Undergraduate / How my abandonment at 13 has influenced who I am today [NEW]

Please help me out! thank you!
Prompt: Some students have a background, identity, interest, or talent that is so meaningful they believe their application would be incomplete without it. If this sounds like you, then please share your story.

When I was 13 my parents dropped me off in the middle of a foreign country, alone for two whole weeks. Most may see this as an act of neglect or carelessness, but this was nothing too out of the ordinary or unusual to me. Let me explain why. In today's society we are living in a world of diversity. Personally, I am a part of the population living a life of mixed cultures. Being born to a Slovene mother and Italian father has evoked my life to a unique mind set and collection of assets. Most people have the basic knowledge of the Italian culture and see it as boot-shaped country commanding a long Mediterranean coast line in Western Europe. Slovenia on the other hand is typically unfamiliar to majority of civilians I have come to encounter. It is a small alpine country sited in Central Europe that was once under the control of Yugoslavia. That being said, my parent's morals are somewhat looser in some aspects than the typical American family. My parents believed that the best way to learn something is to be exposed to whatever knowledge you desire to obtain. This is what led to my temporary abandonment at mere age of thirteen.

My grandfather never had the opportunity to learn the English language. This developed a language barrier between us. The only way to overcome this barrier was to learn the language myself. This resulted in my parents shipping me off to attend a two week long program in Slovenia to develop and build speaking and grammar skills of the Slovene language while also learning about the culture, customs, and geography. Initially, I was not so fond of this idea and the thought of being alone with a weak understanding of the native language did not intrigue me, but in the end I actually had the time of my life. I loved it so much that I was able to partake in this program for three additional years under an awarded scholarship. This camp has had one of the biggest impacts on my life for multiple reasons. Most importantly being that it gave me the opportunity to learn a language and have ability to communicate with my family. I also made friendships that will last me a life time. I have been blessed with friends from Belgium, Macedonia, France, Indonesia, Germany, Portugal, Canada and even a few from the USA. It is a great fortune and honor to have friends from all around the world and be able to communicate with them on a daily bases through social media.

My experiences at camp and the fact that my mom, dad, sister, and I are the only members of my family that reside here in the states, has inspired me to want to learn more about different cultures and societies. Every other summer, my family embarks on what typically is a two month excursion. During this time our main purpose is to visit our family in Slovenia and Italy. Each time we plan to make a few stops to explore new territories. I have had the amazing opportunity to visit various countries throughout my short seventeen years of life. When traveling to places like Netherlands, Austria, Turkey, Croatia, France, Costa Rica, and Aruba I am able to explore a diversity of cultures, economies and different lifestyles far more effectively than I would have ever learned from sitting in a classroom.

My future studies, life and career will definitely always be influenced by my background and experiences. It will help me to achieve my goals and develop me into a person that is exploring, accepting, productive and a compassionate human being with an open mind who wants to contribute to the bright future of the world.

Undergraduate / Admission essay into accelerated PA program [2]

This is my number one school and I have to submit this tomorrow so ANYTHING you can say to help me fix this would be much appreciated. Thank you!

Tell us something unique about you, why you chose your particular major, and how you expect Duquesne University to help you achieve your academic, personal and professional goals. Please include any examples of your research, shadowing or volunteer experiences.

Every Wednesday night my family and I would come together and put our busy lives aside to enjoy whatever it was that my mother had decided to cook that night for dinner. While my sister and I set the table my dad would turn on the television to channel 45. At exactly nine o'clock, the latest episode of House would air. House M.D. was a fictional medical mystery show and what also happened to be my favorite show at the time. This television series is what sparked my interest in the medical field and since then I cannot remember a time where I had not had a passion for anything medicine related.

Choosing a major was particularly challenging for a few reasons one of them being that I am extremely indecisive for anything and everything in life. I am that type of person that takes twenty minutes to choose an ice cream flavor and once I have decided I require an additional ten minutes to overcome whether I would like my ice cream served in a cup or cone. That being said, choosing a major that would determine the road I shall travel for the next for years and potentially the rest of my life was above all stressful. Throughout my high school career I had always excelled in science and math. I knew I had wanted to pursue a career in one of the two fields. For the longest time I had toggled between majoring in statistics or health sciences. After serious contemplation, numerous pieces of advice, personal experiences, and those who have been kind enough to have shared their experiences, I was able to clearly see that I wanted to follow a career in the health sciences.

One class that had a major impact on my desire to major in Health Sciences was Sports Medicine. This class was one of the very few classes offered at my high school that had a focus on medicine. I had never been more motivated to do well in a class before. Doing assignments and studying was never a bother and I actually enjoyed it and I excelled in performance. I never received below a ninety-four percent on a test and scored the highest final exam score in my class. From here it was clear to see that I had a real talent and drive for medicine.

While my Sports medicine class shed the light on my internal desire to pursue an education in health sciences, it was not until recently that I knew that one day I wanted to become a certified physician's assistant. Recently a close family friend of mine who I have known for my entire life has married to a recently graduating physician's assistant. From this I was given the opportunity to ask any and every question about being and becoming a PA. All of my questions were answered by someone who had actually had a first-hand experience at this career. Aside from bombarding the husband of a family friend as my means of conducting research, I also have had the opportunity to gain some experience within a health science career. Near my home there is a private physical therapy practice at which I have been able to gain some experience. Although I have only just recently been given the amazing opportunity to gain hands on experience in medicine, I have already expanded my knowledge. I am aware that a physical therapist and a PA are both different careers and have their own unique career paths but a lot of the basic knowledge that I am learning at my time at the physical therapy office will also benefit me in the future as a PA. For one, patient care is a vital skill I have been exposed to as well as organization and cleanliness, all of which are extremely important skills for a PA.

After performing extensive online research on PA programs throughout the country, Duquesne is the best fit for me. This five year program would allow me to save both time and money because we all know time is money now a days. Not only would Duquesne give me the best bang for my buck but the small class sizes would allow me to get more one on one time with my professors. This aspect of Duquesne is particularly important to me because I learn best in smaller classes and need the option to easily access my professor whenever I reach a point of confusion. Having easy access to a professor is a quality that is very hard to find in most of today's universities but one that I desire the most. I am also looking for a challenge and I feel as though Duquesne will give me exactly that. Attending a school that will offer a challenge is important to be able to be prepared and as educated as possible in order to be the best I can be when I am sent out into the real world to take on a career as a PA. Duquesne is where I long to be and hope to pursue my education to becoming a Physician's Assistant.

Undergraduate / WHY I BECAME VEGAN: to be healthy, save lives, and save the planet [2]

One of the required essays to get into the honors college that I am applying too! Could use all the help I can get! THANK YOU!!

Question: Describe an instance in which you changed your mind about a previously held belief. What led you to hold this belief in the first place and how did you come to change your view?

As a child, animal based food products had a large presence in our household. Being a part of a family with a strong eastern European influence, foods such as cheese and salami where an additional food group all on their own. Without a doubt, every meal my mother prepared for us contained multiple animal based products. Having a dish without meat was a rare. My sister and I drank milk with almost every single meal. My parents where strong advocated for milk consumption within growing children. They strongly believed that the calcium source within cow's milk was vital for proper growth and development. Growing up I do recall questioning the moral correctness of consuming another animal. I specifically recall one instance in particular where I had questioned the rationality of consuming a slow roasted rabbit that my mother had prepared for dinner one evening. My mother assured me that the animals that we consumed never felt any pain, had no perception of what was to become of them, and that most importantly that we as humans needed to consume animals in order to maintain balance on Earth and to keep animals from over populating. Although I am mindful that it was never my parents' intention to ever cause harm, I have now come to learn after doing much research that my parents views and practice of consuming animal based food products is harmful to the human body, the planet, and a contributor to the loss of billions of innocent lives each year. After becoming educated on the magnitude of effects consuming animals has, my views on a lifestyle consisting of animal products have become completely altered. Through my research and enlightenment on the detrimental effects, I adopted a lifestyle consisting of solely plant based foods, or more commonly known as a vegan lifestyle.

Aside from the few occasions where I questioned the moral correctness of eating something that was once able to think and feel for itself, I thought nothing wrong with the way of life I was living. It was not until I was browsing Netflix one Friday night looking for something to watch that I had stumbled across a documentary called Vegucated. Now, I have no idea what compelled me to want to watch a documentary, let alone a documentary on veganism, but I was intrigued. As I watched this film, I started to make connections in my mind. I experienced an array of mixed emotions from anger, disgust, condemnation, and wretchedness as the film revealed the truth behind the treatment of the animals that we derive our food from. I learned what the true meaning behind the labels on our food products such as "free-range" and "grass fed". I was exposed to the truth. No cows or chickens or pigs or any animal is treated as it should be within our meat and dairy industry.

After being uncovered with the information from the film Vegucated, I sought to learn more. This led me to binge watch multiple documentaries of the same topic. Forks over Knives, Fat Sick and Nearly Dead, Food Inc., and Cowspercay all contributed to the expansion of my education on the meat and dairy industry. Aside from the cruel treatment of the animals, I learned how consuming animal products is harmful to the planet and humans. One film, Forks over Knives, had a particularly strong focus on the effects of animal based food products had on the body. The film went in depth on the research performed by Dr. Colin Campbell, a nutritional scientist and not to mention a Penn State Alumni. Dr.Campbell's research on the effects that consuming creatine (main protein found in meat) had on the growth and development of tumor cells within the liver of lab rats concluded that the higher the consumption of creatine, the more rapid the growth of cancer within the liver. Given this information, Campbell was able to conclude that consuming meat greatly increases the growth of cancer. Essentially, we as a society are taking away the life of innocent animals to consume products that are severely toxic to our own bodies. Where is the logic in that? It was also concluded through various studies that the consumption of red meat has had a strong correlation in the development of prostate cancer and the consumption of dairy has linked to breast cancer. So what I struggle to understand is why would someone purposefully put something in their body with the knowledge that it is not only harming the innocent lives of over ten billion animals in the United States alone each year, but could also lead to various diseases and cancers that have the ability to significantly lower a person's life.

As if having the knowledge of the cruelty and harmful health effects are not enough to skew someone opinion, the meat and dairy industry is a huge contributor to global warming and Earth's rising climate. In total, the amount of oil needed to transport the cattle, meat, dairy, and operate machinery within the eat and dairy industry sums up to be larger of a contributor to the depletion of the Earth's atmosphere than the entire global transportation system. And to make matters worse, farm animals give off large amounts of methane which is extremely detrimental to the atmosphere. I was shocked to learn that each year the average cow produces enough methane per year to do the same greenhouse damage as four tons of carbon dioxide.

So my question is why do we continue to do this? Why do we continue to consume animal products when humans can derive all of their nutritional needs from whole plant based foods? Why do people continue to consume products that destroy the plant? Why do people ingest foods that have the power to kill? Why do people eat animals that some people keep as pets? I used to be someone who loved to eat chicken nuggets and ice cream, but my views have changed. I am no longer capable of eat meat and dairy because of my expose to the truth behind the corrupt practices that so many people are blind of within the meat and dairy industry. Today I am proud to say that I am living a plant-based vegan lifestyle. Not only have I become loads healthier but I am also saving hundreds of lives a year and leaving behind a smaller carbon footprint for myself and future generations. Although some people do not agree with my views and do not agree with a vegan lifestyle, no one will be able to alter my opinion. I have hope that we as a society can fix the damage we have done to ourselves and the Earth. I strongly believe a strong education is what we need in order to open up people's minds to making a change, just as it did for me. In the end, everything has a weird way of working themselves out. It may take time, but I am hopeful as a society we will be able to make steps to change and improvement to our planet.

Undergraduate / EVERYONE NEEDS TO TRAVEL THE GLOBE [2]

I feel as though I wrote a strong piece but not totally sure if I achieve everything the prompt is asking. This is an essay prompt for an honors college I am apply at and would really appreciate all the help I could get! Thank you!

Question:The university is a multicultural society, where numerous ethnicities, traditions and religions coexist. Describe your current multicultural world including your cultural history and background. Then explain how you would like to expand that world to achieve a greater multicultural life. To broaden the diversity of your future self, what experiences would you like to have? What places would you like to visit? What people would you like to meet? Please be as specific as possible.

Every person has their own perception of thought, a unique set of goals and ambitions, and their own morals and standards at which they live by. The person we strive to become is fashioned by our experiences, background, and most importantly, our culture. In today's society, our experiences and culture plays a larger role than it ever has before. Personally, my cultural background and experiences have made a huge impact on the goals and ambitions that I strive to complete in the future. Both my mother and my father reside from outside of the United States. My mother was born and raised in Slovenia. I have come to learn, that Slovenia is typically unfamiliar to majority of civilians I have come to encounter. It is a small alpine country sited in Central Europe that was once under the control of Yugoslavia. Although the country is surrounded by many other cultures from places such as Italy and Hungary, Slovenia has a very unique culture that is unlike any other I have learned or come to experienced. The traditional foods, language, and overall attitudes of the people are just a few of the distinctive qualities within the country. My father on the other hand, resides from a small town in Italy. Growing up, my father was given the opportunity to live parts of his life in Italy and other parts in the United States. From this, my father's cultural influences come from a combination of two very different countries and have greatly impacted who he has become today. Currently we are living in a world of diversity and mixed cultures. My background has presented me with the opportunity to travel the world, learn new languages, have exposer to many different customs, cultures, and religions, and most importantly allowed me to develop into the person I am today.

Both sides of my family descend from Central Europe and still to this day most of my family currently resides in Italy or Slovenia. In fact, my parents, sister, and I are amongst the only members of our family who live in the United States. Because of this, my parents have taken it upon themselves and found it incumbent that my sister and I were exposed to our homelands and the culture held within them. As a result, I have been traveling the globe ever since I can remember. Every summer my family and I travel back to Slovenia and Italy to visit our family for two months. During this exertion, we also manage to branch out and travel to at least one new country. At the mere age of seventeen, I have already traveled to over a dozen countries including Turkey, Holland, France, Costa Rica, and Germany. Having been able to travel to a variety of countries has allowed me to experience new customs and religions that significantly differ from mine. My world travels have allowed me to grow and develop to be open-minded, which I personally find is a quality that is hard to find in today's society.

Along with my travels and family background, I was able to learn an additional language in a way that is unique to the traditional class room education setting. My grandfather never had the opportunity to learn the English language. This developed a language barrier between us. The only way to overcome this barrier was to learn the language myself. This resulted in my parents shipping me off to attend a two-week long program in Slovenia to develop and build speaking and grammar skills of the Slovene language while also learning about the culture, customs, and geography. Initially, I was not so fond of this idea and the thought of being alone with a weak understanding of the native language did not intrigue me, but in the end I actually had the time of my life. I loved it so much that I was able to partake in this program for three additional years under an awarded scholarship. This camp has had one of the biggest impacts on my life for multiple reasons. Most importantly being that it gave me the opportunity to learn a language and have an ability to communicate with my family. I also made friendships that will last me a lifetime. I have been blessed with friends from Belgium, Macedonia, France, Indonesia, Germany, Portugal, Canada and even a few from the USA. It is a great fortune and honor to have friends from all around the world and be able to communicate with them on a daily base through social media.

My experiences with the various communities around the world have inspired me to want to continue and expand on my exposer to different places and setting around the world. Seeing as though I have spent a majority of my travel experiences within Europe and parts of South America, I would like to one day to be able to take the opportunity to travel to areas within Asia. Japan, Philippines, and Thailand are just a few of the locations that I hope to one day be able to their customs, cultures, and religions first handedly. Asian culture is unalike many of the cultural that I have had the opportunity to be exposed too. In addition to traveling, I would hope to one day be able to meet extravagant leaders and role models such as The Pope. Being Roman Catholic, The Pope not only embodies a high position within my religion, but he has also been able to inspire me through his moralistic teachings and motive of inspiration. Given the opportunity to meet The Pope would allow me to become more knowledgeable in myself, my family, and most importantly my religious beliefs. Lastly, along with my passion to continue with my travels and to meet inspirational leaders, my experiences have also stirred me to want to spend a portion of my college education studying abroad.

Our world is packed with diversity. Culture is ever changing and adapting as our society continues to diversify which is why it is imperative to broaden your horizons yourself. Through my cultural exchanges, I was able to gain a significant amount of knowledge that I would have never learned in history class. I thank my travel experiences for the person I am today, for without I do not think I would have become. Words are not even able to express how much my culture and travels have had an impact on me, and that is why I highly encourage people to travel. Go on an adventure, try intriguing foods, meet interesting people and allow yourself to be mind-boggled. And when you come back, you are going to see how you have developed a completely new perspective. You are going to see things differently. You will develop a sense of globalization. You will learn lessons that you would never be able to learn from a book. When traveling, the opportunities someone is presented with when traveling are endless. Travel and exposer are the key to achieving a greater multicultural life. So, allow yourself to take a step back from the hustle and bustle and take the opportunity to emulsify yourself into the world around you.