Scholarship / "Everybody is a genius" Review my personal statement for KGSP Undergraduate Scholarship (2018) [2]

KGSP Undergraduate Scholarship - Spring 2018

Hello Everyone,

I have applied for the prestigious KGSP Undergraduate Scholarship for Spring semester of 2018 and they are demanding a Personal Statement from my side. The Personal Statement should include the following things -

- Motivations with which you apply for this program

- Family and Education background

- Significant experiences you have had; risks you have taken and achievements you have made, persons or events that have had a significant influence on you

- Extracurricular activities such as club activities, community service activities or work experiences
- If applicable, describe awards you have received, publications you have made, or skills you have acquired, etc.

Well, I have scratched up my mind and have written something to consider it as my personal statement. So, therefore I request the readers to check and give suggestions about required corrections. Also check that whether it is appropriate or too long for selection.

"Everybody is a genius. But if you judge a fish by its ability to climb a tree, it will live its whole life believing that it is stupid."

- Albert Einstein

Inspired from these kinds of ideas of great personalities, I was raised with the idea that everything you do is 20% talent and 80% passion. It is well that a person encounters difficulties many times in his life, but someone has rightly said that in the middle of a difficulty lies opportunity. If you are persistent in your beliefs, even heavenly powers will help you in accomplishing your goals.

I have countless reasons to apply for this program. Firstly, I think that I'm really impressed with South Korea. The way South Korea has found solutions to its inherited problems is quite praiseworthy. Korea was once an aid recipient country, but today it has totally transformed itself into one of the world's biggest aid donors. The things that draw me heavily towards South Korea are: there excellent technological advancements, high national obsession on best educational standards, rich and incredible Korean culture & food and immense diversity in its economy and industries. Moreover, the prestigious KGSP scholarship will not only provide financial assistance, but is an opportunity that will allow me to have a global vision of my environment. It will be an opportunity for me to understand not only the Korean culture, but also to take a close look at cultures of various countries through other international students. It will be an exchange of knowledge and I would become a highly competitive professional who will contribute towards the strengthening of future relations between India and South Korea.

I always try to explore my hidden qualities and weaknesses, so as to have a better idea of my capabilities and areas where I can outshine others. I was born in a family which was not so strong in the economic fronts; nevertheless, I lead a happy life with my family (My family comprises of my parents, two sisters and myself). My father, who is my first role model, always treats me as his friend, not as his son. He believes that there is nothing in this world that cannot be achieved. My father had to work in a rubber factory at the age of 15 years, due to the economic problems of his family. Moreover, when the economic conditions became even worse, he had to discontinue from his education to support his family. That's why he wants me to study as much as I want and become a successful person in my life. My father always says that I may not inherit you huge resources, luxuries and comforts of life, but the few things that I am able to handover to you is our family's valuable culture and traditions, our outlook of life and can show you the path to become a good human being. Driven by these kinds of motivations, I always try to bring joy to the face of my parents by putting my best efforts to any task that my parents expect me to fulfill. Due to many reasons, my father changed his job from one place to another several times, that's why we travelled to many cities in different states of India like Kushinagar, Bathinda, Indore, Bhopal, Ahmedabad and Ludhiana and learnt many Indian languages such as Hindi, Bhojpuri, Gujarati and Punjabi.

Some of the personalities who are role models along with my father are Albert Einstein, Jack Ma and Ban Ki-moon. They always had a great influence upon me.

At the age of 17, Albert Einstein failed the University Entrance Examination of ETH, but today world remembers him as one of the best known physicist of all time.

After graduating from college, Jack Ma applied to 30 different jobs and was subsequently rejected by all of them. But today he owns one of the world's largest and most valuable e-commerce and Internet Company.

Despite being born in a middle class family of a small farming village of Eumseong, Ban Ki-moon set his ambitions high and became the first Asian person since 1971 to become the Secretary-General of the United Nations.

Taking inspiration from them, I always strive to perform my best, thinking that if they can do it, why can't I?

I was an active somehow indulgent student among others during my school days, very often involved in many curricular and co-curricular activities. I was quite good in drawing during my elementary classes. But as I grew older, my interest in drawing started fading away and I got interested in various other activities. I am fond of collecting facts about various topics like nations, history, military, outer space, technology etc. that's why I have many times participated in District level General knowledge and science quiz competitions.

I was lucky enough to clear the auditions round of popular TV quiz show, Bourn Vita Quiz Contest in my 7th standard. I have written two diaries on General knowledge by collecting amazing facts from bestselling books and other sources. I have been chosen as the leader of science and social studies projects many times for various topics like Waste Product Management, Indus Valley Civilization etc in my school. I was always among the top 5% scorers of my class.

I represented my school in G.K. quiz competition held at Gulzar Group of Institutes, Ludhiana and won that contest. I have also given the Senior NTSE General Knowledge examination conducted by Central Institute of General Knowledge Learning, New Delhi and secured 64% marks in it. I was an active writer of informative articles in our school magazine 'Mehar' and was selected as the Student Editor of science section of our school magazine in my 12th standard. I was among the top 10% participants in Gyan Manthan (2016) contest held at Lovely Professional University, Jalandhar and was awarded a onetime study grant of Rs. 50,000 (876,000 KRW) for studying in LPU. I always showed keen interest in many co-curricular activities like in my 11th standard, I was selected in my school's boxing team. I am blessed with good oratory skills and that's why I usually participate in declamations and other related competitions in my school. I was the member of our school's acting club and have performed many times in our school's annual cultural function. I was also designated as the 'All Rounder Boy of the Institution' in my 12th standard.

I have always been active in community service activities since I was in my 10th standard. Our school has been organizing a campaign every year on 2nd October since 2014 to keep our school and city clean, and I have always been an active member of this campaign, cleaning streets, railway platforms and parks etc with my friends and teachers. I was among the three students selected from whole Ludhiana district to generate awareness among common people by giving an informative speech on the occasion of World Day of Remembrance for Road Traffic Victims, at a function organized by Ludhiana Police Department.

Well, South Korea is the best living example for whole world which proves that education is the strongest weapon for a nation. If I want my country to prosper and develop like the Republic of Korea, I must put my best efforts towards the right direction and study hard for making it a reality. I pray to almighty to make me a deserving candidate of this scholarship, so that I could study in the most innovative education system of the world and would be lucky enough to serve my country in future.

Thank you.

Scholarship / Study plan required to apply for the KGSP Undergraduate Scholarship of 2018 [3]

KGSP plan of study

Well, I have decided to apply for the prestigious KGSP undergraduate scholarship for 2018 spring semester and they are demanding a study plan from my side. It is divided into two parts A and B. Here are the instructions for both parts -

A. Study plans to improve foreign languages(Korean, English, etc) required for taking a bachelor's degree course BEFORE and AFTER you come to Korea.

B. Study plan for a bachelor's degree course (Please state the reason you choose such universities and departments (or majors), your academic goals, specific plans (including timeline) to achieve them, and future plan after completion of your study. In case that preferred departments (or majors) of the preferred universities are different, please mention about them separately.)

I have scratched up my brain and have written my study plan, So i request the readers to please take a look and correct my mistakes. Also suggest me whether it is too long or appropriate for selection. Thank you very much.

A. It has been rightly said that a different language is a different vision of life. In case of my proficiency in English, I have been learning it from an early age as my second language. So, I don't need to think much about English. But the new thing is Korean and I am really excited to add Korean as a new language to my brain's collection of 5 languages. Going through the statistics, there are 24 letters in the Korean alphabet compared to 26 of English, which makes it quite easier to learn Hangul in a short period of time. In order to learn some of the basics of Korean, I have registered myself as a member of the leading online Korean teaching website. The website teaches the basic Korean terms in the best possible ways to make it easier for every kind of learner. Whenever it is possible, I surf through online videos to know more about Korean pronunciation and its vocabulary.

For me, after moving to Korea, things would become clearer. I will make it a priority to make Korean friends in order to help me practice my written and spoken Korean skills and try to communicate with common people to get in touch with real life Korean because the language you learn in the class is often different from the language people speak in the streets. Getting engaged with Korean culture will also be a good way to learn Korean easily. I will read Korean books and newspaper to enhance my reading skills. Also, k-drama and Korean movies would be handy in learning more Korean terms. The best part is that I am fully determined to learn Korean language in the most novel way to score well in TOPIK examination, so as to pursue my studies in Korea.

B. Electricity and Computers always remained a beautiful part of my unique and fascinating world from my childhood. There are many inspiring role models for me in these two fields like Mark Zuckerberg, Jack Ma, James Park and Lee Byung-chul. That's why I made up my mind to establish my career in either of these fields. During my high school period, I decided to pursue my bachelor's degree in one of these two disciplines, but was confused that which of the two would be better for me. But when I came to know that many prominent Korean universities are maintaining a special department named as 'Electrical and Computer Engineering Department' in which they are offering the knowledge of both of these two disciplines, I took a sigh of relief.

As it was mandatory for me to fill up three preferred departments for this scholarship, so, after intense analysis and multiple rounds of researches, I have preferred three departments as follows:

Electrical and Computer Engineering (or Electronics and Communications Engineering for Hanyang University)
Computer Science and Engineering
Materials Science and Engineering
As my plan is to do a B.Tech degree in one of these three disciplines, I need to find out universities with excellent ECE, CSE and MSE departments and luckily I found out three universities having notable position in world rankings. And I believe that I will be admitted into the college of engineering of one of the aforementioned universities that will provide me a platform to prove myself and excel through their advanced teaching methods accompanied with lots of experiments under the guidance of their exceptionally devoted and experienced professors.

We know that hard work is the key to success and hard work mixed with regular palnning always yields optimum results. So, studying with well-planned achievable goals will be the best option to keep myself on track and help me to show good performance. Moreover, I am a practical learner. So, practical knowledge is more important to me. Hence, I will enhance my practical skills there for having in-depth knowledge of the subjects. A proverb goes that practice makes a man perfect. This sentence is applicable for every sphere of life. Hence, I will practice my required skills in the university to become a very competitive and skilled engineer. I have always been among the top scoring students of my school. So, I will try my best to maintain this trend in my higher education.

We all know that a student's life is tasteless or insipid without extra co-curricular activities and as I have been always active in other co-curricular activities from my school days, I will try to continue it in my university by joining various co-curricular clubs. For analyzing my knowledge and boosting my zeal, I will participate in IT and electronics based competitions during my studies.

I will start my preliminary Korean language course at the institution designated by NIIED from next year (2018) and will start my bachelor's degree course in spring semester in 2019. The, it will take 4 years to complete my B.Tech. I will try my best to maintain a strong GPA in my B.Tech course. Then I'll apply for MS course in one of the prestigious universities of Korea. After that, I have plans of pursuing my doctorate (or baksa in Korean) in my interested field. Afterwards I have plans of becoming an entrepreneur by establishing my own firm in my interested discipline and this firm will mainly focus towards research work and bring about new innovations for this technological world. My firm will provide opportunity to young talents from across the world to carry out research work. This will create good competition for global research firms and will continue towards eradicating the problem of unemployment for our youth.

My home country India is still lagging behind from the global technological players. So, I have plans of setting up a R&D centre in my country to promote research and innovation in India and also establishing a non-profit organization in India where the underprivileged students can experience the fascinating world of technology and can obtain an opportunity to study it in my organization.

Every person dreams of something big and fascinating for his life, but it's only his will power, courage, determination and hard work that makes all the difference. Many successful persons have to face ups and downs in their life before reaching their final destination and I am fully determined and devoted to instate my future goals by putting my best efforts in the right direction and give something meaningful and seminal to my home country, land of morning calm (Korea) and the global society.

Daedanhee Gamsahamnida.