Undergraduate / Best of Both Worlds - College Essay [2]

Hey everyone! I just finished my general essay for the common app and I would really appreciate any kind of feedback and criticism! Thanks for taking the time to read this, I hope you find it interesting! :)

Prompt: A range of academic interests, personal perspectives, and life experiences adds much to the educational mix. Given your personal background, describe an experience that illustrates what you would bring to the diversity in a college community, or an encounter that demonstrated the importance of diversity to you.

Best of Both Worlds
I bit my lip and stared at the ground, my eyes blurring with tears threatening to overflow any second and label me as a coward. Mrs. Zhang, the Chinese teacher pointed at the third grade me with accusing fingers, warning the class, "This will be your punishment if you don't do your homework! Do you want to be humiliated like her?" Silence, yet I was sure my classmates could hear me screaming in my head. It wasn't my fault really, I fell asleep trying to finish.

This was the environment I grew up in: Endless homework, no time to catch a break, memorizing not understanding. For seven years, I struggled in Chinese public school. In middle school I managed to squeeze my name into the "top one hundred hall of fame", even ranking fifth in my grade of nearly a thousand students once, yet I felt no joy in learning. School was for socializing with friends, figuring out new ways to pass notes, sharing gossip about the teachers or coming up with other distractions to make our lives bearable. When my parents asked me if I wanted to transfer back to the international school where I spent my kindergarten and first grade in, I agreed with an indifferent shrug. I just didn't care.

International school was nothing like Chinese school. When I received my schedule the first day, my eyes widened with disbelief. Art every day? Back in Chinese school, we were lucky to be allowed one art class a month! Here, the classes were ten people instead of fifty; the teachers knew me personally rather than just saw me as another kid in uniform. I thrived in this new environment. I began getting straight A's in my classes, exploring interests such as art and music, luxuries that I never had. I woke up every day looking forward to school, not only for friends and teachers but also for learning. Learning was something I always felt forced to do, a mundane chore to stop me from having fun. But I soon realized that I began to enjoy it, and even pursue it on my own! Now entering senior year, most of my friends lightened their coursework by adding study halls to their schedule. As much as I longed for free time, I could not bring myself part with any of my classes, and even took up an extra self-study course. There is just so much to learn!

I now see that though Chinese school was probably my worst experience in life, it drilled into me the fundamentals of math and science and trained me to be able to withstand impossible workloads. However, if I had not transferred to international school, my interest in learning would never have been sparked, and I would have ended up as just another mindless drone in a country of millions. Looking back, I wouldn't change a thing about my life. My experiences in two vastly different academic environments shaped who I am as a student, and I can confidently say that I got the best of both worlds.