Undergraduate / 'parents were born in a third world country' - Describe the world you come from [NEW]

Hi guys, I would really appreciate it if you guys could review my essay and tell me if its interesting. And please point out spelling/grammatical errors. Thanks.

Both of my parents were born in a third world country. Growing up in that kind of country, they never got the chance to get a proper education or even a decent job to have a good life. When I was only a year old, my parents decided to come to the United States of America so I could get the proper education to have a good life.

Growing up in California, my parents would always emphasize the importance of education and how closely it is related to being successful in life. I would not really pay attention to those words because I was just too young to know what it meant. All throughout the time I have gone to school, I have been a fairly good student but one year at school, my math grade began to decline. I was a kid and I thought there was more important things to do than get good grades in school. I got a C on my first test and my parents told me it was ok but they wanted me to get a better grade the second time. When my second test was graded, it turned out to be a D. When I was coming home that day, I was thinking that today is going to be the worst day of my life and that I am not going to be allowed to do anything. When I got home, my parents already knew that I had a bad grade because my teacher had already called and told them about it. Surprisingly, they were not mad. They took me to my room and started talking to me. They started telling me a story that I would never forget. They told me about their childhood where they grew up in a bad country where they could not go to school and they told me that there was no chance to go to college or let alone graduate from high school. Hearing my parents tell me these stories of about their childhood really changed me as a person because it made me realize how lucky I am to be living here where there are public schools that can give me the best education possible. From this talk I knew that truly the most important thing in life is having a good education and my dream from that day on has always been to go to college and get the best education possible to make my parents proud and myself proud. What turned out to be the worst day of my life came out to be the most life changing day of my young life.

Word Count=440

Undergraduate / 'more than make me the M.V.P. of the game' [6]

Hi guys I would really appreciate it if u cud give me feedback on my essay like any grammar mistakes and structure. I wanna know if this essay is interesting.

It was halftime and my team was losing by twenty points. The moral was as low as it could possibly get. The star player of our team got injured in the first quarter and even my coach who encouraged us to keep on playing gave up. Not to mention it was the championship game and whoever won had bragging rights for an entire year.

Knowing we would lose, the coach put me in to start the second half. Before the time started, I huddled up with my teammates. I just told them not to look at the score and give it your one-hundred percent and we will win this game. From my part it was a very desperate move but it was the only thing I could do as a player to get my teammates spirits up. The second half started and to my amazement and everyone's amazement we were playing like a different team. The defensive chemistry we lacked in the first half came to life in the second half. And in the game of basketball, a good defense leads to a good offense. It only seemed like two minutes but in fact there was only fifteen seconds left on the clock and we were only losing by two points. The desperate speech I gave to my teammates actually worked and we were just one three point shot away from becoming champions. My coach quickly called a time out and began drawing up a play for our shooting guard to make the game winning three point shot. The referee blew the whistle and the coach told me to throw the ball in. The ball was in my hands and my teammates began to run the play but I saw no one open to pass to. The time was ticking away and I just passed the ball to the nearest teammate. The ball hit my teammate's thigh and came back to me. I looked at the clock with only three seconds left, I just shot the ball. As soon as the ball left my hand, I knew it was in. The swish sound the ball made as it made contact with the net was the best sound I had ever heard. The ball dropped to the ground and the celebration began.

This victory did more than make me the M.V.P. of the game; it made me realize what it means to never give up. After this game, I never see anything as impossible because I know if I put my mind to it and if I put one-hundred percent, I can conquer anything.

Thanks.