Undergraduate / COMMON APP ESSAY about three things to take from a burning house. [2]

my biggest question. does it get across enough/anything about me? and any possible ways to shorten it would be great!

It's a common question: your house is burning down, what things would you take with you? Picking what to take is a conflict between what is practical, valuable and sentimental. What is chosen is a reflection of interests, background and priorities. The items I would pick to take with me would be my laptop, my Winnie the Pooh blanket, and a letter from a young orphan in India. My reason for choosing these items is my emotional attachment to what they represent and their testament to who I am and who I should be.

My laptop means more to me than a means of checking email, going on Facebook, and browsing away on Tumblr. It holds the timeline of my life. Every big moment in my life and many, many small moments have been captured in photographs on my laptop. Photographs are a reflection and definition of self. My family, my achievements, my good fortune. These are the things that matter to me the most. Pictures of my entire extended family in India, my parents proudly standing next to me as I excitedly clutched my 8th grade diploma remind me of my joy. In times of difficulty, happiness is something that can be difficult to remember. But, through photographs on my laptop, I can look back on some of the greatest moments of my life and feel joy as those feelings of elation come back to me once again.

My now torn and fluffed out Winnie the Pooh blanket always had a place on my bed as a child; As a teenager who is growing up, it still does. The blue blanket could pass for a salty ocean for the number of my tears that it has absorbed. It is a symbol of the progress I have made from the young girl I was and the lessons I have learned from my simple growing pains. My most vivid memories of the blanket are the aftermaths of arguments with my parents. As a member of the fifteen year old club, my tongue was always quick to lash out. I was a teenager in high school, it was time for the greatest days of my life and I refused to let my parents take that away from me. It didn't matter that they could possibly be right. They didn't grow up in America. They were wrong. That was that. Naturally, this made for arguments and tears that Pooh and Piglet gladly took in. However, when I look back on our quarrels over curfews and boys, I have realized that it was me who was stubborn. Though we never really found a solution for our culture gap, we learned to respect one another and value the insight that our different upbringing has equipped us with. It's ok to disagree. As a high school senior, I find myself looking back on my blanket as a symbol of my steps forward and my positive relationship with my parents. The blanket reminds me that I have grown up, I have learned to pick my fights, and I have learned to listen, not hear, the ideas of those who are different from me.

My last item is a letter that I received from a young girl in an orphanage that I frequented in my last visit to India in 2010. My interest in making myself more aware of the actual social conditions that existed in places for the less fortunate and affinity for young children prompted me to visit an orphanage several times during my visit to India. During these visits, I noticed one young girl named Latha. She was quiet and reserved, and at eleven years old, older than everyone else at the orphanage. Unlike all of the other children who came running up to me, she stood on the side and not once spoke or smiled. My efforts to engage her were futile. I wondered if she had simply turned bitter with the cold fact that at her age, no one would come to adopt her any more. After my last visit to the orphanage, I had still not talked to her. But, the day before I left to America, I received a letter from her in the mail with a few sentences written in our native language, Telugu. "I didn't want you to feel bad for me" she wrote. I didn't want you to laugh at me because I want to be just like you one day." "I want to command the attention of those in the room, I want to be smart, and proud of being a girl. It is not like that here. I am a girl, so I should be quiet." That is all she wrote, yet those words spoke volumes to me. Her letter reminds me to be brave, and in times of fear, reading it reminds me to always be confident and to be proud, not just for myself, but for the millions of girls in my own country that cannot. So many people in the world do not get the chances I have to simply speak. When I walk into a room and am afraid that I may not be the most intelligent or the most articulate one there, I think of her letter and remember to speak my mind, because I can.

Undergraduate / (Human Ecology + Arts and Science) - Cornell Essays [3]

Do I sound too contrived? or are they boring? Any comments would be welcome! Thanks!

College of Human Ecology: (SUNY)
What do you value about the College of Human Ecology perspective and the majors that interest you, as you consider your academic goals and plans for the future?

The objectives and approach to education at the College of Human Ecology are distinctive, like me. My ultimate objective for myself is to become someone valuable and relevant to society, through my intelligence and insight. To do this, my education must give me an understanding of social issues on a number of different levels. It must also be something that can be applied effectively to issues of today. At the College of Human Ecology, majors are organized into social topics or themes that are relevant to society. Education is seen as more than what is written in textbooks. It is what helps shape students into adults who apply their interdisciplinary education to the current issues of society.

The College of Human Ecology has contemporary and flexible programs that are geared to develop students like me who want to understand things on a number of levels. As someone who loves science, I am immediately drawn to the Biology majors available. The Biology and Society and Human Biology, Health, and Society programs require students to use perspectives from both the biological sciences and the social sciences to examine current health issues. Currently, my interest lies in the field of medicine. I have a passion for helping and understanding others and an interest in studying a relevant topic like the human body. The programs available at this College are traditional in the respected and esteemed education that gives Cornell University its name. But, they also effectively prepare students to apply their education to modern society.

What I like about the biology programs at the College of Human Ecology is their integration of classes that delve into more than just the biological aspects of man. I do not want to go to college to study only science. In fact, I don't think I would be the person I am today without my humanities classes. From a young age, I have always been an outgoing person. I have loved people and have an interest in our biological workings as well as our natural behavior and thinking. I consistently seek to have a deeper understanding of the people around me and find that I am often successful in empathizing with others. However, I can say that a lot of my insights and understandings of people have come from the courses I take in school. Though math and science are my favorites, I also see a tremendous value in the English and history classes that I take. These humanities classes have taught me to study and analyze the progress and behaviors of mankind on a psychological level. I want to be someone who understands mankind on both a biological level and psychological level, someone with great perspective in their work. AT the College of Human Ecology, I know that my education can combine learning in a number of subjects and teach me to be a critical thinker, and leader, knowledgeable in a number of fields.

This one is repetitive, and needs to be shortened.

College of Arts and Sciences:
Describe your intellectual interests, their evolution, and what makes them exciting to you. Tell us how you will utilize the academic programs in the College of Arts and Sciences to further explore your interests, intended major, or field of study.

The purpose of the teen years, and even early adulthood is to define ourselves, discover our talents, and grab every opportunity to achieve. In high school, I have immersed myself and challenged myself in a variety of areas, in order to see my own strengths, my limits, and my interests. At the College of Arts and Sciences, there are students with a number of diverse interests and an overbearing passion to dive into all of them so that they can discover themselves, and discover who they want to be as adults. Trying new things and learning about a variety of things is important to me because I believe these are the experiences that will help me discover who I am. I believe this is the first step in helping me achieve my goal of becoming a relevant and contributable person to society. The flexible and all-encompassing curriculum available at the College of Arts and Sciences is what draws me towards to it; because that is exactly what I believe I need to help me better understand the person I am.

Both academically and personally, my interests and activities exhibit great diversity and progress. From a young age, I have shown great interest in several subjects and have challenged myself by taking AP classes in almost every subject. I am an avid reader and love delving myself into an interesting novel for hours at a time. For me, books are a way to put my creative thinking skills to use as I paint pictures in my mind as I read. True to my talkative nature, I love the chance to share my opinions in a deep and challenging discussion in my English classes. I value learning to articulate my thoughts and reading and hearing the thoughts of others as I grow up and form my opinions of people and the world around me.

When it comes to math classes, I love meticulously going through long derivative problems for pages and pages, simply because of the deliberation and persistence they require. My favorite however, is science. In science, critical thinking is the key part in figuring things out. It is one big puzzle that all adds up to a big picture. It requires me to read and study general concepts and materials and then apply them to situations to understand how things work. I think it a true test of the brain's flexibility as it requires both comprehension and application. My special interest in science has even prompted me to pursue doing research over the summer at a pharmaceutical company where I participated in the testing of several drugs, learned lab techniques, and even animal handling. The environment was completely alien to me, and it was a true test of application of my chemistry and biology knowledge and my ability to adapt and learn quickly. But, I persevered. I took time to look back on my old notebooks and ask questions. I eagerly volunteered myself to do everything and to watch everything. This experience gave me a true insider's look into the world of medical research and excited me as I saw that the concepts I learned in school truly were put into real life use.

As a student, I have been an active member in all of my classes by participating in group discussion and interestedly doing the work required for the class but also taking time to read and think more about topics that interest me. I have taken the initiative to further challenge myself and pursue my interests in English, math, and science by getting involved in essay competitions, math contests, and medical research. I have a deep interest in critical thinking and learning in a number of worldly fields. My ambitious and perseverant nature pushes me to challenge myself to work hard until I am proud of the effort I have put forth. At the Cornell University College of Arts and Sciences, I hope to continue being driven on this academically challenging and enriching path.

Undergraduate / 'purpose and ambition to achieve greatness' - yale supplement question [4]

This is my Yale supplement response. It needs to be shortened a little bit, but any response would be appreciated! Thanks!

What in particular about Yale has influenced your decision to apply? (500 characters)

When I visited Yale, I first fell in love with the Hogwarts castle-esque architecture of the Yale housing colleges. It was everything I dreamt about when I devoured the Harry Potter series as a younger kid. Then, when I visited the library and academic buildings, I found myself loving a different part of Yale. I could feel a sense of accomplishment and simply an overwhelming amount of knowledge and greatness in those buildings and those who walked through them. I could see that the students of Yale walked with stride, filled with purpose and ambition to achieve greatness. It was inspiring and refreshing to see such passion, and I hope to one day start my journey to adulthood at a place like a Yale.