Undergraduate / COMMON APP EXTRACURRICULAR ESSAY; MY LOVE FOR BIOLOGY [5]

I like much of our generation has fallen to procrastination.
Does this do its job? Is it boring? Be harsh!
Any edits criticisms, grammar are much appreciated.

Please briefly elaborate on one of your extracurricular activities or work experiences in the space below (1000 character maximum).
From a young age, biology always captured me. As a child, I rejected the typical Barbies and sparkly paraphernalia for any tool which might help me uncover a cure or unveil a scientific phenomenon. I had yet to meet someone become as excited over science processes.

So, when I was accepted to spend my summers at Temple University to gain lab experience as part of the Physician Scientist Training Program, I was thrilled. Minds like my own meeting to learn skills, years before we would need them, was vindicating and unsettling at the same time. This began my search, this insatiable thirst to find things that would satisfy my medical itch. Eventually it lead me to rationalize the sacrifice of every Saturday from 4th grade, up to my final year of high school, in the name of mathematics and science enrichment. The UIC Early Outreach Program has held me from sleepovers, early morning practices and much deserved sleep-but I would not exchange it for anything.

Thank you so much

Undergraduate / 'every side of the fence' - NYU, What Intrigues you? [3]

Does this do its job?
Is it boring or conventional?
Any edits for grammar or style are greatly appreciated.

Prompt:What intrigues you? Tell us about one work of art, scientific achievement, piece of literature, method of communication, or place in the world (a film, book, performance, website, event, location, etc.), and explain its significance to you.

I have been on every side of the fence. Each facet of the picket has been intimately inspected, investigated, and scrutinized. My severely sympathetic nature has made me immune to walking solely in my own shoes. Instead my mind has fitted out each pair, feeling out the impressions and experiences that have contributed to each perspective-even once traveling to the rugged oxfords of a fiend wolf. Yes, the infamous wolf of The True Story of the Little Three Pigs! By A.Wolf. This newfangled version of traditional tale, paints the antagonist in a brighter light, creating the three pigs into several mischievously unbelievable characters rather than blamelessly fraught. I loved the book not only for its charming and vastly creative watercolors eschewing realism, but for its ability to give a say to the minority. The original tale, pinpointing all the blame on the wolf, left me unsettled. If we can all perform our actions with rationale, then in some sense they are justified. In the same vein, Smith's talent of voicing the wolf's transgressions was invigorating and echoed my own yearning to see that everyone has the opportunity to speak their mind, no matter how unpopular the opinion.

THANKS SOO MUCH!

Undergraduate / 'victim to creeping doubts' - SIGNIFICANT EXPERIENCE [4]

Promt: Evaluate a significant experience, achievement, risk you have taken, or ethical dilemma you have faced and its impact on you.

Does this do its job?
I need to convey a feeling of desperation and utter defeat followed by determination...did you feel it at all? If not what can I do to pack a more powerful punch?

Please, please, please offer any edits for grammer, or style.
Dream school is NYU!
THE MOMENT you lose interest. Please tell me!

Thanks!

At nine, I had fallen under the spell, like many others at my age to the glowing finger, flying bicycle, and Reese's Pieces of E.T the Extra-Terrestrial. The sole most disturbing and heart-wrenching scene, where E.T., gray and unconscious, lay dying in a stream haunted me. At the time, I didn't understand that the culprit of E.T.'s crisis was the thinness of Earth's atmosphere. He needed richer air to breathe.

And, symbolically, so do I. The academic culture combined with the personal trials I faced at the -high school withheld- made the atmosphere to thin for me. The ensuing environment kept me from expanding to my full potential. The school declared best in science by Intel, has its obvious challenges, and demands a student's full submersion in the curriculum and customs head first. However if a student becomes preoccupied with interfering individual concerns success becomes virtually unattainable. <==too pretentious?

My junior year was the root of my problems. I thought I was immune to spreading my self out too thin but I soon found that my varying commitments to co-circulars and clubs outweighed school work. Over all it was my year long Illinois Review Board approved inquiry seeking to correlate print advertisements to a disturbance in body image among females that drained me both mentally and emotionally. I found all my efforts put towards finding proof that would place some blame on advertising companies for using unattainable images of women to get consumers to buy their product, but in the process buying into their portrayal of beauty. Ultimately I wanted to help girls realize that they should seek to themselves to find beauty, but at the time I needed much help in another department.

All the while, my home situation left me unsettled, as -highschool withheld- is a boarding school, living away from is at first invigorating, but the lack luster soon wears off and problems at home were amplified and transparent. Personal dilemmas, from a friend's mental diagnosis to my own, bombarded me every week. At the conclusion of the term, it only made sense to transfer.

This is not to say impossible to face personal dilemma while at the academy, but with a declining social support and fleeting mental confidence that I faced, the task was daunting. Without a doubt, I expect that my undergraduate experience will have its serving bumps and unpleasant surprises but I know that I can seek personal power and strength to overcome them.

Looking back now, if I had I taken advantage of all the opportunities and academic supports available, continuation may have been on the horizon. Nonetheless the atmosphere at -highschool withheld- was suffocating me. The experience has taught me to always proceed every situation with a caution and approach of the same initial intensity.

Now, at my current school I am not only learning but thriving. Where I see faults or sense weakness, I look to family, friends, and teachers to suffice. When I saw that there was a lack of international awareness among the school, my friend and I created a club to promote awareness and discuss foreign relations. Where I noted a deficiency in the school's bag checking and lunch room polices, I helped initiate a dialogue between school officials which would ensure the success and safety of all students.

Nonetheless at times, I have fallen victim to creeping doubts; the most sobering thought for me these days is imagining myself ten years from now, aggravated and disappointed, continuously wondering "What if . . .?"

Where stand now and where I intend to go is compelling enough to fulfill me and assure me of a future devoid of any "What-ifs."

Undergraduate / 'dialogue with amazing individuals' - NYU SUPPLEMENT [6]

Why NYU?

Any edits on grammer & style are welcomed.
Please don't hold back and thank you sooooo sooo much!!!!!!

My mother hisses anytime the term "homosexual" is mentioned on television. She scoffs at words like "Muslim and Latino" and at the utterance of "abortion" she is outright offended. Where my mother does not welcome views unlike her own, I yearn for diversity. It is my belief that the cultivation of all groups and perspectives creates solutions and ideas otherwise untapped. When Albert Gallatin founded the New York University in 1813 declaring it a beckon " graciously opened to all." he also commissioned the cultivation of knowledge from all spectrums, all endeavors, and all walks of life. Should I commit to majoring in biology, NYU offers incomparable resources and programs that will allow me to not just go to NYU but experience it. I will engage in dialogue with amazing individuals as we all embark on a journey to become pioneers that will leave our impact vast beyond our hallways and dorms as we are equipped for leadership on all fronts of human enterprise. I will have the opportunity to collaborate with renowned professors such as Chiye Aoki whose utilization of an electron microscope to connect the physiology of adult and adolescent brains to mental illnesses is not only astounding, remarkable and simply awesome but a testament that NYU professors are not simply educators but innovators in their fields. Attending NYU would allow me to become an organ of a new voice, among a population not found elsewhere-this generation x who will become the leaders, inventors and innovators of tomorrow.

Undergraduate / 'been on both sides of the fence' - Personal Statement [3]

Any feedback appreciated!

Will return the favor!

Thanks so much!

I have been on both sides of the fence countless times. Each facet of the picket has been intimately inspected, investigated, and scrutinized. My severely sympathetic nature has made me immune to walking solely in my own shoes. Instead my mind has fitted out each pair I encounter, feeling out the impressions and experiences that have contributed to each perspective. As an athlete, singer, honor & AP student, class representative, student & cultural ambassador I have seen life, school and other individuals from various perspectives whether it be engaging in a dialogue with school officials to make institutional improvements or as vice presidents of Model United Nations. My varying interest assured me that I would need a college which accommodated my need to wet my feet in a variety of things while providing me with a highly developed learning experience. Despite my diverse interests and chaotic life one thing has remained constant: my love for the study of human life. From a young age, biology had always captured me. As a child, I rejected the typical Barbies and sparkly paraphernalia for any tool which that might help me uncover a cure or unveil a scientific phenomenon. Eventually I hope to obtain a Md.PhD as biomedical scientist researching drug treatments or a Doctorate practicing neurosurgery, offering treatments to peoples of unreachable parts within third world countries. Coupled with this, I plan to pursue bachelor's degree in Chinese or French with hopes of studying and possibly living abroad.

Repression and dearth are like tree which have been dispersing their influence among Americans, its expenditures reaching far and wide; its trunk becoming more resilient with each generation. In my pursuits I will sever some of limbs of the tree and elevate the burdens of others.

Undergraduate / 'I indulge in silence' - my commapp [10]

This is the essay which I hope to use for common app!

Please provide any edits on grammar, tone, vocabulary choice.
Any feedback is much appreciated and will be returned ASAP!

Prompt: Topic of your choice.

:D

I indulge in silence. Though I find refuge in music, I revel in nothingness. I find comfort in the cadence and melodies that can not be man made- the blinking turn signal, the drip of a faucet not completely turned off, rain that beats insistently on windows.

I am an audiophile. I am alone in mental conversations where I create a hundred different perfect possibilities and situations.

I think of millions of things that are wrong: our generation living through the experiences of others posted on social media, the sharp words my father uses to antagonize my mother, and the distance grown between childhood friends.

I make a laundry list of simple pleasures- moments that becomes an inside joke, cleaning messy spaces, letting the opposition win in an argument- a make a note to do them again.

I am a people-person. Yet at some point, I gained deep appreciation for solitude. In eighth grade, when I fractured my mandible in 6 places- I could not talk. Dialogue came through means of a white erase board, which made the simplest chatter delayed and protracted. I spent a lot of time alone those six weeks which made me appreciate my voice, but silence even more. I never search for solitude, it always finds me- the hours awake before sleep, the moments I detract from conversation, the car rides to school.

But in that time I've found the perfect apologies for hurt friends, established a strong validation for my conservative beliefs, reasons not to get a tattoo-yet. Silence has spoken louder than all other noises since it has allowed my mind to run wild on many fronts. Some may claim its psychoanalyzing but I like identify to it as psychosculpting-creating and molding, observing and characterizing in a realm never exhausted.

It is non-addictive, free, non-fattening, catered to each's own.

I indulge in silence.