Vanderbilt University

“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,...

University of Pennsylvania

A cow gave birth and I watched. Staring from the window of our stopped car, I experienced two beginnings that day: the small bovine life and my future. Both emerged when I was only 10 years old and cruising along the twisting roads of rural...

Vanderbilt University

Moving homes is never fun, but the first time I stepped into our new neighborhood, my feelings could be best described as disorienting, if you want to be nice. The small, gray houses were a stark contrast to those found in my old suburban...

University of Rhode Island

As a careless child with no worries besides what my Barbie was wearing to our next tea party, I never cared enough about appearance or culture to be bothered by the clear difference between me most of my classmates. Despite the various lessons we...

Saint Joseph's University

Sprachgefühl. A word introduced to me by author Kory Stamper, in her book Word by Word: The Secret Life of Dictionaries. Sounds like the most exciting book ever, doesn’t it? A friend gave this book to me for my sixteenth birthday. My sweet...

University of Central Florida

I have fallen in love with Thursdays. Why? Because I volunteer in the ER at Cleveland Clinic in Weston, Florida, constantly madcap organization, a symphony of coughing and wheezing, as well as electric energy. Whether it is consoling patients or...

McGill University

The humid morning breeze pulls me down 7th Avenue, the anticipation gnawing at my stomach. Glaring billboards advertising Calvin Klein Jeans, Disney Movies, and Starbucks Coffee surround me; however, only one sign truly catches my eye with its...

Dartmouth College

Growing up, I loved to watch magicians. Amazed at their impossible tricks, I wanted to be a magician myself. Then, I discovered medicine. Pulling cards out of thin air? I studied penicillin instead. Levitating objects? The respiratory system was...

Washington University in St. Louis

After visiting concentration camps in Poland, I became deeply intrigued by the human aspects of World War II. Even though it was difficult, even painful, to learn about what happened to my ancestors, the experience was valuable because it nurtured...

Boston University

"It's all we doctors can do," my dad told me as we stood in the sunbaked dirt watching dying tadpoles flop feebly in the quickly evaporating puddle, "We can't change the course of nature, we can't change the fate of the dying, but we can give them...

Georgetown University

“You’re not the boss of me!” my younger brother taunts as I attempt to make him return a toy that he took from our youngest sibling. Meanwhile, another brother sits on the couch, laughing at all of the commotion going on. As the instigator of this...

University of California - Santa Barbara

It was a sizzling September day. I was behind a table at the Club Fair handing out shiny, glazed donuts. My peers meandered by with their giant plates of stromboli as I attempted to convince them to sign up for Jewish Club.

My biggest leadership...

Cornell University

On our wall at home, there hangs a poster that reads "Mathematics knows no races or geographic boundaries, for mathematics, the cultural world is one country". This paraphernalia comes courtesy of my father - a math professor who would never let...

University of Southern California

Lodhi Garden, New Delhi’s most scenic historic park, is visited by a diverse group of people every day: politicians, businessmen, doctors, and also the occasional celebrity. And of course, me!

In the midst of hectic examinations or on quiet breezy...

Virginia Commonwealth University

After completing an hour of training with the overworked nurses of Johnston-Willis Hospital, I acquainted myself with Holly, a frail ninety year old woman who, along with fighting terminal cancer, was recovering from a stroke that also impaired...

Tulane University Law School

Adolescent boys hurl Molotov cocktails at uniformed soldiers. Snipers target innocent travelers on deserted highways. Corpses sag from the windows of shattered buses. Macabre scenes such as these characterize how Israel is portrayed in the global...

Yale University

The guitar has a voice like no other in one’s soul. Its voice is soft and intimate when its player feels likewise yet also fiery and vehement given the slightest bit of oomph. When I play, I feel as if the guitar is really the one with emotion and...

Brigham Young University

We moved to a different house again. For the eighteenth time.

It had been a Saturday when my father made his grand announcement that we were moving again. I had been eating at the dinner table with my six siblings, and I almost choked. Grinning,...

University of Pennsylvania

6, 7, and 7500: Behold the three numbers that will define my academics at the University of Pennsylvania College of Arts and Sciences! I explore what I love to learn no only through the classes on path to a major, but also through the innumerable...

St. John's University

Wake up, shots fired.

Go out, be kidnapped.

Buy food… there’s none.

A rich country that evolved into a third world country in the blink of an eye. Venezuela, that’s where I lost my childhood innocence. Forced to grow up, forced to take actions....

University of Pennsylvania

Bang! I am deafened by the sound of a gunshot, and suddenly I see hundreds of fourth-graders sprinting towards me. I am temporarily mesmerized by the massive blob of energy consisting of tiny legs moving in unison and tight fists swinging with...

Florida Southern College

"My-my-my name is Te-Teddy."

My presentation about France to my fifth-grade class turned sour from the beginning. I knew what words I wanted to say, and my mouth was moving, but no words were coming out. As the students grew impatient and...