Prompts:
-Tell us about your college career to date, describing your performance, educational path and choices.
-Explain any situations that may have had a significant positive or negative impact on your academic progress and/or curricular choices. If you transferred multiple times, had a significant break in your education, or changed career paths, explain.
-What are the specific reasons you wish to leave your most recent college/university and/or program of study?
-Tell us about your intended major and career aspirations.
-Are you prepared to enter your intended major at this time? If not, describe your plans for preparing for the major. What led you to choose this major? If you are still undecided, why? What type of career are you most likely to pursue after finishing your education?
-How will the UW help you attain your academic, career, and/or personal goals?
-Thoughtfully describe the ways in which culture had an impact on your life and what you have learned about yourself and society as a result. How has your own cultural history enriched and/or challenged you?
NOTE: Culture may be defined broadly. Cultural understanding is often drawn from the ethnic background, customs, values, and ideas of a person's immediate family, community, and/or social environment in which they live.
-Describe your community, Military, or volunteer service, including leadership, awards, or increased levels of responsibility.
-Describe your involvement in research, artistic endeavors, and work (paid or volunteer), as they have contributed to your academic, career or personal goals.
Questions:
1. My structure doesn't follow the outline of their prompts, will that hinder me?
2. I have a lot of accomplishments I want to include, but it just reads like a grocery list at times. Should I take some of them out and only focus on a few? I really want to make sure they're aware of my community service and experiential learning.
Growing up, I never considered myself part of any culture. I come from a white, middle-class family and grew up on a tiny, remote island in Alaska. What I didn't realize at the time was that my mother did everything she could to keep me and my siblings "culturalized." Whenever traveling acts came through town, we would be in the audience. Our family traveled all over the country and to Mexico a few times. In addition to that, though, my mother instilled in us a sense of acceptance and excitement about the world and the people within it. The books we read were by Dr. Seuss and Shel Silverstein, all stories with morals couched in cute rhymes and illustrations that we could understand. She made it a point to teach us that we were no better than anyone else and that the differences between people should be appreciated and celebrated.
To this day, that excitement about the world and its inhabitants remains a large part of me (as does a deep appreciation for ethnic food). My favorite films to watch regularly are documentaries about people- disabled people, Sundanese refugees, the children of prostitutes, bacha bazi in Afghanistan. I've traveled to Costa Rica and Japan and immersed myself in their culture. I've chosen coursework like Intercultural Communication and Cultural Anthropology to learn more about those different than me. I still feel as though my personal culture is limited, but the education and experience that my mother began and I've carried into my adult life has formed who I am and how I see the world.
While in Alaska, I volunteered at the local radio station for two years during high school, eventually hosting my own weekly show. In 2005 I volunteered with 826 Seattle, helping them to open the center. Since then, I have volunteered at events for League of Education Voters (LEV), an education advocacy organization in Seattle, and completed a service-learning project involving a local food bank. I've also just finalized volunteer orientation for Cooking Matters, a program that teaches cooking and nutrition skills to underserved and poor populations. In addition to my volunteer work, this year will be my second attending the Guiding Lights Conference, an annual gathering of change-makers dedicated to citizenship and stewardship.
From January to June of 2010, I was a field intern at LEV. I was able to travel to Olympia on multiple occasions, attending meetings with Sen. Rodney Tom about budget cuts to higher ed and hearings on Running Start funding. I also coordinated and executed field trips for elementary and high-school students to learn about legislation.
Last spring I was also part of a multi-armed research project between LEV and UW's OAG. It's called School 2 Prisons, and it focuses on the school to prison pipeline that is evidenced by schools with zero-tolerance policies and institutionalized class and racism. It began as a series of podcasts and has grown to include ongoing blog posts and community forums with youth leaders and law advocates.
Currently, I'm a communications intern at WaCASA, the support organization for Court Appointed Special Advocates in the foster care system. In that position I have designed and coordinated content for their newsletter, helped coordinate Advocacy Day in Olympia, improved the functionality, content, and navigation of their website, and done bill tracking and other legislative reporting.
When I decided to begin my college career in 2009, 11 years after my senior year of high school, I thought I wanted to be a web developer. I registered at Seattle Central Community College with the intention of obtaining an AAS-T in Web Development, but at the end of my first quarter, I realized programming wasn't for me.
Through my self-education and work with the community, I've always known there are people in society that aren't able to speak up for themselves and don't have the skill set to learn how. I wanted to help them. I chose the program that most closely aligned with the work I wanted to do- Social & Human Services. After the switch, I felt I'd found my groove and my GPA steadily rose from 3.15 to 4.0. Then, during my fifth quarter, I realized that the program wasn't preparing me for the work I wanted to do. I'd taken Survey of Institutions and Client & Community Advocacy, and I knew I wanted to do work on a systemic level, working to make changes through government advocacy for the betterment of all. Because the SHS program was so geared toward casework, and the problems I want to solve can't be fixed on a case by case basis, I decided to get a BA, and plan to double major in Political Science and Communications.
I'm prepared to enter the Political Science major during my second quarter at UW. I will have two of the three prerequisites completed, along with the suggested statistics and writing courses, and plan to take POLS 204 or POLS 205 my first quarter to complete the prereqs. I'll need to take both COM prereqs at UW, so if class capacity permits, I'll also be eligible to apply to that program in my second quarter.
There are many classes offered jointly between the POLS and COM departments. These courses have to do with the media's role in politics, mass communication, and global communication- in other words, how the general public gets informed about government. Since that is the specific area I want to work in, this double major is the best choice for me.
I plan to become a policy analyst for an organization focusing on poverty, or more specifically on education, nutrition, or public health, in addition to facilitating a large community outreach program.
Since UW is widely regarded as one of the best research institutions in the country, being a student there will expose me to countless opportunities for more learning and effective research. The location is also optimal for work with Seattle-based agencies and government programs in Olympia, at the state capitol.
In short, I've always had an inkling that there are problems in the world, and at times I've attempted to help with them. It's only been recently that I've truly figured out what it is I want to do, and attending UW is the next step on that path.
