Undergraduate / "Our system of education" - issue of concern and its importance to you - Common App [3]

I'm not sure whether my essay answers the prompt adequately, so I was wondering if anyone could tell me if it doesn't.

The essay is around 1,400 words long, and I couldn't make it shorter because of the nature of the topic, if I understood it correctly, that is.

Topic: Discuss some issue of personal, local, national, or international concern and its importance to you.

Response:

Our world - Planet Earth, as we like to call it - is ridden with countless problems and mishaps, most of which are caused by us humans. These issues range from matters such as wars, poverty, disease and racism. Most, if not all, of these issues cannot be overcome in a single day. So, we must start working from now, even as individuals - at least to slow down the course of these calamities and find out how to control them, or better yet, stop them in their paths. Of course, not all issues are of great importance; some are more significant than others. Such difficulties are what I, and many others, refer to as 'hot topics'. Among these topics, I personally regard education as one of the most important problems of this time. Unfortunately, the level of education has been declining for a pretty long time. However, since we've been busy doing who-knows-what, we've failed to notice this depression and let it reach the point of (almost) no return. Don't fret, though - there still is hope. We can beat this problem if we work together, but before doing that we must pinpoint what the causes of this decline are. As is the case with many other crucial matters, several factors lie behind the waning in our system of education.

Firstly, let us begin with the factor that causes the most impact on education - mainstream entertainment. Now, you may be asking - what do I mean by 'entertainment'? The entertainment I'm referring to consists of three main branches, in a descending order of impact: games, music and movies. Try asking a student these days about any one of the above, or better yet, try having an informal conversation with him/her about either one of them. You'll be surprised at what he or she knows. Actually, the student would be happy to yap about either one for the whole day, if possible. On the other hand, try asking the same student about what he/she learned at school or which subject he/she despises the most. In most scenarios, you'll get the replies "I don't remember" and "Mathematics"; respectively. So, what does this mean? Is this bad? Well, simply put, it means our future is in the hands of a bunch of game and music addicts who hate mathematics, a subject that happens to be the core of most professions.

Secondly, these days, most children and teenagers find reading books an extremely boring pastime in comparison with playing a game or listening to some music. This decline in reading makes students less informed about the world around them and, consequently, makes them partially ignorant people. Of course, if you asked them on which day a certain actor was born, they would be glad to answer. But let's look at the bright side for a moment - what about the people who do read? Well, most of these people, even though they are low in number, prefer reading books or acquiring information in a digital format. With the rise of iPads, Kindles, Nooks and similar gadgets, people are now moving further and further away from the traditional reading medium. I am well aware that this is not entirely a bad thing, but I believe books are superior, especially because of the fact that they are a lot more tangible. You can feel a book, hold a book, place it on a shelf once you're done with it, and even take whiff of its papery odor. On the other hand, when you have a whole collection of "e-books" in a small and fragile digital device, it doesn't even remotely feel genuine - it feels more like you possess a bunch of fake books. Although it may be true that these modern devices provide a whole lot more portability and are home to options that can be extremely useful at times, we cannot ignore the fact that information began in the form of books, and as such, we should at least try to read a "real" book from time to time.

Lastly, school curriculums and, more importantly, teachers are not the same as they were before. If you take a look at how education was like at the beginning of the 20th century, you'd be surprised at the difference. For instance, according to Thomas Sowell's book Inside American Education: The Decline, the Deception, the Dogmas, around that time, students finishing the 8th grade studied vocabulary words such as "elucidation" and "panegyric". In addition to extremely difficult vocabulary words, they were obliged to study arithmetic problems way above their age-level. Nowadays, the aforementioned words aren't even included in 12th grade vocabulary. Furthermore, according to studies conducted in the 1980s, the lowest SAT, ACT and GRE scores in the United States were, and still are, held by teachers. From this piece of information, we can deduce that teachers are usually the people who didn't, or more likely couldn't, do well academically. So if an increasing proportion of the people who teach us lack intelligence, won't most students turn out like their mentors? To find out, let us consider an average student who plays games, hates reading and expanding his/her knowledge, and is taught how to think by a person who most likely has no goals in place for his teaching career. How do you think this student's future will be like? Will it be an ambitious life full of success and excellence? Or will it be just an average life with nothing unique about it?

We now know the main factors that led to this ever-worsening issue, so we can start looking at ways to avoid them. First and foremost, we have to control how much entertainment our children consume, especially at the beginning of their lifetime. We also have to make sure not to go to the other extreme: completely restricting children from these types of gadgets/games. So there has to be a certain level of freedom. Otherwise, if we completely banned children from gadgets during their youth, they would eventually find out and become more obsessed with them later in life. Thus, we should try to use the method of replacement; for example, instead of giving children a violent and addictive game to play, we could give them one which is a lot more conservative.

Secondly, we have to make our children fall in love with books and encourage their reading them. There are many ways to achieve this, including reading stories to them before going to bed and regularly buying them books to keep them busy. I cannot emphasize enough on the fact that this should all be accomplished during the early stage of a child's lifetime. Why? Because later on in the child's life, external influences, such as 'cool' friends, cause the child to detest books and never really regard them as crucial parts of education. I know this as a fact because I've witnessed it happening first-hand.

Finally, we have to demand certain qualities in the teachers that teach our children and the books that are used to teach them. For instance, there should be more hands-on work with children of all ages, and the requirements to become a teacher should be a bit more challenging. This way, people will not become teachers unless they're motivated enough and are worthy of carrying the weight of the next generation on their shoulders. Furthermore, curriculums should be intensified and should cover basic and advanced topics alike. Instead of making students memorize mathematical formulas, books should show them how these formulas were thought of in the first place. This can help students understand the formula, rather than show them how to blindly plug values into it. Variations of this technique can and should be applied to other subjects as well, and not only in mathematics.

Hopefully, you're now a bit more aware of how much down the line the educational system has gone over the past couple of years, and have a basic understanding of the key factors that caused it. Always remember - if each one of us works on solving this problem and spreads the message to other people, we can definitely emerge from this struggle with a triumphant smile on our faces and the cozy feeling that we made a step in the right direction for the future of mankind. Truth be told, it is definitely not an easy fight to win, but by arming ourselves with persistence and knowledge, victory will be a lot easier to accomplish.

Undergraduate / "To avoid becoming a sheep" - Common App Essay - Second try [4]

I'm not really good with conclusions, so please tell me if it isn't sufficient.

Topic: Evaluate a significant experience, achievement, risk you have taken, or ethical dilemma you have faced and its impact on you.

Every morning, I wake up to the sight of sheep: sheep getting into their cars, sheep rushing to work and sheep carrying their backpacks and heading to school. These 'sheep' are the people who have no definite aims in life: all they do is move with the flow. If the flock finds a patch of nice grass to graze in, they blindly follow. Likewise, if a new style of jeans is out, they gladly imitate their peers, thinking that doing so makes them 'cool'. As a consequence, the things these people do are extremely predictable, and observing and living with such single-minded people gets to you eventually.

Since I'm lucky enough to be able to discern these patterns in human beings, my first aim in life is to definitely avoid becoming a sheep. To achieve this aim, I make sure my social life is not the key to my living, and can be started anew if necessary. I also make sure I have a set of goals in place for the present and future, and, most importantly, I aim for success, and nothing but success. By using this set of rules and sticking to it, I am capable of setting myself apart from the rest of the flock, and eventually, succeeding in life.

Truth be told, adapting my mindset to be able to interact with the people around me and simultaneously fulfill my goals hasn't been an easy task; that is, I was required to take to the road step by step. The first step of the long journey leading to the realization of my aspirations was reading. Since I started learning the English language, I was fascinated by books. I regarded them in awe, and looked at them like they contained the key to infinite knowledge. From that point onwards, I read. And I read... and read... and read even more. I read books of all genres and subjects. I read fiction and non-fiction alike. I read about history, geography, archaeology, astronomy, and I even read dictionaries and atlases. The books I read were utterly unrelated and seemed out of the ordinary for a boy of my age. But the information I gathered during those years has benefited me a lot, and is still aiding me until this day. In my own way, I found out that there is no limit to the amount you can read, nor is there a limit to the amount of information your mind can absorb. The possibilities are endless.

Understanding everything around me and applying it to daily life was the second step. This consisted of constantly reading newspapers, watching the news, and more recently, reading several blogs on the Internet. I continued enhancing my 'library' of information by reading several books and watching several documentaries on current happenings in the world, pertaining to topics such as conspiracy theories and loopholes in the global economic system. I took only what I deemed rational from these theories and claims, and formed my own way of thinking; my own mindset. This steady flow of information also keeps my mind working, and increases my knowledge of the world further and further. This flow also helps me pinpoint flaws in my way of life, and from there, I try my best to fix them. For instance, recently, I learned that a sharp and resourceful mind is not enough to attain success. Therefore, I began training the physical aspects of my body to achieve an optimal combination of both mind and body. By mixing and matching all of the above, I have reached a near-perfect lifestyle that keeps me as far as possible from outer influences and allows me to improve day by day. Of course, this lifestyle still requires some fine tuning; that, I will hopefully be working on in the coming years.

The last step of the journey is the step I haven't reached yet, and that is university. University is my gateway to the world, and there, I will be able to work on and fulfill my goals to the utmost of my capability. I'm also confident that I will find other ambitious people out there who will either help me, or challenge me at what I intend to do. I just hope that you didn't get the idea that I'm the type of person who thinks he's above all - a narcissist. On the contrary - I am absolutely positive that there are thousands of people who are far more superior to me, and will provide me with a challenge that I cannot refuse.