence and purpose of this phrase. Surrounded by sounds that many children my age have only heard in war movies,...