Essay Prompt:
Tell us about your educational history, work experience, present situation, and plans for the future
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Please make sure to address why you consider yourself a nontraditional student and have chosen to pursue your education at the School of General Studies of Columbia University. Successful essays should not only identify and describe specific elements of the program, academic or otherwise, that meet your needs as a nontraditional student, but should also explain why GS is the place for you.
A newly emancipated minor, at 17, I left my home and family for up north, equipped with only a suitcase, a couple hundred dollars, and a renewed approach to living. After years of dealing with my father's abuse, I decided I desperately needed to seek stability and seize control of my life.
Growing up in the West, seven year-old me with my long, dark blue hijab and black skin stuck out like a sore thumb among my classmates. I can still recall the countless recesses where other kids would hurl jeering phrases mocking my religion, likely parroting sentiments they heard at the dinner table the night before. My physical differences made me an unfortunate target of the post-9/11 animosities which proved to be fairly strong even in 2010 Canada.
Afterschool, I came home to a mountain of other issues. Having overcome his family's generational poverty in the bamboo-farming villages of Nigeria, my father did not want his hard work in creating a comfortable life for my siblings and I to have been futile. Additionally, in our culture, an elder is judged by the success of his children, so it was only natural that my father expected great things from us. However, his high expectations overwhelmed me and the abuse he inflicted on my mother drove a wedge between him and the rest of our family. Dealing with my father's apathy towards my siblings and I as well as my mother's beaten down spirit from his abuse, it felt selfish to open up about my treatment at school as it seemed so mild compared to our struggles at home.
These circumstances isolated me for years until I gradually sank into a deep depressive state. These feelings persisted all throughout elementary and junior high, all the way until my first few weeks of high school. One day, while I was studying in a quiet cubicle in the choir room, the choir director approached me to suggest I attend the first meeting after school that evening. I was hesitant at first, but after some internal back and forth, I eventually worked up the nerve and gave it a shot. Drawing in dozens from a spectrum of different cliques at our school, the meeting was filled with diverse students who all appeared as nervous as I. There we shared jokes and stories with each other and the longer I spent, the more at ease I became. Corresponding meetings were just as welcoming. My experience in this dynamic space of affirmation and engagement slowly drew me out of my shell.
This newfound confidence helped me pursue other projects I had long wished to, but always stopped myself from following through. I began volunteering at a small women's health clinic that catered to immigrant and refugee mothers. My duties there doubled as both a receptionist and assistant. I found the job so engaging and rewarding, I continued it for all four years of high school. I enjoyed the face to face interactions with patients, especially recognizing regular patients and asking them about their life. It was extremely rewarding to foster a friendly relationship with the patients. I also relished the organized chaos of Saturdays, our busiest days. The work on these days was tedious but the endless line of patients coming and going kept me attentive and engaged. I learnt that patience was key in attending to patients and promoting a positive relationship between the clinic and its people. I split my time between the clinic and a schoolwide initiative that provided tsunami relief for Minaminsariku. By pursuing these, I was able to enact real change in my community at home, while also promoting a positive reality of minorities in my school.
However, it felt as if with every step taken forward, I was brought two steps back. As I came of age, I came to terms with being queer. Growing up in a conservative Muslim family, I knew this aspect of my identity was one I'd likely have to keep hidden forever. This spurred a lot of inner turmoil as I couldn't even be myself at home. Furthermore, my father's abuse had only worsened with time and I soon dreaded returning home from school because of him. The two months of summer without the escape of my projects at school were torture. When the pandemic hit, I was enrolled in a local university for engineering, a field I wasn't very interested in but was persuaded by my father to pursue, and the pandemic forced me to remain at home. I was incessantly surrounded by toxicity. Focusing on school became extremely difficult as my mental health continued to spiral downward.
I may have been able to endure all this if it weren't for one final straw: just weeks after my seventeenth birthday, my dad planned to evict me. To be on the brink of homelessness that young brought pain like no other. Out of spite and anger, I reacted explosively and parted ways with both my father and the university in hopes to carve an individualized path for myself.
Fortunately, this sporadic decision proved to be quite beneficial for my well being. The first thing I did was line up residence with three other university students as I knew I had enough remaining funds to last me for a few months. Finding jobs in a COVID climate was tough, but by being open to unconventional lines of work, I was able to land a solid housekeeping job to keep myself afloat. I utilized my limited free time to expand on old hobbies and explore new passions, leading me along a path in which I quickly grew into an adult who knows of pain and adversity and how to weave joy from it.
Looking back on the past year, each of my pursuits required some skills I had (making me feel immediately useful and productive) and some I needed to acquire (increasing my value while maintaining my interest). Growing up, my father had instilled his interest in engineering in me so even though it wasn't exactly a field I had passion for, I had some technical experience in computer science. Upon leaving school, I knew tapping into these skills would be key to being financially secure down the road. With this in mind, I applied for any interning positions I could find and eventually landed a part-time internship at a small coding startup in my town. During my time here, I've gained valuable skills that helped me develop my own part time project: a webmail server and complex web scripts for my public domain.
As thrilled as I was to be acquiring valuable experience in this field, I still harbored some guilt for abandoning my mother and siblings. I had tried for years to convince my mother to seek help, to leave, to do something other than stay, but as our culture is one that shames women for seeking autonomy, my pleas ultimately fell on deaf ears. When I think of my mother, I remember the defeat I felt as a younger child during those lonely recesses. Even though I sent money home to her when I could, I knew I had a greater responsibility to not only help her, but immigrants like her gain mobility in any way they could. For this reason, I collected and then donated used bikes out of our garage to immigrant workers who otherwise had no method of transportation. Knowing I created a tangible, positive impact on others brought me immeasurable satisfaction. This was what I was meant to do.
I picked up tutoring lower income children for a rate below minimum wage as I knew many families desperately needed this service due to online schooling, but couldn't afford it. Little projects like this reignited the flame within me that my old choir meetings once had.
Although my time in Canada has been more fulfilling than I could imagine, so much so that I considered taking another year off, sustaining myself through odd jobs means there have been weeks where I've experienced substantial food insecurity. However, being able to openly be myself and continue my humanitarian pursuits has granted me the freedom I consider invaluable.
I believe I was put in this world to make a difference in the human condition. I don't expect to achieve this same change in my current path in STEM. So I've taken to thinking about all the fascinations of my younger self: which of them still hold, which would mean the most to me, which would demand the most of me, which would carry me the furthest. It didn't take much thinking. Although the idea of taking another year off was enticing, I'd already discovered my real passion was in ethics and education. I hope to expand young minds and teach them to act with kindness in the face of someone different. I wish to show that perceptions can be changed with honesty, patience and education. My experiences as a child grew me into an adult who is secure and strong in the presence of myths and assumptions. I would want other youth to learn from this by teaching them to believe in tolerance. Although I am grateful for my opportunities in engineering, it didn't excite me like the study of ethics does.
Being a part-time student at GS would be a natural fit as it allows me to continue my projects and grow freely in a way other schools couldn't. I feel my decision to leave home has allowed me to mature many years in one. A traditional college experience at another school would feel unnatural to adjust to. What I need and what GS provides is a bevy of resources, the flexibility to adjust my work and class schedule as needed each semester to accommodate my unique circumstance, and in general an institution that is organizationally supportive of people with stories like mine.
It is exciting to think that my path to GS is likely one of the most ordinary. I look forward to the stories my peers will tell, the hard-won wisdom they'll reveal.