Alright, so I wrote this in about an hour or so, and just by reading it I am sure that a lot can be changed or expandded on. This personal statement essay is going to the University of Washington (Bothell campus). Have a look, its 553 words long, which is exactly at the range where it is supposed to be. I chose the second essay topic. Cheers.
Full essay instructions/prompt choices:
Choose one topic from below (500-650 words)
- Discuss how your family's experience or cultural history enriched you or presented you with opportunities or challenges in pursuing your educational goals.
- Tell us a story from your life, describing an experience that either demonstrates your character or helped to shape it.
Response:
My first broken computer, believe it or not, made a significant mark on my character and helped define it. How it happened was very simple: about 4 years one day I completely disregarded my PC and its problems that it had already and played games and completely worked with it until there it happened. A blue screen of death was displayed on the screen, a grim sign that the worst was about to happen. Then, much to my disbelief, everything went blank; a dark screen was staring at me. Now, this was not the first time that I got a blue screen that shows some kind of problem, because I usually find something around it, me being the techno geek that I am, I lacked a certain trait back then, diligence. I usually never panic but this time, I panicked. I panicked not because I feared that I would lose all of my files, but because I feared that my machine would never work again or boot up, and that was not convenient at all for me. Since I did not have a lot of money at the time to get a new machine or a laptop, I was forced to either fix this or wait until I had enough funds. But before I made a decision, before I did anything else at that moment when it died on me, I tried to switch it back on. My computer powered back on, but did not boot up and immediately a dark screen again starts back at me. This is the moment where it helps shape my character, as I did lack diligence and to keep solving my problem, I had to keep pushing for a solution which I eventually found through research efforts. Through diligent work and perseverance and time, I was able to find out that there was something wrong with how my PC started windows from the hard drive. And before I knew it, my computer was back to life again.
Although this story might not look as influential, but for me, it changed the way I think and work. This experience from my life helped shape my character because it taught me to be diligent and motivated as well as persevere through problems that seem almost impossible to solve. I believe that these traits that I gained were vital not only because they helped me in other life situations but also demonstrate a will to work out anything. For instance, when I used to play soccer, we were always against odds, but through working and keeping diligent we could always put out a result in the end, and that was the most important that mattered. Or in another example, I now program with Java and C# and HTML and there is never a day that passes by that an issue does not arise. Like when code does not work out or there is something wrong with how a program works when I code it, I never quit on it until I can pinpoint the cause and push forward. Before this experience, I would quit over issues like these and could not bother to try to attempt any effort towards it. However, since I learned to persevere through tough times, I could always expect something in the end, good or bad.
Now, this was not the first time that I got a blue screen that shows some kind of problem, because I usually find something around it, me being the techno geek that I am,
Starts to sound like you are rambling... A teacher once told me when you write, you must assume the reaser has no insight in your topic. If you are going to use tech jargon, explain it for your reader
Ok, can you give an example how to rephrase it better so that it has better meaning to it. I do not wan to use tech jargon, if any, since i would have to go on a digression from the topic.
Well, I don't exactly know what you are referring to. Maybe if you could just explain it in simple terms other than "blue screen" or "black screen" for example "This time, my computer completely shut down unexpectedly" or "My computer immediately brought me to the system restore screen" then its pretty self explanatory.
So I should say, blue screen of death and then specifiy that the black screen simply is the PC turning off? Also, I added a sentence to make things a bit more clearer before the last one, what do you think?
Through diligent work and perseverance and time, I was able to find out that there was something wrong with how my PC started windows from the hard drive. Using a recovery disc, I booted from the disc drive and fixed the boot manager. And before I knew it, my computer was back to life again.
