Undergraduate / Why Engineering (fantasies + inventions and discoveries)- Brown Uni. [5]

This is a compilation of the Engineering essay to Brown Uni!! Help appreciated :) Thanks in advance~

1) Many applicants to college are unsure about eventual majors. What factors led you to an interest in the field of Engineering?

Engineering is all about dreams, and ever since I was a kid, I always had the wildest fantasies. Let's make a hamster launching trebuchet I would say, or a mounted laser death ray! But nah, the usual response: "that's impossible, stop wasting your time." And yet every great invention began this way, with a dream that was met with disbelief. When I finally completed my first trebuchet, I wanted to shout to the world, "Impossible you say? Well, I just did it." For me, engineering captures ideas, however wild, and turns them into reality. It's a constant thrill of innovation and challenges, facing the problems of tomorrow and solving them today. That's why I chose engineering.

2) What experiences beyond school work have broadened your interest in Engineering?

Ever since antiquity, mankind's achievements have been recorded in our inventions and discoveries. Indeed, the very passage of history is a reflection of our progress in science and a testament to the marvelous story of engineering. But technology is no force of nature. Nothing, not even the simple wheel would exist, were it not for the sweat of man. People like Leonardo da Vinci, Nikola Tesla, and Alfred Nobel, pioneers who bravely led the world to dizzying heights of greatness, they were my heroes. I have always wanted to be like them, and growing up, that's exactly what I did. I built birdhouses, small Ferris wheels, Lego robots and even mini roller coasters. I've explored nature and designed my own little park. I'm older now but I've never really grown out of that childish sense of wonder. For the last two summers, not only have I conducted experiments in planarian regeneration at Brown University but also worked as a computer technician. Yet I still don't think there is a single defining experience that broadens my interest in engineering. It's really a lifestyle, the ever present desire to experiment, to design things, to create things, and in the end to be always chasing the impossible.

3) Brown offers programs in Biomedical, Chemical, Civil, Computer, Electrical, Materials, and Mechanical Engineering. Because there is a common core curriculum within Engineering, students need not select a specific area until their junior year. We are curious to know, however, if any particular program within Engineering presently appeals to you. If so, please discuss that choice.

I intend to take up Biomedical engineering because it is the field with the most potential. As a relatively new branch of science, there are many questions that still need to be answered and many mysteries that still await the bold explorer. How can we create artificial stem cells and avoid controversies? Should it be through Induced pluripotent cells or ex-vitro cell culture? We don't know, but I yearn to be one of those explorers who are going to find out, to be at the cutting edge of science, to be where humanity is just beginning to go.

It's not just realities that drive me though, but at my core, it's a vision of a world where people can live free from sickness, where diabetes is no longer synonymous with suffering, where cancer is no worse a disease than the common cold. It's a beautiful dream that I wish to help turn into reality.

Undergraduate / Chicago Supplement - my interests in different areas like films, books, etc. [3]

Share with us a few of your favorite books, poems, authors, films, plays, pieces of music, musicians, performers, paintings, artists, blogs, magazines, or newspapers? Feel free to touch on one, some, or all of the categories listed, or add a category of your own.

The supplement of U of C has this question. I am really curious though, does it mean that you provide them a LIST of books, poems you enjoy? Or does it mean you choose a few and elaborate? If so, how will that work to your advantage? Since their requirement was... a paragraph or two? How should I show my interests in different areas with only a few paragraphs? Should I focus on say, just one book, or like 5-7 of them with a brief sentence of summary, or just provide a list of things I enjoy. Cause I am also interested in discussing music, paintings, etc...

Thanks for your advice!

Undergraduate / "to do what you love" - Common App - What is really important for me. [3]

He was just sitting there; in that small stone courtyard, surrounded by trees, withered by time. It could have been nothing; just another old man. It was easy to turn, to leave, and to continue my little games. But I walked forward; forward to talk, and perhaps, to laugh together.

Then I saw him. Or rather, I saw beyond him. Closed eyes, wrinkled face, and a small, natural smile. Such simple features, yet such radiant happiness surrounded him.

"Why are you so happy?" I blurted out, all else forgotten.

"Be silent." He muttered.

Annoyed, I left.

It is only now in hindsight did I realize what a precious gift I have been given that day. Like all high school students, my life is filled with activities. I strive to complete projects, to win competitions, to be a good student, and to enter a respected university. It was all too easy to be caught up in the storm of information, deadline, and projects, everything that forced me to act. There were just so many things to do, every day, every time. Collapsing on my bed day after day after yet another meeting, I began to recall that faithful day, his joyful appearance and his simple advice, to be silent.

I realized I have never stopped to ask, is this what I really want? Will I be able to look back years later and congratulate myself on a job well done? I had to take a stand. I turned in my resignation as co-chairman of the ecology club and as deputy head of the School Fair, Prom committee, and Academic committee the very next day.

I have never looked back since then. I got time on my hands to do the simple small things of life, to sit and paint, to stand and jump, to stretch myself. I finally realized, in my blind pursuit of "success," I have missed out on what really mattered. I started with my family; I began to help my little sister with her school work and activities. I brought her to parks, to malls, and taught her how to build a trebuchet. I began to visit my grandparents more often, not to do anything, but to simply accompany them, to listen to their stories, and to show them that they still mattered. Grades and activities were no longer the end all, be all of my life; they were just what they were supposed to be, stepping stones in the pursuit of happiness. It wasn't an easy decision however, to abandon the fast route to success for the meandering detour of happiness. But while others saw it as me dropping out, I understood it as simply beginning a new race.

Sure, I might be a few steps behind in the dash to college, but I truly believe, on the marathon of life, I have come out way ahead. To know what you want, to do what you love, and to enjoy the little things, that is what life really is all about. And I am glad that I have realized it now. Perhaps when I grow old and wise, I would return once more to that little courtyard and sit under the sun, to do nothing but smile, to do nothing but wait, to do nothing but be happy.

Undergraduate / What I dont know - Being a student. [4]

French novelist Anatole France wrote: "An education isn't how much you have committed to memory, or even how much you know. It's being able to differentiate between what you do know and what you don't." What don't you know?

500 words maximum. Very rough draft. Wrote this in a burst of sadness...

Give me any comments please. Thanks in advance.
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The Pomp and Circumstances March play in the background. I sit idly beside the computer screen. I hear the marching footsteps, the rising trumpet notes, and imagine in their midst, those glorious graduates. I wonder if I am doing the right thing. When will I ever be able to hear those sounds as I march through the gates of Brown? When will I be able to demonstrate that I know enough to set foot in that secluded patio of excellence? I know my geography, my history, my psychology, and my calculus. I know my SAT, my ACT, and my Molecular Biology. But all this is nothing, because, surprisingly, in order for me to get in, I have to show them what I don't know.

Just sitting here, I can think of at least a hundred things I don't know. I do not know who composed this wonderful March; I do not know where my laptop came from, or even why I am even able to think about laptops in the first place. Now that I think about it, I wonder if the wish I made to my first shooting star will ever come true, or if the star has long since disintegrated into little faeries; for all I know, that is where Tinker Bell came from. But strangely enough, I realize that everything I do not know is simply something waiting for me to find out. A quick bit of sleuthing tells me that Sir Edward Elgar was the composer of Pomp and Circumstance and my laptop was actually made by Toshiba in Taiwan. Shooting stars are actually not stars, just huge pieces of rocks. Faeries, surprisingly, don't even exist.

But some things aren't that easy to find out. There are still many things that I don't know but which I want to find out. Chiefly among them, I do not know what it is like to be a student at Brown. I do not how I will react receiving my acceptance letter. I do not know what it feels like to relax in my dorm as a freshman, enjoying the company of chicken and a bottle of coke. I do not know what it is like to be a rising sophomore, perhaps taking my seventh course this semester. I do not know what it is like to be a junior, entering the year, full of excitement to participate in the study abroad program. I do not know what it is like to finally be a senior of Brown, to be able to look back on my four years with fond memories and to finally graduate under the beautiful melodies of Pomp and Circumstances as I cross Van Wickle Gates for my second and last time.

Undergraduate / Brown Engineering - Why biomedical. "Most potential" [5]

3. Brown offers programs in Biomedical, Chemical, Civil, Computer, Electrical, Materials, and Mechanical Engineering. Because there is a common core curriculum within Engineering, students need not select a specific area until their junior year. We are curious to know, however, if any particular program within Engineering presently appeals to you. If so, please discuss that choice.

I intend to take up Biomedical engineering. For me, it is the field with the most potential. As a relatively new branch of science, there are many questions that still need to be answered and many mysteries that still await the bold ...

Undergraduate / "A place for the ambitious learners" - Why Brown University? 1000 characters. [8]

I love Brown. Plain and simple. Stepping into Wriston quad, I saw Brown for the first time, and wow, would I always remember. It fascinated me; its architecture, surroundings, and even the strutting pigeons practically screamed "Dream University!!!." It was love at first sight; no other schools (and I have visited quite a few) has ever come close in creating the same, almost magical, effect.

Yet Brown is so much more than just its cover. It is a place where the ambitious learners can spread their wings, without fear of workloads. It is a place where dreamers can exist and look for their faeries without fear of reality. It is a place where world class education happens not at the cost of happiness, but rather, as the result of it. This place is Brown, and this is where I want to be.

Undergraduate / I am an atheist: Struggle for personal growth - Common App: Personal Essay [4]

This is my tentative opening. Please give me any suggestions you might have!

Tone, Hook, Narrative style, etc.. :D

Thanks in advance!
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I am an atheist, yet strangely enough, I study in a catholic school. I'm not just talking about a school founded by Catholics (though my school was founded by Opus Dei) but a school in where we begin and end classes with prayers, where religion and moral theology are required subjects, where half the population either wear crosses or scapulars.

It was only natural that a "freak" like me would be subject to the snide remarks of my fellow classmates. I don't blame them; we were after all just entering high school, hardly adolescents, boys in fact. But I was afraid. Afraid of being prosecuted, afraid of being isolated. Towering seniors cornering me during lunch, their queries founded on incredulity and distrust. Them, and their jeering laugh. Me, a small bug caught between the intersecting webs of scorn, malice, and disdain.

I kept asking myself, is it worth it? It would have been easy to lie; "Oh yes, I believe in god the father almighty." But how much is pride worth? How much does it cost to lie to myself? It was a choice between a fragile peace and the destruction of my beliefs.