Scholarship / The Mandalay Bay Shark Reef trip, scholarship prep essay [3]

Prompt in verbatim: Describe an experience that you have had or a concept you have learned about that intellectually excites you. When answering this question, you may want to consider some of the following questions: Why does this topic excite you? How does it impact the way you or others experience the world? What questions do you continue to ponder about it?

Living in the Las Vegas desert for the majority of my life, I had never once felt sand caked in between my toes, the waves of the ocean gently crash against my ankles, or the sea mist spray at the base of my neck. And so, when our fifth class visited Las Vegas's Mandalay Bay Shark Reef, it was my first literal glimpse into what I believed to be the closest I would ever get to experiencing the ocean from the constraints of the desert.

Prior to this pivotal moment in my childhood, I had ceaselessly romanticized aquatic life. My curiosity was sparked by visits to the local fish market where I saw tanks of live catfish mouthing out silenced pleas for help and piles of live crab pincing at unsuspecting customers. In school, I learned of the dolphin's use of echolocation to catch prey and the octopus's remarkable ability to solve complex puzzles. Ocean documentaries and most notably Shark Week on the Discovery Channel further exacerbated my unquenchable inquisitiveness. I found great pleasure in attempting to fathom a whole new blue realm of existence where life pulsed to the movement of the currents, claustrophobia entailed a swarm of mini jellyfish, and breathing meant drowning. Sometimes, when puddles remained as a reminder of a rare desert rainstorm, I would seek these puddles near sidewalks and foolishly expect to find a pool of bubbling aquatic life, thriving with hermit crabs and baby sea turtles. It was impossible to satiate my anxiousness for the ocean and I let my curiosity brew with potency.

My fifth grade field trip to the Mandalay Bay Shark Reef was marked by pure awe upon entering as I gaped at shallow tanks of docile piranhas, extraterrestrial jellyfish, and vicious-looking lemon sharks. Near the end of the exhibit stood an immense 30-foot glass wall meant to authentically immerse the viewer in the surreal depths of the ocean. Upon seeing it, my entire being shifted in posture and piqued in eagerness. I no longer had to imagine an underwater world of refracted sunlight and pillars of seaweed beneath closed eyelids, for that very world laid before me, with my eyes open and mind keen to soak it all in. Sawfish and stingrays casually glided by and a school of fish swiftly jetted past like a flock of birds migrating south. An array of raw life was flourishing before me and only a few inches of glass sundered my world from the world I had long sentimentalized since those fateful days I browsed the fish market. Imagination was no longer considered a form of compromise because reality had finally caught up. It was here. I had leaped into the ocean, sunk to the very bottom, and all I could do was embrace its beauty. It was real. I felt it, the poignant touch of the sea's gentle grasp. And yet I lived in a desert valley 293 miles from the Californian coastline.

Anything I can do to make it flow better? I feel like the ending is sloppy and my use of a thesaurus is very obvious in the second paragraph.

Undergraduate / QUESTBRIDGE NATIONAL MATCH ESSAY [4]

Prompt in verbatim: We are interested in learning more about you and the context in which you have grown up, formed your aspirations and accomplished your academic successes. Please describe the factors and challenges that have most shaped your personal life and aspirations. How have these factors caused you to grow? (800 word limit) *

We received the call at 8:43pm on January 24th, 2001. Rushing to the hospital clad in only pajamas and with thoughts of that day's school lesson still fresh in mind, we entered the waiting room anticipating the verdict that would arrive 3 hours later announcing that he slipped into a coma and later pronounced ...

Please address cohesiveness, sentence structure (I think I went a little crazy on the compound-complex form), and anything you see fit.

Scholarship / "the purpose of (my) art?" - QUESTBRIDGE SCHOLARSHIP ESSAY [2]

Evaluate a significant experience, achievement, risk you have taken, or ethical dilemma you have faced and its impact on you. (500 word limit)

Around the cafeteria stood twenty black-veiled panels, in each sat a representative from an art institution, a student whose portfolio was being critiqued, and a striking portrait of the student's thoughts on paper, canvas, or aluminum. Gathered in clumps near the panels, students cradled their portfolios, each eager for a turn to be criticized, ripped apart as an artist, and reconstructed as a better one in a brief, snipping 10 minute session. This was an art portfolio review night laden with constructive criticism, reassurance, and tears and I had my feet planted on the chopping block.

My first few portfolio critiques went efficiently, each representative offering basic bites of advice such as, "Be sure to spray fixative over your chalk pieces!" and "Always draw from real life. It enhances your perception of light." I remained intact and my spirit resolute, though disappointed at such harmless tips. After three critiques, I lined up for my final critique at a booth where a Chicago representatives sat, hoping for something gratifying. The session moved as protocol, and tips were drawn out at every 1.27 minute interval, as though it was rehearsed clockwork. As it drew to a close, the art reviewer punctuated the monotonous critique with a concluding, deafening line: "I think an artist's work should reflect his or her purpose. So I ask you: why? What is the purpose of your art?"

Caught off guard, the air left my lungs, startled at the compacted question. I awkwardly avoided eye contact and then met her gaze. At that point, she understood I had no answer and I swept my art pieces back into my portfolio, murmured a "Thank you, good bye," and left.

I collected my thoughts: what was the purpose of (my) art? Why would I pursue it? What was my message? I felt ashamed, desecrated, hollowed out by the reality of my own art. Following the critique, I could not draw for weeks. Quaking in my lack of purpose, I invested much time in rebuilding myself not only as an artist but as an individual from the scaffolding of what was left. Piece by piece, I questioned, reasoned, and reconstructed. Gradually, I regained my ambition to draw, but I never defined a narrowed purpose. After so many contemplative, sleepless nights and exposure to a variety of artists among my peers, my family, and art history, I reasoned that perhaps, like the multifaceted quality of art, the purpose of expression is not static. It is morphing, changing, yielding to impulse. If I were to initially define a single motive to pursue art, I would also cut myself off from the sheer possibilities outside of that distinct direction. To not have a purpose is to allow oneself to be lost. However, being lost in itself is crucial to allowing the blossoming of potentialities. For now, I content myself knowing that my drive to create is not necessarily absent, but rather fluctuating, capricious. "Why?" you might ask. "For the possibilities," I will answer.

I feel like I could definitely elaborate more about its impact on me, but I don't know which part of the intro to trim. Initially, the essay had 650 characters, so this is the "abridged" version and consequently the bare bones version.

Could someone please address my pairing of quotation marks and commas? I've forgotten the rules altogether :P

Undergraduate / "For you, I've devoted and risked my chromatids!" - Chicago - FIND X! essay prompt [7]

I avoided the overdone mathematical approach to the prompt and gave it a twist of my own. I initially thought it'd be too obscene to write about (after all, the narrative takes place in the testicles... I KNOW, I KNOW, just keep reading), but I feel like UChicago's quirky and unconventional attitude would warrant something like this. Please tell me what you think.

I'm aware that the essay isn't really reflective of my ambitions, goals, or personality, but I feel like my Common App main essay in addition to my Why Chicago? essay already accomplishes that.

Please address any glaring grammatical errors, spelling mistakes, awkward wording, or anything you see fit! Thank you! :)

"Why?" he asked himself.

Y was retracing a path back to his dorm in the rain, umbrella poised and coffee in hand. Y had just finished a mandatory weight training class to strengthen his chromatids. Attending "St. Y's Chromosomal Academy," a prestigious all-Y boarding school situated in the city of Spermatocytopia, Y had been rigorously taught to search for X, in the name of his livelihood and the honor of his family. Portraits depicting the infamous symbol hugged the walls of the school corridors. Chants of "Pledge of Allegiance to X" served as the patriotic backdrop to each of his mornings. His schoolmates were bound to the same pursuit: "You must find X." Yet, he never really understood why, for no one cared to tell him what would actually ensue upon discovering X. Hidden treasure? Immortality? Love? The schoolmaster, his instructors, and his own spermatogonia mother had been unnervingly vague, urging that finding X will "bring good things." But what good things? He and his classmates had been indoctrinated with a singular, unyielding purpose and yet no one dared to leak the potent question of "Why?" The irony of attending an academy for the education of Ys and yet never being pressed to ask the question of "Why?", he bitterly thought. Y had been entrusted with a mission without being trusted with its purpose.

He trudged on anyway.

Y excelled in his studies, outperformed his classmates at Science Bowl, and outpaced all of his rivals on the track. He devoted his Saturdays to feeding the homeless at the soup kitchen in the poorer sector of Chromosome 21 territory. He tutored the younger Y chromosomes at St. Y's lower division on Twenty-Third Street. He continued to pour his energies into achieving more, winning more, and volunteering more. Despite all these activities, the resounding query of "Why?" continued to rattle in his nucleus, echoing louder as graduation inched closer. After so much time devoted to understanding the intricacies of X, its monopoly on which genes it controlled, its beautifully interwoven anatomy, its delicately intersecting structure, he still did not understand its purpose in his life. Y had more commitments and achievements under his belt but scraped no closer to answering that monosyllabic, lethally critical question.

"WHY AM I SEARCHING FOR X!" he outwardly pleaded.

As though in response to the gravity of the question, the ground beneath his feet shook. Suburban streets cracked in jagged lines and mounds of concrete dislodged from sidewalks, shooting into the air. Wind swirling around him, Y was lifted off his chromatids and emerged into a vortex that shrouded him in darkness. His whole being was being propelled through a series of winding tunnels and tubes, leaving him in a cloud of vertigo and nausea. This might be it, he thought. Y closed his eyes, bracing himself for the oblivion of death. At that very moment, when all he wished for was complete solitude in nothingness, an excuse to wallow in his failure, the all-too-familiar symbol -"X"- flashed in his nucleus, as though mocking his unfinished quest. Only appropriate, Y thought.

However, the symbol was far from his imagination. Upon landing in a dim, humid chamber, his eyes jolted open to reveal, just beyond the scope of his vision, the very symbol illuminated under his eyelids seconds ago during his death wish. Only, it wasn't a mere caricature on flimsy paper nor was it a lifeless textbook rendition depicting the dissection of its parts. It was truly X, in the flesh, too elegantly constructed for even the most skilled of artists to capture. In the process of shrugging off the shock of finally finding his life's purpose, Y realized he was in a sea of fellow Y chromosomes wriggling toward his life's mission, all eager to claim the X chromosome as theirs. Y would not allow this to happen. Beyond the familiar sense of entitlement from having worked so tirelessly at St. Y's, Y pulsed with a powerful, instinctive desire to lay stake in what he felt was so righteously his. With cheetah-like prowess, Y lunged forward and, with the help of chromatids strengthened by years of varsity track, soon outdistanced himself from the competition. Speed serving him well, he saw his Y comrades as a perpetual blur. Every now and then, one of his classmates would try to violently thwart him, threatening his earlier desire of death. No one could be trusted in this barbaric battle for X. Swiftly dodging these hurdles, he jetted onwards, to his centromere's singular and true desire: the X chromosome.

Arriving near his destination, Y was halted by another obstacle: a robust, viscous orb of protein that encased X. Y was not the first of his kind to reach X; many were already digging fiercely at the waxy barrier. Following suit, Y thrusted his sharp chromatids at the blockade with the might of a savage. Y was determined, held spellbound by the prospect of uncovering the mysteries behind X. After much frustration and fallen tears, Y wore down the barrier enough to hear X's rilling voice. This only further fueled his resolve and, with a final, forceful jab forward, Y broke the film. X lay before him, as radiant as ever.

"For you, I've devoted and risked my chromatids! What could possibly be so important in uncovering you?"
"The exquisite possibility of life," shrewdly replied X.
But before Y could begin to retort, all things faded to black and the orb in which they were encased began to duplicate.

***

The union of X and Y, nine months later, yielded a flawless baby boy. His first coherent utterance turned out to sound, almost unmistakably, like the inquiry of "Why?"

And so the question lives on.