So my first essay turned out terrible and had to be scrapped in it's entirety.
Hoping this one gives a better shot at answering the question and being focused
"The quality of Rice's academic life and the Residential College System are heavily influenced by the unique life experiences and cultural traditions each student brings. What perspective do you feel that you will contribute to life at Rice?"
I have always been an enthusiastic artist.
But I was not always a good one. As a child I enjoyed drawing pictures. Pencil, pastels and paint unfolded on paper as imagined planets, creatures, and machines. Sadly, where I perceived elaborate drawings, others saw meaningless scribbles. But hours spent doodling and sketching eventually began to pay off. With time and practice, my skills gradually improved, and so did my art. I had, in a sense, evolved from a caveman to a 5th grader. In the following years, my self-taught 'talent' would win me awards, a scholarship to the Glassell School of Art, and give me access to a better middle school through a magnet program. Nevertheless, the most important thing I got out of it was an idea; an idea which may now seem intensely cliche, but which, as a pre-teen, seemed revolutionary. Having, through practice, become skillful at Art, I acquired the belief that, with enough time and effort, I could become successful at whatever I chose to pursue. It was a belief that would remain unchallenged for many years to come.
When I was a preschooler, my father - still a college student - would spend evening teaching me math and chemistry, concepts which mostly went far over my head, but often left me with a sense of wonder. As a result, when I moved and started school in the U.S., I was already ahead in that area, thanks to the strong foundation I established in Russia. With both parents working, overcoming the language barrier proved difficult, which gave me even more appreciation for math. Mathematics was direct, governed by a straightforward and logical set of rules, in comparison with the seemingly random and arbitrary tendencies of language and humanities. Still, looking back at my experience with art, I understood that succeeding in those classes I found difficult was only a matter of putting in more time and effort. It would be all too easy to tell myself I was simply bad at history, or that truly understanding English didn't matter, so long as I made the grade. When I first started taking French, I was frustrated by the idea of 'wasting' more time struggling to earn another [language/topic I had no interest in/topic I had no affinity for], but assumed I could get by in the same way I had before. Still, it seemed, no matter how much time I spent studying the words, all would be gone within a week, and my grades suffered as a result. Having spent a year and learned practically nothing, I felt hopeless.
The following year we got a new teacher with a radically different approach. Speaking to us in French and discussing french history and art, Mr. Swope captured our enthusiasm for learning the language. As a result, I got far more out of the class, acquiring not only the language, but an appreciation for French culture. Still, the most astonishing change was how I captured the material. Studying for French was no longer the continuous grind it had been before. French transformed from a set of words, to a general comprehension.To me, this experience presented a revelation: hard work alone was not enough to master a topic. Try as I could, knowledge could not be achieved without genuine curiosity, thus, the only way to truly succeed at something would be to find a way to enjoy it.
Encouraged by what occurred in French, I sought to apply this principle elsewhere. Rather than feeling bad and blaming myself or the subject, I forced myself to find an aspect of it I enjoyed; an approach that not only broadened my perspective, but made school far more enjoyable, and allowed me to gain valuable lessons from topics I previously considered useless.
The most important aspect of this approach was that it was not limited to myself. Working as an instructor at Mathnasium, I sought to instill this idea in my students. Rather than attempting to force concepts and skills, I found ways to make students interested in the topic. As a student at Rice, I would seek to promote my approach to learning, just as I have done in Mathnasium and throughout high school.
Anything i should remove or expand upon?
Any words I should change or lines that I should restructure?
Please be mean, and thanks in advance for any advice
Hoping this one gives a better shot at answering the question and being focused
"The quality of Rice's academic life and the Residential College System are heavily influenced by the unique life experiences and cultural traditions each student brings. What perspective do you feel that you will contribute to life at Rice?"
I have always been an enthusiastic artist.
But I was not always a good one. As a child I enjoyed drawing pictures. Pencil, pastels and paint unfolded on paper as imagined planets, creatures, and machines. Sadly, where I perceived elaborate drawings, others saw meaningless scribbles. But hours spent doodling and sketching eventually began to pay off. With time and practice, my skills gradually improved, and so did my art. I had, in a sense, evolved from a caveman to a 5th grader. In the following years, my self-taught 'talent' would win me awards, a scholarship to the Glassell School of Art, and give me access to a better middle school through a magnet program. Nevertheless, the most important thing I got out of it was an idea; an idea which may now seem intensely cliche, but which, as a pre-teen, seemed revolutionary. Having, through practice, become skillful at Art, I acquired the belief that, with enough time and effort, I could become successful at whatever I chose to pursue. It was a belief that would remain unchallenged for many years to come.
When I was a preschooler, my father - still a college student - would spend evening teaching me math and chemistry, concepts which mostly went far over my head, but often left me with a sense of wonder. As a result, when I moved and started school in the U.S., I was already ahead in that area, thanks to the strong foundation I established in Russia. With both parents working, overcoming the language barrier proved difficult, which gave me even more appreciation for math. Mathematics was direct, governed by a straightforward and logical set of rules, in comparison with the seemingly random and arbitrary tendencies of language and humanities. Still, looking back at my experience with art, I understood that succeeding in those classes I found difficult was only a matter of putting in more time and effort. It would be all too easy to tell myself I was simply bad at history, or that truly understanding English didn't matter, so long as I made the grade. When I first started taking French, I was frustrated by the idea of 'wasting' more time struggling to earn another [language/topic I had no interest in/topic I had no affinity for], but assumed I could get by in the same way I had before. Still, it seemed, no matter how much time I spent studying the words, all would be gone within a week, and my grades suffered as a result. Having spent a year and learned practically nothing, I felt hopeless.
The following year we got a new teacher with a radically different approach. Speaking to us in French and discussing french history and art, Mr. Swope captured our enthusiasm for learning the language. As a result, I got far more out of the class, acquiring not only the language, but an appreciation for French culture. Still, the most astonishing change was how I captured the material. Studying for French was no longer the continuous grind it had been before. French transformed from a set of words, to a general comprehension.To me, this experience presented a revelation: hard work alone was not enough to master a topic. Try as I could, knowledge could not be achieved without genuine curiosity, thus, the only way to truly succeed at something would be to find a way to enjoy it.
Encouraged by what occurred in French, I sought to apply this principle elsewhere. Rather than feeling bad and blaming myself or the subject, I forced myself to find an aspect of it I enjoyed; an approach that not only broadened my perspective, but made school far more enjoyable, and allowed me to gain valuable lessons from topics I previously considered useless.
The most important aspect of this approach was that it was not limited to myself. Working as an instructor at Mathnasium, I sought to instill this idea in my students. Rather than attempting to force concepts and skills, I found ways to make students interested in the topic. As a student at Rice, I would seek to promote my approach to learning, just as I have done in Mathnasium and throughout high school.
Anything i should remove or expand upon?
Any words I should change or lines that I should restructure?
Please be mean, and thanks in advance for any advice
