Undergraduate / What I Want - a lot of things from life; Penn Supp. Essay [2]

Hi guys, so I thought I would put my essay on here and hopefully some of you will read it and help me out in exchange for my help as well :)

Please, pick it apart!

Like most people, I want a lot of things from life.
I want the usual - a nice car, the perfect wardrobe, an ability to eat anything without ever getting fat.
But I also want other things - happiness, success, stability - things that are harder to define and harder to obtain.
I have been told that it is never enough to only want something - in order to achieve, you need to transform your wants into goals and carry out those goals with a real, tangible plan.

Finding the perfect college is part of that plan, and when asked the seemingly ubiquitous question, "So where are you applying?" the first university to trip off of my tongue is Penn Engineering. Of course, the usual response that follows is a raising of eyebrows and a "Wow, an Ivy? That's impressive!"

It is no exaggeration, however, to speculate that there must be hundreds of excellent colleges out there that are "impressive".
But an engineering school that stresses interdisciplinary study? Undergraduate research programs year-round? International service opportunities like Engineers Without Borders? And on top of all that, the chance to save 3 years and get a masters in 5?

Honestly, when I first explored the website, each and every tab was like an all-you-can-eat buffet; few universities offer such constructive, hands-on opportunities to all their students, and even fewer offer them to students like me.

I want to major in bioengineering. While this is not at all uncommon, most students choose to combine this with business or nanotechnology. However, my passion lies in neuroscience. I want to design for the brain.

Creating things like visual prostheses and brain-machine interfaces sound oddly Huxelian, let alone actually possible. Yet creating such innovative technologies to help others and alleviate hardship sounds both exciting and gratifying.

While other colleges would make me choose between bioengineering and neuroscience, Penn's liberal-arts emphasis on interdisciplinary study easily allows me to minor, second major, or even dual degree to mold a specific education meant for me.

It is rare for any college to allow undergrads the opportunity to follow their passions and take any class in any school - I can easily see myself on Locust Walk going from calculus to biology without a problem due to the proximity of the schools on campus.

The fact that Penn is known for its research opportunities as well as its academics naturally attracts me; I believe that the experiences you can gain outside the classroom can sometimes be more meaningful than the book-knowledge gained inside. From what I have gleaned from the website and from campus visits, Penn offers exactly what I need - a university with the benefits of a private institution as well as the perks of a liberal-arts education.