Hi guys! I need help with this essay. Please let me know what I can change to make it better. This is the prompt:
Describe a recent academic challenge you have faced. Explain how you overcame it.
There is a 400-600 word limit. Thanks in advance!
"You need to do it", said my academic advisor as we were reviewing my degree plan, "Otherwise you will not be able to graduate on time." A look of consternation immediately invaded my face as I contemplated the semester ahead. "Five engineering classes all in one semester? How could this be happening?" I asked her in the midst of my confusion. I had been carefully planning my degree plan in order to avoid this exact predicament. "Unexpected changes in the degree plan", said my advisor heedlessly.
Up until this semester I had been able to spread my engineering coursework into manageable pieces. However, in order to graduate on time, I had to make an arduous decision. This was the first time I was going to take more than four classes in my college career. Taking more than four classes is already a difficult task, let alone the fact that they were all junior level engineering classes, including the dreaded fluid mechanics course. Uncertain on what was going to happen, I decided to sign up for all the required classes.
During the winter break, I started to read ahead. While everyone else was enjoying their holidays, I was analyzing pressure transient curves, dissecting waterflooding concepts, and creating wellbore diagrams. By the start of the spring semester I felt ready to tackle all of my classes. Although I was already familiar with the material, at the end of my first week of class I realized what I had signed up for. Every single class had extensive projects, weekly quizzes, and weekly homework assignments, not to mention a couple of coinciding midterm exams. I quickly started to doubt myself, "Will I be able to do this?" I wondered as I looked through all the syllabi. Not only did I have to worry about maintaining a good grade point average, but also leading a student organization on campus as president of the American Association of Drilling Engineers (AADE), my on-campus job as an engineering workshop facilitator, and the fact that I still needed to find an internship for the summer.
With the help of my calendar, and the concepts I learned in a project management class the semester before. I created a work breakdown structure, along with a project schedule, for each of my classes and student organizations. In these, I highlighted all the important milestones (exams, projects and important events), and all of the smaller tasks I had to accomplish in order to complete my milestones in a timely, and efficient manner. Since then, I have followed my project schedules religiously.
This is by far the hardest semester I have faced yet; however, with the help of material I learned from previous classes, I was able to create a semesteral schedule outlining everything I had to do in the following four months in order to succeed. We have less than a month left of classes, during this time I have managed to: find an internship with an oil exploration and production company, lead AADE in to one of our best semesters yet, and excel in my job as engineering workshop facilitator, all while maintaining an excellent grade point average.
