<p>Hello All!,
I am currently applying to a plethora of Texas and California Schools including Berkeley, UCLA, Stanford, Rice, and UT Austin. If I could have help deciding which of my two essays are better for the common app, and revisions of the two essays for the UC Application, I would be beyond happy. The essays are as follows:</p>
<p>Prompt: Describe the world you come from for example, your family, community or school and tell us how your world has shaped your dreams and aspirations. </p>
<p>For the first half of my life, I lived in Atlantis, a place under sheer enchantment in which I faced little to no hardship and had excess help to alleviate any of my stresses. Yet, on a day at the end of the sixth grade, I was reintroduced to someone who grew up in what one could call, the opposite of Atlantis, and in this case, the law that states that opposites attract applied only to science.
Id met Lola only once when I was five in the Philippines after the death of her husband Lolo. She differed greatly from my Grandmother on my dads side primarily because of culture. About seven years after that visit, Lola came to live with us, her family. The differences of American and Filipino culture were strikingly obvious in the beginning and she and I feuded often yet time heals all wounds and after many months I took the place of her comforter of Lolo.
As a comforter Ive experienced her emotions vicariously as shes lived them. The happiness of the unity of a family, the excitement of the discovery of a thrift store, and the sadness that accompanied her solitude from her culture and country. Home is where the heart is, and since Lola was far away from her heart, I did whatever I could to make the house she lived in, her home. Along with this came the vicarious experiences of her heart ache of not being able to go back to the Philippines for years at a time, her frustration with a vastly different language, her loneliness in a house with no people, and above all, her sadness when her body started to fail.
Through her frustrations with a new culture I stood as her voice box, helping her make decisions, pay for items and negotiate with individuals. Through her heart ache from her estrangement from the Philippines I made international calls that she couldnt make, accompanied her to Filipino-American events, and made sure that she could preserve her propensities in our house at all times no matter who was there. Through her loneliness in the daytime when others were at work or school, I made sure that I could be with her at every second that I was able to and help her with new ventures with gardens or sewing that she wanted to do. And lastly through her sadness at the failing of her hips, joints, muscles, and sight, I made sure to that she would take her pills every single day, massage her wherever she was hurting, apply all of her gels, carry her things, read her what she couldnt see, and most frequently sew the thread through her myriad amount of needles before every project.
Above all tasks that I do, sewing the thread through the needle seems to be the one most symbolic to me. Me threading the needle seems to characterize me and Lolas relationship. I am the thread and she is the needle and after properly threaded we stitch up her wounds together. Above all Lola has taught me that I am the needle-threader. I am the one whos precision and effort can make a difference in this world if I can focus enough to slide through the small opening of any goal I have. My grandmother has taught me that precision and focus are what it takes to achieve dreams dreams of helping those who can often not help themselves. I am the needle-threader, the one who sees an almost impossible goal and finds a way to get through it. </p>
<p>Prompt: Tell us about a personal quality, talent, accomplishment, contribution or experience that is important to you. What about this quality or accomplishment makes you proud and how does it relate to the person you are?</p>
<p>One year ago, Chapin High’s Principal repeated a common phrase to me, yet the effect of it was highly uncommon. She simply said that leadership is not tested when times are easy and everything goes perfectly, it’s tested through hardship, when things don’t go your way - how you cope with that defines your leadership. What she said really described the entire Student Council year for me. I pictured my first term as the Chapin Student Council (StuCo) President to be dynamic, impactful, and incomparable. Looking back on the year, it was very dynamic, immensely impactful, and incomparable to any other experience I’ve been through, yet these successes were harder than I could have ever imagined.
Almost instantaneously I learned that leadership doesn’t follow a straight line to a goal, it could drive someone through circles before the simplest mission is achieved. At the start of my term, the StuCo Manager of thirteen years retired, leaving me with a completely new advisor with a completely new perspective. After I won my election as President, I was filled with excitement and ready to take a virtually unknown Student Council to the next level. I was ecstatic over all of the possibilities for the new year yet over and over again I’d find myself frustrated because of the implications that kept me from leading my StuCo to easy success. On my journey I’d face constant struggles with pessimistic attitudes, differing opinions, constant high school drama, unreliable co-officers, but most of all, failures to create vicarious visions of the possible success StuCo could achieve. Included in these hardships was the time sucked up by floods of AP homework, the exhaustion after track practices, and other extracurricular activities. While others ceased to persist in the struggle, I didn’t and although I couldn’t accomplish every single thing on my list of changes, I succeeded with most of them: one battle at a time.
Other than the countless pep rallies, teacher and staff appreciation, school board meetings, environmental education projects, anti-drug and alcohol projects, and faculty speeches, I’ve led my StuCo to raise over $40,000 worth of community, state, national, and global donations. I’ve led my chapter of StuCo to be the first ever El Paso County Student Council District Officer from Chapin, and led Chapin Student Council to achieve state recognition as an Outstanding Student Council. Personally, I am the first junior to be a Student Council President at Chapin, the first El Paso County Student Council Officer Representative from Chapin High School, and have been selected as one of four out of hundreds of applicants to serve as a Junior Counselor at the Trinity University Summer Leadership Camp under the current Texas Student Council State President Advisor.
Ultimately, you reap what you sow, and although the drought of struggles held me back, I overcame obstacles that only I could understand: obstacles that have taken Chapin StuCo to places it’s never been. Powering through these battles has formed me into my own leader and above all, I’ve learned that leadership is based off of passion. If you’re not passionate, no fruit will bear, yet if you are genuinely passionate about what you’re doing, then you’re leadership will develop and grow, and if you use this leadership for the right causes, you will make a difference in everyone and everything you make contact with, directly and indirectly.</p>