Posts by Snowhite76

Snowhite76

Jul 6, 2013

Undergraduate / I have always been a competitive person; Stanford intellectual vitality essay! [6]

Batman helped me pick a career path. Specifically, the movie The Dark Knight. In it, Harvey Dent, the District Attorney, is questioning a shooter that is working for the Joker and Batman says that he is a paranoid schizophrenic. This man was so strange and scary, but to me, he was intriguing. I had to look up schizophrenia and see what it was. I learned about the hallucinations and delusions and how some victims find it hard to distinguish reality. I wondered how this could happen to someone. It isn't like a virus that you catch and you can treat and kill. It is something that your brain is doing to itself. But why?

I began to look into many other disorders, such as bipolar disorder and multiple personalities disorder and this led to many hours of me glued to the screen watching documentaries on YouTube. It just fascinated me that these people with nothing physically wrong with them could just destroy themselves from the inside out and go insane.

This isn't enough words but is it a better topic? Should I continue?

Snowhite76

Jul 6, 2013

Undergraduate / I have always been a competitive person; Stanford intellectual vitality essay! [6]

Thanks. I was thinking that it was just an average experience but I can't think of any ah-hah moment that I have had. I'll think of something else

Snowhite76

Jul 6, 2013

Undergraduate / I have always been a competitive person; Stanford intellectual vitality essay! [6]

This is a very rough draft. I just wanted other opinions on it. Be as critical as you want. Thanks!

Prompt: Stanford students possess intellectual vitality. Reflect on an idea or experience that has been important to your intellectual development.

I have always been a competitive person, especially with myself. I want to do the best I possibly can. Because of this, in the beginning of high school, AP class intimidated me and I didn't think I would be able to excel in them, so I didn't take any during my first two years. I regret this now because I should have pushed myself.

Junior year, however, I signed up for AP calculus and AP physics. The first day of physics, the class was completely silent and uncomfortable and I realized that that was not a good learning environment for me. I quickly switched to AP biology and everyone was friendly and there were group discussions. I liked this class a lot more because it seemed like the students wanted to be there and contribute to the class and I enjoyed hearing what others had to say.

This class helped me learn many study skills because a lot of the sections we just had to learn on our own and we would do labs in class. It also gave me confidence because I started doing really well in the class and set the curve for almost every test, which I had never done before. Even though I was setting the curves, I still wanted my classmates to succeed and a couple of us had study sessions to review for tests.

Another way this class influenced me was by helping me choose what I want to major in. I found a real love for biology and realized that I want to focus on science.