I love to learn about Sola system & Universe; Urbana champaign essay - interest in major

Topic:Explain your interest in the major you selected. You may describe a related experience you've had to that area of study and/or your future career goals. Please limit your response to approximately 300 words.

Please be critical as it is my first time writing an essay.

Ever since I learned about the solar system and the universe, I was intrigued by it. Since my childhood I wanted to be an astronaut. I remember convincing my father to buy me a telescope when I was young so that I can look at the moon and the stars and pretend to be a young scientist.

I was curious as to how all these Heavenly bodies were there just wandering about so perfectly. Questions like "How the universe was formed?", "Why do planets move?", "Where does sun come from?", etc were always in the back of my mind. None of my family member or friends could give me answers so i took to research. I started reading articles on the internet related to space and astronomy. I learned various new things on the internet, some of them very useful. And it was then that i started my habit of reading.

As I read more and more I came to know about the big bang theory and the creation of the universe. I was fascinated as to how every body in this world that has mass came from a single particle i.e. the Higgs Boson or the supposedly 'god particle'. I wanted to learn more about the particle and i came to know about CERN and their experiment with the Large Hadron Collider (LHC). I became interested in the research. It became a goal in my life to do research at CERN as i wanted to learn more and more things in the field of particle physics. Whenever anyone asked me what I wanted to do research in I always used to say particle physics. Due to its similarity with nuclear physics people thought i was talking about it and used to ask me jokingly if i was going to make an atomic bomb.

In my opinion, you have a very rough transition jumping from interests in celestial bodies to nuclear physics since both paragraphs are only really joined by a commonality of reading. Personally, I think it would be more effective if you stated how after reading tons of literature on astronomy and other things on the topic of space, you stumbled upon the very answer to all of your previous questions (which would be atoms, quarks, and other subatomic particles). After stating that, follow it up into your experience in reading about nuclear physics.

The anecdote is a very fun read, but considering that your intended major (assuming from the essay) is particle physics, you should cut down the references to space-walking, walking on other planets, etc. The anecdote shouldn't take up a good portion of the essay This transitions into my next critique: your future goals. It's very important for colleges to recognize that you have a planned out future as opposed to just straight-up YOLO'ing it.

Thanks for your feedback and i did mention a little bit about future, the last paragraph about 'CERN'. Is it enough or should i mention more? And BTW i will be majoring in physics so wouldn't both of them, astronomy and particle physics, will be in my major?

These two ideas are very very close and I feel you should combine both of them and make one sentence.


In fact I feel this would provide you a better hook for this response. Why not begin with this sentence? It speaks of your interest in astronomy so well :)

I think you should talk more about your experience in this field and future goals. You talk a lot about your passion, but it is also important to tell them what you did to pursue your passion and what you intend to reach at the end.