Newest College Application Essays

The summer before my junior year, I watched my grandparents working on the far side of the lawn, shoveling compost and mounds of grayish soil over freshly seeded patches. It was a strangely perceptive moment: glistening beads of sweat ran over...

Half-priced bread, two-dollar savings on Reese’s Peanut Butter Cups, and free eggs: it all adds up. This is the maxim I repeat to myself daily as I attempt to save money for my education. Indeed, the use of coupons and rebates to offset everyday...

In exploring the Western literary canon, I’ve noticed a clear link between felines and mortality. For instance: why do cats have nine lives? Why is the archetypal “cat lady” usually an elderly spinster? And why does Schrödinger's cat only exist in...

Don't expect me to laud a murder job too often! It is certain that my mother would have baulked at the prospect of me reading 'The Orient Express’ by Agatha Christie. However, there is a transcendent attraction between a drowsy child on a humid...

For me the world can have a strangely retentive quality, in which certain places represent the nerve points of my past. When I think of my childhood, I think of the room where I took art lessons, where I first met my art teacher. I see a floral...

I became a magician at age seven.

Standing before my friends, I plucked coins from elbow bends and crushed dandelion heads into painted buttons. Green hair ties ripened to rich plum hues. Cards flipped up and hoisted themselves into the air,...

I walked on land that was supposed be a stream. I stood with people who were supposed to be ‘animals’. Well, I myself wasn’t really supposed to be there at all, for Makoko, an unrecognized community, is a cradle of crime in Lagos. Swarms of...

It was my turn to speak.

The Korean girl across the table and I had spent the past hour in a back-and-forth of stilted conversation. Our pre-collegiate institute had demanded that all disciplines “mingle,” and the silence told a story of two...

The smell of a Nigerian Christmas is intoxicating. The sulphur-like pungency in the air tells of nearby fireworks. Or is it egusi soup simmering on an open fire surrounded by friends and relatives? For once, whilst on holiday with my family in a...

Growing up in an ultra-liberal town just outside of San Francisco’s Bay Area, I have become accustomed to the long-running joke in my school that it’s easier to be gay than it is to be Republican. As an openly bisexual Democrat, I would both agree...

I sat in the ornate home of my teammate’s mom, an established Palestinian surgeon, when she said, “I wish someone had killed them all.” I just finished asking this woman how the Israeli-Palestinian Conflict impacted her life, and was shocked at...

The pit yawned beneath my feet, over 50m deep and 200m in diameter. I stood at its edge, an infinitesimal figure at the boundary of endless filth and decay. I realised, with growing dread, that we had indeed come to Jakande; we had come to the...

It is often thought that the fastest route to Carnegie Hall is practice. I would never discredit the importance of practice, knowing its vitality in my own vocal development, but I believe confidence is equally important to success for any...

Telling my peers that I intern at a morgue catches them by surprise; typically, they look at me in bewilderment. Many question why I would want to do something like this. But I honestly do not think they would react with such astonishment if they...

From the time I was able to grasp the basic concepts of the body’s organ systems in elementary school, to my study of the laws of Isaac Newton and the applications of Le Châtelier's Principle, I have always been enraptured by the sciences. Even...

"Hurry, everyone, she's here!"

The children started running towards the door. As you can imagine, I turned around to see who all the fuss was about. There was no one behind me. Suddenly, I was encircled by a knot of small arms pulling me away...

My choir director points at me, whispering, “You’re next.” Those daunting words make me falter back to my chair. As I wait for my turn, my hands start trembling with fear. I immediately slap my wrist hard enough for the choir director to turn...

It begins with an itch, a malignant rash of fire and ice water running down my neck and arms. My heartbeat is a steady rhythm in my ears and my tongue is coated in lead. I have told a lie: an act that is contradictory to my nature.

I was six years...

Watching out at the Mediterranean Sea, I get a kick out of each nibble of the kolokithakia tiganita my Yiayia had made for lunch. In the little angling town of Methoni, Greece, my grandma meanders through her garden every day, choosing stout...

Picture me, the morose infant, drowning in copious amounts of wedding lace fabric. I am perched on my mother’s hip as she chats amiably to another guest. Eyes pinched and lips puckered, I am a tempest held at bay only by the bottle of Coca-Cola I...

I live in Saratoga, California: the sunny land of tutors, prep centers, and SAT classes. Everywhere you drive there are signs offering the best discounts, the best teachers, the best results. I always wondered, however, why my community didn’t...

A house is a trove of memories; a source of dignity and pride; the essence of security - or at least it's supposed to be. When my family was evicted from our fading domicile on Alexander Street, I began to question my right to the city I called...

One thing remains constant from London to Krakow to Ambala Cantt. Regardless of how far one roams, the Law of Moments will remain in effect. Facts such as these were very comforting to my younger self. No matter how many despondent children I...

The trick to picking a perfect peach is simple: Gently squeeze the chot (stem and fruit junction); if the inside of the fruit is juicy and dark yellow, carefully roll the fruit and pull while holding the stem to avoid bruising.

After nine summers,...