Undergraduate / UT Austin Topic C, "Growing up as the oldest of three brothers" [2]

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Growing up as the oldest of three brothers, in a low-income household, with a single parent who did everything she could to help me and my brothers get ahead in life. I intend to make sure her sacrifice was not in vain. I've had to mature at a younger age than most. I couldn't afford to have a regular childhood, I had to be a role model for my brothers and I had to help out my mother as she did everything she could to support us. This has been a driving motivation for me to be successful. My goal in life is to be the best I can possibly be. Everything I've done is to advance myself. In school I've taken several AP classes that have taught me responsibility and time managing habits. I also have a passion for computer science and have since I was young. After taking three years worth of computer science classes at school and studying different programming languages at home during my free time, I know that computer science will be a part of my life forever. I learned how to develop an iPhone app last summer and I am currently working on creating my own. Even though I've gone through struggles in life, I also know that many others have it worse. I learned this when I started volunteering at a shelter for immigrant children. These are kids from mostly central American countries who crossed the border in hopes of a better life. They are taken to shelters until they can find them a suitable home. They made me realize how lucky I am to have access to so many opportunities to improve my life and the lives of others and I intend to take advantage of them. I am also interested in the global community, I am involved in Model United Nations class at school and will attend conferences in San Antonio and New York in the coming months. Besides my native language Spanish, I have also taken three years of french classes which I hope will help me become a more cultured individual.

Tennis has also been an important part of my life, and from it I have learned patience, maturity, and problem solving techniques that I can apply to other areas in my life. It takes dedication to become a good tennis player, if you're not willing to put in the hours then you wont be very good. It requires mental and physical training because when you are facing an opponent of the same skill level then the match will be determined by the smartest and most mentally tough opponent. I believe that my dedication to tennis has helped me flourish in many other aspects of my life. It has taught me to work hard for what I want and to never give up. I strive for perfection in everything even though I know no one is perfect, I hope to get as close as I possibly can to perfection, in every aspect of my life.

Undergraduate / 'everything gets better with time' - moving from Mexico to the U.S. - UT Austin Topic A [4]

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Describe a setting in which you have collaborated or interacted with people whose experiences and/or beliefs differ from yours. Address your initial feelings and how those feelings were or were not changed by this experience.

One of the most challenging experiences of my life was moving from Mexico to the U.S. I remember sitting in my living room as my parents told me that we would move to San Antonio the following year. I could see that they expected an unenthusiastic response from me. I however didn't react that way at all. I was honestly enthused by this idea, I longed for new experiences and I thought that moving and leaving my old life behind wouldn't be too hard. Honestly I don't quite know what I was thinking, it never dawned on me how hard this transition would actually be. So I set about my days and casually told people about the news, they would ask me if I was scared or if I would miss my friends. I would say I wasn't scared because I've never had any difficulty making friends or fitting in so I didn't know what I should be scared of. As for my friends I would just say that I would but I didn't really understand how much relationships can be affected by distance.

When I first moved to the U.S. and started my 8th Grade year, I was excited I couldn't wait to see my new school and make new friends. As school started and I got to experience what it's really like to live here, I realized that settling in here would prove to be a challenge. It wasn't until I started to get to know people here that I realized that I was dealing with a completely different culture and no matter how well I thought I knew English, I would have to learn small but important social norms. An example of this would be the way to greet people of the opposite sex. In Mexico and other parts of the world, we are taught to greet all members of the opposite sex with a kiss on the cheek, this applies to acquaintances, strangers, friends and parents of friends. That is not common here in the U.S. and I had to learn that the hard way, through many awkward encounter when I leaned in for a kiss and I am met by a friendly hug or when I met a friend's mom and I lean in to kiss her and she cuts me off with a confused stare and an awkward handshake. During the middle of my 8th Grade year I had finally had enough of this, I missed the comfort of my own home, I missed my culture and my friends. I longed for my previous life and was angered that I had wanted to come here in the first place. I begged my parents to take my back but they said we couldn't. Im glad they said no, because if they hadn't I never would've gotten to experience what its like to live among other cultures and beliefs. This is something that has changed me forever.

People say that everything gets better with time, and I wholeheartedly agree. The longer I lived here the more I started to understand American customs, some even started to make sense to me. I made new friendships that have shaped me to be who I am today. I've come to grow as person in several ways, for example, I've become more outspoken, more independent, and more open-minded. This is experience has made me who I am today and for that I am extremely grateful.