Undergraduate / 'African-American girl into science and technology' - Rutgers "Diversity" [2]

The prompt was:
Rutgers University is a vibrant community of people with a wide variety of backgrounds and experiences. How would you benefit from and contribute to such an environment? Consider variables such as your talents, travels, leadership activities, volunteer services, and cultural experiences.

Writing my other essays seemed to be a breeze compared to the struggle that I have had with the Rutgers essay. I find it very difficult to write about myself, especially with this sort of prompt. But could someone please help me edit my extremely rough draft. Thank you.

As an African American young woman that is interested in science and technology, I have always been something of an oddball. During the summer of my freshman year of high school, I attended a program called National Youth Leadership Forum on Medicine in DC, which is approximately just an hour drive from my home. I arrived at the hotel in which all the members of the forum where residing for the week and a half in which we would learn about medicine and all its glory. I proceeded to say goodbye to my parents, and walk into my hotel room. The minute I stepped into my room, it was a little bit of a surprise to me. Where I grew up in Prince Georges County, Maryland, I was used to being surrounded by mostly Latinos and African Americans. But in my hotel room sat two ladies that would soon become my close and constant pen-pals. Sitting in the first bed was a young Caucasian girl from Grand Forks, North Dakota that lived in Cleveland, Ohio. And in the second bed was a Caucasian young lady that was born and raised in South Carolina. Something about being a teenage girl made me hesitant to approach the two girls that had clearly been in the room together for a while and had seemingly bonded. But after our introductions to each other, my eyes were opened to a bigger world. Just because we were of different backgrounds did not mean that we did not have anything in common. For one, we all discovered that we had the same favorite color, purple, and that we were all athletic and had played sports. Later in the day, I also met an African American young lady that happened to live in the same state that I did, and also happened to attend my high schools' rival school, and I met a bubbly East Indian young lady that flown from British Virgin Islands just to attend the forum. Across the hall from my hotel room were two Chinese twins girls. From them, I learned how to perfect my suturing techniques on unsuspecting bananas, and I learned how to say "I love you" in Mandarin.

Throughout the duration forum, I managed to meet people from various cultures that not only taught me about embracing myself and my culture, but I was able to take away a lot of knowledge from their cultures and experiences as well. Diversity has played a tremendous role in my search for the college that fits me. The diversity at Rutgers University allows cultural competency to develop, and would allow me to interact with different people from various cultures. With these interactions, I know that would gain knowledge, experience, and understanding about a world that I am not accustomed to. At Rutgers, I would be able to apply myself to various clubs and activities that would expose me to people from all over the country. I hope to gain a lot of new friends, and learn beyond what the professors can teach me, and beyond what the classroom experience has to offer.