Undergraduate / KOD: Knowledge on Display - Kalamazoo Supplemental Essay [7]

Prompt: Explain how Kalamazoo College's approach to education will help you explore your ideas

The closest comparison I can draw to the K-Plan is of my second semester freshmen year. My freshmen year we had a project called KOD: Knowledge on Display.

We were tasked with choosing a single topic from our Ancient History class that our professor would cover during the year and presenting it in front of the class. But it wasn't like a normal exposition essay and presentation, we were given four months to complete a single assignment that would count as 50% of our term grade, and 50% of our exam grade.

What happened next was a flurry of activity that consisted of eighty fourteen year olds panicking, 90 pages of research notes, 30 petri dishes, 2 reports, 1 voice over video, and and an A+ on the exam and on the term. Our teacher gave us a sink or swim situation, but didn't leave us treading water, we got hands on experience in researching, primary sources, and language. My topic: The Black Plague (c. 1300's) forced me to expand beyond Latin class and to delve into the naming of bacterium's like yersinia pestis.

Undergraduate / "I used to hate piano" - University of Michigan-Ann Arbor Supplemental Essay! [3]

If you could only do one of the activities you have listed in the Activities section of your Common Application, which one would you keep doing? Why? (Required for all applicants. Must be under 150 words)

I used to hate piano, I detested practicing, I'd "accidentally" lose my scale worksheet and whine about lessons. Then, my teacher introduced Waltz of the Flowers and I fell in love. Music was like learning a new language and I'd just experienced a culture shock. I played my keyboard for hours, practiced easy versions of Tchaikovsky until my fingers hurt, all to get my hands on the original composition. Debussy was my art, Chopin was my math, and Tchaikovsky was my literature. Each was like a cacophony of sounds, that needed hours to pick apart, and separate. Piano helped me cast off my stage fright and be bold. After changing schools it helped me make friends when I was terrified of not fitting in. It's opened doors where I could compete with others doing something I love, and has been an amazing source of motivation in my life for nearly 12 years.

Undergraduate / Internet was my weapon, laden with spikes and snares - Ann Arbor Supplemental Essay! (Michigan) [3]

Everyone belongs to many different communities and/or groups defined by (among other things) shared geography, religion, ethnicity, income, cuisine, interest, race, ideology, or intellectual heritage. Choose one of the communities to which you belong, and describe that community and your place within it. Limit is 300 words:

Ok, I've begun writing this and rewriting the beginning- and I don't know if I should use it, use a different version, or scrap it and start from the beginning??? I could use some advice- this is the very first part.

"Lets open our Bibles to Romans 1,"

As soon as those words were spoken my sister and I exchanged glances, each of us stifling a collective groan, both already knowing how the bible study would end- a private chat with the pastor, and a few phone calls between parents.

When those opening words were quickly followed up by, "to begin our next unit on Homosexuality in the New Testament," my fingers went on autopilot, pens clicked all around the room, I opened three new browsers on my laptop, set my phasers from stun to kill, while bringing up a few .edu articles, and plastering a placid smile on my face. The Internet was my weapon, laden with spikes and snares that took on the form of logic and science in the real world, and my calm disposition was my armor.

Do you like it? Is it to cliche? I could use other scenarios- there's one in Ephesians about women being submissive that we've had plenty of lessons on?

Undergraduate / When I was young I dreamed of running feet. My story [3]

Prompt: Some students have a background or story that is so central to their identity that they believe their application would be incomplete without it. If this sounds like you, then please share your story.

I don't like my conclusion at all- I would appreciate some help please!!! :) :) Thank you!

When I was young I dreamed of running feet.

Two pairs of them, the figures of my cousin and I leaping and bounding over the hills in our backyard. A fuzzy blur of trees in full bloom appears as we speed by, a mini roller coaster drop occurs in our stomachs when we stumble down a hill, the wind blows tangles of hair into my face, and there's the soft crunch of grass beneath my feet.

When you tell a story it's like giving away a piece of yourself. I need to say the words to tell what others are too afraid to ask, even after time wants to keep them quiet after it has scabbed the wounds over, the scars that remain have sculpted who I am today.

Disabled. The word sounds so discouraging. It's a word applied to other people, people who got into accidents, people who have lost something. To claim to be that was the pure antithesis of everything I wanted to do.

When I woke in that hospital I was still running. Only this time in the hospital room there was a table that stood over the bed. I can still recall the excruciating pain when I slammed my freshly operated leg into the underside. My mother, sleeping on the couch next to me was startled out of sleep to my screams, trying to explain deliriously that I'd had a dream.

I lost my leg just days after finishing first grade in the beginning of June. It was 8 days after my 7th birthday. It was the single event that changed my life.

It's something that I still find difficult to talk about, but I can tell you. I can tell you about the identical scars that run up my legs, left behind by doctors searching for viable veins to replace my crushed popliteal artery, I could tell you about blood clots, about aspirin and so many shots the holes wouldn't stop bleeding, the visceral stinging that comes with hundreds of IV's, and the tape doctors put over skin grafts. I could talk about shattered knees, and broken bones, about thick swathes of bandages I was wrapped in, hallucinations brought on by vile tasting medicine, and how doctors looked at you behind their masks.

It's so much easier to speak of the good things.

I replace those painful things with stories of motherly nurses, dozens of stuffed animals, hundreds of letters sent by children I'd never even met before, going outside for the first time in months, my dad- completely exhausted- sleeping in the tiny couch next to my bed for weeks on end, seeing my siblings for the first time in weeks, and walking for my first second time.

Both are true, but there's only one I would consider saying to absolute strangers.

It's harder, though, to talk about the pride I feel when doing simple tasks like running or jumping without pain. Two years of physical therapy and endless frustration culminating in others not even noticing my disability without visual confirmation.

These events have shaped my life, and I know without them I would never have been the same person that I am today. Through my disability I found a passion for reading, languages, and history. The hardships that I've encountered have made me a better person and increased my resolve to finish the things I start.

We've all experienced some sort of tragedy in our lives, but at a certain point you stop conceptualizing it as a tragedy. After the pain has gone numb and the wound has scarred over we become content with our struggles and regard them as something that makes us different. Something that makes us more worldly, and better in touch with our empathy so that we can sympathize with others going through much worse. Our struggles are what defines us, draws us together, and makes us human.

Undergraduate / The secret: on the 8th floor of the Michigan University is a place only children are privy to. [4]

Prompt: Describe the unique qualities that attract you to the specific undergraduate College or School (including preferred admission and dual degree programs) to which you are applying at the University of Michigan. How would that curriculum support your interests?

Word Limit: 500
Current Word Count: 435

Hello! This is my first draft essay. I would love to expand it from how I have it now- I think it sounds far too awkward. Any suggestions on how to tie everything together and make better transitions would be amazing! I'd love some advice on how to make it MUCH BETTER! Thank you!!!

The University of Michigan Health System has a secret. Up in the clouds on the 8th floor there's a place only children are privy to. An elevator ride lit with giddy anticipation always predates an initiation into the inner sanctum.

Skyscraper slides, towering monkeybars, and swings that could launch children into orbit follow. Massive curved slides I would gaze longingly at made my decision for me: I was going to work here someday

Just a few years later I was touring U of M. It was June and the campus was alive with green and only few hours away from home. The law library was like stepping into Hermione Granger's dream. Beautiful crisp silence, and the intoxicating smell of paper. I could almost see myself seated under one of gleaming gothic windows.

Stretching up on my tip toes I gazed at the gentle etchings on the library's tall gothic windows- every law school in the country during the 1930's our guide had said. My eyes caught and lit against famous schools I'd heard of- Chicago, Yale, and Princeton.

U of M felt unique, it was small when compared with other schools, but in a big city. It had a huge student population, but had specialized majors I could delve into to understand the bigger picture. It's a school that presents hundreds of opportunities for educational and personal growth through a higher breadth of topics than small liberal arts colleges could muster.

Their College of Literature, Science and the Arts had a History Department that would let me choose between a smorgasbord of different topics. And allow me to tailor my major around subjects I was interested, by basing my education around a theme, and enabling me to explore a time period.

That curriculum reminded me of my own History professor who taught by having us take a significant event, put in a historical context, then demonstrate our understanding. It was an invaluable learning experience that helped me gain greater confidence, and improve my public speaking abilities, along with a better timeline of European history. I can only imagine how my education would be affected if I were to base each of my four years at U of M using this model.

Looking back I can still remember that girl all those years ago who looked around the Michigan hospital playground who already knew what she wanted. The girl who jumped headlong into things without fear for the consequences, the girl who looked around and thought, "I want to work here."