Notes

1. Why Brown?

“Yes, I FINALLY did it!” I screamed to my mom and sister. “300,000 points in the bank!” I had just unlocked a new achievement on KhanAcademy, “WorkHorse,” by watching 1000 videos.

“You LIKE to learn?” My younger sister asked me skeptically as if learning for the love of learning was a notion she had never heard of.

I believe Brown will nurture my desire to learn. It will foster it, with its open curriculum and open-minded and kind students. Brown will help me continue learning by encouraging me to take risks and push boundaries without fear of failure.

2. Tell us where you have lived - and for how long - since you were born; whether you've always lived in the same place, or perhaps in a variety of places.

Back and forth, day and night, I journeyed between two separate sides of the same person: two homes where I belonged, two homes where I was required to be. “After school, go to dad’s house to do homework. Evening, back to mom’s to eat dinner and sleep.” I told myself again and again. In the process of going back and forth, I often lost papers, homework, and belongings. I live a two-sided life: passed back and forth between my divorced parents like a doll, my time is split and my life is split.

3. We all exist within communities or groups of various sizes, origins, and purposes; pick one and tell us why it is important to you, and how it has shaped you.

“Since birth, we’ve raised you and you can’t do this for us?” Normally kind and loving, my parents spoke to me with disappointment and shame. I had just told them I would no longer be pursuing a career in medicine.

For me, being Chinese and Vietnamese means high expectations across the board. I’ve seen many friends and relatives grow up and attain those things that are prided in an Asian household: the prestigious university and stable job - the whole “package,” essentially. When I talk with them, I see emptiness - and that’s not a life I want to live.

4. Please briefly elaborate on one of your extracurricular activities or work experiences.

As ASB Vice-President, I was always envisioning ideas for school and figuring out how to implement them. I revamped the leadership curriculum to introduce the discussion of social issues and started the first ever annual digital media campaign to raise ticket sales for homecoming.

Student government is important to me because it taught me to see things as a whole. When things were not functioning, I took great pride in understanding the challenges and facilitating conversation. By striving to solve issues with open and honest communication, I helped to create a positive classroom environment for everyone.

In all aspects of my position, I was able to bring my vision to life by supporting other officers and the leadership class. My work as ASB was extremely rewarding because of the satisfaction that came from tangibly seeing my efforts validated and being given the space to bring new ideas to the table.

5. Why are you drawn to the area(s) of study you indicated earlier in this application?

Recently, a friend of mine asked me, “So you love to code?... What’s so special about typing into a computer?” Asking a computer programmer that is analogous to asking an author, “So you love to write?... What’s so special about putting your pencil on a piece of paper?” It’s not the coding or the writing that is special to me, it is the thought process behind it. It is the creative solution-based thinking and the critical thinking skills that appeal to me - the adrenaline rush that comes when a code is compiled.

I love computer science - I love the myriad of ways that I can solve a problem. I love that each problem has its own nooks and crannies and challenges me to think creatively and efficiently. With code, life seems limitless; code is my medium of expression and a vital part of my identity.














Why am I comfortable sharing all of this?

Brown was an interesting case for me. Throughout October and November, I obsessed over perfecting my UC app. I called all of my cousins and got them to help me edit my essays. In retrospect, I let them influence me too much, and my essays no longer felt like they were mine. Come December, and I had to focus on scholarship applications (didn’t want to die from student loans). This left me no time to apply to private colleges (wasn’t too worried about it because I wouldn’t be able to afford any of them anyway).

Fast forward to the morning of Brown’s application deadline; I sat at my laptop in the morning thinking to myself, “Should I apply to Brown? I mean I only have a few hours to write their essays. I think I’ll be screwed…” But then I remembered that I could reuse my essays from the UC app! I was saved!

Well, not exactly. What do you know… Of course, Brown’s essay prompts had to be unique, and the essays I had already written were not applicable. At that point, my thought process was as follows: “I’m screwed. Well, I wasn’t going to get into Brown anyway. And honestly, my dream school ever since I was little was UCLA, and it’s so much cheaper, so I don’t know why I’m wasting my time applying to these privates. Also, I’d miss my mom and family if I moved out to the east, so I should just scrap it. Maybe I’ll just spend a couple hours writing whatever I can for these essays, submit the application, and just be done with it.”

And that’s all I did. I sat down, poured my heart and soul into these four essays and just went for it. All I did was express my thoughts and feelings. All those college prep books I had read, all 200+ of those college essays I read the summer before — I discarded all of that knowledge. I wrote from my heart, and as a result, I captured the essence of who I was. The craziest part? No one alive has seen these essays except for me. I didn’t want to let anyone touch these because I didn’t want to go through the effort of incorporating their feedback (I mean why go through the effort to get rejected right?). Also, I didn’t want to hear any of my friends telling me that my essays were “too out there” and too weird or unconventional. I just didn’t want to hear any of it.

I’m sharing this to explain one thing about the college admissions process: there really is no formula. Some things may work for some people – that doesn’t mean they’ll work for you. Sure, you can copy and paste, and use these essays for your own application, but what good will it do? They’re not literary masterpieces; all they are are fragments of my personality, pieces of my mind. The interview, my application, my extracurricular activities, my essays, my letters of recommendation – they all comprise parts of my identity, and together they form the bigger picture that is me. So for those out there embarking on the college admissions journey, don’t be afraid to be yourself. We’re told by society that we need to be more than just us – that we need to be these ambitious superstars, that we NEED to be a certain way to get into college, but it’s not true. Be yourself, and things will fall into place.